Christmas didn’t feel much like Christmas without snow, but New Years? With temps in the high 40s and sun all day long, it certainly doesn’t like January in Upstate New York. Not that I’m complaining – far from it. Everyone around here is praising global warming and wondering just how bad a beating we’ll be getting in late March to make up for all this moderate weather.
The calendar swears it’s January 1st, so I thought I should reflect a bit on how far we’ve come this year. It’s easy to forget what we have accomplished – each project becomes a far-away blur the minute it’s completed. (Might be all those fumes going to my head.) Luckily, I’ve got the blog to remind me. And when I sat and flipped through 12 months of old posts, I was pretty damn impressed.

Our 2006 to-do list included:

• Finishing the kitchen remodel
• Finishing the rewiring (whole house is done!)
• Jacking the basement and parging the foundation walls
• Refinishing all of the hardwood floors downstairs (no more cat pee smell!)
• Gutting the stairwell and hallway, then putting drywall up in both
• Putting blown-in insulation in about 1/2 of the outer walls downstairs
• Restoring the cupola windows
• Putting up two new ceilings – one in the downstairs office, one in an upstairs bedroom
• Redoing our main roof (including tear-off, repaired decking, and new shingles)
• And of course, the master bathroom! (Not done, but I’m counting it anyway)

And that’s not all!

We traveled, made the papers, and learned all sorts of new skills. We pushed beyond our comfort zone, and found we could do just about anything we set our minds to.
It’s been 2.5 years since we bought this house, and every week brings something different. New challenges, new stresses, new achievements, and new opportunities for creativity and compromise. With all that behind us, and so much still ahead, I can’t even imagine what 2007 will bring – but I know it’ll be interesting.

Thanks to all of you for sticking by us this year. Your support, opinions, and generally cheering-on and commiseration are much appreciated!