Nesting, Part II. Now with asbestos!

I HAVE A NEST.

YOU GUYS.

MY NEST.

LOOK AT MY NEST.

LOOK AT HOW LITTLE AND CUTE MY NEST IS.

MY NESSSSSTTTTTTTTT.

As you might've guessed, a large part of the nesting dilemma has been solved. We'll probably take possession of the house sometime next month, and then I will steam-clean and tear down the wallpaper and paint things and put down a rug in the living room and basically attempt to get all of my pent-up nesting out of the way.

Things I like about my nest:

1. Nest has a giant kitchen. I AM GOING TO BAKE EVERYTHING.

2. Nest has a gorgeous brick fireplace with built-in bookshelves. I GET TO LIGHT THINGS ON FIRE.

3. Nest has a garage-door opener that actually functions. I GET TO PARK MY CAR INDOORS.

4. Nest has a sunroom. I DON'T ACTUALLY KNOW WHAT IT'S GOOD FOR BUT I'M GLAD I HAVE ONE.

5. The living area has asbestos tile. JUST LIKE HOME!* <3


Planned improvements to my nest:

1. The house currently has horrible wallpaper. I hate wallpaper, and I especially hate horrible wallpaper. I am going to paint the living area taupe, Paxton's room is going to light green and turquoise, and the (now Pepto-Bismol pink) bathroom is going to be gray-blue. I haven't decided about the master and guest bedrooms yet.

2. The house does not have carpet in the living area. I'm buying an area rug, ASAP.

3. The fence is only four feet high and my dog has been known to scale six-foot barriers without much of a problem. We're going to get a $170 install-your-own-electric-fence kit and put it in the backyard to deter Angua from going after squirrels/other dogs/the mailman/meter readers.

4. The bathroom currently has a lot of hand-holds and other "safety" things installed, which reminds me of a bathroom in a nursing home. Tris says we can take them out after I have the baby, but I am quick to point out that I am pregnant, not disabled, and I am perfectly capable of taking a shower without breaking a hip.

5. This one is for far, far in the future, but I'd like to replace the bathroom countertop. The current sink is made of white marble with black swirls, except the swirls are more like swipes and they're all on one side. It looks like someone rubbed dirt into the sink and it's messing with my slight case of OCD.




*A note on asbestos tile...

This house is part of the same neighborhood as the house I grew up in (where my parents still live). All the houses were constructed sometime around 1955 and you can tell that the architect had some running themes, most notably a certain pattern of black-brown asbestos tile (which was a perfectly good building material back in the day before they figured out that asbestos kills people).

I tease my parents about this, because there was a strip of the original tile in my bedroom growing up, although the majority of the tile had been replaced with laminate. Obviously, being allowed to crawl around on asbestos is the reason I grew up to be a total nutbar. Never mind that (as my father often reminds me), I'd have to grind up the tile and snort it for it to have any effect...

My parents are currently in the process of taking up the original tile in their home office, which is beginning to crumble. The tile in the master bedroom remains.

I figure that, if I lived on asbestos tile for 20+ years and made it out okay, there's no reason to freak out and refuse Paxton the same luxury. Long live the asbestos!