Don’t Break Down!
If you have ever remodeled an old house or even completed home improvements on a newer house, you know that things usually get more complicated than you expected they would be at first. A few months after we moved into our new warehouse across the driveway from our house, we decided to remodel the mother-in-law apartment into a more suitable space.
We had made a few necessary changes through the years. We had taken the doors off the kitchen cabinets to store paper and printed book pages on open shelves; and, as you can see in the photo below, I had covered some of the cheap, peeling paneling with clearance wallpaper. We made additional countertop out of an old door and held up that door and the shelves above it with louvered closet doors from another part of the house. Frankly, the space had become an organized but crowded and unsightly place to work.
The apartment had once been part of a wrap-around front porch before the previous owners turned it into an apartment. Some of the tearing out brought pleasant surprises. Beneath the flooring was some of the original wooden flooring. Hiding behind that clearance wallpaper and the cheap paneling that was behind it was this beautiful stone chimney. Beneath the acoustic ceiling tiles was some of the original tongue and grove wooden porch ceiling.
The surprise wasn’t so pleasant when Nate and Ethan removed the cabinets from the apartment’s kitchen. It turned out that those cabinets were helping to hold up the floor on that end of the room. When the cabinets came out, the floor fell in! They built a new one though. As you can see, we also were able to reveal over five feet of the original wood siding on the house. Here is the former kitchen (seen in the background in this photo), . . .
. . . waiting for the countertops . . .
. . . which became new desks for the team. As you can see, we color-matched the original color of the porch ceiling and painted the ceiling that same color. I well remember the day I agonized over that decision. Because the space was a former porch, I had planned to have it painted the sky blue that was once popular on large Southern porches. I decided that I would always be sorry if I did not keep that original green. This is just about the only thing that is green in our entire house, but I have never regretted that decision. We replaced the ceiling’s two lone bulbs with lighted ceiling fans to continue the porch theme of the office.
In this photo, Ray and Nate are celebrating the completed project.
This was Ray’s spot in our remodeled home office. Somewhere along the way, he found this “Do Not Break Down” sticker on a cardboard box. My silly husband posted it on his desk as a reminder not to do so himself.
This was my spot between where the kitchen stove and kitchen sink used to be.
Homeschooling children is a bit like remodeling. One day reveals a happy discovery—”Wow, I didn’t know you could do that!” Another day reveals an unexpected problem—”Oops! I guess we aren’t as far along in that skill as I thought we were.” One day you decide you want to keep on doing something the way you have been doing it. Another day you decide it’s time to make a change, maybe a major one. That’s when it’s important to remember Ray’s sign: Don’t break down!
Jesus invites us to trust Him with whatever comes our way today.
But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness,
and all these things will be provided to you.
So do not worry about tomorrow;
for tomorrow will worry about itself.Â
Each day has enough trouble of its own.
Matthew 6:33-34