Compromising

 I really do want to be clear that my 'dilemma' for lack of a better term, was not whether I should replace the knobs. I knew that eventually I would replace them. It is just something that I did not need to do right now, not really. 

But the beige didn't match, and that bugged me. Everything else was so perfect...but the knobs did not match. 

And it was stupid, because when Tim and I married, I lived in a house with a kitchen that was functional. It was always something that we wanted to do, but we had five kids between us and Tim felt very strongly that kids needed to go to college, or at least some sort of vocational school, and so that was the priority. 

Tim is a machinist. a precision machinist. That was a pretty secure job until Reagan's NAFTA sent those jobs overseas to be done by other machinists in other countries who would do the job for a fraction of the cost. (Think Mexico or Eastern European countries). That began a long period of layoffs for him. At one point, he was laid off from 3 different machinist jobs in one year. 

So...yeah...the kitchen took a back seat. Keeping a roof over our heads, raising kids, cutting firewood. Those were hard working years, but we did okay. We both kind of saw the writing on the wall, and managed to get our house paid off before things went entirely to hell. 

And in his frustration, Tim said, "I will never depend on a company for my living again." 

And that's when he got into buying fixer-uppers.

We moved into town probably about 2010 or  '11, and we live in a hundred year old house. And it is a nice old house. Don't get me wrong, it needs spruced up outside, but it's a gorgeous place on the inside with all the quirks of an old house. No closets for one thing. Doors on every room. The kitchen needed updating too. Old cabinets. Limited electrical outlets. A design that probably was just fine a hundred years ago, but today...well...it just doesn't work. Tim talked about a new kitchen...but...well...it didn't happen, and I didn't push, but we made an awful lot of nice kitchens for tenants and for home buyers. 

So...it's worked for us, and now we are building our own house. We've been collecting things for the new house for a long time, and now, at last, all those pipe dreams are coming to life before our delighted eyes. 

After 27 years, I have a new kitchen. Well. Pretty much new. The cupboards are reclaimed from someone else's tragedy. A tornado dropped three trees on his house and since he never liked the lay out of his kitchen, he decided to use the insurance money to fix the house and to build his own dream kitchen. We got his old cabinets for $500. 

(He left the knobs on the doors and drawers.) 

But yeah. I scrubbed all those cupboards out and they look good as new. We had an Amish carpenter build the sink cupboard to match the existing cupboards and it does. The appliances are new. The design is my own. We picked our color and our countertop. We have a antique butcher block to move inside the house when the ground is dry enough to let the tractor close enough to bring it through the sliding doors. Looks something like this: It will be my kitchen island. 

Guess What? Ellie K's comment reminded me! She told me the story about her butcher block before, and it triggered my memory that I'd written about my butcher block 5 years ago, when I got it. An old very popular restaurant had closed in 1996 after a family tragedy. After the owner died, the contents were sold. I stood in line with over a hundred people. I wasn't even sure that I would get in on the first wave of people, but I did. I went straight to this table, picked up the tag and went straight to the cashier and bought it. I got in at 9:15 and I was on my way home at 9:45. It was so very crowded, and it was in the early days of covid when no one was quite sure what we were dealing with. The crowds made me nervous. This is our butcher block though. I'd forgotten that I wrote about it, let alone had a picture. It has been standing patiently down at the old house, carefully wrapped and waiting for us to get around to building that darn house we'd been talking about. 

Above it will hang another auction find: 

Once the windows are trimmed and my shelves up, and the microwave bought for in the corner, the kitchen will be pretty much done. 

And then we'll be putting the bathroom together. 

All this to say, with all we have to do, I felt very silly about wanting new knobs for the cupboards. I mean, I'm a very lucky woman, and we've got a lot to do. 

But they didn't match, and it was just one of those things. One of those ridiculous things. It is surely something that I could have done at some point in the future. There was no need to do it now. None. 

It was Mary Moon's comment with a link to some gorgeous knobs that got me doing some internet looking. I looked at stainless steel ones. I just felt like they needed to be more organic, if that makes sense. I mean, I spent hours looking. I found some beautiful ones that I wanted something awful, but they were almost $5 a piece. 

In the end, what I came up with was a compromise. I got these. For $30, I got 35 of them, and the important thing is that they match. I'm not going to be groaning to myself every time I look at that kitchen. They match. They'll work. They will keep me happy until such a time as I don't feel guilty about replacing them if I still want to. 

I spent this morning putting up the brushed nickel trim around the ceramic tile. Tim picked it out, but he didn't like it after it was up. I'm not sure why. I think it looks just fine. 

I also had a doctor's appointment this afternoon. I was surprised that the visit was recorded. Probably because I argued against the medication. I hadn't been rude. I'd made it very clear. I told them that I thought they were being unnecessarily forceful about the medication. I made it clear that I'd only had one high A1C reading. I made it clear that everything that I'd read is that medication should only be used after two high readings AND after it was determined that it couldn't be controlled by diet and exercise. I mean, it's moot now. My readings are once again in the normal range, which indicated to me that whatever was going on could obviously be controlled by diet and exercise. 

She agreed that I'd done great. She was pleased with the labs. She was pleased with the weight loss and she agreed that I was taking it very seriously. She also said that most people 'struggle'. I guess that explains it right there. I guess that we reached a compromise as well. She understands that I am not 'most people'. I understand that she doesn't mind being proven wrong, and that I don't need to feel bad about sticking to my guns with her. So. That's good. 

We're having a thunderstorm. I do love a nice thunderstorm. On that bright note, I'll log off and get supper dishes done.