And the verdict...

Is that the shower is still a giant piece of shit! Even after waiting until after 6pm I watched with horror as water started leaking out of the seams of the shower as Andre bathed the filth of camping off his body.

I couldn't believe it! After all that work, all that waiting, all that mess! So we went up and told them that the shower was leaking. Her answer after I showed her all the seams that were leaking? "Well it did take us two years to fix your fridge! Ha ha ha!" (I am seething in the bathroom sopping up water as I hear this exchange) Andre says "I hope that doesn't mean that it's going to take you that long to fix the shower."

Who the hell says something like that?! Are they on crack? Do they just not care? The moral of this whole scenerio is that you should never, ever rent an apartment from a someone from your church. They will still screw you over, but your Christian guilt will keep you from telling them they're fucking idiots.

So after getting all the water cleaned up from our shower we went out to dinner (yummy Lebonese food!) and I drowned my stress in 3 glasses of wine with dinner. We came home and they told us they had added some more caulking (the plumber had said you didn't need any?!WTF?). I checked the shower and it is the worst caulking job I have ever seen in my life. It's going to drive me crazy every time I shower and scrub it clean.

Bathroom Reno

Despite my pessimism the bathroom was actually 90% complete when we got home from the camping trip. The shower was up and we just had to wait for the silicon to continue sitting for a few more hours and we will be able to test it out at 6pm tonight. As long as there are no leaks we will be able to use it as we normally would as soon as I clean out the bottom. (all I have to say is dirty work boots in the bottom of a wet shower=ewwww)

So when we left there were a bunch of damp towels on the floor controlling the leak in the shower:

It was not pleasant.

So we called my mother who was checking in on the cat to see what the progress was on the shower when she came in for the cat, so we had some sort of idea what to expect. She was great, she even did our dishes that we didn't have time to get done before we left!

Nothing prepared us for the disgusting mess that awaited us when we walked in the door. The owner was in the back doing lord only knows and as soon as we walked in (probably with looks of horror) she said "you aren't suppose to be home yet!" Now when we left the apartment it was clean. Dirty dishes piled neatly by the sink. Counter and stove wiped and clean. Dining room table cleaned off with only a note for my mom. Not so much when we returned home.

Apparently while we had been gone the fridge leaked three times for the owner. Not a new thing. Another thing that's been leaking forever, and her solution again was to shove a towel under the crisper (nothing like a moldy towel under your produce!). So while the plumber was there he looked at it and fixed it. So after he had done this, she had taken our crisper out along with the bottom shelf. All the contents were on our counter and stove top. EVERYTHING. Our wine rack and wine that was on the fridge, my mixing bowls and little odds and ends that were on the fridge when we left? On the counter! Everything was scattered everywhere. It was horrible mess. There was stuff everywhere. Her answer for everything being everywhere? "I just didn't want to put it back"

For the love of all things good in this world, it took all I had not to strangle her! So in addition to having to unpack all of our camping gear and food, I had to clean up her mess. Then after it's all away Andre asks: "Jenna don't you feel relaxed since we've been camping?" I just had to look at him. Are men clueless all the time?!

The only problem with the new shower is the damage that we are left with to the drywall, and the new storage unit. I now have this wire thing that I'm suppose to store all of our hand towels and toiletries in. Now, in the picture it looks okay, but I'm not the kind of girl that likes open storage. I don't like everyone knowing what I keep in my bathroom. Now to maintain my sanity we will have to make a trip to Ikea to find some sort of storage box that I can use in here. Hopefully we will have enough room for everything otherwise I will have to buy more wire boxes that you can apparently buy at Canadian Tire. Yeah, that's really what I want to be spending my money on right now...

The other problem with the bathroom reno are all the tears to the drywall and my beautiful paint! Now as you can probably gather from my almost weekly vents about the owners of our apartment are that they are not the most prompt at fixing up things around here. Now I'm wondering how long it will take them to patch up these rips so that they can be painted over. Something that will be left up to us, because they left all the painting up to us when we moved in. Not that I minded, because then we were able to pick our own colours, but I really hate the idea of having to repaint a bathroom that didn't need to be repainted in the first place.

Camping at Valens

This year we finally had a summer, and with summer means camping! We didn't get to do much with all the wedding hoopla last summer. Andre's favourite camp site is Valens Conservation Area. Not too far from home, clean bathrooms, the sites themselves are nice, but we've been going there almost every summer for the past 5 years. I wanted a change, but Andre didn't. So off to Valens we went.

We almost didn't go though. The weather was suppose to rain (60% POP) with scattered thunderstorms, but we went mainly because we didn't want to be home with all the chaos with the bathroom reno going on. So we made sure to pack some extra tarps for cover, had our friends and family cross their fingers and do a sunshine dance and we were off.

Aside from thunder rumbling for the entire day on Saturday, and two little rainshowers on Saturdaymorning, the weather wasn't too bad. The sky got very dark while we were hiking Saturday afternoon and I was worried we would have a downpour, but we managed to miss the terrible thunderstorm complete with hail and funnel clouds that hit Hamilton that same afternoon.

What was very unusual for us was the fact that we only snapped a few pictures the entire weekend! I don't know whether we were so exhausted from the week and stress of the bathroom, but we only got some pictures from our campfire Saturday night. This is some of our documentation of our camping trip: (we didn't even get one of the two of us!)

The saga continues...

I feel like lately all I use this blog for is to vent about whatever chaos is going on with our apartment. So why stop now?!

I can't remember whether I have mentioned the bathroom before. Well since we moved in just over 2 years ago the bathroom has leaked. Literally the day we moved in, we walked into the bathroom and there was a huge puddle on the floor. The owners response: "yeah, it's done that since we had it installed. Just put some towels on the floor to collect the water till we have it fixed." They never did have it fixed, but we (yes you're reading correctly we had a friend of mine come in and re-caulk the shower and that seemed to do the trick until about two weeks ago.

So after a few talks with the owners and them hmmming and ahhhing over what the hell they were going to do they have finally decided that they're going to replace the shower while we're away camping this weekend. She came down this morning to measure the shower stall and explain what they're doing (I don't even think they know what they're doing). Thankfully they have a plumber (their granddaughters boyfriend) coming over to do the work for them.

I will have to post some before during and after pictures once it's all done. In the meantime though this will mean that we will not have a shower (lord, give me strength!) and will have to use the owners shower upstairs. I so hate having an audience when I have to shower but we'll have to deal with it until it's all finished.

I hope I don't have too many breakdowns in the process. With all the repairs that have needed to be done in the last little while, and having no control over what's happening I haven't been the easiest person to deal with.

My Garden

The one downfall (well the one that I will talk about right now) is that we do not have our own garden. I love to garden. Nothing fancy, but it's very satisfying to see your hard work bloom throughout the summer. Luckily my grandmother and mother both have homes with little gardens, so I get to help them out with their gardens.

When Andre and I moved into our current apartment just over two years ago my mother bought us three African Violet plants as a housewarming present. Shortly after their arrival we found out that our cat Mikey also had an appreciation for flowers. But his was more of a destructive sort of relationship with them. Now two years later I have one hardy little violet left after all the carnage. I've tried fertilizer and moving it to different locations, but with being in a basement apartment it's hard to find a place where it will have enough light.

I think I may have found the perfect place for it. A little while ago I had a talk with my friend Pam about our love of Lavender, both the scent and the plant. We had both tried growing it from seed, but had only succeeded it growing mold. Definitely not as exciting. So she surprised me one night by giving me a little potted Lavender plant. She had bought one already germinated, and re potted a little bit of the plant for me.

I put it on the window ledge, and soon discovered that Mikey hates it because it smells! Yeah for me (and the lavender plant)! So now I have a well lit home for both my violet and my lavender. This week the lavender finally started to bloom. I was so excited, and just had to share some pictures.

Summer Fun

Every year my grandfather (Poppy) and his wife have all of their family down to their house on Lake Erie for a big BBQ. Andre loves to go and play Bacce Ball all afternoon. This year for some reason it was a smaller group, and the rain threatened to ruin the fun all afternoon, but held out until just after dinner. Thankfully we were able to get everything inside the house before it really started to pour.

For those of you that don't know, I affectionately call Andre my own person paparazzi. He has to have photos documenting every aspect of our lives. I was the score keeper of the game but Andre made me drag out the camera to snap a few pictures of the game.

The following are some pictures of Andre and his dad Frank.

Commence finger crossing now!

The one thing that I want more than anything (well maybe almost as much as winning the lottery) is to own our own home. I want to be able to decorate the way I want. I want to have a kitchen that actually has useful storage, or more useful storage than we have right now. I want a garden to plant some flowers. I want more room!! Oh the list is endless, but I would settle for a little home of our own.

We don't have unrealistic dreams. We know that in order to stay in the area that we are renting in we won't be able to have the single home. That just won't be possible. We're fine with this and are perfectly willing to own a townhouse. We're currently working with a financial planner at our bank to help make that dream a reality.

A topic of conversation that routinely comes up is my grandmother's inability to maintain her home. She owns a 3 bedroom (converted from a 4 bdrm) townhouse behind my mother's home. She is a pack rat/hoarder and her house is, well, in one word disgusting. I can't stand to spend a significant amount of time there.

Well apparently my mom and grandma were talking on Saturday and my grandmother mentioned that she's thinking that she might have to downsize to an apartment in a year because she can't take care of the house. This is huge because she's finally realizing what we've known for years, and we could possibly be ready to purchase a home by the time she's ready to sell!

I'm not particularly attached to her home, so if something else in the area went up for sale when we were ready to buy that was more suitable (ie. more move-in ready) we would probably take that instead, but the town homes in her area have been selling in just a couple weeks so they don't last on the market very long.

It's fun to daydream about our one day home!

Canada Day 2008

Andre and I really didn't do anything too exciting last year because our life pretty much centred around the wedding. We've been trying to make up for it this year, and have had a very busy summer so far.

Andre doesn't get any of the Stat holidays off since his company is open every day except for Christmas Day. This didn't stop us from planning a picnic at Bayfront park once he got home after work on July 1st. My cousin and godson, Jonathan was visiting my grandmother so we brought him with us. He is always on the lookout for new "experiences" so we thought this would be a new experience for him.

One of the first things out of his mouth when we picked him up after saying hello was "Oh my gosh Jenna, you're my godmother!" I guess somehow this had come up in conversation with my grandmother earlier that morning and he just thought this was the most amazing thing to have learned. The entire day he would just blurt out how he couldn't believe that I was his godmother. He told me that it was like having three moms (his mother, his step-mother and myself). I told him that it just meant that I loved him very much and that he would always have a safe place to visit if he every needed one. He seemed happy with this.

Over all it was a great afternoon. We had a great lunch at a picnic table right by the water and then found a place for Andre to nap under a tree while Jonathan scooted around the park on his scooter and I walked behind him. It was a fabulous day.

"Ceiling Watch 2008" comes to a close

It's finally done. I received the glorious news when I walked in the door from work this evening. It's complete, no more leaking! Yeah!! I'm so happy. My allergies were becoming quite unbearable for a little bit before they got rid of the rotting drywall.

When they had someone into inspect the ceiling they discovered that not only did someone seal up a hole in the pipe with electrical tape, but when the house was built the lines were not installed at the correct angle apparently thus preventing the normal flow of water out of the pipe.

So now we just have to wait for everything to dry out completely after they had to cut open everything today to fix the pipe, and then have the ugly, ugly hole covered. Apparently they (the owners) just want to slap some painted plywood up to save us having to "deal with the mess of drywall". The real reason is that they just don't want to have to pay someone to install drywall. They sure didn't care that mold was growing over our table for months and months.

I hate the idea of having to live with a huge eyesore above our dining room table, but at the same time am happy that this mold problem is just about over. Since they took out the rotting drywall and we sprayed the wood my allergies and asthma has been a lot better already. I think I may spray everything again on the weekend though. I have a botanical spray that kills 99% of mold and mildew spores.

So without further ado here are the pictures of the during and the (hideous) after.

During:

This is what everything looked like the night that the owners daughter finally came over to get rid of the mold. The pink is a towel wrapped around the pipe so they would be able to gauge if water was actually still leaking. The leak was actually at the top of the pipe, so the water would drip around the pipe and pool between the wood and the drywall. That's why the black on the wood is so scary looking. It's very wet. The black thing hanging on the left is actually the electrical tape that some idiot had used to fix the problem in the first place.

After:

And now here is the hole sans leak. The plumber installed some wood to elevate the pipe and help the natural flow of water. Hopefully there won't be anymore leakage as long as we're renting. The black on the wood is much less scary looking now. It as been sprayed with bleach and a botanical spray to help kill the mold spores.
They don't want to cut out the wood, but I'm a little leary of them sanding the wood and potentially releasing spores into the air. Who knows what will happen now. Hopefully they will fix this hole quicker than the four months it took to fix the leak!