Girl with a drill

With Rich away, I've been actually getting things done -- including touching up the stairwell and painting the ceiling. Thank goodness for Renee coming over to help; I may never paint without her again.

That done, it was time to finally put up the shelves and photos that have been sitting in a box in the basement ever since we moved in.

As usual, I had plenty of ambition to start, and naturally assumed that this project will take no time at all (an assumption I make with every project despite the fact that I know it will take at least six times as long).

Edited to add: Just to highlight the difference, here's the stairwell before we even owned the house.

Inspection day, May 2010

I did have the patience to make brown-paper templates so I could properly place the shelves and photos, instead of the usual "let's nail it to the wall and see if it sticks and rip it down later if I realize I screwed up" mentality.

I mark my drill holes (yes, I went and bought my own drill; Rich will have to deal instead of borrow) ... and realize that my walls are Damn. Stubborn. We'll pretend there isn't a new hole in the wall. After an interminable amount of time screwing anchors into the wall with no progress, me getting mad and wondering how the hell I was going to finish this on my own, I took a break.

A little "Project Runway," some sauvignon blanc, and I got my courage back.

Oh, yeah.

Somehow I even had the luck of starting a drill hole into an already existing anchor. I almost laughed, and then I made that wall my prisoner.

I can be a little messy.

But, at last, success!