What can you buy with $13?
I WASTED that much this afternoon at the Omaha Home Show.
SIX dollars to park and SEVEN dollars to get in.
OH, getting in.
That was a joke. I used my debit card because I don’t believe in spending REAL money and he had to see my Identification……looked it over for nearly a minute…..and then KEPT my ID and the debit card until it went through.
PHEW! Thank god that SEVEN DOLLARS went through, or else I don’t know WHAT would have happened!!!

I was excited to go to the home show to see new and different cabinets. Maybe some eco-friendly models. Carpet and tile would be nice to see. Maybe they’d have samples I could feel? And new and different deck material. And windows and sliding doors. I need to see and feel some doors. And Paint! How cool would it be to see new paint. OH, and concrete. I LOVE concrete. Concrete floors and countertops and sinks. OH, we are gonna need new toilets, too. I wonder what’s new in toilets.

(sound of crickets chirping here…not much else)

I came home with THREE brochures. One was deck material. Two were concrete. But they don’t make countertops.

Ed Begley Junior was speaking, but he garbled on about how he was the first green guy ever and has been since 1970.
Yah, Yah, Yah.
Tell me what is NEW! Tell me how to convince my builder or supplier to GET that eco-friendly item.

Lots of crap out there.
Evidently, it costs THIRTEEN dollars to see crap.

So, decisions about TheHouseAtTheLake have to be made. When you build a house, ALL the decisions have to be made ahead of time. Like where toilets will go because the plumbing has to be put in.

In our case, the house already has some decisions made.
Like the toilets will stay in the same place. The bedrooms, kitchen, front door….those decisions have all been made. We Love the layout of the house. It is simple and easy to live in. The four bedrooms seem to be all we need and they are out of the way…over on THAT side of the house. The kitchen and living room are open and just big enough. They are all on THIS side of the house. The deck could be bigger because the BEST room in the house is the deck.

And I now know how we USE that house. We STAY there. We cook and eat and drink and watch TV and read and sleep and use the internet and do puzzles and cook and eat some more. We USE it!

I am a Craftsman Style kind of girl. Dark, heavy, comfortable trim and cabinets and furniture.
That style fits right in at the lake.
But I also love looking at shabby, white, country comfy floors, cabinets and walls.

Love those cabinets and wall o windows.

Love the black and white floor.

This countertop is a recycled product called Paperstone.
I am also interested in flooring called Marmolium.
These are green products. I need to look up "green" cabinets and carpet.

Should I make a BIG change at TheHouseAtTheLake? Should I leave the Dark Side and venture over to the Neutral and Shabby side?