Hold Your Breath

They came two weeks before Christmas.

We had a hole in our roof--and no roof at all in some places--almost all of January and February.

Portland city codes required them to do some additional work in the basement because apparently we were missing a load-bearing wall (oops!).

The sinks, which were supposed to be so easy, required specialty drains, which we didn't find out until, oh, the day we were installing them.

And on and on and on and...

Until today. The last day some one is going to ring the doorbell at 8 a.m. I can hear his drill as he's putting in the final outlet cover.

We have lamps. Sinks. A toilet (did you know toilets don't come with toilet seats? Yeah, I didn't know that either. Until, of course, the day we installed our toilet.). Doors. Windows. Walls.

It's done. Eight months later. We have a new bathroom and two new bedrooms.

Dear sweet jeebus. It's done.