Tuesday, October 26, 2010

God Never Slams a Door in Your Face

.....without opening a box of Girl Scout cookies. (Elizibeth Gilbert)
It's hard to believe that I haven't posted since September . Things have just been crazy around here--and not the fun crazy where all sorts of new, happy things are jumping out at you--but the bad crazy where you are so distracted by your own whininess and grumbling that you end up face down on the sofa for most of the winter.

Enough of that.....while we still do not have spring yet in Michigan; the days are getting longer, the sun is shining more and the robins have returned. It's time to start looking forward.

I finally made the real, final and actual decision to retire in June. The angst surrounding that decision--well, let's not go into it here. Let's just say that it was a hard decision to make, but in the end we decided to give up some financial security for a better quality of life.

To celebrate that decision my Rog had what one of friends said was "a moment of pure brilliance" and surprise me with this:

It doesn't look like much now, but it is my very own studio. We had an unheated side porch on our house up north that we basically used for storage. It had a slab floor, was unheated and smelled of mildew. It also has the most beautiful view of the lake.

While I was working this fall, Rog had the old, nasty panelling torn down, drywall put in, had the floor raised and put in heat. And then painted it the most beautiful spa blue/green.

I had no idea this was going on--what with working and spending most of my free time with the whining and grumbling (see above). You can imagine my surprise when I finally was able to go up for a weekend, opened the door expecting to be hit by a blast of artic air and saw this beautiful, beautiful room. And to make it even better......
A doorwall with a deck overlooking the lake (look closly--it's there under the snow). Let me tell you, dreaming about sitting out there with my rug hooking or knitting is what kept me same this winter. So let me just say it here for the record: BEST. PRESENT. EVER!

So I have been taking measurments, looking online at the work spaces of others and making numerous trips to IKEA thinking about how to design my workspace. What do you think? What things have worked for you?