House talk and ideas consume many of our thoughts these days. We plan to visit a site in Wausau soon to look at all the handicap options out there. Apparently its a house built through a grant to display all the options you can decide on with building an ADA home. Things that are not "tied down" can be borrowed out to test use. I'm excited to see what things are out there.
Our house plan is relatively simple....one story with everything "at grade"...garage to house, front door to house, back porch to house...essentially wheelchair friendly. Our crazy ideas include pocket doors where possible, a surveillance system to see Mason's room from our master bedroom TV (in case of seizure scares), a heated approach so you can turn on a switch and melt all the snow in front of the garage. Over the cold winter months, we hope to get more answers to these questions: are they possible and how much are they going to cost us?
Mason is Reason #1 that our house will have no stairs.
Reason #2 is probably a little more entertaining to read about.
Last week, I got up at my usual time - 5:45 am. After getting out of the shower, I plugged in my hair dryer, only to remember that it busted the morning before. I wrapped in a towel, and walked down the hallway to the stairs, heading to the downstairs bathroom to borrow my mom's hair dryer. I was trying to be polite by not turning on the hallway light and waking anyone. I took one step down on the stairs and heard an ear wretching "MEOOOOOOOOOW". I put all my weight on one of my parent's cats, who darted beneath me and started running down the stairs. In an attempt to shift my weight off the cat, I went barreling down the stairs, landing on the cat about 3 times. This woke Addy, who came darting to the stairs and almost broke my fall on the bottom stair. After I sat for a second to make sure nothing was broken, I crawled my way up to the top stair to retrieve the towel I was wearing, hoping to God that no one would wake up, turn on the light, and see me in the buff (anyone meaning Dad.) After retrieving my towel, I went to the bathroom to repair my bleeding hand that had slid down the popcorn-textured drywall in an attempt to stop my speed down the stairs. After bandaging myself, I went up to bed and laid there for about 10 minutes to get my heart to stop racing and really analyze the pain. Day 1 wasn't too bad - just a tad stiff. Day 2 was horrible - aches all over and a shoulder that throbbed. I have a "road rash" on my upper thigh and plenty of bruises to document this story. I'm not sure how the cat is doing - because I don't know which one it was, but they both appear to be okay - probably just short one of their nine lives.
That's reason #2 my house will have no stairs. Or cats.
Other than an occasional good story, things have been pretty status-quo around here lately, which bugs the crap out of me. I have had a lot of desire to be impulsive lately - whether it be a random day trip to Door County (which we did) or a last minute trip to Milwaukee for a postseason game (which we did not do). My impulsiveness has been slowed by lack of energy and real-life commitments. I think I'm looking for something to stir things up - like a new hobby. I just haven't heard of any new hobbies that I can actually get excited about. If you have any new ideas - throw 'em my way.
Hope all is well with you and yours as well! Have a happy Halloween and I'll try to post some fun costume pics!
Love the story and I'm glad you survived your fall without any more humiliation than necessary!
ReplyDeleteI have had this nagging desire in the back of my head since Fall started that someday I will have a booth at the Mosinee Craft fair in December....maybe you could do that? If you are anything like me though I have some good ideas, but lack any real skill when it comes to producing a product worth selling (hence the reason I don't make my kids halloween costumes!) Anyway, just a thought!