Lol, poor Daniella. Ask him if he will do my laundry too. I throw it all in together and everything looks like crap, lol. I was telling John about this and he said ohhh good idea about the pots and the roots now that winter is coming he is wanting to bring in more of them so he is liking the idea of burying the pots in the ground then lifting the pots for the winter. He forgets before we did all these flower beds and I told him about this he told me I was crazy and why would I want to dig a hole and buy a pot. Just put the dang things in the ground and leave them there he said, lol. How soon he forgets now that he is getting excited that they are going to start blooming, lol. I bet we have sunken pots next year, lol. The one I had last year bloomed in the garage nearly all winter long. I think he is remembering that and realizing all those in the ground are going to have to be cut down and he will miss them blooming. Who wants to make a bet he digs up some of his to bring in the house instead of cutting them, lol.

The first thing to do is pull out all the paperwork on the condo agreement. Somewhere in there, it states who is responsible for what water leakage. Then go to the entire condo board with this situation, not just the manager. Explain that you have tried to work through the manager, but you are not getting results. You thought the leak was found and repaired, but you are still getting water damage in your bathroom. The thing is, water drips. And it may not just be dripping into your bathroom--some of it could be running off elsewhere and causing mold or rot in other parts of the building. You don't want the ceiling fixed until the source of the leak is found and corrected. This has been going on for 6 months and you are getting tired of waiting. There is the potential for damage to the building, not just your unit. And the potential for mold issues. Both of which could lower property values for everyone in the building, not just you. Give the board a one month deadline to fix the problem before getting your lawyer involved.

We started our remodel in January and it was supposed to be done by the end of May. Here we are halfway through July and have at least several weeks to go. We added a garden garage on the basement level and a family room above. We added a laundry room on the main level and expanded a big closet into another bedroom above the laundry room. We also annexed the old laundry room to add a desk and butler's pantry to the kitchen, swapped the kitchen sink and dishwasher locations, reused old cabinets, and added some new cabinets and new counter tops. My biggest problems have been the contractor's health issues, the framer's health issues, the trim carpenter's mother's health issues, rainy weather, and bad attitudes. Also, money. The general asked for a payment in advance of when it was due (red flag) because he had bills due on other jobs that were done before mine. All of the subs have told me they won't work for him again because he doesn't pay. I'm preparing lien releases this afternoon. Also, I purchased most of the items that were in allowances (like kitchen cabinets, counter tops, appliances, lights and plumbing fixtures, carpeting) myself because I got better prices on everything or at least could get what I wanted when the suppliers for the general didn't have what I wanted. When I said I was going to subtract the money that I was out-of-pocket for the allowances from the second draw, he flipped and said that would be a breach of contract. I did some quick calculations and figured if I went ahead and paid the entire draw, I wouldn't owe anything at the end, so I stupidly did pay it all. Now, with all the mistakes that have been made, I think he will end up owing me money at the end! Here's a short list of the problems. They poured the foundation wall for the laundry room wrong and now the laundry room (and the bedroom above it) are 6" less deep than they should have been. They poured the floor of the garden garage sloped the wrong way so it doesn't drain if we get water in there. Then they cut grooves in the floor so water would drain when we washed off the mower, but they are crooked and jagged and overlap at the doorway leaving a little "pillar" of concrete that will surely break off. They left the downspouts off the front of the house for months, so with all the heavy rain we've had, all the water washed under the foundation and soaked through the walls of the garden garage, ruining the drywall and paint with mildew. The gutter installer ran a downspout so it washed uphill on the new family room roof and caused a water leak the first time it rained after that. They had to repair the drywall and repaint half the room, as well as extend the downspout to the gutter below as it should have been done. The electricians installed a ceiling fixture 10" out of alignment with the one across the room it was supposed to line up with. Now they have to move the fixture, repair the drywall, and repaint the ceiling. They tore up the daylight drain that ran across the backyard and caused it to plug up. Wasn't a problem until it got hot and we turned on the air conditioner. Then the condensate had nowhere to go and flooded a room in the basement. They tore up the TV cable that ran across the yard even though I told them where it was before they started. They also tore up the dog fence wire in several areas. Now they say we are responsible for getting them repaired. They put vents to the outside in the crawlspace under the new laundry room, but they are blocked off with tyvek and now the whole basement smells "like a basement". The plumber was re-routing the pipes under the kitchen floor for the sink/DW swap and got called away to an emergency. He didn't come back to finish that day and when one of my kids took a shower upstairs that evening, water started pouring into the floor of the kitchen and the ceiling of our theater room in the basement. Luckily I got my hand over the open end of the pipe before it flooded the electronics, but the ceiling was ruined and the chairs and carpet got wet. In his favor, the plumber came back that night to cap the pipe that was accidentally left open. I could go on and on, but you get the idea. If I'm not standing watch every second that someone is working, something gets done wrong. Yet I overheard the drywall guy say to another sub, "I wish [the GC] would grow some b---s and not let the homeowner get involved in our business." This from the guy who slung drywall mud ten feet away so it got on kid's toys that should have been well out of harm's way. He also tracked it all through the house on our hardwood floors (that are not being refinished) and did a lousy job to boot. I'm so done with these morons. I've lost my sense of humor, I don't trust anyone, I just want my kitchen back. If I hadn't overpaid, I'd tell them all to get lost and hire someone else. A word of advice to anyone else contemplating a remodel, put deadlines and penalties for not meeting them, into the contract. Add that things you buy on your own get subtracted right away from the allowances.

I think SS is confused and torn. I've been with DH for several years so SS barely remembers life before me (just random memories of things like kids have). It's hard for him because he knows what a Mom is, and what a Mom does, and how she behaves. But then he sees someone who has the title of "Mom" who doesn't act that way at all, while I do. It was never my intention to be Mom figure in the beginning; SS was the one who kept trying to put me into it. My choices seemed to be to either refuse to do so out of deference to an absentee mother, or to try to be the best pseudo-mom/custodial step-mom/whatever that I can be. Given the circumstances, (DH has had custody of SS since he was a year old or so, and the 90 minute travel distance), it would be really tough for BM to have formed/maintained a close relationship even if everyone involved was very committed and outstanding parents, I'd think. At this point, he doesn't seem to have any real bond with her, and I don't see much chance of one being formed without extensive effort (including family counseling for BM and SS) and I just don't see that happening. BM's attitude seems to be that she deserves SS' love and admiration because she is his egg donor, sorry, I mean mother, and so he should be the one to change, not her. So he's left in this situation where he knows that she's a poor excuse for a mother, yet she (and the courts) insist that because she is his mother, her behavior, by default, is perfectly fine. And we cannot talk to him about it; God forbid we'd agree with him (out loud) when he says that she doesn't want him there but makes him go, or that she's a liar, or any other charming sentiments. (He is in counseling so presumably he is talking to the counselor about it.) So no, he is very pragmatic about it. He's never known her to behave any differently so he does not seem to even expect that she might want to talk to him on the phone, or show up for one of his events, or go to the doctor when he is sick, or anything else. I wish she'd just go away. I honestly do not see this situation getting any better. I wish that SS wasn't being made to feel that he was obligated to love and care for someone who does not seem to love and care for him. Sorry, I've gone completely off-topic. It's been a rough summer. :(