Renovations and Restorations

We had a water leak here at the condo, and as a result, we are doing some renovation work in our basement entertainment room. While the leak and the damage were frustrating, I'm finding it invigorating to do the renovation. The hard stuff (dry wall, pouring a concrete pad upstairs) we contracted out, but I'm doing the painting of the room myself.

Yesterday, I finished the first wall. That was the hardest wall, painting around lots of shelves and edges and small spots. It took me about 3 hours to do that single wall.

Of course, I got (unwanted) input about the process from all sides, telling me the "best" way to approach the task.

But as I made progress along the wall, and saw the new, clean shine of the paint appear (it's essentially the same color as the old paint), I felt a huge sense of satisfaction.

Sometimes, we need to renovate.

As I wrote about here, we do periodically need to clean house, figuratively and literally.

We need to mend the broken pieces, deep clean the carpeting, touch up the paint job, top it off with new throw pillows and an area rug.

And when we have finished that project, we can rejoice in the clean, crisp results that make us smile and feel joy.



(This was the Renova Spa at our resort in Jamaica, where we went for our honeymoon last year)

And just as we need to do periodic physical renovations of our surroundings, sometimes we need to do some personal renovations as well.

The Spa, I believe, was aptly named. RENOVA. A place to renovate the self.

And I have been doing this type of renovations lately, as well. I returned to swimming, after a long hiatus, and found it to be completely rejuvenating and restorative.

I trimmed the anxieties and stress from my life, making some conscious decisions about just where and how I would be exerting my (admittedly limited) energies.

I have begun to revel in the many, many blessings that surround me on a daily basis.

I have rebuilt the house of myself, brick by brick, new paint job (in my brightly painted nails, that I talked about here), new exercise program, new attitude, and overall new sense of joy and happiness.

Life is good, oh so good, once you take the time to do the renovations.

How will you renovate this week?