The Heart of the home

To this point I had been concentrating on the Bathroom because I needed to get that done because I need to move into the house as quickly as possible and a bathroom is fairly necessary to make it habitable.

The second big job on my to do list is the Kitchen; it is said that the kitchen is the heart of the home, the beating center. This is very true of my parents kitchen, when anyone is over the kitchen is generally the first area  where we stop and talk. Everything happens in our kitchen, if i look back over the years we cook and we eat there but we've also spent hours talking; about life, about problems , about people and about nonsense. Primary school, high school  and university assignments have been done on the dining table along with all kinds of other work; school reports get written, plans and sketches have been drawn even computers dismantled and rebuilt. The room has played host to big family lunches and dinners, bible studies, Christmas year after year, birthdays and pretty much any other event that's been held at our place. at 3:00am on a given Saturday night the evening events will be discussed in whispers in the kitchen and I have laughed so much in that room that several times I have ended up on the polished wood floor trying to catch my breath. I wonder how much the kitchen in my little house has seen?

The houses Kitchen isn't really positioned for that Kind of use its small and off to one side however I think that it could be quite a bit more inviting so with a bit of work I think we can get this room beating strongly and at the very least become a place where you'd be happy to fix yourself a snack or help yourself to drink while you listen in to the voices of friends coming from the lounge room.
 

To save myself money I am re-using as much of the old kitchen units as possible, and building a new benchtop out of timber myself. I will also (for lack of a better word) 'make over' the old doors with a new finish and handles to give the whole room a much fresher look.

Greater than the sum of its parts (2)

It has now been almost two months since I last posted, there are a number of reasons for that, one is that I have spent most of my free time doing other stuff (some of which you will read about in future posts) but also a small part of my procrastination was that I was unable to think of something to write about that related to the topic. usually there is something rolling around in my head but not this time... until now:  

I finished framing up for the bath 

Then I built a the vanity unit that would hopefully give my bathroom some character and distract people from the slightly odd characteristics of the room such as too full sized windows that don't quite line up and the fact that the layout is a little unusual due to the joining of the two rooms without changing the plumbing around at all. I then painted my new vanity unit.

 We finished leveling and topping the bathroom floor.

All the walls that were previously asbestos had to be re-clad in fiber cement

 Then we waterproofed.

 

 

 And we tiled and grouted the floor.

So Far all the parts have been coming together in my bathroom fairly well and I am pleased to say that once I'm done the bathroom should be better than the two small, dark & damaged rooms originally in my house. As I mentioned before however this is not always the case, sometimes a finished product does not add up to the sum of its parts. I watched a movie tonight about gangs, specifically English football gangs It reminded me of something I had noticed once or twice before when dealing with groups of boys out here coming to youth events etc; a gang or the like brings out so many great qualities in the boys or men and yet some how the final product is far from good.

It is hard see why a group often mostly good guys by themselves; usually loyal, strong, courageous and who will give sacrificially for each other; ends up being such a negative thing for themselves and everyone around them. It is almost sickening to think about how these groups responsible for honing so many good qualities then miss guide and wrongly focus them to bring out some of the very worst in people. It is sad that virtues such as loyalty and courage are so often clouded by fear, a longing for acceptance and pride so that the end result is violence, destruction and ultimately more pain.

What these guys really need... in my opinion... is family, a loving place to belong and to be safe and an identity that isn't just part of what ever group, in short they each need is a real home & real life. The need for real home brings me back to my original objective for this project and as for real life; that requires a purpose and for that I would suggest perhaps a prayer would be a good place to start.