I'm weepy today. I think everything is taking it's toll on me. I'm sore, I don't know my body, I'm limited to what I can do, my house is filthy...I wish the nurse would come so that I can go have a nap.

Fortunately (heavy use of sarcasm here), Ron the sub-contractor stayed away from the house the entire time I was away at the hospital, only to return my first full day home. On Tuesday. There are so many problems that keep getting added to the deficiency list. The kitchen sink leaks, the powder room sink leaks and is ruining the paint job - this added to all the other problems. There are still no doors for the basement or powder room. Every time something gets fixed, it's worse. The powder room now pours water on the floor instead of leaking it in behind the wall. The light fixture was finally rehung but so poorly it looks like it's going to fall down and Ron damaged the ceiling.

I still have no idea where anything is, all I know is that it's in the basement.

No wonder I'm weeping.

I'm home! I survived my mastectomy and reconstruction!

But it was 15 hours long, not the 8 hours that had initially stressed me about.

And I feel like I was hit by a truck, which then backed up and then drove off again. But that's why the good drugs are dispensed I suppose and with the drugs, the insane dreams to keep me entertained.

Thanks to everyone for your support and encouragement during this time, it truly helped me get through it. My thanks especially to my incredible plastic surgeon, Dr. Joan Lipa, for her amazing work. I had tried to prepare myself for the end results by looking at images of other women who had gone through similar surgeries and I couldn't be happier with the results. Dr. Lipa is quite an artist as well as accomplished surgeon; a young beautiful willowy blonde with a team of young handsome doctors. One nurse likened her and her entourage to that of a rock star.

I will write later but wanted to get one quick note out saying that I am fine and am thrilled the surgery is finally over so that I can now focus on healing.

More house news...I just couldn't resist throwing the images of Haemish in to the blog.

The appliance installers came Monday so that we finally had, well, appliances. They were twins: Dave & Bill. Their company: Twin Installations. They were hysterical - both heavily in to online poker. Dave was more fun than Bill, Bill was going through poker withdrawal.

The plumber finally showed up on Tuesday to connect the powder room sink so that we now had 2 sinks: the basement and the powder room. The main bathroom taps that were supposed to arrive Tuesday at TAPs did not show up until Thursday morning - the day the stainless steel guy showed up and also the plumber. By Thursday night we now had access to all sinks and a dishwasher and a washing machine. Thursday night was spent clearing all the dirty dishes that had piled up since Saturday.

Friday night we had our first guests over for drinks and take out: Kim & Scott from next door and Lauraine from work. It felt wonderful to be able to entertain - even amongst the dirt and the boxes.

Saturday our contractor left for Disneyland.

Sunday we began to compile our list of everything we are not happy with and what still needs to be done, it's quite a long list.

I'm going to start clearing off the island so I can take a few more pictures.

Before I go though, I must show you the green both Satch and Jakob chose for their bedroom. I have to avert my eyes every time I walk in to their rooms. I limited it to one wall each. This is taken before the carpeting was installed - also last Friday, before the move. Both greens are the same, more close in colour to the lime in Jakob's pictures vs. the picture of Satchel's room.

I came home to find Haemish enjoying the new bathroom...





...and also his new favourite past time.


Haemish. He's a little devil that one.

Saturday came and with it 3 movers and a not as big truck as I was led to believe. Paul's brother also joined us and his brother-in-law showed as well.

We were not ready. Paul went to the house with a car load of stuff and to await the arrival of the movers. I watched the kids, packed and coordinated the movers from this end. Yves (Paul's brother) packed kitchen stuff and then would ferry car loads to the house. Absolute madness.

Meanwhile, the plumber never showed up, the sub-contractor was at the house trying to finish a few things up before the movers came - it was a really horrible day. By the time the movers left, at just after 3 in the afternoon, we were all exhausted emotionally and physically.

And here are a few pictures to what we arrived at:

One (exceptionally beautiful) kitchen with no island top, sink or appliances.





But at least we are home and even with all the inconveniences, we are so happy to be here.

Where do I continue from...

Saturday during the move the plumber was to return to hook up sinks. He blew us off. The stainless steel guy ended up saying that ___ had been 2 days late in giving him his deposit so the stainless steel wasn't even finished. It would take days before we had working sinks and a dishwasher. Until Thursday in fact when the plumber came in to install the faucets that had been reordered from Montreal, hook up the dishwasher, the washing machine and the sinks.

We were down to the last of our clean dishes when I kicked myself thinking why hadn't we used paper plates.

We are home! And most importantly we're back sleeping in our wonderful, fantastic, comfortable, KING-SIZED bed again! After roughly 180 days, we are finally getting a good night sleep. Well, Paul may contest that since he had to up and get PNEUMONIA. But I digress.

The move was hell. HELL.

I took Friday, October 27th off to prepare for the Saturday movers. Instead of packing I spent the day running around trying to put out fires because most of our taps didn't work. Either they were defective, didn't fit, were the wrong product... Then the light fixtures didn't fit, weren't up to code, looked horrible...

Every few minutes Ron would call with another problem to solve.

Thankfully Dave & Jodie drove in from London to help for the day and Dave spent most of the time driving around with Paul which helped keep him fairly calm. And Jodie kept me company as I drove to TAPs and back and tried to find quick replacement light fixtures from neighbourhood shops...in the rain. A side note, when Paul and Dave were at TAPs, they ran in to Sarah Richardson, Jodie was a tad jealous I think. We saw no one, even though we arrived mere moments after they had left.

By the end of Friday, when all was to be done (except for a few doors installed) so we could move in comfortably on the Saturday: we had no sinks except for the laundry tub in the basement, no appliances hooked up, no stainless steel counter top on the island and the place was filthy.

I desperately tried to reschedule the movers to Sunday to give me one more day to ready myself for them but no luck, in fact just to test my sanity they showed up early.

I will write more tomorrow, I need to go reacquaint myself with the king size bed.