I'm beginning to hate this place...

Yeah, I admit it. I'm beginning to hate this place that we've moved into. I could try to keep lying to myself and say "Oh, this feeling will pass. I really am just stressed out and that's it, seriously!" If that was even remotely believeable, however, I should be off somewhere selling impossible things for incredible amounts of money, making the concept of selling ice to eskimos look like child's play. No, I'll admit it, I am beginning to hate this place.

The neighbors irritate me. I do my best not to allow myself to be irritated but I can't exactly help the way their screaming arguments in the middle of the afternoon set my teeth on edge. And I do rather feel disgusted by how they find it appropriate to leave the bag of garbage sitting on the front yard until it is dragged down to the dumpster. It'd be one thing if it was in a garbage can of some sort.

It's not, however, and I am daily amazed by the fact that a raccoon or something hasn't strewn their garbage across the parking lot and the yard. I'm horrified by the fact that they're willing to let their infant children play where the garbage bag sat and there are remnants of the garbage still in the lawn. I hope to god this doesn't make me an elitist snob or something insane like that. I work very hard not to be a bitch like that.

The carpet is in the midst of coming apart. My son can't play on the floor unless I've put something down for him to play on. Otherwise, he's pulling up chunks of lint and putting them in his mouth. To put it lightly, this is not acceptable and I'm more then a little upset with this. Each day that passes, the angrier I get with that minor fact because you can't walk across the room with out lifting up the nap of the rug and having lint balls left in your wake. Nothing I can do will resolve this problem, it's going to happen until the rug is bare or it gets replaced. Neither of which I don't think we'll be here for.

I have been doing my best to clean this place up. It was filthy when we moved in. The manager had told me months before we moved in that it was going to have the carpets replaced, damage repaired, and everything cleaned up. That didn't happen. I have cleaned out black mold in the kitchen cupboards, picked up nails left in the rug, and I've yet to get all of the soap scum off of the tub and shower surround. The owner of the complex appears to be of a mind to jerk us around and it's making me angrier by the minute when I think about it.

I do my best not to think about how they're attempting to screw us. But, when I look around here and I see the degree of disaster around me, I really want to go burn things down. I hate the process of moving. I hate the process of searching for a new place to live. I really, really hate the fact that we're forced to do so again after having been living here for barely a full two weeks. Somebody please tell me, what god did I piss off?

I'd love to know. Because, I really can't think of any reason why we've got an asshole running the show here trying to scam money out of us and attempting to strong arm us into doing what they want. And all the while, we're supposed to shut up and accept what pittance of responsibility they decide to accept in the maintenance of this place? I'm sorry, but I've got enough of my pride where I'll fix my own damn problems if the solution is within my abilities and they can't be bothered to help us out. And I'll be enough of a bitch to send them the goddamn bill for it too.

Thank god they took care of that problem with the drain in the bathroom sink.

Gods, I really really want to wing a brick thru the car window of the owner's nice little new looking leased sedan the next time I see it in front of the office and to have a conversation with that former manager who we were talking to when we signed the lease. Yep, a conversation including a nice baseball bat. My thoughts are tending towards the aluminum one rather then the wood one. After all, wood is relatively soft compared to metal.

Hmm...

So, I'm in an interesting position. I'm not exactly a big fan of our new neighbors. I'll admit it, the initial impression that they were 'ok' is progressively getting tainted with each fight I hear thru the wall, the stream of random people coming to the door, and a myriad of other little things. I'm doing my best not to be judgemental, but it's not exactly easy. Today, as I was getting back from my walk, I paused to see if I could meet up with the manager.

The same manager who has been conspiciously absent from the premises of the apartment complex we moved into for a while now. According to the other residents it's been almost a month now and they've been unable to reach her by phone for two months. I know that for the past week since we moved in, I have had to call the owner of the complex to get a maintenance guy to come over and kill the hornets nest outside my son's bedroom window and resolve an existing drain problem. Again, I'm doing my best not to let the situation be colored by emotion or false impressions. Moving in to a place that had mold of some sort growing in the cupboards and needs a fair amount of cleaning, when I was told prior to our moving in that it was going to be cleaned, however, is making it difficult to do.

Sooo... in the midst of all this, I've been trying to get ahold of the manager to find out just what my husband and I are supposed to do about our storage unit. The storage unit assigned to us had some one elses stuff in it. That makes things a little difficult to put our things in there. As I was going to talk to the manager, however, I met up with the person who had their stuff in our unit. I then heard an interesting story about the entire situation.

That story kinda made me a little wary but it was having the big guy who lives across the complex from me (who was helping his signifigant other put some of their stuff into storage) offer to talk to the neighbors if they caused problems that made me uneasy. According to reputation, the neighbors are drug dealers and users. I generally don't have a problem with other people's recreational habits. I do my best to make the drug use of others a non-issue when it doesn't directly impact me or my own. After all, what they do to their body is their business and I've no grounds to tell them otherwise.

It was hearing about how they had been moved from one side of the complex to here on the basis of multiple complaints from their neighbors that made me mentally say 'oh? this is an interesting development.' Now, as my son is napping (theoretically napping, he's in his crib with the fan blowing on him and playing in actuallity), I sit here and I wonder just what to do. On one hand, it really isn't my concern just what these people do to or with themselves. At the same time, I've been warned multiple times over the last week that these people are a potential problem, specifically the male half of the equasion.

I've been doing my best to keep the advice of my Father in mind here. Keep my eyes open, my ears open, and my mouth shut. But I really don't know what to do with the information I'm learning. I've been told these things about the one set of neighbors immediately next to us, specifically warned that they get into loud fights and have called the police on each other multiple times, for example.

I'm finding out increasing evidence about the manager's tendancy to avoid complicated situations. To the extent where it looks like she won't come to work in order to avoid dealing with upset residents who have a genuine complaint (like that only one of the three washing machines work) and will actively avoid being available to contact by phone. I look at all of it and I see a situation where ... well... I have a bad feeling that I'm not going to be making any friends soon.

You see, unlike alot of these other people who just sigh and laydown when their legitimate complaints are ignored, I tend to stand up and start forcing the situation to get resolved. I suspect that may make me a trouble maker and several social/political enemies here. I don't like being in that situation, it's always a headache. But I can't help the burgeoning feeling of anger at this whole mess that we've seemingly landed in.

I'm trying, I'm really trying not to view it this way, but there's an increasing pile of material that's pointing it in the direction of actually being that kind of a mess. I so don't want to have to deal with an outside mess ontop of all of the domestic concerns and craziness that comes with raising a kid.

Decorating the kitchen & entry way.

I've finally got the opportunity to put up my blue and white curtains in the kitchen. The kitchen in our new apartment (they call it a townhouse, but I keep thinking apartment, does that make me a fool?) is woefully small compared to our current place. I'm still a bit giddy, however, because I love the idea of having those wonderful blue and white muslin curtains up in the window. We'll need to do something on the window that's to the front door, but I've enough fabric that I don't think it'll be a problem. I can whip up a fairly simple plain sheer white panel easily.

I don't think the management at the apartment complex is going to mind that terribly much. While the counter space is somewhat limited, it's actually quite good for the size of the kitchen. Right beside the kitchen is two closets. Apparently the larger one, that goes underneath the stairs up to the second floor (where the bedrooms and bathroom are) has been used in the past as a pantry of sorts. Looking in the space, I can turn it into a pretty nice pantry and storage area. If I play my cards right, I think I could even make it fairly easy to access the stored materials, despite how narrow the area is.

I'd like to put up on the door to the first closet, which is immediately across from the entry into the kitchen and right next to the front door, my little chalk board. On there, I can do things like put up my grocery list or the list of chores that needs done in a given day. I think it would do me a world of good. It is the door to the second closet that I'd like to turn into something useful and yet attractive. On the side that faces the inside of the closet, if I could, I would have a set of pockets, like a shoe bag. In there, I would put things like serving utensils that I don't typically need, an apron, hot mitts, and perhaps a few napkins and a table cloth.

The outside of the closet door, I would love to have something wonderfully useful and beautiful to look at. I don't like the thought of nothing but pockets on the outside of it. I want it to work with the living room area, though. That's moving away, however, from the kitchen. I just love the blue and white themes that I had in my old apartment before I got married. If I can, I'd like to put it to work in the kitchen again. Fortunately, my husband also liked that theme, a lot!

Hmm... so what do I do in the baby's room? (2)

I think I will put the circus/jungle/rain forest/zoo animal theme around his bed. We may as well work the fish concept in, as one of his new favorite toys is a fish themed thing for in his crib. It's kind of like a kick-n-play, it's the Ocean Wonders Musical Activity Mirror. At his crib, we've also got the rain forest themed mobile and a beautiful baby quilt with safari animals. I think we may need to surrender to the rain forest concept here, because that's the only way I see to work in the fish. After all, fish live in the rivers that are in the rain-forest, right?

If we were able to do murals or some other wall art, like the really nifty stencils out there, I'd put a little 'river' with palm trees on either side of it in the part of the room we are going to be putting the crib. As it stands, however, I need to think of something different to do there. I don't think I'm going to be making a wall hanging. I will be framing a little printed picture (well, actually an adorable gift bag) with a bunch of zoo animals on it and putting it up on the wall. I may draw or paint a large rain forest picture with the elements of the animals and fish together in it. This can then go up in that area. Perhaps I'll locate a little throw rug to put down beside the crib with the animals on it. I don't know.

We've got a small problem, however, with the teddy bear army. The teddy bears are of pretty much every size, shape, and about three different colors. There also is a blanket that I embroidered with teddy bears of all colors on it. Confining them to a basket isn't exactly the best idea because it doesn't do much for the beautification of the room. This said, I'm not entirely enthusiastic with the idea of making it difficult for him to access his toys either. My mother and my sister-in-law have both suggested rotating what toys are available. I really do like that concept. But how do I do this with the teddy bears?

I suppose the toy hammock is my friend in this case. We can put the toys he is not using in the hammock and put the toys that he would be using in the baskets on the baker's rack. I'd be remiss in saying that we have several baby blankets. There's quite a few beautiful handmade or other wise sentimental blankets that have been given to our little boy. He can't possibly use them all. I'm at a loss, however, for what to do with them. I suspect that they'll either be stacked in a neatly folded pile on the rack or put into a box in the closet. The embroidered teddy bear blanket and the crochet blanket that I made for him I don't exactly want to put into storage. But I don't really want to put the other blankets into storage. I suppose the baker's rack with them it is.

I've several wicker baskets that I can use on that baker's rack. I realize that I need to secure the rack to the wall so it doesn't get pulled down on top of my little darling, but I have a fleeting worry about the baskets I'll be putting on the rack. The lowest level of the rack is a large open space. I'll be putting the largest baskets there with his toys in them. The middle rack is about hip height on me and won't be entirely out of reach once this child starts walking. On there, I think I'll want to do something for holding some of his shoes and hats, as well as perhaps some of his books. If I make a fabric cushion that ties to the rack, perhaps it would work to keep things from falling thru the openings in it, and then I could store his books on there. I've got to admit, it would make life alot easier to do it that way.

I really like the shoe bags and the little canvas sweater holders that people have in their closets. It's had me considering making one of these for additional storage space in the closet. I think it could make keeping his diapers and the refills for the diaper wipes easier to deal with. We purchase those things in bulk and tend to have quite a few of them kicking around here at any given time. At the same time, I love the appeal of having those sturdy shelves that you can put up with those 'storage systems'. It's a tough debate. I suppose I should look at what the budget says we can do on that front and look at the space we've got to work with a bit better.

Hmm... so what do I do in the baby's room? (1)

Themes, themes, themes. The devil truly is in the details on this one. We've got a lot of stuff so far with just about every imaginable kind of animal (or so it feels). We tried for a somewhat unified theme of zoo animals but the split is between circus animals, jungle/rain-forest animals, and fish. We've got a pretty healthy representation of the Winnie-The-Pooh inspired toys and teddy bears as well.

There's a little Winnie-The-Pooh music box contraption that the boy loves to look at while he's getting changed. If we make the changing table area a Winnie-The-Pooh area, I think it will work somewhat well to contain some of that pastel and confectionery sugared material. We can hope, at least. Now, if the management at the apartment complex we're moving into says ok, I think I want to put up a few shelves on the wall above the changing table. I've a few reasons for this idea. First, I would really love to have a place to store some of this boy's toys that he doesn't use. Secondly, I'd be a lot more comfortable with the stuff for giving him a bath and all of that were in one location. As we will be a little bit pressed for space still in the bathroom, I know that we can't store all of it in there.

I've been having the thought of hanging his Winnie-The-Pooh blanket on the side of the changing table tickle at my brain for a little while now. I really don't know, however. If we orient the changing table so that the part that's not cosmeticly pleasing is against the wall, it opens up the shelves for him to ransack at any time. If the blanket is hung on the changing table, however, it makes for something he can grab and possibly pull the whole thing down on himself. Not good would be an understatement for that one, folks. So, what am I going to do with this? It's too nice of a blankie and it would really be inconsiderate of the meaning to it for me to turn it into a mat to be on the floor where I'd stand when I change him. Sure, it's theoretically possible, but it's a waste of a beautiful plush blankie.

We've got fantastic jungle/rain-forest/circus themed toys. This was the orginal theme that I wanted for the boy's room. His father just asked that it not be hideous and shared my distaste for the "baby = pastel" trend. So, I'd like to take the majority of the room and use this brightly colored theme. At the same time, however, we've got a small army of teddy bears to contend with. I am planning on using a wire baker's rack in the room for some storage space. I've some muslin lined wicker baskets that I think would make fantastic containers for holding some of his toys and books. I also think that it would be a wonderful way to put away his shoes and hats.

If it were possible, I'd use all of the potential themes as we have them. I don't know, however, if the room would look good with it being divided up by the different themes. As I consider it, I suppose it could be alright. The room is fairly large.

Wait... moving means decorating, doesn't it?

It occurred to me earlier as I was picking up the baby's toys off of the living room floor, he's going to have his own room. This means I can finally decorate with that animals theme we've got going! I'm not sure if I'll be able to find prints of pictures like this:



But it'd be pretty awesome if I could. :) I've realized that I need to make or buy curtains for his room and I think it may also be necessary for there to be a few things like shelves put up in the room as well. As I think about it, I realize that it could be pretty awesome in there with out an insane amount of work. Fortunately, I've got yards upon yards of fabric I can use.

While the landlord of our new apartment doesn't want us to put up wallpaper or repaint the walls, we can hang pictures. I need to check and make sure that putting up shelves isn't a problem. If not, then I can do things like make a few shelf liners that go along with the animal/jungle theme that we've got going on. I know that the living room is going to keep some of the Asian theme that we've had in here. I want to make things kid friendly, though, and incorporate some of that theme from the boy's room in there. I've been thinking about it and I'm just at something of a loss at the moment.

Perhaps if I try to arrange for a small 'downstairs' toybox or something else akin... Actually, I could make him a toy bin that could go with the open storage unit! If I either iron on or applique something Asian and animal related, it could work well. We've some carvings that my husband inherited from his maternal grandfather with a pheonix and a dragon on them. I'm pretty sure that I could put something on a red canvas bin with that on it. Our living room curtains are red and gold colored, with something of a brocade-ish pattern to them. It makes them blend somewhat well with the rest of the asian themed stuff. The wall art that we have up, however, is black fabric fans with painted birds on them in gold and a few other colors.

Hmm... I think I'm going to split this into different posts. I'll brainstorm here on my blog, giving all of you folks in the world something more plesant to read then my whining about local politics or how stressful moving could be.