We Had a Showing on Sunday

I have not yet properly introduced my cat, Snuffles.  I will have to do that one of these days, as she's as much of a character in my life as my husband is.  Seriously.  She has quite a unique personality, and I love her to pieces.

There are many things to know about Snuffles, but two of them are:

1. She is very vocal, and very expressive.  It's almost like talking to a toddler.
2. She hates being confined, period.  In a room, in a crate, in a car. She voices strong opinions about it.

If we're home when someone comes to see the house, we take her out.  She likes the outdoors, and might sneak out the door if someone who isn't alert to this comes over.  The first time, Kevin took her out in her carrier.  He was so traumatized by her distress that he suggested that, from now on, I just take her in my car and park across the street, without the carrier.  She is definitely a little happier out of the carrier than in, but the car is still a confined space.  Here's what she thinks about it:

She did eventually curl up on my lap and start purring, still letting out intermittent "meows" here and there.

If you'd like to stop these traumatic experiences for Snuffles, please consider buying our house!

House for Sale

Our house is finally on the market, and we finally have some pictures up! If you want complete listing information, leave a comment and I'll send it to.  Big shout out to our friend Carl, who took the fab photos.  Our house never looked so good!

I actually took this one.

Cleaning...it burns!

We just put our townhouse on the market (listing to be posted once we get photos up!).  I have many things to say about getting a house ready to show, but today I'm thinking about cleaners.

Now, I moved into my now-husband's house on a part-time basis about four years after he'd been as a bachelor.  And we'll just say that neither of us is really...an avid housekeeper.  So, there was (is) plenty of cleaning to be done to get our townhouse into "show" condition.  From wiping smudged windows, to scuffed doors, to the floor under the stair railing.  And  "regular" cleaning needs to be done more frequently, as potential buyers could come it AT ANY MOMENT.

As I've been doing most of this cleaning (while Kevin does things like build bathrooms and switch our motion-sensitive light switches back to regular ones), I've really noticed that I've been having a reaction to using all the different cleaners.  I've gone green on most of the cleaners I use regularly, like laundry detergent, dish soap, and toilet bowl cleaner.  But we have all of these old chemical cleaners, so to use them and do a thorough cleaning job, I've been cleaning with them.  Here's a picture of all of the different cleaners I've used in the past week: