When the going gets tough, the tough get creative

Building your own house is not without its bumps and bruises. Without learning curves. Without trials. And, at least for us, it is certainly not without errors.


Like how to get a shower/tub from the store an hour away from your home construction site.
We were like a couple of crazy optimistic kids when we started out that morning.

We exclaimed over our tub, analyzed every corner and surface for perfection, sealed the deal, and exited the store with our treasure. Maybe it would explain our excitement more to say that we had been renting an ancient farmhouse *without a shower* for the past several years, and the idea of *our very own shower* had us happier than a kid in a candy store. We felt like Christmas morning had come in the middle of the summer.


We bumpity bumped all the way home with our shiny new tub strapped on back.
Each bump loosened our padding.
Each bump shifted our straps.

We tightened.
Drove the next mile and hit another bump.

Our young optimism was aging fast.
Tightened again. Padded again.

I watched wide-eyed and waved goodbye as each padding piece whisked way way way away. Never had a highway felt so fast. Or so long, as we crept slower and slower to try to salvage our last hope of padding. Flying randomly and unpredictably off our trailer at each bump in the pot-hole ridden highway went all the factory packaging, two baby blankets, a baby dress, and multiple diapers. After the last of the diapers, I volunteered to walk behind the trailer on the highway all the way home.

Then, in one final scrounge around the truck floor and various packed bags for our happy little outing, I found the solution: feminine products. It was the absolute last thing I had. I stuck those babies all over our shiny new tub. And they held. (Think I should contact the company to let them know they have an untapped market out there?!)



By the time we crept/puddled/flopped exhausted into our driveway, our little bandaged tub still arrived with a crack. But shout out to Home Depot for helping us with a replacement. Not kidding. I coulda kissed the returns guy. Not really. But I can say that cause the conversation was just over the telephone.
So now, much wisened and suddenly quite aged and instantaneously gray for our years, we returned that tub and with a fully enclosed trailer and enough padding to keep the satellite returning to earth's orbit safer than a cotton ball in 6972 layers of bubble wrap, we brought back the tub now framed into our house. Sans feminine products. That. was a good day.

Never give up coming up with creative solutions. We sometimes find them in the most unexpected places.

Have any completely creative and unexpected solutions you want to share?!

Always be creative,
Marie Winfield