I've located two American Standard Cadet 3 High Efficiency water sense compact toilets like the one in our Alabama bathroom which works like a champ for the last two years. I've found a reasonably priced white bathtub for both bathrooms, and decided on the Fantech 2-duct exhaust system with in-line remote fan so the new master bath can piggyback to the one motor. I have not yet decided on the sinks, but one that drops into a small vanity would be best for both upstairs and downstairs baths. Both baths must have their doors removed and rehung to swing from the other side, and the electrical wiring relocated inside the bathroom where you can find the switches. Behind a door outside the bathroom is NOT GOOD.

After that, I'm thinking the only thing left to do is to replace the upstairs carpeting for the two bedrooms, and the carpeting in the fourth bedroom/study downstairs, and also put new carpeting in the big family room. It is 34 feet long, and only 13 feet wide. I'd like to add a bar top to a cabinet peninsula that divides the back door from the family room and kitchen, so that I can also make a mudroom area for that entry. Of course, on the basement level there is a real rudimentary mudroom just inside the basement from the garage, but it is like a cave and only DH ever hangs his work clothes and boots there. He still doesn't GET IT.

Anyway, I'm thinking about the furniture items which must be either eliminated or set aside for moving to Alabama. It is not easy up in MA to get rid of old furniture or possessions in general. Down here, if you put it to the curb, it is gone within an hour, no kidding. But up there you must pay someone to come get it, and then it is trashed instead of reused. I don't mean antique stuff, but solid things that have some life still in them, but it would cost us to bring it south, and then we'd have no room for it in our really small house. Which I've put on a "diet" anyway.

Marti, we had a record breaking 103 the other day, and my grass crunches when I walk on it. Then it is also drought except this week we are hoping for scat. aft. thunderstorms. I cannot keep the grass alive, but I am managing to save my plants. Mobile has a municipal water supply that is within the county, almost entirely within the city I THINK, and it is huge. We are much luckier than many places that get their water from great distances. I do not take water for granted. I hope the dryness is an anomaly that will not last long or come again. Even old established azaleas in the shade are drooping. Poor little birds and wildlife in general are looking for water. I hope everyone remembers to put out fresh water for them.

It is sometimes in the 40s up in MA. And they have lots of rain. The weather is upside down and I think it is a feature of global warming, with changing weather patterns.

Well, DH is tearing out the bathroom wall shared with the kitchen sink and dishwasher. He is planning to replace the plumbing in there according to the updated code. I asked him to save the 4" square blue ceramic tile as much as he could. Some folks like mid century modern colored tiles. Me, I plan to redo it with white plain subway tile. I forget what the floor tile is called, but it looks like chicken wire....does that ring a bell for anyone? Unless he wants to use the 2" mosaic like we used in our master in Mobile. He knows how to do that already. :)

ML, another place to send the furniture would be Salvation Army, Purple Heart, St. Vincent De Paul, Disabled American Vets.

Here in Michigan the economy is so bad that the only new stores opening up are resale shops. The Salvation Army near my other house closed down their big store and opened one a mile away in an old furniture showroom. Now, THAT is a big store. They call them Salvation Army Family Centers now. The SA also just opened one in a posh suburb called Sally's on Fourth. There are no-name thrift and resale shops everywhere.

And awesome what Salvation Army is doing to take advantage of the finer things donated to them. I hope we can find a place that will come pick them up, because we cannot transport anything like big chests etc in a car. And DH will NOT allow anyone to come to his house, or bother with a yard sale. Just not done in his lifetime.

He almost has the cast iron bath tub removed from the downstairs bathroom. If I had insisted on it coming out, I do not think he would have voluntarily removed it. I was just thinking to have it reglazed white, but he has now torn out the alcove which contained the tub, and soon will have the tub flange freed up for disposal. I suppose someone who likes blue bath fixtures would like to have the tub, toilet and sink. And the blue tiles. However, I've never in my life liked blue inside a house, it always sucks the light and life out of a room (personal opinion, not fact), and it depresses me no end. You cannot beat WHITE fixtures in a bathroom. However, I know they ask a pretty penny for high gloss black glazed fixtures...and red too. But OMG how could you tell if you have a health problem with RED glazed fixtures!!!! Do not take it personally if you have colored fixtures, I'm just expressing my personal philosophy here.

The economy here is none too good either. A house around the corner from us, but on a much busier street, was put up for sale, I think a foreclosure. Brick veneer, ranch, big lot with good elevation, but it is built on a slab, and the price is $45,000. I wonder what will happen there. CaldwellBanker sends us postcards whenever they are the agent to market any homes in the neighborhood.

One of those grain bins was stuffed to the top with an estate of relative and had been in there for 15 years. The one right over top of sold sign. LOL They are LARGE bins.