01/02/2023 – Happy 2023, and Our 2022 Review!

Happy 2023! Undoubtedly, most if not all of you are already celebrated-out by now but because of our oddball work schedules here at Colehaus, we’re celebrating today. The photo above was taken by Mom back in 2007 on a magical trip to Seattle for New Year’s Eve.

Another reason for celebrating today is that fireworks are still going off around our area, so how could one not celebrate January 2nd, too? Either that or spend the day grumbling about the noise that has just about gone on too long, don’t you think? Viola says YES!

Whatever may be going on at your place, thank you for visiting us today. We have so many thank yous to hand out starting with a BIG THANK YOU to everyone who has stuck with us over the years, particularly this past year when we grumbled constantly about our upstairs shower leak fiasco. Thank you for your words of comfort, for your inquires, suggestions, comments, well wishes, and prayers. Trust us when we say there were days/weeks when we hung on every comment, not knowing if we were going to survive that latest calamity, but taking comfort in that some someones read what we typed and lent us a kind word.

THANK YOU angels and Friends of Colehaus who selflessly sent us kibble, canned food, litter, cat treats and toys, a pound or two of coffee, wild bird food, and good, hard cash. Your donations helped ease our financial burden of ridiculous bathroom repair expenses and all around inflation.

And THANK YOU to all who keep believing in us, for your messages and chats, for cards and emails. 2022 was a very tough year. Thank you for helping us get through it.

January 2022 started off with the very best of intentions. Mom decided we were about ten years past our brown phase and began repainting our entire house. Why, of course the cats were supportive. She also made plans to sell/give away some unused furniture (some bits are still here!) and then, she was laid off at the end of the month. More painting time! Clearly, the cats were highly enthused.

All was not lost in February 2022 because Mom quickly found a job much closer to home, there were outdoor visitors coming over regularly, spring bulbs were popping up, reader questions were answered (mostly), and Mom’s interior house painting was moving right along. All was good.

Spring maintenance began in March 2022 with some much needed backyard fountain work and outdoor window cleaning. No one liked that noise. Later in the week, Quint belted out a song of his own over the time change, we answered more reader questions, those spring bulbs started blooming, and so did our living room ceiling when an upstairs shower valve blew out and soaked through a bathroom, a second bathroom, a spare room, and the downstairs kitchen and living room.

Looking back, April 2022 wasn’t the worst month the cats would have had to give up their Cat Den. No longer needing their winter warming beds, they learned to eat, drink, poop, and sleep alongside literary greats such as Bradbury, Hemmingway, Poe, and Michener in the small area we call our library. We stuffed everything from the bathrooms and the spare room into the Cat Den in hopes repairs would be rapidly coming. We also called, interviewed, and took reconstruction bids from contractors #1 thru 11, all whom turned out to either not return our calls, never showed up, or were Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire! Little did we know we had a L-O-N-G way to go before anything was started.

New visitor Tippy and raccoon regular Shaggy became regular outdoor visitors in May 2022. Our homeowners insurance created more damage in our leaking upstairs bathroom before bringing in someone to rip everything out down to the studs, and leaving it that way. Our second bathroom started leaking as well around then. Quint gave us a scare by stopping pooping for a few days and required us to take him to the emergency vet, followed up with an hour-long trip into Oregon for a really expensive ultrasound to rule out a tumor. And Olivia appointed herself as Stairs Monitor, causing trouble, more cleanup, and a permanent change we’ve learned to live with.

Outdoor visitor Lloyd gave Mom a wonderful treat in June 2022 by allowing himself to be petted. Restoration/reconstruction contractors continued to ghost us. Olivia put us in our place. Shaggy brought babies to visit and play. And finally, progress – our soaked spare room carpet was replaced with laminate flooring. And then, our insurance company dropped us.

Colehaus Cats July always begins with boom and bangs from fireworks and Olivia playing with fruit left out on our kitchen countertops. New outdoor visitor Murray showed himself (Mom still gets the feel that Murray is a boy cat) and Shaggy’s babies, sans mom Shaggy who sadly went missing from then onward, proved to be the first destructive raccoons we’ve ever had around here. There were things on cats and on Dad. Contractors #12 thru #18 didn’t come through and we finally settled on contractor #19 who couldn’t begin work until September. There was singing, grumpy days, serious scratchings, a Monday mystery, and the interior house painting got back on track.

One word describes August 2022 to a T: Hot! Pia’s haircut shouldn’t have been a surprise, then. Mom missed most of the summer flowers in order to work lots of overtime so Dad took lots of great garden photos to share.

After a long, hot summer, it should have been no surprise that we learned our bathroom restoration would NOT begin in September 2022 as first promised. Regardless, there was singing, a refusal to let some smug person get us down, and the requirement of more patience. We did a Quint baby flashback, had a discussion about autumn, and at last! Work actually began on our bathroom!

October 2022 began with a sense of relief. And pumpkin spice loaf. We celebrated late flowers in the garden, Viola’s 9th birthday, and Tessa accepting a construction worker’s petting. New warming mats and fresh straw were put into the feral shelters for any chilly nights on their way. Bathroom reconstruction suffered a hiccup, we looked back at a cute baby Olivia, and then we packed emergency supplies due to our first ever Level 1 fire evacuation alert. We shared bloopers, officially gave outside visitor Murray his name, showed a photo of our newly tiled bathroom, and learned not everyone knows what a shower niche is.

Mom shared that Tessa’s becoming a love bug in her old age. Tippy was officially seen coming and going from the heated feral shelters. And finally, we got our main bathroom back in late November 2022, over 9 months after leak damage made itself known. The cats exhibited so much patience through all the noise, upheaval, and our worry. That didn’t mean Olivia stopped lurking, that Pia stopped hogging the computer chair, that Quint stopped questioning everything, that Viola stopped aggravating Tessa, or that Tessa suddenly stopped being grumpy.

December 2022 came and went and not a single whit was given to holiday spirits. We felt we’d been through so much this past year and didn’t have the energy for anything more. Anything more would have felt forced. Mom decorated, albeit, with a heavily restrained hand, thinking she didn’t want drywall dust coating holiday decorations, thinking surely, our water damaged ceiling would be worked on during December. No work was done on the ceiling and just as well, since our heater died just before a big ice storm hit. By the time Mom had time, it was just too cold to take Christmas card photos. All that said, our heater was fixed, Mom caught a cold from work, won fifty bucks on a gifted scratcher lottery ticket, and we celebrated a warm Christmas with cards and email sent from awesome people like you.

We can’t lie; 2022 was a really hard year for us. Mom lost a job and found a new one quickly, though it’s lower paying. Dad’s still hoping for a better paying job closer to home while his Multiple Sclerosis and resulting depression gets progressively worse. Having our long-time insurance company challenge, then drop us after our shower leaks and all the trouble we had with contractors was more than enough.

Today, our new shower hasn’t been used in a month after some grout fell out of a couple of spots in early December. We’re being overly paranoid about creating more damage should water get in behind the tile but we just can’t go through any of that again. We’re using the other old shower until Mom can get instructions from the contractor on how to fix this herself.

Our living room ceiling and wall are still holes. We really could have used some insulation up there when the heater went out and during our ice storm, but we were certain work would begin any day. As it turns out, our contractor’s going through some medical things that kept him from working all last month. We’re fairly certain now nothing will be fixed until sometime later this year. Or it could be tomorrow. No one knows.

Through all this, the cats have been our comforts. Only one or two used to sleep with us at night; now four regularly snuggle under covers and keep our feet warm. Viola’s that last hold out. She prefers Ruby’s old tower next to our dresser.

Thank you again, for visiting us and for reading this far. Yes, we complained a lot this past year and we apologize for that. We’re ashamed we weren’t the bright spot on the Internet we used to pride ourselves in being. We’ll try harder this year, in 2023. As always, we love your comments and suggestions. Send them our way!

Here’s to a new year and new adventures. From all of us, Mom and Dad, Tessa, Pia Bean, Quint, Olivia, and Viola, and all our visitors, Happy New Year! Happy 2023 to you all!

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A Colehaus Cats flashback:

2021 – No post
2020 – No post
2019 – No post
2018 – No post
2017 – Our Year in Review – Goodbye 2016, Hello 2017!
2016 – No post
2015 – Premium Quality
2014 – No post
2013 – Almost Wordless Wednesday – Bag it
2012 – No post