Rough, it is.

Despite having been in Minneapolis for 3 days, I haven't done anything outside of the apartment besides walking the dogs and going to Target, the grocery store, Home Depot and Menards. The only people we have seen are my family members that have come over to bring food, tools and cleaning supplies (THANK YOU!). The reason for our lack of fun time is the state of our apartment. Despite having paid rent for August and the apartment having been vacant for nearly the entire month, nothing was done to refresh the place after the last tenants left. And, they left some funky stuff. Like these kinds of paint jobs:

They also left a million bajillion hooks, nails and screws E V E R Y W H E R E in the apartment. I mean everywhere! After three days of removing them, we are still coming across more. When Paul looked at the apartment it was stuffed full of the previous tenants things. He had no idea it would be in the condition it was when we got here. What he did see was the amazing potential and uniqueness of the place. We still think it has great potential. It just needs, as my sister put it, "a good spit shine."


We have talked to the landlord and will hopefully be working out an arrangement that pleases everyone. For now, we are busy focusing on getting the place cleaned and painted so that we are ready for our stuff to arrive next weekend.


Part of the specialness of the place are the tremendously high ceilings. Paul is standing on the radiator, has his monkey-armed 6' body stretched out and still isn't able to touch the ceiling. Somehow all our pets managed to sneak into this random photo. Also apparent in this photo is another of the apartment's perks, huge windows that let in lots of light.

Lucky for us, we moved close to family and friends who aren't afraid to don their workshirts and pitch in. My dad has been a great help in figuring out solutions to some of the "quirks" of the apartment (no light in the bathroom, funky plumbing, seriously tricky paint scenarios), accompanying us to the hardware store and lending us tools. He also hooked us up with some homemade food and some homegrown veggies.


My mom showed up bright and early yesterday morning with breakfast and cleaning supples, ready to attack the grime. She scraped the paint off the sloppily painted windows and showed our nasty oven who is the boss. She made a commendable dent in the nastiness and left us equipped to clean up the rest.

I guess there was truth in advertising with this place. I think we were just expecting to not find paint like in the picture above and 4 years worth of dirt in the apartment. You think I jest? The paper in this picture was printed out in 2004:

Let's just hope we don't run out of spit before this place is shining!