a little competition becomes big motivation...

every time my parents come for a visit they help matt and i with projects around the house. sometimes i have a to-do list ready and waiting and other times a to-do list gets generated as they walk around the house innocently commenting on "well, don't you want that done?" and "don't you think that should be done?" and "why is that not done yet?" these such comments are usually followed by a trip or two to the hardware store and then hours of labor.

during one visit, our unusable master bathroom became the target. a project that was started by us when we bought the house in '05 and after a few months two years of seeing no advancement, my parents finally went in there with a chisel, a sledgehammer, and a determination to get us motivated. about a year later the bathroom was completed and for the first time we had two working bathrooms.

one would think that after such a long ordeal with one bathroom that a breath would be taken. a little break perhaps. a few months with no projects. but those innocent questions continued..."so when are you starting on your other bathroom?" and "you're not going to take three years again are you?" and "did you start yet? how about now?" it only took so long before we cracked, but we weren't going to tell them that.

see my parents were planning a bathroom remodel of their own, so we jokingly made a bet to see who's would get done first. little did they know that just the month prior we had torn out the tile around the tub and floor, had ordered the cabinets, and picked out new tile. the day they arrived for their bi-annual visit, they walked down the hallway past the bathroom (twice!) and never noticed a thing. once i pointed out our demolition, they were not only shocked but thrilled to see our progress. unfortunately that's all it took to light a fire under them, and the demo of their bathroom began the very next week.

as it stands, they are much further along with their upstairs bathroom remodel than we are on our main bathroom. our excuse is that we only work on the weekends and dad is working round the clock. we also hear that mom bribes him with hearty meals like pot roast...which i suppose is okay since we did get a head start. either way we are both going to end up with beautiful new bathrooms much sooner than either of us thought because of a little bit of healthy competition and a whole lot of motivation.

ps: please don't stop innocently commenting or questioning. this tends to be my motivation.