We’ve made an offer on the gallery and it was accepted.  Closing is mid-April but we’ve invited the current occupant to stay on for an extended period because we are not yet in position to take over.  The most likely time-line is that I will move into the gallery for part of the week as I get started on all the other things that need doing: including building the casita. 

As for the project itself: I finally got a hold of the fellow who may be putting in my driveway from the road to the property.  He was highly recommended by a friend and hopefully this will work out.  All I need is a rough track that drains reasonably so I don’t risk becoming one of the people currently stuck in the mud (literally).

In the meantime I’m undertaking a number of projects down here in the current homestead.  These are things that will make our remaining year-plus living here a bit nicer, and will hopefully add value to the house and make it more sell-able in this tough market. 

On Saturday I took down a rather unpleasant and not very effective ceiling fan and put up a new one.   This house is 160 years old in parts and that had often meant that the original work was already jerry-rigged.  The same was certainly true of the fan. 

Today I will be painting the master-bath white in preparation for an entirely new color scheme.  We had painted it in some rather unfortunate dark colors (it seemed a good idea at the time) and we will lighten it up and make it “go” better with the house.

After that there’s the repainting of the master bedroom and then on to other projects.

As for the headline: the decision to go ahead and turn our lives upside down with the gallery is the “giant stride”.  The rest are all baby steps.