Nanoo

I keep thinking about Nanno. I know that should be obvious as to why since this is her house. I have even dreamed about her. Of course in that dream, she was a ghost who walked around with heavy footsteps in the attic as we tried to have a party in the unfinished gutted dining room on a card table and folding chairs amidst dust and dirt--clearly I was having issues that night--but I dreamed about her nonetheless.
The construction crew probably thinks I am a little crazy because I keep a picture of her in the house so that she can "oversee" the whole process. Its been there since the beginning. The picture was left there after the last renter moved out and I felt she belonged to stay and would watch over us as we began the painstaking process of renovation. It is a great picture of her, one my grandparents also have framed at their house. She was a huge presence of a woman. In this picture, she is standing in the yard smiling. It is how I always remember her, so it is a perfect picture to sit in the house. She has been moved from room to room throughout the project. Starting off in "her" place, which was in the corner in the den where her chair always was. As things starting to be torn out in that area and so much going on with that back hallway/garage, I moved her to the living room and she has been mostly living on the fireplace mantel, until recently when she needed shelter inside the kitchen cupboard because they were cutting into the ceiling over the fire place and I guess Jeff (the electrician) or someone realized how important she was to me and moved her to keep her safe. :)

I am somehow hoping that as she watches over the changes, that she knows we have the best interest at heart and will restore its beauty even though currently it is taking a long time and looks nothing like the house she loved. We want the house to be what is used to be. To be a house that is the foundation of our life and our family, to be a house full of love, to be a house where children run around on its hard wood floor, laughing and playing in its beautiful yard, and living life to its fullest as she always did.