We love our cozy (read tiny) Spanish style bungalow. It was built in 1925 and still holds many of its original features, such as the exquisite Batchelder tile fireplace, which had been painted over with – count ‘em – six layers of different colored oil-based paint.  Removing each one was like getting to the center of an everlasting gobstopper. There was Navajo white, robin’s egg blue, bubble gum pink, canary yellow, and Mylanta bottle green.

One of the house’s greatest selling points was the hardwood floors. They were buried under thick shag carpeting but we revealed and refinished them and they are perfect – almost. Those darn things creak – nay SCREAM – when treaded on in just the right spot, which was not a problem when we were young newlyweds. We went from either not noticing, to finding a particularly loud spot and swaying back and forth on it, coordinating the loud creaks and squeaks of the boards with our movement while reciting Robert Shaw’s monologue about a shark having “doll’s eyes” from the movie Jaws.

Now that we’ve got a baby who is just learning to be particular about what she will and will not be sleeping through, walking out of her room after gently placing her peacefully sleeping body into her crib, or returning later to check on her has come to resemble escaping a room full of laser beams after a jewelry heist. “I think if I take a wider step riiiight here then I’ll…” Cry! Reset. Begin again.

I’m on my way to go and get some glow tape. Tonight, so help me, I’ll mark my safe path in and out of that room! Or maybe I can get my handy husband to install a zip line from the ceiling to get in and out of there without a sound. Yeah. That’s what we’ll do.