Early Signs of Spring at Londo Lodge.

Will this whole thing pay off?

I’m at Londo Lodge with my mom, who graciously agreed to come up and help me tick off some items from the ever-growing, never finished To Do List up here. The main project is getting the deck repainted and set up for spring and summer guests. The Airbnb listing shows a deck full of furniture, so I want to make sure it’s set up nicely for a group that arrives Monday (it snowed a week ago so there hasn’t been a good time to set it up before now).

I’ve learned a good deal in the first few months listing the house for rent, mostly about guest expectations and how explicit you need to be with spelling things out in the listing. I didn’t even think about people coming up here in December and wanting to use the grill. But people came up in when the house was blanketed in snow and demanded to use the grill.

“Honestly, they have a point,” I thought to myself, “the grill is in the photos.”

So we got the grill out for them, only to have them realize how ridiculous it is to try and grill in the snow. Then we edited the copy on the listing to note that the grill would not be available in winter months. The main thing I’ve learned is that you can’t assume guests will know what you know - they’re not from here. Some people will travel to an area without knowing anything about the climate, so we were very communicative about the fact that while this house was in California, it snows here and getting here in the winter requires a vehicle with chains or all wheel drive (and sometimes both).

Luckily, aside from the expensive drama with the heat, there weren’t any huge catastrophes with guests. And it’s looking like May is going to be the first month the house gets out of the red and into the black (in terms of month to month cost, not overall - I've invested about a half million dollars in this place at this point in the form of cash, labor, and sponsored items so it would take years to make that back). Right now, I’m just trying to survive, so I’m really just thinking about month to month expenses.

I was lucky enough to find a local guy to help me clear my yard of debris who is much more affordable than the yard crew I’ve used in the past (I’d love to do this work myself but it would take me weeks). He’s spent the past few weeks sweeping up the twigs, branches, and pine needles all over the yard and burning them in neat, small piles.

I’ve never seen people burn yard waste before and to be honest I’d prefer the method the other yard crew uses, driving the yard waste to the dump an hour away. But everyone up here seems to burn their yard debris. It’s just too time consuming and expensive to take it to the dump. I’m thankful that I found someone to help me with the yard as I’m trying to keep it as neat and fire safe as possible.

The plants around the property are starting to bud, including the river dogwood above and some of the other dogwood trees I’ve planted around the property. I also planted a few bulb flowers around the property in the fall, just for fun and to see if they’d sprout. And luckily they have!

The sprouting tulips feel like a good sign. A sign that my near four year journey to getting this place rentable and rented could be finally producing some good results. Spring comes late up here and lingers around a long time - the beautiful lupine that blanket the entire property have barely started to surface. They’ll stick around, covering the whole yard with bright blooms until August.

There is no guarantee that the gamble I took on this house will pay off. I drove up here with $79 in my bank account, and currently have $25. To say I am limping to the finish line is an understatement. I have given everything - financially, emotionally, physically - to trying to get this rental off the ground. The goal, like a lot of other peoples’, is to have a little slice of the American Dream. To own property that hopefully accrues value over time and allows me to have an asset.

But the house is about so much more than all that. I have had a nearly romantic fascination with houses my whole life. When I dream, the spaces are always beautiful. The journey of buying and renovating this house sometimes feels like a really complicated, messed up relationship. I love the house but the house has done me dirty so many times.

Londo Lodge was the first house I ever looked at with a realtor, the first I ever put an offer on (I know how lucky that makes me in California, where most people put offers on dozens of houses before they get one). When I saw it, I knew I wanted it. It was really dated and lacked style, but I could tell the spaces inside it made sense, the innate architecture was logical (if stupidly designed for snow) and the house will lend itself to what I want to eventually do, which is to transform it into a more historic looking home I can share with my family, use for photo shoots, and keep as a sort of case study design lab to test my own design theories.

But it feels like everything that could have gone wrong, has. Every time I seem to get a leg up, there’s a wind storm or the well system fails. I hope I’m getting to the end of the logjam of house problems I’ve had the past three and a half years, but I also know there will always be house problems. You don’t just do a full house makeover then let your house be forever. A house is living organism that needs to be cared for, fed, and nurtured over time. I’m hoping that the house gets a little less needy soon (and that my rental income allows me to hire more outside help) but I know now that there will always be something to fix or improve in this house.

In the past month, I’ve done a full makeover on my LA bedroom (unpaid), a backyard makeover in LA (paid), and today I’ll embark on yet another deck update at the cabin (sort of paid). One point of joy for me lately is that I’m liking doing this kind of work again. I took the early part of this year off doing social media home makeovers and I think it was the right thing to do for my brain, even if it was a bit bad for business.

I just wasn’t enjoying doing all that manual labor, recording myself, and posting about it. That gets really tedious after a while (I have been doing this twelve years). With everything else I had going on it just felt like too much. But I’m actually realizing I do enjoy doing this kind of physical work again, which is a joy. Yes, it’s stressful to be painting a deck knowing you’re getting behind on other projects and emails. For example, I’m supposed to be designing a lighting line right now but finding time between all these time consuming, laborious home makeovers has been a challenge. You can’t really multitask when you’re working with your hands, you have to be really present. I’m glad to report I’m enjoying working with my hands again and finding joy in sharing my projects with everyone. It’s a huge relief to feel that way!

On any given day, I have about three hundred things I want to do. And I struggle with never getting to the bigger picture things I want to do because I am so bogged down by the day to day. I’d love to write a memoir. I’d love to write a TV series based on my experience being on TV. I’d love to make large scale abstract paintings again. But I’m barely keeping up with my daily life, there’s no room for big conceptual projects right now. Someday…

I’ve kind of come to peace with that feeling. There are times in your life where you can grow and change and there are times in your life where just surviving is enough. I’m definitely in that survival mode mindset right now. I’m accepting you can’t take a step up until you are on stable ground.

I’m hopeful that these spring blooms are a sign of things to come. A sign of the house changing from a stressor to a place of peace and prosperity. We’ll see…