Who Says You Can’t Rock a Tool Belt with Heels?

Tool belt and heels

I love to DIY

When it comes to home repairs or pulling off DIY projects, it’s the ladies in my family rocking the tool belt.  Despite being a card carrying Daddy’s girl, I did not grow up with the kind of father who owned lots of power tools or worked around the house fixing things each weekend.  However, I do have a mother who currently owns a band saw and thinks instructions manuals are for babies.

I am a hardcore DIY’er.  I have a list longer than the square footage of my house full of home improvement projects.

My loving and supportive (and manly, did I mention manly?) husband is totally okay with our little role reversal and basically leaves me and my tools alone.

I actually enjoy going to the local ACE hardware more than the mall. 

It did not start out this way.  The early years of our marriage my husband tried to play the traditional role and took the lead with home repairs.  Of course I would go behind him and “fix” his work.  Over the years we hit our couple stride and with zero drama, I took over the handyman role.

For me, these little projects offer me a chance to work through stress while creating something unique in my home. My husband can often gauge just how stressed out I am based on how many trips I take to the hardware store.

Of course there is an added bonus to my repair minded ways, we save a lot of money. 

We are not the kind of homeowners who cannot withstand a botched home improvement project…have I mentioned my car?  My husband has a high tolerance for my efforts. Although I have shown tremendous improvement over the years…I still occasionally get something wrong.  But we can live with imperfection.  In fact, imperfection suits us just fine.

We just do not have a very, “Keeping up with the Joneses,” or the Smiths or really any neighbor mentality.

We have found a certain freedom in our shared sense of frugality. 

This extends us a lot of wiggle room with certain expenses.  For example, we just wiggle right out of caring that some of the walls in the living room are not smooth, or that I miss judged the molding length in one spot; where there just so happens to now be a large plant.

About Suzanne Coblentz

14 Responses to “Who Says You Can’t Rock a Tool Belt with Heels?”

Read below or add a comment...

  1. Judy Kline says:

    Great blog post, women are gladiators!
    You rock!

  2. The not-keeping-up-with-the-Joneses mentality is so important to getting out of debt. You are wise to take the imperfections in stride. I admire your motivation to renovate. I could use a little of that sort of initiative. Keep hammering away – at both your house and your debt.

    • Thanks @Prudence! I could not agree with you more. The ability to stop caring how others perceive you is tremendously freeing. I am lucky to have met a great guy that shares my distaste for commercialism. Keep up the great work with your debt free goals and thanks for commenting!

  3. Travis says:

    I love the thrill of taking a task by the horns, learning something new, and accomplishing something I’ve never done before. It may not be perfect……but hey, little imperfections are what makes life interesting. People who obsess over perfection live a life of stress. Did I just say that? I should probably take my own advice sometimes…

  4. I admire women who can carry a tool. That’s just awesome that you are able to be contented with what you have. You rock.

  5. Glad to hear this! Kudos.

  6. Slackerjo says:

    My sewing machine manual has more danger warnings than my chop saw manual. I still use both though.They are both essential to my workshop.

  7. JennyR says:

    I need to take serious lessons from you…so impressed!

  8. @JennyR well, I am not sure you want to take lessons from me, let’s wait and see how the kitchen turns out LOL. Thanks for stopping by!

Leave a Comment...

*

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.