I know they say you can't buy happiness, but I'm beginning to wonder.

Let me explain.

In my house, when we undertake a remodeling project, it is my husband and I who do the work. When the bathrooms needed a makeover, we were the ones who stripped the wallpaper, spackled, painted, laid tile and installed new fixtures.

The results, though satisfying, were hard earned. With little spare time and more than our share of middle-age aches and pains, it took us a year to finish each bathroom. And living around the mess didn't make me very happy.

Now we are remodeling our kitchen, a project that began last January when I removed the curtains and wall decorations while my husband ripped off the wood trim and pulled up the old flooring.

In early February, we laid a new floor. By March, we were stripping off the old wallpaper, as we did in April and May and… You get the picture.

Because the old paper had been hung on bare drywall, it clung tenaciously to the "unsized" walls. First we tried a steamer, but only the outermost layer surrendered to the moisture. Next, we sprayed the walls with a mixture of fabric softener and water, a "sure-fire" method, our friends told us.

Although more of the paper was coaxed from the walls, it came at a price. Little bits of the dry wall came too, and that meant more spackling. Finally, we resorted to putty knives, scraping with one hand and pulling the ultra-thin strips of backing with the other.

By November, we had finished stripping the walls, almost. Only the stuff behind the cupboards remains, but we both needed to see visible progress, so we hung wallpaper and had new countertops installed.

A year later, most of the work is finished. Again, the results were hard earned, and I wasn't too happy fixing dinner amid that mess, either.

Which brings me to my initial point, about being able to buy happiness.

During the holidays, my husband and I, on a whim, decided to buy new living room furniture: a sofa, love seat and coffee and end tables.

It was Dec. 27, our 30th wedding anniversary, and we headed to the stores for their annual after-Christmas sales. We stopped at one store, then another. We returned to the first store, where we made our purchase. It was all accomplished in a matter of hours.

A week later, the furniture arrived, so we hauled out the old and ran the sweeper in places that hadn't seen the light of day in a dozen years. Inside of a day, our living room was transformed from an eclectic mish mash of hand-me-downs to a decorated, unified living area.

And I was happy.

So this is how it feels, I kept telling my husband, as I moved around the living room, thoroughly enjoying the ease with which we had accomplished the makeover.

I've been smiling for weeks, although I have to tell you, we haven't received the credit card bill yet.

Linda K. Schmitmeyer is a freelance writer living in Middlesex Township. Her e-mail address is lks260@aol.com