The Nesting Mode is a Terrible Thing

When you have ADD. 

We got back from our late honeymoon, and the long stay at the hotel has inspired me.

 .. To throw away everything I own.   There's something about living in an empty hotel room, out of a bag with 3 dresses (and 9 bathing suits) that was really, really appealing.   This seemed really simple until I got home and remembered I really *like* all the crap I have.  But, my God.. there's so much stuff.  

So far I have simply resorted to randomly throw away various pieces of clothing as I fold laundry.  I have to be quick about it, because if they linger in a plastic 'donate' bag by the door too long, I eventually talk myself into keeping it for refashioning, using the fabric for something else.. a dusting rag..  etc.   I think what the problem *really* is, is that I do not have a walk in closet.  Clearly.

The kitchen also got hit, and I managed to toss all the ratty old spatulas, and the 5 sets of measuring cup sets.  As well as 800 packets of soy sauce.  Then I thought, what if we go camping, spur of the moment, and make rice.. and I'll have no soy sauce?!  And then I thought that's exactly how I end up with 800 packets of soy sauce, and that if I served it with rice while camping, Mr Snork would refuse to eat it anyway, citing health concerns, FDA guidelines, and average life expectancy of people who scavenge for food at the bottooms of their kitchen drawers. 

I did, however, keep the 200 ketchup packets, because parting with two perfectly edible things at once might seriously scar my psyche. 

I have also stripped down the living room curtains, and made Mr Snork put up a traverse rod we've had for ages, and am now working on making the sheers into austrian shades, of sort.  I was pretty sure getting the rod hanging was the major obstacle, but it's now been 4 curtain-less days, and an unreasonable sunny/hot living room.  Oops.

I am waiting for the mail ordered sheer austrian tape.   Had I known the sheer type can only be gotten online, Mr Snork might have gotten an extension.   Something tells me it's going to be a disaster.  Horizontal gathers just seem wrong.  I mean, I found some really good pictures online, but my sheers are looking at me with a smug smirk that tells me they will not go down easily.  It's not just their attidude, either.  I used some opaque white tape JoAnn Fabric carries for the edges, and the sheers curved in mutinously.  Something tells me that adding 5-6 more segments is not going to improve the situation.   Good thing I got a load of drapery weights at a yard sale for a nickel.  Fingers crossed.

In addition this, I'm re-making the curtains to add heading tape, pleats, hooks, etc.  This requires piecing panels together, by hand;  so, mostly, I've been staring at a giant pile of curtain.  I have a sore back that's not conducive to hours of hand sewing.  I'm contemplating Stitch-Witchery, or some other iron on adhesive.   Horrifying as it may be, it might be the only way these curtains will go up before Strawberry gets here.

Speaking of whom, I have to paint her room.  Green, with bubbles?  Or flowers?  And, may be a monkey.  Might have to stencil the monkey..   She's also going to need curtains.  I'm waiting for Mr Snork to rip out the carpet and put down flooring in that room.  He's seriously lagging on his nesting syndrome, because I sense no sense of urgency about him whatsoever.  Although, he is remarkably good at humoring me, so there's that.  Had I said today I need that room painted purple, hire an artist to paint a castle, and need him to get into the walls to wire some lights into said castle, I swear, he wouldn't bat an eyelash.  He'd pretend to look up castle painting artists adn their credentials and lay low, waiting for the nightmare to pass.

AND, in a truly exciting development, I think I have tracked down the T-Mobile dress reincarnation.  What do you think:

And, this, from McCall (#6029) with a fluffiier skirt:

Well, it's close enough.  It's closer than the other 'reincarnation' I procured on Ebay:

 Might have to make both.  After the curtains.  And room painting.  And shady sheers.  And a quilt I am making...  (true story).  And, of course, the wedding thank you cards.  (Insert very ashamed smiley face)

And, only, like, 6 weeks to go till Strawberry!  (Who is no longer breech, after 9 days of 4-hour-a-day snorkeling schedule). 

Surprise Garage Sale WIN

I'm behind on bloggying, because I've been wrestling 90 yards of velvet into some curtains every night after work, but this last weekend...

June was gonna be a “Thrift Free” month, because I can’t help myself. I guess it’s not THAT bad,  I could instead have a nasty Starbucks habit, like certain significant others..  So, if I walk out S-Boutique $4-5 later with a dress, teacup, pair of shoes, whatever – it’s not the end of the world, right? Except the Starbucks disappears into Mr Snork’s scary metabolism, and my dress pile (to make something out of) has grown considerably.


Anyway, this Saturday, Mr Snork woke me up at 6:30, for a surprise, which had me in a pretty sour mood.  He's been talking about it since Thursday night and it sounded shady.  There aren’t very many things I am receptive to that early. So, he stuffed me in the vehicle, with my mood improving tea thermos, and went off driving to me muttering “probably somewhere ridiculous”. He was positively giddy, and I was a little worried he secretly signed me up for another 5k. But then, he pulled up and unleashed me onto this driveway.. where sewing stuff was e v e r y w h e r e.   I may have squealed a little.

Mr Snork found what looked like the mother of all crafty sales on CL, and has planned to deliver me there right at 7 am on the dot.  (God forbid someone else walks away with my stuff).  It was a little amazing, and the woman hosting the sale was the most energetic, chatty garage sale haver EVER. At first it was annoying, but then it became contagious. She was selling stuff like the guy a the farmers’ market sells bundt cakes. Loudly, and with conviction. Do I need a sewing machine? How about some ribbon? How about tassels? Do I know how to use tassels? Well, if I did, I would want them for sure. Thread? Oh, I got thread? Take MORE thread! How about a snap maker? Look at this pillow!! On and on and on.

In a stroke of luck (yet again) she had a Giant Curtain Rod. This thing is meant for a place much grander than my two bedroom, it’s like a sideways palm tree, skinned. But, it just so happens, my mother gave me the most ridiculous set of curtains – something like 20 yards of 54” fabric, sewn together into one, 108” by 20 yard piece of velvet football field awesomeness. In the 1500’s, they’d make the royal tents in the field of battle out of this stuff. And it’s been sitting, all 190 lbs of it, in my closet, because the type of rod that would hold them up does NOT sell at Ross for $6.99. (I love Ross rods).

$1 Curtain Rod. I am now knee deep in sewing curtains. And then duvet covers. And table runners. And chair covers. More curtains. Who knows.

$3 Bolt of green raw silk. It’s SO pretty. The pictures really fail here.   $1 bolt of stripey green/purple silk. $1 bolt of quilt interfacing/curtain interlining stuff (Not pictured, but it's giant and brand new, in plastic).

A Trash Bag o’Thread. $1. Mostly new rolls, serger thread even, despite the fact that serger hunt has been unsuccessful, I'm preparing.  Some spray adhesive. Some snap tape for duvet covers. Some more silk (brown, dupioni).

A $1 shelf, already hung by the door, with some teacup hooks to accommodate keys. Mr Snork really took initiative on that, because every morning he hunts the house for my keys, which I leave various places the night before. On one occasion he’s found them in the fridge.   I don't care for the green color, but I guess it goes well with the dolphin theme (to be found nowhere else in my home) untill I strip and stain it. 

Mr Snork also really liked the curtain hold back things. Especially after he was told they came from a sister’s old house in Ohio. 50c. Did you know you can use them to HANG curtains? I saw pictures in a magazine. It’s true.   Mostly over triangle shaped windows, but that might not stop me..

At some point, I looked up to see the Mr holding three bolts of fabric, a giant curtain rod, and various odds and ends, just hanging out, looking at book titles. The garage saler’s neighbor shared that her husband would rather die than be there, and I felt extra lucky. And a little guilty, I don’t know if I could be that good if he decided to, say, take me to 8 auto parts shops in one day. I might snap by #2, and offer we order whatever we need online..

I offered repeatedly that he set the stuff down in a corner, and frolick freely, but he told me later, he was being stalked for the curtain rod and possibly some other loot, and setting it down didn’t seem safe, and he’d hate to see me get violent in a driveway..   Ahhh, love. 

AND, the best part of this sale is that the hostess and I exchanged phone numbers, because, apparently, if ever I need more stuff (like a fabric cutting board), there's a good chance she has it (turns out she did).  Squeal!!!

Sarah's Paintings

I met Sarah on a ThumperTalk.com Girls Weekend party 3 years ago.  She was my age, rode a bike by herself, just like me, [meaning, without a boyfriend/mechanic] and by the end of the weekend she invited me over to her house for next weekend, to ride. 

I remember thinking how cool her house was, she had all these paintings, tapestries, and handmade things.  It turned out we had everything in common.  She paints with acrylics - so do I!  She sews - so do I!  She makes her own jewelry - I always want to! She cooks - I cook!  She likes colored socks, sculpey clay, shiny things - the list never ends.  By themselves, lots of these things are common, but she also rode a dirt bike. 

Few years later, we both picked ourselves up a boyfriend/mechanic (ha!) off the internet, but we still ride together whenever possible.  We spent the weekend at her house up in Palmdale, CA, where she rents a giant house with tons of wall space (for same amount Jesse and I rent a 2 bedroom, but I'm not bitter or anything.)  I love that her walls are all hung with her paintings.  (Kinda like my house, except, I have, like, 3 walls, all full.. but, still, not bitter or anything).

I've told her about Etsy, but she says she doesn't ever want to sell her paintings.  She paints what makes her happy and gives a lot away as presents, or, in my case, when asked.  :D  So I ran around her house, taking pictures and putting in orders. 

I am all types of behind on my bloggy, I was actually gonna post these last week, but I stuck my camera card into my makeup case, and since there's no reason for SD cards to be anywhere near eyeshadow, I had a hard time finding it until an occasion for bright green eye shadow came up.

She (like me!) likes awesome colors and awesome sunsets.  We've sat at campfires, looking at sunsets, talking about how cool they'd look painted and hung on our walls. 

A lot of the stuff is inspired by trips and travels and cool places.  I like that it probably reminds her of trips she took, more than a photo album on a bookshelf.  And it reminds me that it'd be cool to make some photo albums.  If I am too keep all my trip pictures in Picasa, really, what's the point.. 

I liked the "little ball paintings" so much she gave me one. 

Here's the one I got:

I like it in my living room, it goes nicely with the bright yellow wall, bright pink chairs, and green curtains. 

There are also some abstract fun ones, on occasion featuring pieces of glass or other decorative stuff glued on. 

 

Of course, dirtbikes must be involved..  This one was a litle risque, so it is currently housed in a closet, but it makes me giggle every time I see it. 

And, one of my favorites, inspired by a trip to India and their art:

I think she should paint me one.  I'd have to get rid of some furniture to make walls space, but Jesse's pretty used to moving stuff around when a Feng Shui mood hits me.  (Read: when I unexpectedly drag home yet another 'piece')

I personally don't like Koi fish, they are like oversized gold fish, and not anywhere near as cool as sharks or squid, (or awesome Batwing Fish that grace a certain chick's forearm..) and nonethelss get a lot of exposure in art and, puzzling-ly, tattoos..  but the painted ones look cool.  

Few years ago, I picked this one out of her closet: 

When she gets tired of them, she stashes them away, (or if they feature naked body parts that we aren't sure are OK to display large scale over a dinner table).  Sometimes, she repaints over them, or adds stuff to the existing painting.   I acquired a giant elephant painting, from the pile of stuff to be painted over. 

Tragically, as an elephant sized picture, there's only space in garage, but I am working on it.  That and a giant old picture frame (which Jesse argued could NEVER fit in the truck, and had to be proven wrong) straight from Connecticut.  She doesn't like the look of framed canvas, and I do.  Especially with frames that spent some 50 years hanging out in an old Connecticut attick.  Win!

Curtain Tiebacks

A really easy, almost instant gratification project. I have brown fabric to make a border for my living room curtains. I have been lagging on that, since it would require to take the curtains down and do some hand stitching. I also got enough fabric to make some throw pillows and curtain tiebacks.

The brown goes well with the green AND the pink AND the yellow. Score.

Two yard strips of 10" fabric, some interfacing, couple short pieces of gold cord and a couple of loop shaped hook deals you see on bras (but bigger).



Not really much in the way of construction: I sewed a tube, slipped the cord in and stitched one end close.



In retrospect, the cord is a nice touch, but you never see it. Another little hook or a ring stitched to the surface would have been fine.



After turning them right side out, I pressed, stitched the other end closed and hand stitched the little loop hook to the inside. I like the 'floating' look, but I think if I do it again, I will go with some brass rings to attach the the ends.



And the finished product:



The Christmas tree is actually what prompted this project in the first place. I didn't want the semi-finished curtains to hang all funny looking about the tree. Now, if only I got around to hemming the Green Fluff, seen pinned up pitifully behind the tree.. Otherwise, I'm pretty pleased. Top brown border still to come.

The Christmas Tree - Fake or Real?

I never even thought about fake Christmas tree. It seemed so .. fake? I totally envisioned Jesse hauling upstairs a giant pine I deemed acceptable at the local lot. About 9 feet, long needles, fluffy, and possibly still with traces of fox fur from sheltering all things cute and furry in the wild woods. Never mind that we *apparently* have 8 foot ceilings. That’s Jesse’s problem.

Until we walked into Target for some lights, and there was the 7’5” Slim Cashmere Pre Lit Pointy Needled Happiness. It was $99 and looked magical. You can't see the trunk through the branches, and it's all types of fluffy (and pointy) It's a 'slim' version, and they make no full one that I could find. I was a little bummed - I think that cuts down on the number of ornaments I was going to wrap it with. But slim fits perfectly in our living room, without having to move furniture to the garage. Score.

Of course, I can’t just buy the tree. I must research every fake tree available. Speaking of which, did you know Macy’s sells pre-decorated trees? Themed and everything. I can’t find them online, but they were in the store. I only imagine they sell them with decorations, because they are pretty sad looking trees for $700-$900.

So, having read every online review (23 at Target alone and all but 2 magical) and posting an online poll on a favorite message board, we decided to go with fake.

It looks amazing. It did in Target, too, but running around and looking at all the other trees further convinced me it’s the most beautiful one. I even went to the lot – not only did they not have my favorite long needled ones, but they had baked a little in the SoCal sun, and looked dry and yellow. Dry and yellow in mid November doesn’t look good for December. Or January 7th – the Eastern Orthodox Christmas.



Pros:

It's beautiful, on all sides. (No more spinning the tree around to find the fullest spot!)
Jesse didn't have to haul a real tree upstairs
It fits perfectly in the apartment
Pre lit - once you assemble the 3 sections together - it pretty much looks fantastic, even pre-fluffing.
It holds heavy ornaments

Cons:

It doesn't smell like pine. To be fixed shortly by pine scented candles/wall plug ins.

And, while it doesn't smell like pine, it has adorable little pine cones.




I have a small collection of Christmas ornaments, and we’ll expand it a bit more this year. We already got some clear glass balls – to fill with glitter? And post Catholic Christmas I plan a full on combative invasion of Macy’s, Bloomingdales, and Rogers Garden invasion for the sale ornaments. I do this every year in lieu of Black Friday. I might don elbow pads to better push people out of the way.

Project Complete - Framed TV

The hanging, framed TV is here!


A couple holes in the walls for the wires to be fished through, and this project is done! I’m super excited, I wanted that TV up and gone off the floor space.

It’s only been a couple months, but it feels like we’ve been planning it forever. Jesse and I saw the awesome old frame in a Pacifica junk shop during Fog Fest, couple months ago, and thought it might be cool to frame our TV. Then we went to Aaron Brothers, got told it would be about $500-700 to get a frame about 30x40, got butthurt, and went back to Pacifica's Debbie's Attic. $50 dollars later, the Frame was had.

The wall got painted an Golden Nugget Yellow. The TV bracket got ordered from Amazon ($27!) Surprisingly, it got stellar reviews, so I’m hoping it won’t just fold in anytime soon, leaving a pile of plasma TV behind.

I negotiated a TV position 3” higher than Jesse wanted it. Actually, a LOT higher than Jesse wanted it. I had a girlfriend over to take notes for when she goes to hang her TV, and further my cause, if need be, but she sided with Jesse on the whole TV height deal. They both lost. My contention was that it would look stupid at knee level or wherever he thought it’d be ideal, and he didn’t want to spend money in chiropractor bills from craning his neck. 3” accidental inches later, a deal was struck. By sheer luck, he measured wrong (this type of sheer luck happens often for him, HA!) and the TV is up where I like it. Something about not wanting to take 8 bolts out of studs. Score!

I view it as more of a pretty frame on the wall, so I’m not really concerned with “optimal viewing angles” and whatever other rubbish he was babbling about. But he does the actual watching of the TV, so I couldn’t hoist it up by the ceiling like I’d have liked.



Jesse got every swatch of purple color imaginable, and when I had a complete retinal overload, he just picked. He’s a lot better at picking out things that make sense, as opposed to veering towards the brightest, most sensory obnoxious option available, so the purple we ended up with I love. It looks good with yellow, and it seems to be the same red/purple colour family of the Danish Chair cushions, which pleases me.
I guess with only 2” showing you can’t really go wrong anyway, but now I have ¾ of a can of a brilliant purple color that’s making Jesse nervous. (Bathroom? Hallway wall? Stripes? Background for Golden Nugget comet tails? The possibilities!) From now on, I think we need only pick out the swatches of the most basic in house brand paint offered. Then, if there's r e a l l y nothing that strikes my fancy, we can proceed to the 7 million shades Benjamin Moore offers.



The inside of the frame got marked, and painted 4 layers of purple.

Layer 1 was pretty unimpressive:


Layer 2 was still weak:


Then it got all types of better:



Oddly, if you look closely, it needs another coat, but barely 2.5” are visible top and bottom, and it was midnight at that point. It came out to a really nice purple:



The 35lb frame got hoisted on two enormous 75lb anchors, into studs (WIN!); the TV got hung in middle.



I am really pleased with the profile, I thought it would stick out a lot further. The Cheetah Wall Mount had 1.9 profile, according to the specs, the frame is ~3" thick. The purple hides all the bracket nonsense, what little of it you might spot from the side.


Jesse’s currently wandering Ace Hardware looking for tools to make holes in drywall for wires. (My idea of punching it with a fist didn’t fly. I had others, involving screwdriver and a hammer, and butter knife and a heavy shoe, but never even got to voice them)

The semi finished product, as viewed from the couch (chiropractor nothing,) and imagine the wires hidden inside the wall:



We still need somewhere to stack all the DVD, Wii, and related fluff. I found an awesome bookshelf type thing on Craigslist, but Jesse vetoed. Too big, he said. Phhhth says I. But the search goes on.

UPDATE

Jesse made holes in wall, and wires are now hidden. The holes look better than if he had let me take a screwdriver and hammer to them:



The finished product:




I also discovered that we can hook up our laptop to the TV, and Google Pictures Screen Saver. I can have the TV play music and show me pictures of me, ALL day EVERY day.