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Friday, June 26, 2009

Friday Night Lights?

It's Friday night and I'm contemplating folding a boatload of laundry. Or sleep. Or blogging. You can guess which one won out, though I have so little to share.

Doug and I are heading down to Connecticut this weekend, but I'm staying up in the Hartford area and he's heading down to Monroe. Not sure what he has planned, but I have an afternoon with my sister and mother planned - picking out material for the quilt I plan to make, getting my nephew a birthday gift (he turned 10 on Monday. Ten! I remember when my sister had us over to her house to tell us that she was pregnant. I was at UConn, living in Buckley, and Doug had tickets to go to a Squirrel Nut Zippers concert. He didn't want to go to the show, but thought I would want to go so he got tickets, hoping I'd go, too. I didn't. He did. He still holds a grudge about that.), going to dinner with my mom, dad and brother to celebrate my brother's birthday, and then heading to the Hartford Stage to see a play. Should be a good day, but packed with activity. Must leave the house early. Probably should go to bed instead of blog.

Got my haircut tonight and it's shorter. Shorter than I've had it in a year or so, but no one else but me would probably notice it. Again, I will not likely maintain this look, seeing how I don't blow dry my hair, but at least for one night it looks good!

Tonight Doug and I went to BJ's (this is what our Friday nights are like now - trips to BJ's and laundry!) and we got some books. I've become addicted to the book section at BJ's, as it's such a hodgepodge of titles and it's such fun to see what they'll actually have. Tonight we picked up Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, When You Are Engulfed in Flames, Mornings on Horseback, and Leading Men, a TCM film guide. Doug's pouring over the guide right now. He's on Harold Lloyd, a physical comedian from the silent era. Never heard of him.

Can I tell you how boring Toyota ads are? There is nothing in a Toyota ad that would make me want to buy one of their equally boring cars. Right now a Chrysler ad is on and at least it has good background music, nice scenery, and a good message - "Come see what we've built for you." The last Toyota ad I saw had some kind of keyboard soundtrack, a bunch of white people tossing around a beach ball, and then a shot of some giant Camry driving along a wooded road. Boring. Don't think I'd buy a Toyota if I were in the market for a new car, and this is certainly one of the reasons why.

Oh, yes - today our new storm door in the front was installed. Hallelujah! It's so nice to be able to close the door and have it actually fully close, and it's nice to be able to have the front door open to let in a little air without worrying about the cats busting out of the bottom of the door. It has a sliding window, too - one on the top half and one on the bottom half of the door, and the screen is permanently in it. This makes for easy access to breeze - no need to swap out windows and screens come each change of season - just slide down the top window and the screen is automatically there. We never knew we could get so excited about a door, but we love it.

What we don't love is now that the door looks nice and fresh, our front steps really show their need for help. There's this shamrock carved into the top step in the front and it's in need of a little filling around the edges. I bought the mortar stuff that we need to fill in the cracks, because we also need to re-attached several stones that have fallen out of our back steps, but between busy weekends, the weather, and just plain laziness neither of these projects have gotten done. The weekend of July 11th. That's my new goal for mixing the mortar (or is it cement? Haven't a clue, but I know I have to mix it in a big bucket) and doing my masonry work. I'm sure I'll have photos, so check back for that blog.

Okay, my eyes are closing. Definitely time to either go to bed or get up and do something. Have a good weekend!

Thursday, June 25, 2009

I'm talkin' 'bout the man in the mirror

I think the whole world is shocked and saddened by the news of the death of Michael Jackson. At age 50 no less! And right before he launched a huge series of shows! I admit that I was surprised to hear that he was going to tour again, or at least play in London this summer - isn't that a little out of character for our otherwise almost reclusive King of Pop? Maybe his untimely and unfortunate death is related to this impending schedule. Maybe not. All I know is that the world is definitely a different place now that Michael Jackson isn't in it.

What kid growing up in the '80s didn't adore the Thriller album? What kid didn't throw little living-room concerts, dancing on the coffee table while singing into an old brush, the vacuum cleaner nozzle, a plastic microphone, belting out Billie Jean? I was always partial to PYT (Pretty Young Thing) and The Girl is Mine, but who didn't love Wanna be Startin' Somethin'? I think we wore that record out in our house, and I know we weren't the only ones. And then there was the Sega game that my brother and I had. Moonwalker. Greatest video game soundtrack ever. Now I wish I had that game, had saved the Sega. That's one to keep for the ages.

It is true that MJ grew to be a little odd in his later years, and kept out of the spotlight. And even if you rarely heard about him, or heard of him only once a year when he either exiled himself to the Middle East, or was spotted by paparazzi whiter than ever, at least you knew that he was still out there, still living, still connected to all of our lives in some way. And now he's gone. And so is Farrah Fawcett, another icon of a by-gone era.

Doug just came upstairs to turn on the Michael Jackson news coverage, because there is news coverage of his death. Anderson Cooper is interviewing Reverend Al Sharpton, reading statements from Madonna and Quincy Jones... My aunt wrote in one of her emails today that it's as if a president died. And it is, almost even more so. Michael Jackson, as Reverend Al Sharpton says, was a trailblazer; he transcended race, music, and life itself. "He was not just some eccentric freak... he was brilliant." Well said. Today's loss is truly great, and I mean it.

Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Rainy weekends

So, what does one do when the weather stinks and one has no real plans? Nothing. Yay! It's so nice to do nothing, but I wish that it weren't raining while we were doing nothing. But actually, we did do stuff this weekend, just nothing big. No road trips, no appointments, nothing necessary. Just relaxing fun. The best kind.

Saturday we lounged around in the morning and then headed off to the Blue Hills Reservation, taking advantage of the lull in the rain. Saturday was actually rather humid, so we didn't do much walking. Plus, there were these little tiny frogs hopping about on the trail and we didn't want to step on them (aren't we kind?), so we cut our walk somewhat short and headed out to... Dunkin' Donuts for some iced coffee. I'm not hooked by any means, but I do like to drink them now. Decaf, though. And I was trying Splenda in them for a while, but that stuff just doesn't taste right. I'll gladly risk weight gain, diabetes and whatever else the real sugar might bring, but no more Splenda, please. After Dunks Doug and I went around looking for a bookcase for our growing collection of books. I've been on a massive book-buying frenzy these past few months and we are outgrowing our current book space. We didn't end up getting one, though, so the search will continue on some other rainy weekend. Bookcases are rather expensive, by the way.

Sunday the rain appeared again, and I headed out into it early on to get my grocery shopping done. I returned from the grocery store in time for a visit from Ryan and Janet and Peter, visiting Boston from their home in New York. So good to see them! We haven't seen them since our wedding (just typed "weeding"... oops), but we haven't seen Peter since he was a tiny baby in a stroller - maybe 6 months old or so? It's been a while. And what a cutie he is - and a lover of music. He was enthralled by Doug's guitar- here's a photo of him strumming. He's actually quite good at it.
After R & J & P left, Doug and I went out so that I could finish my grocery shopping (needed yogurts and Whole Foods has my new favorite kind... Brown Cow coffee flavor. I've always liked coffee-flavored foods, like ice cream and yogurt, and the Brown Cow yogurt has a mild flavor and is very, very creamy). We did that, but we also decided to stop by Crate & Barrel to see what they had to offer in terms of bookcases (nothing in our price range, unfortunately) and ended up coming home with a 60% off floor-sample chair.
In our defense, we've been wanting to move the Poang chair down to the basement, as it's a perfect Wii chair and that's where our Wii is now, so we've moved the Poang and put this one in its place. The cat wasn't included in the purchase, but Sasha's now a permanent fixture on the chair (when Wyatt's not on it, of course).

And while it's not technically part of the weekend, on Monday boy Chris stayed at the Sheriko Inn while in town for a conference and we took him out to dinner at Kiku Yama, a local Japanese steakhouse. Chris was bold and got sushi, ordering Boston roll and Philadelphia roll. The Philly roll had cream cheese in it, along with smoked salmon. What a flavor combo! Doug got brave and mooched a piece of sushi off of Chris - he'd never had fish sushi before; only California roll (with just the veggies).

What to do now that the rainy weekend is over? Look forward to the rest of the rainy week. Our new storm door in the front is being installed on Friday (as long as it's not raining that day... fingers crossed!), and Saturday we're headed down to CT - I'm visiting my brother for his birthday and Doug's heading down to the family homestead in Monroe. We haven't been back to CT since April, I don't think, or at least to the Hartford area, so maybe it's about time. I just hope it's sunny by that point. A rainy weekend in Connecticut is not ideal.

Friday, June 19, 2009

It's a mission statement!

Today I read an article on effective time management that was written before email was invented. Well, not really, but written before email was widely used. Published date on this article is February 1997. Yikes! I like the part that says, "Don't interrupt your work when the mail comes." Yeah, as if that's anyone's problem. If written today, I bet it would say something along the lines of, "Don't interrupt your work when you hear all the little beeps flowing from your Outlook, or feel the vibrations of your Blackberry, or hear the endless ringing of your telephone, or see out of the corner of your eye one of your staff standing at the door waiting to ask another question..."

One part of the article hit home, though. The part on balancing the different sectors of one's life. The basic idea of this section is that not only does one have to practice effective time management in one's professional life, but also should practice effective time management in one's personal life. What are my personal goals, and what is my personal mission statement? Am I spending my time in a way that reflects this mission statement? Sure, watching TV and taking Facebook quizzes are good ways to get my mind off of work, because these are activities that don't require any thinking at all. None. But do these activities help me reach my personal goals of being more physically fit, doing more craft projects, or reading more books? Or what about volunteering? Old people aren't getting any younger, and they're not going to wait for me to watch House Hunters four times a night. Many of the things that I like to do and that I believe are things that define me are passing me by. I need to get some motivation, and this personal mission statement idea is an interesting one.

What would mine be? I thought about that a lot this past weekend, while this post was sitting in draft form. And I think it would be something simple. Something like, "Wake up each morning looking forward to the way I'm going to spend my day and go to bed each night feeling good about what I accomplished." Is that a mission statement, though, or more like a set of goals? Who knows. The point is that I read this old article from Harvard Business Review and thought that most of it was useless, but there was this little gem that I pulled out of it. Much of life is like that - a lot of useless stuff but a few gems once in a while. It's those gems that keep us going.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Just call me Odor Eaters.

Tonight I got home early enough to make us dinner (please let this trend of getting home in the daylight last all summer...), so I threw together a Boboli pizza. My half has the peppers, but with a pesto base the pizza was pretty good. What did we ever do without Boboli wheat crusts? Anyway, to celebrate our early and homemade dinner, Wyatt treated us to a little humping action while we ate. Doug and I are on the couch eating our pizza when we hear Wyatt make his little needy cry. We turn around to see him getting on top of the blanket that was resting on the back of the couch. He's biting it, and making biscuits on it, and purring to beat the band. And then his little hips start to thrust. I took a video of it with the intention of posting it here so that everyone would be able to see the torture that we endure from Wyatt and his randiness, but why would anyone want to sit through a minute of watching the cat hump a blanket? I'll spare you the evidence of Wyatt's love, but search for it on YouTube if you really are in need of some base humor.

In other news, I was thinking of what kind of careers women can have as mothers that are flexible and would still pay you decent money if you did them part-time. I was thinking about this on the way home from Maine on Sunday, as Chris had been talking about her job and day care and making it all work. I did some Internet investigating, and some possibilities are freelancer (freelancing with anything, I guess, since you can dictate your own hours), nurse, dental hygienist, pharmacist (pretty much anything in the health professions), teacher, cosmetologist... the usual. So I asked Doug what he would think if I ever decided to work part time as a cosmetologist, or a dental hygienist (which would require another degree. Actually, all of these things would require more schooling, so unless one was smart and planned ahead one would be faced with getting some sort of certificate or degree in order to pursue as a new mother one of these paths). He couldn't picture me as a cosmetologist, and while he could more easily picture me flossing people's teeth and handing the dentist the Novocaine needles, he decided that he had the perfect part-time job for me. One that he could totally picture me doing, with enthusiasm that he's never seen me bring to any other job. He thinks that a career as a bowling alley assistant would be ideal for me. Taking the money, activating the lanes, giving people the bowling shoes, but especially spraying down the hot and sweaty worn shoes with antibacterial spray. I'm looking for a real conversation, real advice from my husband and he tells me that I should make a career out of using an aerosol can. Thanks!

However, I did get very enthusiastic today about libraries. Every once in a while I get on a libraries kick. I get tired of trying to think of what else I could do with my life when I am in a fine profession already, but just maybe not in the right specialization. I've always said that I'd be great in a public library, and today I agreed with myself. I had renewed vigor for public library work and started to imagine myself working in reference at a mid- to large-sized urban library, helping patrons with their reference questions, providing reader advisory services, designing community outreach programs, fixing the copy machine, giving directions, whatever - just out with people and working in a community. That's what I want to do. Eventually I might want to move into management again, maybe to the assistant director or director level, but I'd be very content for a while to work as a librarian, to work on the front lines. The economy isn't helping me reach my goals, though. Towns are not hiring new librarians or adding new positions. Towns are cutting back library funding and are cutting back hours of existing staff, many cutting staff altogether. Until the economy gets better and more librarians retire, I will just have to be content reading Library Journal and belonging to the PLA.

Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Doughnuts, doughnuts everywhere

I've got to make this somewhat quick, as I have a date with Humphrey Bogart in The Maltese Falcon, but I have to share these great photos of our weekend in Maine visiting Chris and Chris.

Whenever we go to Portland we have a lot of fun. Unfortunately, we haven't been there as much as we would like to be there, but we do try to go as often as we can. On Saturday, Doug and I stopped at Congdon's Doughnuts in Wells, ME, on a tip from my co-worker, and picked up a baker's dozen to share with Chris and Chris. After all, nothing says friendship like everyone gaining 5 pounds by eating doughnuts together. Saturday was a nice day (The sun! The sun!) but we decided to spend a good portion of the afternoon in the HART shelter, where Lulu found Chris and Chris and decided to have them take her home with them. It's a pretty cool shelter - the cats have a lot of space to roam around, and they all have adequate bedding, plenty of food, and lots of people to take care of them. I could have taken at least three home with me, but Doug and I really are reluctant to make that plunge into owning four cats. That just seems extreme.

I have a lot of photos of Chris and Chris from this weekend. Unfortunately, none of them showcase girl Chris's growing baby bump - but trust me, it's there! It's so funny - the last time we saw Chris and Chris we did not know of the bun in the oven, even though it was there. And now when we see Chris and Chris we know of the bun, we see evidence of the bun, and there is a whole new part to the equation. It's a good thing, for sure, and let me share the photos of the soon-to-be parents. This one was taken at dinner on Saturday night (good choice of restaurants, guys - very tasty) and this one at the Lobster Shack, home of greater Portland's best lobster roll (and what a view... I'll get to that) and this last one at the Portland Head Light If they look wet it's because they are - it rained all day on Sunday. Not a hard, driving rain, but enough to make walking around in the outdoors a little unpleasant.

We persevered despite the rain, though. The Lobster Shack is where we headed for lunch. There were great views from this place, which is situated right on the edge of Cape Elizabeth. We could have dined at one of these picnic tables if the day were nicer, right up near the water, but we ate inside, in where the lobsters are waiting to meet their death in a pot of boiling water and in a buttery hot dog roll.I was momentarily struck with a desire to free one of them, to grab one and throw it into the nearby sea, but I didn't and instead stepped up to the register and ordered my cheeseburger. The food was good - put Doug in a stupor but he quickly recovered and we went about the rest of our day.

The rest of our day included a trip out to Portland Head Light. It seems that Chris and Chris always go here when they have visitors, but this is the first time that they visited in the rain. Here is the requisite shot of the visiting couple in front of the lighthouse I don't know if we were sure we wanted to head out to the lighthouse, given the weather, but I sort-of thought that it would be the perfect weather for a lighthouse - just the kind of weather they were made for. And look this dark sky against the crisp white paint of the lighthouse - makes for quite the nice contrast. I'm glad we went, despite feeling a bit like drowned rats before we left.Three drowned rats, see how they... eat doughnuts?

Doug and I took some of the remaining doughnuts home with us after we left the lighthouse and left the guitar store (yes, there was a guitar store in our weekend. Two, actually, now that I think about it), and we're still eating them. Here's the one I had tonight: Congdon's indeed makes a tasty doughnut, but tonight my doughnut was a little hard. There's one left. I think I might leave this one for Wyatt.

Saturday, June 13, 2009

For what it's worth.

Doug named my blog. Back in the summer when I was trying to think up a new blog name Doug suggested Nothing Ventured, Nothing Gained, and after his suggestion I just couldn't think of anything else. It's like my mind went blank. I never really and truly liked that name, though, since a) I didn't think of it myself, and b) it suggests that I'm a go-getter. I'm not, really. However, I liked that the blog name was a cliché, a little saying that one might stick in a sentence while talking with one's neighbor, or bus driver, or whatever. I spent a good part of tonight wasting time on Facebook and on Goodreads (another night of not being able to fall asleep...), all while trying to think of another good cliché for my blog, and I think I found one that works. And I changed the photo, too. Yes, yes, so much change. This is what happens when I can't sleep!

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

In with the new, out with the old.

- Do pilates video - check.
- Refill the cats' food and water bowl - check.
- Make bed - check.
- Pet cats and toss the mouse around to Wyatt a bit - check.
- Throw in another load of laundry (I cannot complain about laundry now that I have that lovely new washer) - check.
- Do pilates video - check
- Blog about tag sale - almost check.

Today I got home at 7pm. Miraculous! I wonder what I could do with myself if I always got home this early. I'm sure I'd be a much more prolific blogger, that's for sure.

Anyway, as promised, here is the blog about the tag sale. Doug and I participated in a town-wide tag sale, held by the Unitarian Universalist church in Dedham. Doug had been for months talking about having a tag sale and while I didn't think that we had much junk to warrant one all on our own, I thought that setting up a table at the one in town would be perfect. And it was, in a way. It cost us $30 to rent a table and a space on the green from 8am to 2pm. Our goal was to break even at this event, and we did, but barely.

Friday night we went around the house searching for stuff to sell, as we only had one small box of a few pocket books, the old kitchen canisters, and our chalk board already set aside in a tag sale pile. Doug scoured the basement while I scoured the upstairs and the first floor, looking on shelves, in drawers, in closets, in boxes, in bins, for stuff that we could stand parting with. We came up with a goodly amount of stuff, though a few items Doug was a little iffy about (like the pink bunny bank and the teapot lamp). We had some other stuff, too, not in these photos, like old lamps, one of the old end tables that I got from Ames in the Ames going-out-of-business-sale that we have no room/use for now, an old shower caddy... stuff like that.

Set-up for the tag sale began at 7:30am, and I was told by the church lady with whom I made the table reservation that to get the best spot we'd want to get there right at 7:30. So Doug and I quickly threw all of our stuff into the car and headed over to the church bright and early on that rather chilly Saturday morning and got there at about 7:40. To our surprise, there were only about 6 other tables on the green. Maybe not everyone had arrived yet, we thought. We got our table from the church guy, set up on the perimeter of the green, and got to setting up our goods. As all experienced tag-salers know, early birds are inevitable, and there were early birds at this tag sale. I mean no disrespect whatsoever to the African immigrant population who comes out early to tag sales, but from 7:30 through 9am we only had African women whose native language was not English (and they were not speaking a French dialect, either, so I don't believe they were Haitian) rummaging through our stuff. And these ladies are ruthless with their bargaining. I was selling about 8 bags - 5 pocket books and 3 tote/duffel bags. One lady wanted all 5 pocketbooks for $6, even though I posted their price at $3 each, which was a steal - I tend to use my pocket books for 6 months, throw them into my box of bags, and then never use them again. When I said no, I couldn't go that low on them, the lady put one back and then offered me $4 for the rest. Ha! I still said no. Of course, I ended up selling all of my pocket books before the tag sale even officially started and sold 3 of them for $6 to one lady and the rest of the bags to another lady for $6. Great - $12 towards our break-even goal of $30 and six hours to go...

The morning was rather chilly. Really rather unpleasant, though it was not raining. Doug and I finished setting up our stuff, making sales to the non-native English speakers and at 9:10 (the hands of time were watching our every move that day) decided that it was very cold and we needed a)something warm to drink, and b) breakfast. Here are some photos of our set-up, me demonstrating how cold it is, and us making note of how long we'd been at the tag sale thus far: After Doug finished his little mini photo-shoot, he walked over to Cafe Fresh Bagel (the one in Dedham) and got us some bagel sandwiches and him a latte and me a hot tea (I only do iced coffee... haven't graduated my habit into hot coffee). While he was gone I sold a couple more things, but business was really, really slow. I knew this was the way it would be for the rest of the day. Tag sales always, always have a flurry of activity early on (it's those hard-bargaining early birds!) and then another little flutter around lunch-time, but are pretty much dead at all other times.

Doug and I used the down time to catch up with each other, talk about where we could go next on a vacation, what was going on at work, what we wanted to do that weekend, why we weren't Unitarian Universalists (one purchaser of goods told his aging father that he should buy something that we had offered him for free because we were Unitarian Universalists. We told him we were not, in fact, Unitarian Universalists, to which he said maybe we should be. We didn't really respond. It was a tag sale, not a forum for religious discussion), and why the lady next to us was selling two giant boxes full of brand new toothbrushes, all for $1 each (and she wasn't budging on the price). We also surveyed the rest of the tag-sale land to scope out our competition.This is about the extent of the competition. Kind of sad, isn't it. Makes one think that Dedham is a pretty small and pathetic town. But the good news about this is that Doug and I didn't spend any money on other people's stuff, because there really wasn't much to pick from.

Moving on. Pretty much at each half-hour increment Doug and I tried to re-market our goods. We'd re-arrange the set-up of the table, and eventually Doug created a free zone. Our stuff started to move again once we had that free zone, but we still had to convince a lot of people to take away our stuff. "Take it - it's free!" isn't as enticing an opening line as I thought it would be. Nevertheless, by 1:20pm the sun had come out and we were down to just a couple of items in the free zone and a few things in the pay area.We ended up selling the wallet you see here and we gave away the career book to someone whom I don't believe spoke or read English at all (that's why we gave it to her for free), but we came home with the bunny bank, the lamp shade, and the teapot lamp. That's it! That's all! Poof - junk be gone. After doing the math, we determined that we sold $45 worth of stuff, but if you subtract the money for the table and space, that leaves us with a net of $15. And if you subtract the $10 Doug spent on breakfast and the $1 on the Coke we bought from the church guy, that leaves us with $4 profit for about 6 hours of work. But hey, it was fun and we purged our stuff, so we are certainly in no way complaining about it. We even thought we'd participate next year, but we really don't have any more stuff that we'd like to sell. We could sell your stuff, though!

Tuesday, June 9, 2009

Today is my father's birthday.

Today my father turns 66. Is it wrong to post his actual age? I think not - I think that it's fine to post someone's age when they've lived a full and healthy life. So happy birthday, Dad! Don't let your students give you a hard time today, but remember - only a few more weeks left, if that. And then a summer of no students. A nice, peaceful summer... the reason most people go into teaching.

Before I settle in for a full day of work, arguing with slimy sales people and paying invoices for databases that cost more than I can possibly imagine (but how do you put a monetary value on electronic content, anyway?), I wanted to post this photo that one of my team-members sent around when she first started here two years ago. She wanted to get some more camaraderie going on the team, and she thought this would work:I think it would be great as a t-shirt. Does anyone know of a company that will put a photo on a t-shirt for you? I have to get the staff holiday gifts this year, and I'm not sure I'll be going the gift-card to Sephora route like we all got last year, though I just used it and rather appreciated it.

Anyway, the sentiment for the day is long, happy life and a sense of team and community. Now ready, set, go! Let's start the day.

Monday, June 8, 2009

It's amazing what a little paint, some new appliances, a new table, and some homemade curtains can do.

To continue from yesterday's blog - tonight I have for you the "finished" product. I say "finished" because there's one thing that I've learned - I always eventually have to change things up. For now, though, I'm quite satisfied and hope you'll agree that what we've done has improved the rooms greatly.

First, let's focus on the cat/sun room. We painted the room a relaxing latte color and put a tallish table in there so that we can sit and read, do work on the laptop, eat, enjoy the view from our windows, watch the fish, or just hang out. Now this room has a purpose other than holding the cat toys, and so far we enjoy sitting out there. I was also charged with decorating the walls in this room, and so far my ideas for the walls have turned out well. The wall where the fish tank is has become the vintage photo wall (pictures-of-my-mom-and-dad and-sister-grandmother-and-Doug's-grandparents-circa-the-late-'60s-and-'70s vintage) (and note that the fish tank is a nice green color again. The tank hasn't been green like this since Doug lived in the cave in Newton about 5 years ago, and we're hoping that we can figure out a way to make it clear again... this is the one and only instance where I don't like sunlight), and the wall with the coat hooks now keeps the bird print that was once in the bedroom. Then the wall that had only the small painting I got in Paris in 2001 now is home to my Gardner Museum-inspired art wall, which needs a lot more art crammed onto it, but there's plenty of time for that. The wall directly behind the table has nothing on it for now (the ocean painting that reminds me of Nantucket will soon be hung in our bedroom upstairs), but now we have a place for more art should we find something that strikes our fancy. This room is now a room - homey, cozy, and with purpose. Score one for transformation weekend!

Score two for transformation weekend comes in the kitchen. As you read in my previous post, we painted the entryway to the kitchen and the kitchen accent wall a raspberry color. The color I originally picked out was called Deep Mango, which had a deep orange hue, but the closest match with the paint we got at the hardware store was Raspberry Blush. This paint on the little swatch had a rich orange hue, but it is not really very orange at all. As a matter of fact, it reminds me of the color we had in our old office/hobby room in Newton, which was called Strawberry something. Guess I'm not too original when picking out colors! But no matter - the color looks very good - bright and alive and it definitely transforms the look of the kitchen. What also transforms the look of the kitchen are the new curtains I made yesterday evening - made them from a tablecloth I bought at Target this past winter. Doug took a picture of me hard at work, and I have to say that I was a little rusty at the pedal of this machine...It took me forever to thread the needle, and then I accidentally sewed one end of the material to the other and had to rip that out. I really need more practice with this thing. But the curtains came out well, no?They give the room a more complete look. We also hung up some more hooks in the kitchen to hold keys and my apron (and yes, I've wondered why I have an apron when I only cook one night a week if I'm lucky these days), and also got the tin cow art back on the wall. Things are finally settled in the kitchen. Here's a view of the new look from looking towards the oven and new microwave: From looking towards the refrigerator (note that while our magnets and other flare don't stick to the front they do to the side!): And, finally, from looking towards the island:The kitchen is now clean, fresh, and reflects our style much more than the other kitchen decor (though we still have that silly Tuscan light fixture! We can only take so much change at once, so we may have to put changing that light fixture on hold, but now more than ever it really doesn't go with the kitchen, so please let me know if you think someone may want it! Otherwise I fear it may be headed for the Dedham Transfer Station...)

Stay tuned later this week for my post on the tag sale we participated in this past weekend. These have been marathon posts; trust me, I'm aware of this, but I finally have content to share so I want to share it! I think I may have to finally join Flickr as a paying member, though. I can't in good conscience keep using this blog as my digital photo album.

Sunday, June 7, 2009

I love paint colors that remind me of food.

Welcome back, me! I've been absent from the blogosphere these past couple of weeks, mostly because I've lacked the time that it will take to do these posts I have planned justice. Plus, after the marathon post of my Memorial Day Weekend adventures with my family, I was a little tired of blogging. Let's hope this post is a little shorter, but there's a lot of ground to cover...

As some of you may already know, last weekend my mother and brother came up to visit. My mom arrived Friday afternoon and the sweet woman cooked Doug and me a wonderful dinner of roast beef, sweet potatoes and green beans. Anytime she wants to come back to cook for us we'll welcome her with open arms, because there's still something very comforting about a mother's home-cooked meal. But my mother didn't come up just to cook us dinner... no, we had other plans. After dinner we started to clear out the cat/sun room and also the kitchen to prepare for our transformation weekend. While we painted the cat/sun room last year during our painting week right before we moved into the house, I've never felt totally satisfied with it. Same with the kitchen, though we didn't actually paint that last year. I've just never felt satisfied with the yellow color; wasn't a shade I'd have picked myself. So, in an effort to get more of my life in order, I solicited my mother's help to get these two rooms painted (and we wanted to paint the kitchen wall, too, because thanks to the federal government we bought a new, fully-functioning refrigerator, microwave, and washing machine and wanted a fresh start with our new appliances). Here are some before photos of the two rooms in question; you'll note that my mom and I seem a little tired already... we're well aware of the work we have ahead of us:

My mother and I woke up early on Saturday morning to get started on our painting. Not only did we have to paint the sun room and the kitchen, but we had to wait around for all the appliance to show up. Our table for the cat/sun room was slated to show up first, so we wanted to get as much of that room done before the table was delivered. Luckily we had an extra pair of hands to help with the painting:

Once we got the first coat of the latte-like brown (called Shabby Chic) on that room we moved into the kitchen. This color was not so easy to paint - why again do I gravitate towards the deep, rich colors that require tinted primers and multiple coats? Thank god we were only painting one wall and the little entryway area. The color is called Raspberry Blush, and I thought it was going to be a lot more orange than it actually is - it is definitely in the raspberry family - but it works very well in the kitchen. Here's me painting with the tinted primer: We had to work faster in this room because the microwave was scheduled to be delivered and installed between 1 and 3 and refrigerator between 4 and 6, but we didn't start in the kitchen until about noon. No matter - my mom and I can be efficient when we have to be, and the microwave guy was late. This meant that the whole coat of primer was on the entryway, and I was able to get most of the kitchen wall done before the guy came with the microwave. That was a perfect time for some lunch, so here's a view of what we got to look at while eating:

Once the microwave and refrigerator were installed (and the new washer, which deserves a section all to itself), my mother went back into the cat/sun room to finish the second coat and I stayed in the kitchen to finish the primer. Here are photos of my mom doing a bang-up job with the paint brush, the refrigerator and the wall with the primer on itThe refrigerator is a bit blinding - and none of our magnets stick to the front of it! You can also see the new microwave in the photo of the primered wall... also very shiny.

The next morning my mom and I put the first coat of paint on the entryway and the kitchen wall, but because it was a beautiful day and because my bother had arrived, we decided to head over to the Blue Hills for a hike and then take in the new Star Trek movie. Both were great fun. My mother and brother love to hike, and I think they liked the trail we chose to go on, but I will say that Doug and I are terribly out of shape and were eager to stay on the easier trails. All trails are good, though - there are great views from this reservation.I don't know why we don't go there more often. Oh wait, yes I do. We try to cram too much stuff into our weekends, but never exercise and nature.

When we got home from the movie (loved the Spock character, and thought the Kirk character wasn't bad, either) I put the last coat of paint on the kitchen wall, and while that was drying and while my family was eating I started to put the house back together. It's amazing how disordered it got that weekend. We put the new table into the sun/cat room, so now we can sit there on the weekends and enjoy the windows.I also did an inaugural load of laundry in the new washer. This was really my favorite part of the weekend. Here's the old washer:Here's the new one:Yes, I do love my new washing machine. It's so much bigger than the old one, and it actually spins the clothes around and gets them clean! Miraculous!

Even though I have much more to write about and so many more pictures to show, especially of the finished rooms and the curtains I made for the kitchen and the pictures I hung on the walls in the sun/cat room, I'll end today's post with this video of my mom, Doug, and me watching the first load of wash in the new washer (can't use up all my content in one post!). We stood there for a good half-hour watching the clothes wash, even after the lid fogged up. It really doesn't take much to amuse us down here, and I will say that even after my 4th or 5th load of wash in this thing I am still a captive audience. (Warning - for those with young ears there is a perhaps age-inappropriate word at the very end of the video...)