The Master Procrastinator

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2011-09-08T19:55:00.001-05:00

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It's been a while...

2011-07-25T14:43:00.001-05:00

and I learned something about me. Actually, I learned a lot about me.

1. I can't do big projects - like a sewing project a day. Or 90 days of p90x. If it were P1X maybe I could exercise and feel a sense of accomplishment... or or or tackle all the miscellaneous to do items around the house, or blog consistently, or keep the house clean, or keep the car clean, well, you get the idea. The main reason for this is that I am a procrastinator. The master procrastinator.

2. I can't do hobbies - like sew consistently, read consistently, blog consistently, garden consistently, etc.
The main reason for this is that I am easily bored.

3. I can do little projects - like make 8 jars of salsa once a year or, well I can't think of anything else I have done.

4. I have read 1 book in the last 365 days. Eat Pray Love. That's it. One. It however changed my way of thinking about me and the things that I do or don't do.

I have a new guru. She isn't a real guru, I don't even think she knows she's my guru. Her name is Sissy. I am not even sure if that is her real name. She lives part time in Mississippi, part time in California, part time in Arizona and the rest of the time traveling all over the world. She has this saying, "You can't do what you are supposed to do, unless, you say Yes to the Universe." At first, I wasn't sure what she meant by that statement, so she explained it to me in this manner... "You can't do what you are supposed to do, unless, you say Yes to the Universe."

ahh, Young Grasshopper, still not get it. Moving on.

Driving home from Mississippi after my visit with my MIL and Sissy, it dawned on me as I was listening to Sister Hazel sing, "If you want to be somebody else, change your mind." Then I reflected on my reading of Eat Pray Love. "If you want to control things in your life so bad, work on the mind". So then, how does saying Yes to the Universe fit into all of this? Well, here's my conclusion... I am a chicken at heart. I take the safest, easiest, and fastest route out of a tough situation. Might not be the right thing to do, but it's what I do. I also spend a lot of time with my head buried in the sand. With my head buried in the sand, I also spend a lot of time in denial about what is going on with me and my life. While my head is in the sand in denial, I can't see what is going on around me thus I live in fear of what is going to happen next. I am constantly exhausted by "preparing for the worst", most of which is just a figment of my imagination and never comes to fruition. In order to say Yes to the Universe, I have to get my head out of the sand. I have to look around and see what is available to me. Looking at my world and how it "REALLY" works instead of how I "IMAGINED" it worked, took away a lot of the fear. In taking away the fear, I am opening myself up to the possibilities of my life. In opening myself, I am allowing all the things I ever wanted to do, see, or be come in to my life. I am saying Yes to the Universe.

Took me a year to figure this out.
Now. For the big project that I will be successful in completing: P1X.

Help me solve the mystery!

2010-06-19T11:02:00.001-05:00

I must admit, I do love finding a new, and sometimes unusual, purpose for everyday items that one might generally discard. For instance, an old plastic lazy susan that you would normally use in the kitchen has found a new use as a lazy susan for small painting projects. I can turn the tray without touching my freshly painted item. Or, how about the outdoor storage bench that is being used in the basement for Tanner's toy box and also doubles as additional seating for playing the guitar.

Most times when I come home after a trip to the thrift store, yard sale or trash-day curbside confiscations, Mike gives me a puzzled look of "What on earth were you thinking and what are you going to do with that?!?"

Imagine my surprise when HE says to me this morning, "Oh honey! I got you a gift! I forgot to give it to you."

Holding his hands behind his back, "Guess what it is?" I look at him, puzzled by this most unusual gesture of thoughtfulness. It isn't my birthday, it isn't Mother's day, it isn't any special day in particular at all.

"I dunno," I say.

With a grin on his face he says, "Ok, I'll give you a clue. I found it on the street between East St. Louis and Brooklyn."

Now, I am more puzzled. If you knew anything about the neighborhood between East St. Louis and Brooklyn, you would know there is not much there except the railroad (where he works) and strip clubs.

"I have no frikkin' clue! It could be anything if you picked it up on the road between East St. Louis and Brooklyn!"

Out he pulls this...

and says, "I thought you might like it to use as a planter for a pretty flower!"

And he's probably right. I will probably do that this evening when it cools off.
In the meantime... how do think this shoe came to be on the side of the road in between East St. Louis and Brooklyn where's there isn't much beside trains and strip clubs? Oh, by the way, it's a size 8. That's a big girl. Post your version of her story in the comments.

Also, what type of flower do you think I could plant in this shoe?

Heidi... How ya like me now?

2010-03-28T20:33:00.001-05:00

HEIDI - PUSH PLAY

Remember these?

Well now they look like this.... I painted the frames black, removed the japanese prints and added the lyrics to Bob Marley's Three Little Birds. (yes I still suck at photography)
Here's the original idea at My Backyard Eden.

Uh huh... yeah... I thought so.

I had no choice, I HAD to go...

2010-03-28T20:08:00.001-05:00

Tanner has grown 4 inches in the last year. He's now 5'4" and only 13 years old. That means he has no clothes that fit this spring. So, I HAD to go to the thrift store. I did score 3 pairs of cargo shorts, long ones because he doesn't like his 'thighs' showing, for $3.43 each pair. They didn't have any decent polo shirts he would wear, so I will have to go again. Rats! ;)

Anyway, while I was there, I also found a few items for my house or maybe for a mom, mother-in-law, sister-in-law or sister's house.

These are a cute set of Japanese prints that might look good in Heidi's guest bedroom. Yes? No? Japanese prints probably aren't your style, though. Mom, Suzy??? Maybe Carrie or Maranda might like them? I don't know. They were $1.41 each but yesterday was 1/2 price on home goods, so I got them both for $1.41.

Sage & Oregano, anyone? 88cents for the set. Sweet!

Floating Shelves $2.92 for the set. They would look really cute painted a chocolate brown color... Heidi.... ??

Heidi, you asked for a topiary.... I found this one. What do you think? You can change the colors of the flowers or paint the pot a different color. I like it the way it is, but that's my tastes. 1/2 price too! Man, I love the thrift store on Wednesdays!

Here's the gingham curtain I was telling you about on the phone the other night.

OR... I found these stripe panels at the thrift store yesterday. They are too long for what you need, but I can fix that. What do you think? Colors are beige and burgundy. (the lighting is different on these... they were on the kitchen counter instead of hanging in the
bath.)

Mom (Patty), I found this for you... You can't really see the star on top that it is hanging from, but I thought you might like it. There's a star over the door, too. Yes, No?

Ok, I have to get back to work. Today is my day off and I need to clean my house. Everybody, let me know what you want...

P.S. I have noticed people are starting to clean out their garages and basements
here because the weather has been so nice. I think I am going to have to start going to the thrift stores every other day!

Sewing again... finally

2010-02-15T13:10:00.001-06:00

I have done a little bit of sewing over the past weekend since I have cleaned out my sewing room/office and can now get back in it without feeling too guilty. Before Mike left to go skiing, I mended the lining in his snow bibs and fixed the boot strap on one leg. It was pretty boring, no photos.

For Valentine's Day, I made a bag for his ski goggles out of some scrap fleece and string thrifted from some other long gone object.

Today, I hemmed the dragonfly fabric I bought last year for a new tablecloth. I am ready for spring to be here! It is beige-y gold, just like everything else in my house. It looks very pretty on the kitchen table.

Catch Up Ketchup

2010-02-10T10:15:00.001-06:00

I am catching up on my sewing journal. I actually did real work on Friday and Saturday ~~and didn't have time to sew or post~~. That's not true. I was just too lazy to post. I played Zuma, instead. I have been thinking about my sewing journal a lot lately. Maybe sewing something every day is a lofty goal, maybe it's not. Maybe it IS because it's me doing it. I am the Master Procrastinator after all. Talking to my sister the other day, we hit upon a procrastinator's great idea.

On the days I do sew, I should sew 2 or 3 things to keep me caught up for days that I don't sew.

Does that count for a daily sewing? I mean really, who is going to know, besides me, whether I refashioned one of Tanner's shirts on Friday or Saturday?

So, here's Friday, Saturday and Sunday. You decide which day I did what. I'm counting them all as days of sewing because I am actually sewing and using the things I have.

Image 1 (nothing to see here)

Image 2 (or here)

Image 3(...or...here. Move along)

P.S. I'm out of ketchup. I don't know how this happened. I buy in bulk. I have a "store" in the basement. Mom, can you send me a bottle from your stash? jk

Franken-Laptop

2010-01-14T20:32:00.001-06:00

Sewing Journal Update at bottom

I have spent the last few hours cleaning off my laptop. It is a sad state. The battery doesn't work, so the laptop has to be plugged in at all times. Kinda defeats the purpose of being mobile. It doesn't have a built in keyboard anymore since I spilled an entire cup of coffee on it about a year & a half ago. I have a standard size keyboard attached to it.
I don't like using the touch pad mouse and have a regular mouse in it's place.

The screen sorta works... I mean it works great for someone who has ADD and a 3 second attention span. That's how long the screen backlight stays lit before it goes black. There's something wrong with release latch that causes it to think it is in perpetual sleep mode. I have a yellow piece of foam taped over the hole so I don't accidentally close the lid and turn it off. The Shut Down mechanism still works great. So for me... I don't have a 3 second attention span, based on the fact that I can waste entire seasons on the computer... I also have a monitor attached to the laptop so I can read and type to you all.

Ohh, I almost forgot the cooling pad it has to sit on because it gets extremely hot and the internal fans can't keep up. I feel kinda bad about finally giving up the laptop. It is still usable, sort of. There is nothing wrong with the hard drive. It's practically brand new. This feels almost wasteful. So, if anyone needs a Sony VAIO for parts, let me know. By tomorrow, Frankenlaptop will no longer be used. I have a newer abused-less desktop pc that is going to work just fine.

Daily Sewing Journal
2 scarves for Christmas stragglers, Brittany & Kimberly. See their names in the snowflakes? Ok, so you can't really read their names. Just imagine for a moment that the one on the left says Kimberly and and the one on the right says Brittany. Sorry about the blurriness. Life's too short to retake blog photos.

uggh! I'm working on it!

2010-01-14T10:34:00.001-06:00

A couple of days ago, I decided to simplify my life and get down to just one google account for my blog. I am not sure why I had 2 accounts in the first place. Anyway, I merged the account and deleted the old account. Then decided I should add a new template to my site since it was just plain white and kind of boring.

The template addition went ok. The merge did not. I didn't even think to back up the photos on the blog. So now I am going through my old posts and reloading the images. I have all of 2009 complete except for the "SCORE" post. I am not even sure if I kept those photos. Thankfully there are only 20 posts for 2008 and only 6 have photos. I just have to figure out where the photos are hiding. I have 3 computers in my office, one franken-laptop(a post all on it's own some other time), my home desktop and the desktop for my office that I brought home to clean off because it's full of crap and a lot of my personal photos.

Sheesh. 2 steps forward 3 steps back.

Recycled/Reusable Makeup Remover Pad Tutorial

2010-01-13T08:43:00.001-06:00

Tutorial is below my daily sewing journal.

Daily Sewing with What I Have
January 12 - re-stuffed Mike's favorite pillow
January 12 - square makeup removers from old washcloths and scrap material. I started out by sewing them right sides together, turn and topstitched, but they were so small and really hard to stitch through 4 layers. I decided to stitch them wrong sides together and just use the serger. This worked somewhat better. The square shape was hard to serge the edges and have them look neat.

Moving on to today.
January 13 - I thought I would try the makeup remover pads again today, only this time larger & rounder. Much easier.

Recycled/Reusable Makeup Remover Pad Tutorial

Supplies Needed:

Old terrycloth washcloths (mine were 11in.x11in, washed a million times and had makeup stains) If you want something softer than terrycloth you can use microfiber fleece, just be sure to pre-wash first.

24in. x 24in. Cotton Fabric (I used an old pillow case from the thrift store that was in my stash)

Scissors

Sewing Machine

Serger

Download Template

Step 1: Cut out fabric & terrycloth circles. I could get 4 circles from 1 washcloth. Don't worry if your washcloth has a finished edge. The edge will be removed when you serge.
Step 2: Layer the fabric & terrycloth with wrong sides together.

3. Run a basting stitch around the circle to keep it from slipping when you serge.
4. Serge the circle. If you don't have a serger, trim close to the basting stitch and then zigzag around the circle's edges.

5. You're done! Now go wash your face!

How to use your new recycled makeup remover pads
Wash. Wipe. Rinse. Repeat until your face is clean.
How to clean your new recycled makeup remover pads
Throw them in a lingerie bag and dump them in the wash with like colored items. Dry as usual.

12:45 AM Tuesday January 12

2010-01-12T10:21:00.001-06:00

11:45 PM Monday January 11 - I fell asleep in bed with the tv on watching Intervention, waiting for Mike to come home from his Monday night hockey league. I was disappointed that I missed the end of the program. I really wanted to know what happened with Gabe.

Update: aetv.com is cool. I was able to finish the episode. I love web tv.

12:30 AM Tuesday January 12 - Mike wakes me as he comes into the bedroom. He tells me about the cool goal he scored as he is getting ready to get in the shower. Then he says, "I need you to take a picture for me."

I bet you weren't taking pictures of a tongue at 12:45 AM Tuesday January 12, 2010. I didn't want to go to the basement to get the camera, so these are taken with his blackberry. I am a terrible picture taker and these are proof.

He needs a shave... and a mouth guard! Even at 36, boys are gross.

2010 - A Space Odyssey

2010-01-11T20:00:00.001-06:00

I know the title is incorrect. The correct movie title is 2010: Odyssey Two, but 2010 - A Space Odyssey is more appropriate to my circumstances.

I am on a mission and it might as well be to Jupiter if my past history is any clue to the success that I will achieve.

Objective:
To reclaim my space and unravel the secrets of the monolithic structure that is my ever growing pile of fabric.

I think Stanley Kubrick is alive and well, living in my sewing room. It is a mess of chaos that only he could understand and appreciate. Actually, I think he created this mess, not me.

{The Plan}
Attack!

I would like to sew something every day. It doesn't have to be big or glorious or fabulous or even usable. But I must sew. every. day. at. least. one. thing.

That's it. I wonder how long it will take me to go through all the material I have?

Here are some of the projects I have in mind.

1. A denim quilt for Tanner's bed made from his and Mike's old jeans.
2. Potholders
3. A quilted suit for me. (Burgundy, I already have the queen comforter to recycle)
4. Embroider the remaining dishtowels (6) and golf towel (1) that I have on hand.
5. Embroider the remaining 10 coolie cups on hand.
6. Dog beds. I have a queen size foam mattress that has seen better days but is still good enough for the dogs.
7. Curtains for the small windows in the basement.
8. Tablecloth for the round table (already have dragonfly material)
9. A box full of clothes that can be restyled or recycled.
10. 4 summer dresses for me
11. a pressing ham
12. embroider my cleaning cloths so the kids don't use the lemon oil furniture cloth on the mirrors.
13. a new clothespin bag
14. embroider the dog's bath towels so they don't get washed with my good towels
15. a new bedding pad for the dog crate
16. pj bottoms for me
17. tank tops with built in bra for me
18. embroidered luggage tags
19. Shoe bags for me (I didn't make any for myself when I did the others)
20. new curtain for the kitchen
21. new curtain for sliding glass door
22. A flag of some sort for my flagpole that never gets put out because I don't have a flag.
23. Spring, Summer, Fall & Winter table runners and place mats.
24. Covered dish cozy thingy
25. An apron
26. A 1950's style dress
27. Take in my 1950's dress coat (too wide in the shoulders)

Oh I am sure there is more, but that is all I can think of for now.

P.S. I did sew today. I hemmed a pair of dress pants(early, early this morning) that I have owned for 4 years and never worn. I wore them to work today.

I made Christmas Gifts this year (well, last year)

2010-01-06T11:23:00.000-06:00

I am slow about getting my posts up, but here they are... 2009 Christmas Gifts

1. Gifts for 5 yr old girl from Angel Tree at Church -
The "jolly bag" aka backpack or pj bag is made from a reclaimed/recycled baby blanket that I got for 44cents at Family Thrift store. I embroidered the bag and then added some goodies. I also embroidered a coolie cup to go with it.

2.Golf Towels for the guys

3. Doggie blankets for Suzy's (my mother in law) schnauzers. These were also made from recycled baby blankets from Family Thrift.

4. Embroidered Jolly bags for my neices... also from recycled baby blankets.

I patched a hole in Cyera's blanket with an applique heart. :)

Alexis & Addison with their jolly bags. Alexis also got a "hair salon" for Christmas. She charged everyone a $1 to do their hair. I think she made about $8 that night.

5. Baby Bradley's Fish Blanket - I love those little fish!

Other things I made but didn't have the time to take photos before they were wrapped and sent to VA, MS and other various points around the globe...

6. 7(yes seven) White Scarf with name embroidered in a snowflake pattern for all of Ellie's friends.
7. Travel Shoe Bags for my mom and sisters with the words "Shoe Bag" and a high heeled shoe embroidered on the bag. If I can get someone to email me a photo of their bags, I will post those later.
8. Dishtowels for Suzy - one with 3 wine glasses that says "Group Therapy" and one with a cute little woman in her robe with curlers in her hair drinking a cup of coffee saying "I don't do mornings"
9. More coolie cups for all the teen boys in the family. Each with their First Initial and name.
10. Travel pillows for Ellie & Tanner made of left over fleece from the other projects above. One is pink, the other is blue.
11. A laptop sleeve for Ellie with her name embroidered on it.
12. An Ipod sleeve for Tanner with a tribal artsy type spider embroidered on it.

I think that's about it for Christmas presents.

I haven't posted since November... so get comfy!

2010-01-05T18:44:00.000-06:00

November 1st: Tanner turns 13! He isn't so little anymore. He's taller than me and didn't ask for toys. He wanted CASH MONEY and a fleece jacket with full zipper! Oh... and I made the fleece jacket he is wearing.

This cake was a disaster! I made it from scratch and the cake part I did right. The icing is a whole other story. Donna wasn't helping much, just watching and laughing as I poured the milk in TWICE! and then had to add more sugar, more butter, more cocoa, etc. The icing didn't get stiff, thus the terraced sides.
Side note: I seriously need to repaint the table top.

Mike hung the iron wall thingy (on January 2, 2010) Momma bought for me in May 2009.
We kept putting it off because I wanted it above the staircase.

It's a huge 12ft wall ... taller if you count the descending staircase below it. It looks great thought! I love it!

January 1st or 2nd or 3rd or all three: I cleaned the storage room! BELIEVE IT! Here's proof!

Mike took down the broken bi-fold doors and I made the curtain to replace them. Mike helped too! He man-hammered the grommets into the curtain. I bought this material 2 or 3 years ago for $1/yard when our Walmart was closing the fabric department. I had originally planned to make drapes for my living room and dining room.

It isn't perfect, but it looks wonderful for a basement!! I also made the matching table runner. I bought the trim at Hancock Fabrics. It was discontinued and $1/yard. I think I bought like 40 yards or something silly. It just happened to match the fabric perfectly!

Not so bad even if I did do it myself! I am starting to feel good about my sewing. It just takes a little practice.

Homemade Christmas presents in the next post...

Still Getting Organized

2009-11-15T13:00:00.001-06:00

I am still working on organizing my home office/sewing/study/work/craft room. It has been a challenge for me, to say the least. I hate filing and most of the mess in my office is the mountain of paper that I don't know what to do with and the rest of it is papers/bills, etc that need to be filed. I HATE FILING! And it's pretty obvious from the mounds of paper everywhere. In the midst of dreading cleaning out the filing cabinet and organizing the files in an appropriate manner (notice there is no work being done in this sentence), I happened upon a not so novel idea! Why not scan all my files I absolutely have to keep and store them on disk?

We do it at work all the time. If it's good enough for a business it should be good enough for me, right? So my handy dandy HP Officejet J3680 printer/scanner/copier/fax machine is getting a workout. It has been scanning bank statements, retirement accounts, monthly bills(I have to track this for work),medical bills, insurance and other ephemera for a couple of weeks now. I don't know if it's getting tired, but I am tired of looking at all this paper! I think it will be worth it in the end.

The paper shredder has also been working overtime.

I must be crazy.

I'm getting organized...

2009-08-21T21:32:00.001-05:00

I'm getting organized... or at least corralling my junk a little better.I found these boxes at the thrift store yesterday. They look like they could be VHS boxes but they aren't the right size and don't have the little circle thing-a-ma-jigs.

I cleaned out my desk and gathered up all the sewing notions I had strung all over the room and put them in the boxes. I sorted the items to how I use them. Then, I got out my trusty label maker and labeled each box. Extra Pins, Needles, Empty bobbins. Threaded bobbins. Elastic. Buttons. Scrapbook Pen Cutters. Frequently Used Notions. Brother Accessories... well you get the point.

I'm just happy as a lark about these little boxes. I have to go buy rechargeable batteries for my camera before I can take any more pictures of my progress. I have been taking so many photos lately, my camera is eating AA batteries like crazy! So... before my camera died... here are the photos I took last month & again yesterday before I started cleaning my room.

A box of binders.... wth?

I taught myself knitting.... NOT

2009-08-21T20:56:00.000-05:00

I have tried to teach myself to crochet and knit several times over the last 15 years. It just didn't take. It's not my thing. So, Heidi... look at this pile and tell me what you want and I will mail it to you. (list is below the pic)

1 - I Taught Myself Knitting Book with several patterns
Candy Print Yarn (the pink) - 1 full skein (5 oz, 255 yards), 4 partial skeins (they may be nearly whole skeins... I can't remember anything that I did with it.
Buff Yarn - 1 full skein (7 oz, 364 yards), 1 partial skein. Again, I don't know what I did with it.
The big purple thingy (a knitting loom) - I think it was for knitting scarves.
Needles - sizes: 6, 8, 11
Large plastic needles (yellow packet)... maybe I bought these for tying off??
Big fat blue crochet hook... I don't see a size on it.
Ziplock baggie contains: ruler/knitting guage, a couple pins, needle tip protectors, stitch counter, and some little plastic rings (I don't know what they're for either).

Like I said, let me know if you want any of this. What you don't want goes into a freebie giveaway on my blog.

Note to self: Knitting is not my thing. I am never allowed to purchase knitting supplies ever again. period.

The Garage Door Fiasco

2009-08-20T10:40:00.001-05:00

I had repressed this incident in my life until this morning. The garage door has had a terrible screeching sound for the past 2 weeks and this morning I decided to fix it with a little WD-40. While standing on the ladder, I had a flashback to this post. I was so disgusted with the glossy paint, I didn't even put the images in the first post. So, here they are.... the pearly gates. These are the images I was referring to when we pulled up the house in the dark that night.

Thankfully, they have weathered nicely and the gloss has dulled a little bit since May 2008.

Ohh! Gargamel!!

2009-08-20T07:36:00.001-05:00

Last night a village of smurfs moved into our back yard after all the rain.

New Ironing Board Cover from a Thrifted Sheet

2009-08-19T12:01:00.000-05:00

I think my aversion to ironing has to do with the cover. It's old, ugly and stained. Blue tick cloth is just not my thing. I had looked at covers in the past but just couldn't make myself pay $20-25 for a cheapy designer looking cover. While at the thrift store the other day, I found a complete sheet set for $5, including the matching comforter! I used the ironing board cover tutorial from U-Handbag with a few modifications.

I removed the old cover from the ironing board. Mine did not have a string casing like the one in the U-Handbag tutorial. The string was in the overlock stitch. I pulled out the string and laid the old cover on top of my new fabric and pinned. I added 2" extra all the way around for the new casing and cut out the new cover. The old cover was just a wee bit too small and pulled off the edges sometimes and I wanted to be sure I had it covered all the way around.

Note: The next step is not in the original U-Handbag tutorial) The pad on my old board always slipped around and got bunched up when I ironed, driving me absolutely batty. So, I took the old pad and centered it on the wrong side of the fabric and pinned it to the new fabric. I sewed around the pad attaching it to the cover. Now if the pad slips, the whole cover slips but I don't think it will. By the time the pad wears out, I will probably need a new cover anyway.

I serged around all the edges of the new cover. (This is my first project on my new EZ Lock 100 serger circa 1994... well, new to me... that I got today. I'm so excited, can you see the giddiness in my typing?!) Next, I turned under and hemmed the edges to form the casing for the string. Then, I tied the end of the string to the loop on a safety pin and fed through the casing. (sorry, forgot to take a pic of this step) A more experienced seamstress could probably just include the string while sewing the casing. I am not that coordinated. All done with the sewing.

I put the new cover on the floor and placed the ironing board on top of it. After some wiggling & jiggling, I got the cover smoothed out and tied off. Look at those cute fishes!!!!!! I love it! Most people who know me, would never believe that I could say such a thing about an ironing board. Maybe this will make ironing more fun for me... and the kids.

Learning to Iron

2009-08-10T11:25:00.000-05:00

Today, Ellie & Tanner learned the basics of ironing.

We started simple. How to set up the ironing board. What all the dials and buttons mean on the iron. How to refill it with water. The shiny metal part is hot! Don't touch!

They started learning on dinner napkins and how not to press wrinkles into the fabric. They complained a little bit (not much) while they were doing it. I found out later from Mike, that they had bragged about learning to iron today. Of course, he sugarcoats a lot, so it could have been, "Mom, made us learn to iron today! :( "

Yes, I made them smile in the photos.

Around the Garden

2009-07-31T17:59:00.000-05:00

Just strolling through the yard today, looking at the bounty.

This is the first year we have grown cucumbers. We planted 2 vines and have been getting cukes for a few weeks now. The grape tomato Mike planted has produced a gajillion tomatoes already this month. I have been giving them away to everybody and we keep a bowl on the counter in the kitchen. We can't eat them fast enough! All of these are ready to go in the salad for dinner tonight!

Not edible, but still pretty... the ivy I planted when we first moved in has become quite prolific. Ivy pleases me.

Happy gardening!

A few projects completed

2009-07-30T20:38:00.001-05:00

For the last week or so, I have been slowly working on cleaning up 'my room' aka the office/sewing room. My room is in the basement and has only been partially finished. The concrete walls are painted a peachy color. I finally cleared enough space to get out my trusty sewing machine and complete a few small projects.

Project #1: Drab to Fab Cutesy Curtains
I swear, these photos are in the same room and only about an hour apart and taken with the same camera. It's amazing how the color of the fabric changes the color of the room and the lighting. I could just be sucky at taking photos, too. I have never been accused of being a good photographer. The before curtains are actually a sage green color and had resided previously in our bedroom. My room always gets the cast-offs from the rest of the house.

Before

After

The new curtains were made from material I had in my stash from a couple of years ago. Our local Walmart was closing their fabric department and I bought several bolts of this fabric and it's matching stripes for a $1/yard. I had intentions of using it for the dining room but Mike didn't like the girly print.

Project #2: The Chair
This chair was given to me by my father-in-law. It was one of his chairs in his law office. It's a good sturdy chair and has been around forever. You can feel the solidity of the chair in your butt if you sit in it for very long. My original cushion came from heaven knows where and was about as thin as a pancake from years of my bum squishing it flat.
(Sorry, the image is a little blurry. My awesome photography skills at work again!)

Before

After

The new cushion fabric is one of the coordinating stripes to the floral print I used for my new curtains.

And last but not least...

Project #3: Refurbishing the Dog's Bed
Poor Baxter, he only has one place in the house where he can lie down comfortably and that is on his big comfy pillow... which wasn't so big anymore. You know how dogs walk in circles before they lay down, well, his bed looked like a herd of elephants had trampled it flat. We have bought several dog beds in the past and this has been the most recent purchase and so far the best! I can take the outer cover off and throw it in the wash. Woohoo! no more smelly dog bed. The last time I washed it, I noticed the inner pillow casing was ripped and the stuffing was matted flat. So, today, Baxter gets a new bed, sorta. I found an old sheer curtain that had been stashed for years, and made a new pillow casing for the stuffing.

The old curtain

I attached velcro to the top for easy removal of the old stuffing, stitched up two side seams and was finished. I like simple projects.

The new bed guts

Baxter on his "new" bed just minutes after getting the re-purposed pillow inserted into the cover.

English Orange Marmalade

2009-07-21T20:53:00.000-05:00

I must be crazy. Today, I decided I would make orange marmalade. I have never made marmalade in my life! I've probably only eaten it 7 or 8 times in entire life, but I do loves me some oranges! Natalie at Oven Love has a super easy recipe. I did a lot more than one orange, though. I did 8! Madness, I tell you! Even though, I used 8 oranges, my yield was only 7 jars after being cooked down. If you are making large quantities, be sure you have friends to give it to for use right away, else you will need to preserve it. This was a really easy recipe and one that you can make anytime and give as a great gift.

A word of caution! This is English style marmalade. The zest of the orange has a slightly bitter taste when you bite into it. If you think you won't like it, or your friends won't like it, don't zest the orange peel into your marmalade mixture.

My Orange Marmalade

It's pretty, isn't it?!

Managing the Laundry

2009-06-20T09:59:00.000-05:00

When we moved to our home 3 years ago, I was thrilled to have main floor laundry. No more lugging laundry baskets up and down the stairs. No more mountains of laundry because nobody would go to the basement to do laundry. However, main floor laundry does have it's drawbacks... at least in this house anyway.

My washer and dryer are in the double pantry in the kitchen. It is just wide enough to get both machines in there and has wire shelving for storage above the washer and dryer. There is NO PLACE FOR DIRTY CLOTHES! Dang it! I guess you can also look at it as a blessing in disguise. It forces us to stay on top of all the laundry all the time! No Mount Washmore here! Both kids have a laundry basket in their bedroom and Mike & I share one in our bedroom. It always bothered me that I had to do a laundry round up from all the bedrooms and try to guess what color we had enough of to make a load because the clothes were not sorted into piles before the wash. Neither of our bathrooms have closets in them and they are too small to have the separator bins stored in the bathroom. The linen closet is too small for a laundry basket on the floor.

I looked for months and months to try to find a solution that would work for us. Finally, I hit upon a solution. A Storage Chest! We have a fairly large kitchen and also a breakfast nook that is about the size of a small dining room with a half wall that separates it from the living room. I bought 2 of these little storage chests from Target and put them together myself. One chest contains whites & jeans, the other chest has light and dark colors.

When half the bin gets full it is time to do a load. It is the perfect size for normal load size on my washer. See... it's time to wash again already!

Really, this system does keep us on top of the laundry. We have a hanging bar above the washer & dryer but I can't reach it easily because I am so short, so empty hangers stay there until they are ready to be used. When the clothes are dry, they are folded and placed on the kitchen table at the place setting for that person. Hanging clothes are put on hangers and draped over the back of the chair. We eat dinner at this very table every single night. Laundry has to be done andput away every day before we can sit down to dinner. There's no arguing about who is going to put the laundry away. Everybody does their own and it is easy to see who hasn't when they have a pile of clothes instead of a plate at dinner time.

Free Exercise, I mean Free Exploring

2009-06-14T20:30:00.000-05:00

In an effort to get into better shape, Mike and I have started exercising. I have a really hard time staying motivated when I am staring at the blank wall in the basement while riding the bike or watching the same work out video for the umpteenth thousandth time. I decided it would be grand to view all the different places in our little slice of the world. Get out of the house, explore, get some sunshine and have some fun. I have a really hard time saying the word exercise, so calling it EXPLORING has worked really well for me. St. Louis and the metro area is really great in that it has hundreds of places go for a stroll, a walk or a hike!

While looking for a new place to explore, I stumbled upon Washington State Park in De Soto, Missouri. They have petroglyphs! Cool! I have been taking an archeology class and learning a lot about our local Native American populations. The petroglyphs are believed to date around 1000 AD.

The photo above shows the Thunderbird with the sun to the left of it's head. The thunderbird was an often recurring theme in Native American tradition.

The images above show oval indentations in the rock. These carvings are believed to be eggs, a sign of fertility. The image on the left has a spiral in the top/center, thought to be a snake, also representative of fertility.

There are a lot more of these carvings throughout the park. It's really neat. Walking along the paths, looking at the rocks, wondering 'Who was this person that carved these stones?', gave me a little better perspective on how ideas impact our culture, society and the land we live on.

I'm looking forward to more ~~exercise~~ exploring.

So Pretty

2009-06-01T07:58:00.001-05:00

When I was a little girl, growing up on the farm, we had a neighbor who had a very green thumb. Mrs. Kincer grew a lot of flowers. I can remember walking down to her house with my mom and strolling through her small yard for hours, looking at all the different flowers she grew. There must have been millions! At least it seemed that way to a 12 year old. I always enjoyed going to visit Mrs. Kincer because she always gave us something to bring home to plant. I can remember carrying home a few sprigs of sweet william with it's hot pink & white flowers wrapped in wet paper towels to keep it moist on the way home.

Our flower gardens were not the perfectly manicured beds you see in the magazines. They looked much more like wild patches of color growing around the house. I think that is why my flower beds look the way they do. Flowers are just willy nilly all over the place. You never know what color combinations are next to each other until they bloom. The image above is the hydrangea growing in my side yard. This is the first year it bloomed! yaay! I spent the whole winter drinking massive quantities of coffee and sprinkled the used coffee grounds on the old shoots all winter. I had resigned myself to ripping it out after this summer if it did not bloom. Idle threats do work, sometimes.

There weren't a ton of blooms, but that's ok. I am happy that it bloomed! The photo on the right shows the pretty lavendar tucked beside the hydrangea. It smells so good!

Necessity, the mother of invention, can be green, too!

2009-05-28T16:45:00.001-05:00

My spice cabinet is tiny, only 10 inches in width. I am short, only 5'2" with shoes on. I can't see above the first shelf of most of the cabinets in my kitchen so I have a nifty little wooden stool that resides in the pantry that I pull out when I need to get something off the upper shelves or just to see further back in the lowest shelf.

While painting the kitchen cabinets, I decided my spice cabinet needed those tiered shelves. You know the ones that allow you to see all of your spices at once. Like this...

Well, I looked and I looked and I looked and I looked. I never found any that were smaller than 12 inches wide and that would be too wide for my cabinets. I also didn't really want to purchase something as simplistic as a rack to set my spices on. It just wasn't a real need! One day while cleaning up the garage, I found a small piece of 2x4 with a little bit of shelf paper stuck to it and the idea hit me! I can make my own tiered shelves to fit my cabinet!

I cut an old 2x4 into 3 - 10 inch pieces to fit the width of my cabinet and covered them with the shelf paper that matched the inside of my cabinets. The back row is 2 of the 'shelves' stacked on top of each other and then 1 shelf placed in front of those, giving me 3 tiers to stack my spices. The 2x4 is the perfect width even for the larger spice containers that are on the back tier. Pretty dang nifty, even if I did do it myself!

Everything I needed just happened to be in my garage or kitchen to create these little shelves. I recycled old lumber saving it from the landfill, created a much appreciated feature in our kitchen, saved money ($0 spent on this project) and organized my spices. Just look around... you never know what you might find in your own home that will fix a need, or a want! It's cool to be green.

Still in the kitchen

2009-05-13T16:09:00.001-05:00

Being the neat freak that I am, I absolutely hate kitchen drawers. Everything just gets smashed into the drawer. I can never find what I am looking for and end up with a fork tine or toothpick or something stuck under a fingernail. I also hate measuring cups in a drawer. They wobble around, get stuck when you try to open the drawer and I inevitably get them all dirty trying get just the one I need.

So I fixed my problems. I bought heavy duty magnetic hooks and placed them on the side of the refrigerator. Now all my measuring cups have a designated home and they aren't getting shoved around in a drawer.

I need new measuring cups, too, by the way. Possibly a Christmas gift from someone?

The silverware drawer was also a major problem. I must have bought 4 or 5 silverware trays before I realized they just don't make one to fit this drawer! I didn't want to move the silverware drawer across the kitchen to a larger drawer, because this drawer made sense. It just didn't work properly. I fixed that, too!

I found some scrap pieces of wood from some project I don't remember. Cut them to fit my drawer and cut the dividers. Then, I nailed and glued it all together, slapped a couple of coats of white paint on it and called it done.

My silverware doesn't slide all the way back in the drawer anymore. I'm happy. Life is good.

Kitchen Makeover

2009-05-10T14:28:00.001-05:00

When we bought this house 3 years ago, the kitchen looked like this...

Yes. That is a red wall and extends all the way down into the living room. The cabinets are the cheap builder grade cabinets that were installed in the house in 1980 when it was built. GOLD, yes gold, not almond, countertops and black appliances.

I knew immediately that the cabinets would be painted. Why? Because this was the way it has always been done in my house. See exhibit A & B below.

Exhibit A
Our first house on Winona built in the 1920's. I love that house. Still miss it! The cabinets were not original to the kitchen but were there when we bought the house. The green trim is funky. Miss that, too.

Moving on...

Exhibit B
Our second home The Burncoate kitchen (after the remodel). This home had a very small kitchen but still very pretty and clean looking!

Do you see a recurring theme yet?

White cabinetry!

And now, The Westcliffe kitchen. Before & After...

Still the same gold counter tops, but now they work with the color scheme. The walls to the left of the refrigerator & above the cabinets are a dark chocolate brown. The backsplash area and right wall are a light taupe color. The cabinets are painted a marshmallow white (not stark white, they have just a hint of yellow). We added beadboard to the island area and the single cabinet in the right front of the photo (also shown below). Mike installed a new white sink and dishwasher and then updated the look of the cabinets by adding crown molding to the top of the cabinet frame. Mike's dad gave us their old microwave, which was only a year old, when they remodeled their kitchen and installed stainless appliances. The stove is the only appliance we need to replace now.

Painting the cabinets was a daunting task, but I finally got it finished. I primed one cabinet and waited, then painted one cabinet and waited, let it completely dry, moved the stuff back into it and moved on to the next cabinet. That was the only way I knew how to get it done without the entire kitchen being moved to the living room while I painted. Plus, I am a slow painter and I wanted to be able to use my kitchen every evening to cook. Cleaning up and putting away supplies every afternoon took a little time but with patience, I achieved the desired effect... almost. I'm still toying with the idea of glazing to make them look old. Maybe next year.

old photos

2009-04-16T11:07:00.001-05:00

I found these photos while cleaning up my hard drive. I don't even remember exactly why they had animal balloons. They're still super cute though!

I think maybe we had been to the zoo. These photos were taken 6 years ago. Our girl graduates from high school this year and the little monkey will be in the 7th grade. Man, how time flies!

Thrift Store Cabinet

2009-01-25T10:51:00.001-06:00

I purchased this cabinet at the Salvation Army Thrift Store for $10. I forgot to take a photo of the before, sorry. It was beat up, scratched and just dull 1970's looking, but made of solid wood and very sturdy.

I have been looking at black accessory pieces for a long time to compliment the 27 shades of beige in my home decor. Cabinets like this were going for around $75-$150 but I just didn't want to spend that kind of money on a small piece of furniture for the foyer that was made of pressed board. Plus, I just don't have the cash to spend that much on something so non-essential.

It took an afternoon to paint the 2 coats of black satin finish latex enamel with a couple of hours drying time between coats. I like doing quick projects like this. It gives me a sense of accomplishment that buying pre-painted brand new furniture just doesn't give me. I like finding old pieces that someone threw out of grandma's basement and giving it a new life. Anybody can do this! It just takes a little patience to find the right piece and then just a little time and paint to make it lovable again.

It doesn't do much. It holds a few table cloths and odd wine glasses, but dresses up the foyer nicely. I love it.

Let it snow...

2009-01-10T18:17:00.001-06:00

Look at the snow! January 7, 2005 - still finding more photographs on the pc that haven't been cataloged yet.

Poor Mike! The rest of us played in the snow. He worked. :(
He's still cute, though. There's nothing in this world like a man in jeans with a shovel!

Lemon Snowflake Cookies & Mother of The Year

2008-11-30T16:17:00.000-06:00

I made these cookies today from Tanner's elementary school cookbook. They are tasty and super easy! And... it's snowing today.

Lemon Snowflake Cookies
1 box Lemon Cake Mix
2 Cups Cool Whip (thawed)
1 egg
Powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 350. Place parchment paper on cookie sheet. Mix Lemon cake mix, cool whip and egg in a bowl. It will be really thick and dense (not runny like cake batter). Form into balls and roll the balls in powdered sugar. Place balls on parchment paper on cookie sheet. Bake for 10 minutes. Remove from cookie sheet and place on cooling rack. They are really good with a glass of cold milk and the cookies still just a little warm from the oven.

Sorry... no Thanksgiving photos of the monstrous meal I prepared. By the time I got it on the table nobody wanted to wait for me to take photos and frankly... I forgot. I was hungry.

As for my Mother Of The Year status... the cookies only rated 50% since only one kid would eat them. Tanner likes everything... how can he not like lemon snowflake cookies baked by mom?

YTD MOTY Score: 50% - My goal is to make at least 90% by Dec 31, 2008 and start 2009 with a fresh start. If I can get my MOTY score up to 90 by the end of the year with all the holiday hustle & bustle I think I might just be able to keep in good standing through the month of January.

Coons & Gators & Snakes... oh my!

2008-07-30T20:48:00.001-05:00

We took the kids to Louisiana today for a swamp tour. It was very interesting and we had tons of fun.

The resident gator at Cajun Pride Tours.

Cory, our tour guide, feeding the resident.

A bayou full of gators, snakes, racoons... and a lot more we didn't see.

You can barely see the faint trail of where our boat came through the water. The bayou seems like the ideal place to get rid of "unwanteds" since it reclaims it's natural state almost instantly.

An alligator lurking in dense cover.

It looks like a mess, but it really is beautiful... in it's own way.

Just a photo op site. Nobody ever really lived here. It is just for tourists. It shows the typical kind of home that is built on the bayou.
I didn't snap the photo fast enough to catch the 4 raccoons that came scampering out when we pulled up.

Tanner holding a baby alligator. That is as close as Ellie would get to it. I don't think she even touched it.

At this point in the tour, we had 11 alligators swimming around our boat. There were three when I tried to snap this photo but I only captured two of them.

More gators... then one in the middle of the photo, with his head barely out of the water, is over 12 feet long.

....... and the grand gator finale.......

Tanner feeding the gators. He was the first person to volunteer to feed the alligators. By far, the best shot of the day!

Later.... in N'Orleans...
The boyscout strikes again...

The snake charmer on Jackson Square after eating a Shrimp Po' Boy at Cafe Pontalba's and then beignets at Cafe Du Monde.

This is just the way I roll...

2008-07-03T10:36:00.001-05:00

need to work on my Entourage.

YAAAY! I WIN!

2008-07-03T10:15:00.001-05:00

Ha! Told you I'd have him out there mowing the grass with the non-gas powered mower.
He was even excited about it, because he could use him mp3 player AND actually HEAR the music because the mower isn't loud.

Gluten-Glutt0n Free Diet Update
Day 10 - 10 lbs gone.

Wardrobe Refashion
This morning I did another simple sewing project. It's more of an alteration than a refashion. A nice pretty white blouse that was way too big became today's victim. I took 2 inches off each side and raised the shoulder seams, removing about an inch off each shoulder seam. I think I need to take some more off the shoulder seams so the seams sit right on the top of the shoulder instead of just below it. I top-stitched the new seams to match the original seams.

Before

After

A couple of days ago, I made a tank top for Ellie that she will probably never wear, not even to bed. It's cute, though.

finished tank top

close up of fabric

ok... I have to go do REAL work for a while.

WTF Bad Debt Update WTF

2008-07-02T16:57:00.000-05:00

WTF?
The economy sucks. Gas prices (auto), gas prices (heating) and electricity here are kicking my ass! I have the heat & electric on budget billing so I can afford the gas bills in the winter and the electric bills in the summer, but still! damn!

Heating May 2007: $79/month
Heating May 2008: $106/month
~35% increase in 1 year

Electric May 2007: $84/month
Electric May 2008: $104/month
~36% increase in 1 year

Sooooo... The Bad Debt Update

Start
01/01/07: - $40,438

Current Debt
07/02/08: - $15,188.68
03/31/08: - $16,000

Total Paid: $25,249.32

So in 90 days I was only able to pay down $811.32
how depressing, but the major repairs are done on the cars. They are now safe to drive and we can't afford to buy gas.
WTF?

can you tell I paid the bills today?

Wardrobe Refashions - a lot of green goodness

2008-07-01T16:33:00.000-05:00

I dusted off the old sewing machine Mom gave me a few years ago and after a couple of days of cussing and fiddling with the tension, calling Mom for help, giving up and going to bed... I have refashioned 2 pairs of pants for me and a pair of sleep shorts for Ellie.

Basically, wardrobe refashioning is taking something you already have but don't like and won't wear and making it into something that you do like and will wear. I had two pairs of Stretch Riders pants, one black pair and one dk brown pair. After wearing them one time and running them through the wash, they shrank(or is it shrunk?? dictionary.com didn't really help me out on this one). The pants were about an inch too short and looked goofy with everything. So I cut the legs off. Now, I have 2 really great pairs of capri pants. I even put the little slits on the outside seam like real-store-bought capris.

There is a whole blog dedicated to Wardrobe Refashion.

My goal is to take the crappy clothes that I have right now and turn them into my transition clothes while I am losing weight. So far I have lost 9 lbs in 9 days on my new rheumatologist approved gluten- & glutton- free diet.

Procrastination Of The Most Ultimate Magnitude Update

2008-06-17T22:16:00.001-05:00

Updated: June 17, 2008
THE MASTER PROCRASTINATION LIST

General Cleaning and Organization

Office
- Clean off desk
- Purge old files and shred
- Condense filing cabinets and freecycle empty cabinets
- Clean off sewing area
- ~~Clean out closet~~ completed: 05/16/08
- Clean out storage cabinet
- Organize desktop computer and files
- ~~Organize laptop and files~~ completed: 03/28/08
Storage area
- Purge old files
- ~~Purge unused luggage~~ completed: 05/16/08
- ~~Purge unused boxes~~ completed: 05/16/08
- Finish coffee table and put in LR
- ~~Build shelves for Christmas storage~~ completed: 05/16/08
- ~~Build shelves for future stockpile~~ completed: 05/16/08
General Living Area of Basement Den
- Entertainment/Gaming Center
- Computer centers for kids
- Finish reupholstering chair
Dog's Room
- Add wall cabinets for storage (kitchen cabinets from remodel?)
- Waterproof wall covering
- Tile floor
Yard work
- Trim bushes at fence line
- ~~Trim or remove Bradford pear tree~~ completed: 05/02/08
- ~~Remove broken Birch tree~~ completed: 05/02/08
- Transplant Rose of Sharon bushes
- ~~Create tomato garden area~~ completed: 06/08/08
- ~~Clean out all flower bed~~s completed: 06/08/08
- Re-route all gutters to rain barrels
- Set up rain barrels and irrigation system
- Get rock to make matching flower beds
- Plant shrubs and flowers
- ~~Hanging baskets for front porch~~ completed: 05/??/08
Garage
- Purge all trash/unused toys/broken tools etc
- Tear out old workbench
- Install garage storage system and work bench
- Bike racks
- Stackable recycling bins
- Paint vent cover for front of garage

Car Repairs

~~Rendezvous~~ YAAAAY 1st thing completely finished
- ~~Fix heater~~ completed: 05/??/08
- ~~Fix storage compartment for sunglasses~~ completed: 05/??/08
- ~~Carpet cleaned~~ completed: 05/??/08
- ~~Navigation system~~ decided not needed
Probe
- Fix emergency brake
- Get new faceplate for radio
Cutlass
- Find radiator leak and get fixed
- ~~Replace ball bearings on front end~~ completed: 05/??/08
- Fix glove box handle

Man! After writing all that, I'm not sure if I should feel safe driving any of these cars.

Life Organizational Skills to Attempt

Use calendar to keep track of all schedules - use reminders too!
Tame the paper monster that throws crap on my counters and tables
Set up a rotating menu plan
Set up a shopping list on pda for Mike to use
Get on a routine cleaning schedule
Update Christmas Card list and actually mail to them this year
Get all important birthdays, anniversaries in datebook
Make an "important" phone numbers list
Stockpile non-perishable items
Find some freezer cooking recipes
Find more crockpot recipes
Scrapbook the last 16 years of my children's lives
Get all of Mike's Navy photos in albums
Shadow box all of Mike's Navy memorabilia
Print our wedding photos

Money Goals

Pay off credit card($9K) and student loan($7K).
- Bad Debt as of January 01, 2007: $40,438
- Bad Debt as of March 31, 2008: $16,000
- Amount paid off so far: $24,438

House General Repairs (not done by me, but I still have to save $$ for them)

New windows
Fix siding I set on fire July 4, 2006
Blown in insulation in attic
Hardwood Floors - LR, DR, Foyer, Hall, 3 Bedrooms
New doors
New 6" baseboards and trim
Crown Molding - DR, Baths, 3 Bedrooms
Remodel baths - Hall and Master
- new paint
- shower/tub
- new vanity & top
- new tile floor
- trim mirror
- new lighting
Kitchen Remodel (maybe add on to enlarge??)
- new paint
- new cabinets
- new counters
- redesign laundry (new washer/dryer??)
- redesign pantry
- new subfloor
- new tile floor
- new sliding glass door
- 3 Season Room?
Add a 1/2 bath in lower level
Reconfigure Office and Storage area ??
Build in bar?
Replace retaining wall

Product Testing: Airwick Automatic Air Freshener

2008-06-17T22:01:00.001-05:00

03/31/08 - Airwick Automatic Air Freshener - 30min/60day setting

05/29/08 - It lasted exactly 60 days. It probably would have lasted a few days longer but we pushed the manual squirt button a few times to mask the dog's farts. I think as animals get older they start to rot from the inside out. He's getting rank at his old age of 8.

yes yes... I know this post is almost 3 weeks late, but I did mark it in my calendar so that I would remember the day the air freshener ran out of smelly juice.

I'm trying to be conservative & green. I am sooo NOT COOL.

2008-06-03T06:52:00.000-05:00

Gas here is $3.89/gal. Not terrible by the averages in some states, but extremely terrible to me and my pocketbook. I have been slowly making the changes to go green and to be SEVERELY CONSERVATIVE with our money and spending.

Refusing both paper and plastic bags at all shopping centers (this is slowly becoming a habit)
Using Reusable shopping bags, when I remember to take them in the store (this is slowly becoming a habit)
Doing all my shopping/errands on the same day with a planned route
Making my kids walk to the school bus stop
Using the new St. Louis County provided personal recycling container
Clipping coupons
Refusing to buy something unless I have a coupon (unless it is milk or eggs... I rarely findany coupons for those products) Even Mike is using coupons, if I make the list and pull the coupons for him.
Creating menu plans to curb our eating out and promote better home cooked meals that are cheaper and better for us.

You get the idea. I have been saying for 4-5 months now, that if gas gets to $4/gallon, WALKING to the grocery store, walgreens, etc becomes mandatory. It's getting close.

Last week, I started mowing the yard with our reel mower. It's 9 years old but still works like new. And the best part is... it doesn't use gas. Yay! I win. The lawn looks nice, even Mike commented on how nice it looked. I didn't waste gas. It is good exercise for me. I also bought a pair of glass clippers ($7.99) to use instead of the weedeater. Yeah I know, weedeaters don't use that much gas, but still... exercise. Important!

BACKGROUND INFO: You have to understand, we live in an middle-upper middle class neighborhood where we(as in our family) is pulling down the average annual family income. Most families in our neighborhood are in their mid 50's - 70's and don't have any children living at home. It's a clean quiet neighborhood.

Upon finishing the yard yesterday around 1:30pm (it took me 1 hour to mow the lawn plus 30 minutes to trim) my neighbor asks as she is getting out of her car... "Why on earth would you mow your grass with THAT?!?"

Me sheepishly, "Because.... gas is getting expensive?"

Neighbor, "Pfffsh!" and walks into her house.

This morning, I was researching my next pro-green purchase, a folding shopping cart. You know the ones that bag ladies push around looking all homeless. Mike wanted to know why I was looking at folding shopping carts. Duh! To take to the grocery store to haul all my groceries back home when gas is $4 gallon and I refuse to start my car to drive 2 blocks. Plus, the exercise wouldn't kill me. Well, the exercise might kill me in July 102 temps and 390% humidity, but I doubt I would be so silly as to go walking/shopping on a day like that.

Mike: "It's not like we live in the country and have to drive 20 miles to the store."

Me: "I know, but still, every little bit helps and if I don't need to DRIVE to the store it conserves the gas for long trips that we can't walk. Like picking up the kids after spending the summer with their dad in Virginia."

Mike: "Walking to Schnuck's just seems a bit.... unnecessary, when we live so close."

So even in the same house, we are at opposite ends of the conservation spectrum. I might not be cool right now with my husband and neighbors, but you just wait. I'll win. 6 months ago Mike wouldn't have used coupons at all! I'm the first in the neighborhood to use the reel mower, but you just wait...

Sing it with me... "I was gree-een, when gree - een wasn't cool."

Sometimes You Are Just DESTINED To Fail

2008-05-21T09:33:00.002-05:00

Our house needs some work. Not major work, but aesthetically pleasing work. You know, simple things like painting the shutters and garage door. We had been planning to do this little project for quite some time and since I had some free time, I thought now would be as good a time as any to start. So off to the hardware store I go...

MONDAY

It should have been a sign when I had to special order the two additional shutters for the house because the builder never put them on 22 years ago. Nobody sells 72" long shutters, they have to be special ordered. $43 for the set, not terribly expensive for shutters. So I ordered the shutters and picked up 2 quarts of paint in different colors because I was having a hard time deciding between the colors. Mistake #1

I painted one existing shutter a beige/brown color and the other the brown/red color. Even after getting the colors on the shutter, I still couldn't decide but I was leaning towards the brown/red. I waited for Mike to come home from work to help me decide.

He stands in the front yard, making little squares with his fingers blocking out the rest of the color and house trying to decide which color he likes best. He chooses the beige/brown. I conceded.
Mistake #2

We proceed to paint the shutters the beige/brown. One hour later, we're back at the curb making finger frames again. What little bit of character our brown/red brick house with black shutters had was now gone. Bland, boring, blah.

Mike says, "Yeah, we should have used the brown/red." Scarlett O'Hara said, "I'll think about that tomorrow." I was tired and hungry and I still needed to cook supper for the kids.

TUESDAY

I paint the shutters brown/red. It looked great going on... 3 hours later when it was dry, it looked ugly and putrid. I called Mike at work. "It looks worse," I said.

At this point, in 24 hours the shutters have been 3 different colors. Black (the original color), brown, brown/red.

3:50 PM I go to the hardware store to buy yet MORE paint. This time, I am smart. The siding on the house is white, so I KNOW white shutters and garage door will look good with the house. I have my list. White Exterior Latex Satin Finish Paint, 2 extra paint brushes and a roller because the kids are going to help do the garage door.

Standing in the paint aisle, I am trying to decide which BRAND of paint to buy. 15 year warranty or 25 year warranty. I didn't really care, this isn't that big of a project so if I have to paint it again in 15 years who cares? I will probably sell the house by then anyway. As I am reaching down to grab the 15 yr White Exterior Latex Satin Finish Paint, the ancient clerk walks up to me and asks me what my painting project is.

Sharon: "We're painting the shutters and garage door. I need White Exterior Latex Satin Finish Paint."

Methuselah: "Oh... well... this is what you need," as he picks up a gallon of Rustoleum Exterior Paint.

Sharon: "Um, ok." Now, being raised to respect your elders and raised to know that your elders most times know what is best, I didn't question his choice of exterior paint. That... and he was a man. I figured he had painted a garage door or 4 in his 130 years on this earth. This was to be my first garage door painting, what did I know?
Mistake #3

Methuselah stirs the paint while I pick up the other supplies I needed. I didn't look at the can of paint. I didn't read the can of paint. I trusted him, plus I had bought Rustoleum products in the past and was pleased with the results. Mistake #4
I pay for the stuff and head home.

4:15 PM Back at home, we drag out the ladders, paint trays, brushes, newspapaers, stir sticks and can openers yet again. I put the kids with rollers on the garage door (Mistake #5)with explicit instructions to NOT PAINT NEAR THE EDGES. I will do that.

4:35 PM Tanner starts whining that his arms are tired. As he is walking towards me, I see white paint all over the toes of his black Vans (skateboard shoes and the only pair that fits him) Another sign. I make him take his shoes off and he sits down to take a break.

4:40 PM Ellie informs us she has a chemistry final on Wednesday and needs to study. She is excused.

I start painting the garage door. I start thinking, "Man... this paint is thick. My wrist hurts."

Mike asks me if I think this paint is a lot harder to apply than the previous 2 coats I applied earlier in the day and the day before. YEAH! A lot harder to work with... at this point nearly an hour later after purchasing the paint, I read the label.

"SON OF A %$&(*@!" (The kids are both in the house, I can cuss.)
"STOP PAINTING!! This is white exterior OIL BASED GLOSS ENAMEL! STOP PAINTING!"

Mike asks me why I bought the paint. I tell him about Methuselah. Mike says it will be fine. We've already started we might as well just finish it with what we have and quit spending money on paint for the same project. Yet again, I conceded. Mistake #6

Sometime around 6:30 PM we finish painting the first coat on the shutters and garage. The sun is starting to go down. Our house faces west and the sun was hitting the front of the house full force. Everything was bright and shiny, but the paint was still wet. It's oil based, it takes a century to dry.

We clean up the mess, I talk to the neighbors a bit about the fiasco. Lynn, a neighbor, is dying laughing at us wearing our sunglasses while standing in front of the garage door trying to decide if "everything will be ok".

7:15 PM We eat dinner.

7:45 PM I try to clean the paint off Tanner's shoes.

8:00 PM Mike tells us to get in the car, we're going to get Tanner a new pair of shoes. He needs them anyway, the old Vans are worn out and are starting to get a little tight. Oh, and Tanner needs a pair of black dress pants for 5th grade graduation. So retarded to have a 5th grade graduation if you ask me. That's another rant. I'll save it for Thursday, Graduation Day. I make Tanner wear his boyscout hiking boots. Even though the oil based paint looks dry and feels dry, I don't want him kicking around in the back seat of my nice car.

8:10 PM Shoe Carnival. Mistake #7 looking around for Vans. Tanner is clodding his way around the store in a t-shirt, shorts and hiking boots. Why did we come here? They never have shoes to fit Tanner. Ellie, yes. Mike, yes. Me, yes. Tanner, never!

8:15 PM Realization that Shoe Carnival doesn't have shoes to fit Tanner. Tanner is shooting basketball in the back of the store not looking at shoes. He snubs his nose to everything Mike takes back for him to look at, some he won't even take out of the box and try on. I'm disgusted and walking around the store carrying Tanner's hiking boots. Mike wants to go to the Mall to get Vans.

8:25 PM Mike again states that we should go to the Mall.

Sharon: "Well quit shooting hoops and come on already! The mall closes at 9!"

In the car to the mall, Tanner says, "I will go into the mall with dignity, but I might come out with none."

One good thing about living in the city is the close proximity of everything. We get to the mall, find his shoes and trying to save myself a little heartache and headache, I pick up his black pants at Sears and we go home. The only uneventful part of the whole day.

9:15 PM It is dark. Pull into the driveway. The headlights on the car damn near blinded us reflecting off the garage door. Mike starts laughing uncontrollably and I start crying. I'm pissed.

Sometimes, failure is inevitable.

I listened to two men and ignored all the warning signs. When I know what I want, I need to stick to my list(s).

Learning to Read is very important. More important than learning to read is utilizing that particular skill when the need arises.

I can't paint the 2nd coat on the garage door now until next week because we're gone for Memorial Weekend and the oil paint needs a couple of days to cure. It's just going to have to look like crap for a few days.

Next time... Screw it. Save my money. Hire a professional. No headache and I don't have to clean up the mess.

The Haphazard Earth Conscious Sister

2008-04-19T19:19:00.001-05:00

After reading my sister's post about recycling, I remembered that I have a reusable bag as well.

Below is a photo of my reusable shopping bag. It's black. The bags on top of it are from the last 2-3 trips I have made to Wal-Mart and Schnuck's and have forgotten to take my earth friendly bag.

(Note to Mom: This container is in my laundry closet. There are currently 44 plastic bags in the container. I counted them. I think I could easily fit almost 100, if I squished them enough.)

This is what my bag looks like with stuff in it...

Unlike my sister's photo (shown right) of her bag laiden with grocery goods, my bag has only carried goods on it's maiden voyage from the local Wal-mart to our home. All the plastic bags from the previous picture are fluffing it out. I'm trying....seriously!

Our local recycling program is pretty cool. You just throw everything that is recyclable into a big black 65 gallon trash bin on wheels and take it to the curb on Thursday mornings. No sorting. Paper, plastic, cardboard, tin and aluminum can all go in the same bin together. We are asked to rinse any containers. Sometimes, I do. Sometimes, I don't. Most times... I do. I'm not that much of a renegade recycler.

Tanner's Art

2008-04-19T15:30:00.001-05:00

Click image for full size view

Our World Got Rocked...

2008-04-18T18:03:00.000-05:00

by a 5.2 Magnitude earthquake in Bellmont, IL, 128 miles east of St. Louis. It banged furniture against the walls, rocked the bed violently and severely swayed the walls of the house. It was like walking through a carnival fun house and riding a roller coaster at the same time. There was some minor damage to bridges and a few old historical brick buildings (mostly cracking in the brick work). Nothing fell down... at least not here.

St. Louis is located on the New Madrid fault, considered the most dangerous fault line in the United States.

All in all, there were 7 earthquakes today. Two of which we felt in St. Louis. The USGS Website has all the quakes that hit our region, plus lots of other cool and weird information.

While looking at past earthquake destruction, I stumbled upon "Top 10 Ways to Destroy Earth".

huh?

2008-04-02T20:13:00.001-05:00

"Elephants are really good at remembering things in Chinese." - Tanner, April 03, 2007

"Yeah, they can't remember for shit in English!" - Mike, immediately after Tanner's comment

Tanner was trying to explain the Chinese Zodiac. He is an elephant and according to the Chinese Zodiac elephants area really good at remembering things.

The future of our country is in a sad state and I didn't even break a sweat.

2008-04-02T17:35:00.001-05:00

I don't know how Mom does it's everyday. Going to school and looking at the faces of our future. Trying to beat some sense and sensibilities into today's youth. Mom must have a very strong will to live.

Teachers spend more time with our children, than we, as parents, do. Teachers have limited budgets and minuscule amounts of time dedicated to each individual student. And parents wonder why their kids don't do well in school!?! I know it takes a lot of time and effort to mold our children into tomorrow's leaders but my Generation X parents have dropped the ball. BIG TIME! Ok Parents, How about starting with the basics of general courtesy, like "Excuse Me" and then we'll move on to (parent speaking to child) "Your job is to go to school, be prepared and learn! Period! End of Conversation."

I spent a couple of hours today giving a presentation on website development to 25 students who stared at me like I two heads and twelve eyes. The class is called, "Website Development". It requires the use of computers. Each student has their very own computer with internet access at their desk. Very cool desks (see photo) and exceptionally good computers, but the coolness stopped right about there. The curriculum this class is being taught is Basic HTML using FrontPage 2003. FrontPage 2003 is now defunct and no longer available even as a trial on Microsoft's website. Technology changes fast and yes it is hard to keep up. But the technology they are teaching right this minute at this school was worthless 4 years before they printed it in the curriculum books in July 2007.

Before starting my presentation, I was standing in the back of the classroom with the teacher watching the kids file in at the bell. Most of the kids knew the drill. Spit out your gum, no sodas/drinks in the lab, flip open your desktop and login to your computer. A few filtered in with sodas and were turned towards the trash can. It's April, they've been in this class since January. Do they really think today a miracle happened and they will be allowed to bring a drink into the computer lab?

So as the class is settling the down, Mrs. E. makes the announcement that everyone needs to get settled in, turn on their pc, etc. and "Let's all welcome Mrs. O, who is here today to talk to us about her web development business."

I kid you NOT! One girl actually sat with a stack of five books on top of her desk/monitor, raised her hand and then asked, "Do I need to use the computer today?" DUH! yeah you twit, you're in a COMPUTER class. It's what you do in computer class. Use the computer.

I had a lot of questions from the students and even a couple of comments from the teacher that it was so nice to have someone who knew what they were talking about and didn't sweat profusely. What?!? Apparently, the guy they had come in last year was very nervous and sweated a lot. I would like to think that my presentation went well because I knew what I was talking about but in reality I think it was because I didn't break a sweat.

For my sister: How to name a link

2008-04-02T16:18:00.000-05:00

Type the text you want to link.

Heidi's Blog

Select the text you want to link, in this case Heidi's Blog.

Then click on the hyperlink button on the toolbar. It's the globe with the paperclip.

Write or paste the link in the box, then click ok.

Heidi's Blog

all done

If you copy a link and then just past it to the screen, it will "name" the link the same as the URL.

http://heidi1977.blogspot.com

Mom does NOT work for UPS or Life Lesson #1

2008-03-31T23:01:00.001-05:00

"She just gave me a box out of her car and said it was stuff from you. So, thank you for the 4 boxes of taco shells. I hope they aren't rancid. Also, I got the check for $15.00. I bet you have been cussing me for not cashing it. And, how did you end up with my crock pot lid? Thanks also for the shirts."

The previous is a comment from my sister, Heidi. The "She", mentioned above, is our mother. Heidi & Mom live in Virginia. I live in St. Louis, MO. I don't get home as often as I should. It's obvious from my sister's post. The package she is talking about is from the Thanksgiving 2007 holiday season.

You see.. we are a strange family. We have this weird obsession with using coupons to the extreme and never paying retail prices and free is always best. My local grocery store was having a "dollar days" sales and had Old El Paso taco shells for $1/box and I had several coupons for 50c off. I used them on double coupon day, so my coupons were actually worth $1. I bought 10 boxes and got 5 of the boxes free. Upon bringing them home, Mike pulls a full Spanish Inquisition into my sanity since I had just spent $2K on braces for Ellie and she could potentially pop off the newly glued brackets eating crunchy tacos.

To save my marriage, I decided to spread the wealth and put together a care package for Heidi. I couldn't just send 4 boxes of taco shells, my sister would think I was crazy as well. I owed her $15 for my portion of the framing of our surprise "just the kids" family portrait for Mom's Christmas present, so in the box it went. I had a couple of shirts that I bought, didn't fit well and had only worn once, so in the box they went. What about the crockpot lid you ask? Well, during the holiday dinner, Heidi had brought over a super duper creamy cheesy dip in her mini crockpot. After dinner, we cleaned up, the crockpot was hand washed and the lid went into the dishwasher. The next day I found the lid in the dishwasher. We were going to be meeting up with Heidi to take the above mentioned family portrait, and I just threw the lid in my car to return it to her house. In all the hubbub of the holidays, picture taking and cramming one year of being away into a 2 day visit the entire family marathon, the crockpot lid got shoved under the car seat and driven across country to St. Louis a few days later, which I find several days AFTER getting back to St. Louis. Knowing my sister as I do, if the crockpot had been lidless for more than a week, it would most likely be pitched. She doesn't keep junk or cooking utensils missing parts. I, on the other hand, have perfectly good pots and perfectly good lids. They just belong to different sets and don't fit, but I still use them. Being the tightwad that I can be at times, I feared for the usefulness of the crockpot sans lid, so in the box it went.

Box contents:
4 boxes of crunchy taco shells
2 shirts
$15 check
1 mini crockpot lid
and probably a bunch of ephemera for Mom

Error: You will notice the original package was to be sent to my sister, Heidi (Paragraph 4). Instead I sent the box to Mom's house sometime around Christmas. Mom's typical turn around on packages, regardless of holiday, birthday or moonphase, is about 6 months. If I calculate correctly, she still had 2 months to go to meet her delivery deadline. In her defense though, I should have sent the package directly to Heidi.

Heidi is efficient with the "put away, throw away or give away" thing. Had I shipped to my sister... By now, the taco shells would have probably been eaten, the check cashed, shirts passed on to Goodwill(which I should have done instead of shipping them all the way across the country just to be sent to Goodwill) and mom would have scrapbooked about 1/2 the ephemera.

P.S. I still have 2 boxes of taco shells left. Our most recent taco dinner was 03/24/08.

Monday's Goal

2008-03-31T08:04:00.002-05:00

Last night, I was thinking about the massive list I posted yesterday. The thing that kept popping into my head was "one day at a time". I can do this one day at a time...

Today's goal: Clean off my desk.
We'll see how far I can get today. My weekly goal is to have the office purged by Saturday.

Update: 1:00PM CST - I am making progress. I have one pile completely gone/filed away. Checked the mail while on my 'lunch break' and received a refund check from GMAC. When I paid off my car, apparently I paid $0.93 too much. Not hardly worth the it to them, with a 41c stamp, paper and envelope, but you can bet you ass, I'll be glad to cash it once I can combine it with another trip. Dang gas is expensive here. $3.19

Other News: Also at lunch, I received a call from Ellie's web dev teacher at school. I will be talking with the class about my job, how I got into web development, etc. Looks like I am finally going to put my 1992 Wytheville Community College Speech & Public Speaking class to use.

Procrastination Of The Most Ultimate Magnitude Update

2008-03-30T20:08:00.001-05:00

Updated: June 17, 2008
THE MASTER PROCRASTINATION LIST

General Cleaning & Organization

Office
- Clean off desk
- Purge old files & shred
- Condense filing cabinets & freecycle empty cabinets
- Clean off sewing area
- ~~Clean out closet~~ completed: 05/16/08
- Clean out storage cabinet
- Organize desktop computer and files
- ~~Organize laptop & files~~ completed: 03/28/08
Storage area
- Purge old files
- ~~Purge unused luggage~~ completed: 05/16/08
- ~~Purge unused boxes~~ completed: 05/16/08
- Finish coffee table & put in LR
- ~~Build shelves for Christmas storage~~ completed: 05/16/08
- ~~Build shelves for future stockpile~~ completed: 05/16/08
General Living Area of Basement Den
- Entertainment/Gaming Center
- Computer centers for kids
- Finish reupholstering chair
Dog's Room
- Add wall cabinets for storage (kitchen cabinets from remodel?)
- Waterproof wall covering
- Tile floor
Yard work
- Trim bushes at fence line
- ~~Trim or remove Bradford pear tree~~ completed: 05/02/08
- ~~Remove broken Birch tree~~ completed: 05/02/08
- Transplant Rose of Sharon bushes
- ~~Create tomato garden area~~ completed: 06/08/08
- ~~Clean out all flower bed~~s completed: 06/08/08
- Re-route all gutters to rain barrels
- Set up rain barrels & irrigation system
- Get rock to make matching flower beds
- Plant shrubs and flowers
- ~~Hanging baskets for front porch~~ completed: 05/??/08
Garage
- Purge all trash/unused toys/broken tools etc
- Tear out old workbench
- Install garage storage system & work bench
- Bike racks
- Stackable recycling bins
- Paint vent cover for front of garage

Car Repairs

~~Rendezvous~~ YAAAAY 1st thing completely finished
- ~~Fix heater~~ completed: 05/??/08
- ~~Fix storage compartment for sunglasses~~ completed: 05/??/08
- ~~Carpet cleaned~~ completed: 05/??/08
- ~~Navigation system~~ decided not needed
Probe
- Fix emergency brake
- Get new faceplate for radio
Cutlass
- Find radiator leak & get fixed
- ~~Replace ball bearings on front end~~ completed: 05/??/08
- Fix glove box handle

Man! After writing all that, I'm not sure if I should feel safe driving any of these cars.

Life Organizational Skills to Attempt

Use calendar to keep track of all schedules - use reminders too!
Tame the paper monster that throws crap on my counters and tables
Set up a rotating menu plan
Set up a shopping list on pda for Mike to use
Get on a routine cleaning schedule
Update Christmas Card list & actually mail to them this year
Get all important birthdays, anniversaries in datebook
Make an "important" phone numbers list
Stockpile non-perishable items
Find some freezer cooking recipes
Find more crockpot recipes
Scrapbook the last 16 years of my children's lives
Get all of Mike's Navy photos in albums
Shadow box all of Mike's Navy memorabilia
Print our wedding photos

Money Goals

Pay off credit card($9K) and student loan($7K).
- Bad Debt as of January 01, 2007: $40,438
- Bad Debt as of March 31, 2008: $16,000
- Amount paid off so far: $24,438

House General Repairs (not done by me, but I still have to save $$ for them)

New windows
Fix siding I set on fire July 4, 2006
Blown in insulation in attic
Hardwood Floors - LR, DR, Foyer, Hall, 3 Bedrooms
New doors
New 6" baseboards & trim
Crown Molding - DR, Baths, 3 Bedrooms
Remodel baths - Hall & Master
- new paint
- shower/tub
- new vanity & top
- new tile floor
- trim mirror
- new lighting
Kitchen Remodel (maybe add on to enlarge??)
- new paint
- new cabinets
- new counters
- redesign laundry (new washer/dryer??)
- redesign pantry
- new subfloor
- new tile floor
- new sliding glass door
- 3 Season Room?
Add a 1/2 bath in lower level
Reconfigure Office & Storage area ??
Build a bar?
Replace retaining wall

My Ubuntu

2008-03-30T16:11:00.001-05:00

A couple of weeks ago, Mike decided we needed to be a dual operating system family. I now have Windows XP Home Edition and Ubuntu 7.10. I like the Ubuntu set up. I've been playing around with this version for about 3 days now. I am now trying to set up & sync my PDA... so far so good. Printing, however, is still non-existant. I haven't quite mastered how to set up a printer, connected to a windows machine, to this OS. I will get it figured out eventually. For now though, I have to reboot back to windows to print anything and Mike says print servers are still too expensive for our measly little home network.

I like this new partition & clean operating system. I haven't screwed up the file structure, yet, nor have I junked it up with 10,000,000 desktop icons and 40billion photos. You would think I would use some of the web space provided by Flickr and keep my pc clean. I'm going to try.