Back in the saddle

I have been MIA for the past few days because my mom was in the hospital again, it seems like it is finally determined what has been going on with her. We are relieved for that, but I getting back into the swing of things has been a challenge post holiday, and post family emergency. But here I am again, trying to get back in the saddle.

My office space is in my kitchen, and my dining table is usually my desk, unless I am having people over for dinner. My office was completely dismantled over the holidays, and although I began working again (I work from home), I had not gotten it all set up. Today's project - Mission Office Organization.
I have been on the hunt for the perfect desk lamp for a long time. I found this one at the thrift store for $3, and spray painted the shade kelly green. It's awesome because it's small and portable, so when I need to do the old office switcheroo, it folds up and I can put it on my printer cart and roll everything out.
I am doing new "To Do List" method, I got one of those giant post it pads and some markers, and I have a gigantic poster sized list on my fridge. I think checking things off and seeing the list get shorter that way will help me feel like I am actually getting things accomplished. I bought old school Mr. Sketch markers, you know - the kind that smell like cherries and licorice. Sooo retro. It takes me back to elementary school. Those were always the markers everyone went for!

So now that my space is pretty organized (I still have a big stack of papers to file, but that will be for another day) I'm hoping to really be off and running now...let's cross our fingers.

Happy New Year

"And now we welcome the new year, full of things that have never been."

-Rainer Maria Wilke

Wishing you every good thing this new year. I'm kicking it off in grand style by cleaning my bathroom like it has never been cleaned before. I'm talking scrubbing the floors by hand, here.
This will happen no more than once a year, twice at most, I assure you. We're good for the next six months. And there's nothing quite like the feeling of having a big basket of fresh white towels.
I had a long vacation and lots of down time, and it's time to kick it back into gear again. I made a whole bunch of new shoe clips that I am starting to post on my Etsy shop, too! New shoes for a brand new year. Hope your holidays were amazing. I'm looking forward to a fantastic 2010 full of adventures and surprises.

Twas the night after Christmas

The night after Christmas. Whew, it was a whirlwind of holiday activity around here. My work week was absolutely insane, cramming all of December's work in preparation for a very busy new year...into two days or so. When it was finally over, and I was just kicking a touch of the flu, it was Christmas Eve.
How did it get here so quickly? The days on the advent calendar flew by. Regretfully, I found myself shopping on Christmas Eve. I blame my brother, who was doing about 90% of his shopping that day. A mild day turned into full blown winter as I went to Ross in search of a tin for baked goods. Kids screaming, a 20 minute wait in line, and the store looked like it had virtually been looted. The redeeming point of the day were the two Santas I spotted, one the jolliest Christmas crackhead ever strutting in his green pants, red t-shirt, santa hat, and leather pimp coat. The other was a lady Santa wearing a red jumpsuit almost cut to her naval, and black knee high patent leather boots. Classy. She was clearly shopping for more than gifts.
This is the shopping list of a person with a craft problem. I had a few last minute crafty things I wanted to do before the holidays, and a few that I will just have to file away for next year. My family comes over to my house on Christmas Eve for dinner, so I had a table to set. I tried to do it mostly with things I had around the house already.
I had every aspiration to make a tablecloth or at least napkins out of this pink floral fabric for a Christmas table. The best laid plans often go awry. In the end, I found a red floral tablecloth at Ross for $9 on clearance. It would have been $80 at least at Anthropologie and looks almost just like one I have been eying there. I used the snowflake doilies again, reused the votives from Hanukkah, and got some new green napkins. It has been Project Kitchen Upgrade around here. I feel like I'm too old to still be using the hand me down utensils and worn out linens anymore. My stocking was stuffed with spatulas, a fancy basting brush, and serving spoons. We survived the shopping, and went to the candle light service at church, which was lovely as always. There was a flamenco dancer in the service! Back at my house, we ate the traditional Italian sausage and fried potatoes and had the obligatory screening of National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. This an essential holiday tradition.
My brother and I slept in and made our way over to my parent's house. We opened presents, had lox and bagels and my dad's insanely strong coffee for breakfast, and cooked meat and sauce and lasagna all day. It was a feast.
I got wonderfully lovely and thoughtful gifts. I am so very blessed. I also learned that a dear friend is going to have a bambino, and my best friend got engaged over the holidays. Many wonderful milestones to come this year.
My favorite gift was the one I gave my mother, a print of this photograph she took of my grandmothers hands. I played with the coloring and put it in a beautiful frame with a mat. It was so gorgeous I wanted to keep it. She really loved it.

I have promised myself that I will not work until Monday at the earliest. I am on vacation until the 4th, and I couldn't be more in need of a break. I have a to do list that I have to accomplish to be ready for the new year, but I have a whole week to do it. Until then, I'm turning off the alarm, may unleash the crafty beast a time or two, and generally taking it easy.

I'm a lumberjack and I'm okay

The giant old tree in front of my house bit the dust today. It was about 75% dead, limbs dropping all the time, and it was really time to pull the plug. So the tree-climber-cutter-downers, which you could call urban lumberjacks, arrived early this morning, strapped in to a harness and scaled the tree. I decided to stay and work at my desk in the front window, and was entertained until a limb swung from a rope uncomfortably close to the glass. I ducked out and came home to find a guy half up the tree and a gigantic pile of limbs blocking the front door. I squeezed in and tried to mentally block the drone of the chainsaws until it got dark. It's sad to see the old tree go. The lumberjacks showed me where the tree had been struck by lightning years ago, you could see the impact on the rings and the way the tree was starting to grow over it. The stumps and big slices of the trunk are scattered in the yard, which a guy will come and grind up tomorrow. Hasta luego, Mr. Tree.

It's all in the wrist

Last night was the final evening of Hanukkah. My family came over to my house to eat and celebrate. I have gifted myself with some new kitchen things for the holidays, first some white dishes from Ikea, which were $20 for a set of dinner plates, salad plates, and bowls for six. I decorated the table with a turquoise twin sheet, also purchased at Ikea for $5, snowflake-like doilies from the dollar store for $5, and napkins and votive holders from Big Lots for $10. The place cards were a total find at Publix when I was finishing up my grocery shopping. Total cost for tableware that I will use again for Christmas Eve - $35. Considering that my dishes previously were cobbled together from a set I had in college that is missing most of the pieces, a few from the thrift store, and some plastic ones from Target, this is a big step for me.
Of course, Hanukkah must include latkes. The technique is all in the wrist. You eat a lot of fried food, partly because the oil is symbolic of the lamp oil that lasted for eight nights, and also just because it is delicious. My mom is a master latke maker, which you must serve with applesauce and sour cream.
Penny Lane was tormented while we cooked and ate, especially because I made a new recipe for brussel sprouts with pancetta. Like a good part Jew puppy (it's legit from your mother's bloodline, so she's covered), she sniffed and snacked on crumbs all around the stove and the latkes fried. She was a maniac.
The brussel sprouts were sooooo good. It's a Nigella recipe from the Food Network. Words cannot express how delicious these are. Even if you don't like brussel sprouts, you will love these. Pancetta is like $10 a pound, so I considered just using bacon, but it was totally worth it. I left out the chestnuts and parsley but it was still amazing.
The evening was rounded out with a little dreidel spinning and gambling with chocolate gelt. We played "high stakes" dreidel, the competition was vicious. I'm kind of sad Hanukkah is over, I really enjoyed it this year. Even though I stumbled over the Hebrew readings, I got better and it was nice to spend some time each night with my heritage and remembering those who came before me.

Home town tour

I was out and about this weekend and decided to do a little tour of where I live. I am inside the Atlanta city limits, but just adjacent to City of Decatur, the cutest little town within a big city. It's just four and a half square miles. People who live here are very specific to say "City of Decatur" instead of just Decatur, they are a bit snobbish that way. But, I have lived here for around six years now, and I love it. I get the anonymity of the city and a small town feel at the same time. Here's the giant water tower with the city logo, which is also plastered all over the place in town.This is downtown Decatur, where there is great boutique shopping, coffee shops, pubs, condos, the most bad ass yogurt shop ever (they have Captain Crunch and Nutella as toppings).
And here's my church, I doctored up the photo a little bit. Ooooh, mysterious. We had our Moravian love feast at church on Sunday night. It's like an advent celebration with lots of choral music, carols, and the youth pass out coffee and sweet buns. I volunteered to bake a batch this year, and they took literally 5 hours to make. It was pretty intense for a Sunday afternoon. But the house smelled delicious, and I love kneading dough. Here's the bread rising...

The pinnacle of my crafting career

I was inspired by KnockKnocking on Etsy to make a yarn wreath. It took forever to wrap the yarn neatly around the wreath form, but it was totally worth it. I made a few yarn flowers and attached a vintage button in the center. I also made some rosettes of of lace, some snowflakes, and the cute little glittered bird. I think the chandelier glass in the center really makes it special. OK, so maybe I got carried away with the glue gun and some little rhinestones and a few feathers, I bedazzled it quite a bit, but it's sparkly and fun. I also love that I can leave it up post-holiday. I'm already envisioning how sad my bare my apartment is going to look after Christmas.
I'm considering putting this guy up on my Etsy shop, I had so much fun with it I would love to make another.

Lighting the lights

It's the first day of Hanukkah. We celebrate both Christmas and Hanukkah in my house, so we've got candles and latkes until sundown next Friday. Here are the lights around my house tonight.
And here's the Hanukkah bush, miraculously just like a Christmas tree. It's going undercover this week.
I'm spending the weekend with friends and family, and baking buns for the Moravian love feast at church Sunday night. The buns take five hours to make. I've made them once and as I remember, they weren't that fantastic, but I have to use this traditional recipe they gave me. Bread making is always therapeutic, though, so Sunday afternoon I will be laundering and baking.

The paper whites emerge

I planted these paper white bulbs just after Thanksgiving in this little kit I found that had dirt, three bulbs and the aluminum planter. You have to keep them in a dark, cool place for a week or so until the leaves come up, and about two weeks later you have blooms like these. They are so pretty and they smell amazing. It's also just a nice sense of accomplishment to actually grow something!

These are a few of my favorite things

Well, these are not brown paper packages tied up with strings, but they are pillows tied up as packages. This is a super easy and inexpensive holiday decoration. I happen to have a giant box of ribbon hanging around my house, so I chose some in holiday colors and just tied up some of my pillows like presents. I was worried they wouldn't stay put, but they are working out beautifully.

Trimming the home for the holidays

It's finally time to get ready for the holidays! I don't have to restrain myself any more.

My regular posts this month will feature an ornament of the day and a song from my holiday mix, in addition to ideas for DIY, cheap and chic holiday home decor, crafts, gift ideas, and tips for holiday entertaining on a budget.

I'm kicking off the official season to be merry by making my second-annual holiday mix CD. Last year, I put one together, made some copies, and gave it as gifts to friends . I was inspired by a friend who also does the same thing, and I look forward to getting his mix each year. I like a mix of traditional, choral, old crooners, motown, acoustic, humorous, etc. I'm counting down December days til Christmas giving you a song (or maybe two) a day.

Today's Holiday Mix Song -

Please Come Home for Christmas, Harry Connick Jr. (Super jazzy and fun.)

I did a bit of holiday decorating, I got the tree and some lights up. Unwrapping those ornaments takes forever! I did some other fun little projects that I will be sharing with you in upcoming posts - an easy holiday pillow makeover, my faux wood mantel, and DIY advent calendar from recycled materials.

Jumping the gun

I caved. I am normally very anti-Christmas-before-Thanksgiving. However, I broke down at Ikea this weekend and bought some wrapping paper and ribbon. I justified this to myself by saying, well, I am not at Ikea very often (ummm, about once every six weeks?), it's kind of out of my way (ten minutes down the road), and it was on sale (99 cents for the paper, 25 cents for the ribbon). The only thing that really holds water is the sale. Oh well. But, what I am looking forward to is advent, which starts just after Thanksgiving. I always loved getting my advent calendar, which was always one of those cardboard ones with little chocolates inside. But there are some really creative advent calendars out there, and I'm thinking of making one myself this year. Here are some great handmade advent calendars from Etsy.

Bingo advent calendar by Shanty2Chic
Nativity puzzle advent calendar by woodencreations
Advent calendar pouches by nuvonova
Muffin tin advent calendar by everydaysamemory

Closet makeover

It seems like I have been figuring out how to most effectively use the closets in my apartment since I moved in last May. In the old place, I had one huge closet and one smaller closet in my bedroom, plus a linen closet in the bathroom and a storage closet in the hall. Now I've got a gigantic storage closet, a unremarkable medium sized closet in the bathroom, and a teeny linen closet in the bedroom. Sadly, this has given me some organizational challenges. The clothes closet was a yucky dingy white, and no matter how organized it was, it was never appealing to the eye. Hence, the closet makeover. I used leftover paint from the kitchen and the bedroom and some vintage fabric I haven't known what to do with to cover the shelves. Cost - $0.

Vintage sewing pattern wall art

I have been looking for ways to freshen up my apartment without spending any money. I was in need of a switcheroo on some artwork in my living room. I had one of my paintings up, and honestly, I was just tired of looking at it. So, I dug through my trusty box of fabric and craft supplies, and scrounged up some vintage sewing patterns I bought forever ago. I also used some scraps of fabric from a chair semi-upholstering I did recently, white spray paint, black and white poster board, and old frames. I usually have a stash of unused frames for moments like this.
I spray painted the frames white so the would have a cohesive look and chose my favorite pattern envelopes from the sixties and seventies. For the larger frame, I cut out a piece of fabric, black poster board mat, and white poster board mat and layered them. I couldn't find my ruler, so I free handed the cutting and measurements, but it worked out well, and I'm not so into measurements anyways. Voila, new vintage sewing pattern wall art. Project time: About 20 minutes.

And while I worked, Penny slept, as usual.

House Tour - Bedroom

I'm starting to put together a little house tour of my humble abode, beginning with the bedroom. My apartment is one bedroom, one bath and is the top floor of a large older home renovated into apartments. It's right by Emory University village, so I've got a Starbucks, a CVS and a fantastic brunch place within easy walking distance (so the basics are covered!). There are some things I love (like the big kitchen and lots of natural light) and some things I dislike about the place (my living room is impossibly narrow, and I have to work around carpet and not hardwood floors). I've lived here for almost a year now, and have painted, scrubbed, and arranged it into my little treetop nest.

I think my aesthetic is eclectic, colorful, vintage-y, sometimes kitschy (I try to keep a sense of humor). I love corals, reds, and turquoise, aqua, and white. I am a sucker for an obnoxious floral print. I thrift, garage sale, estate sale, recycle, paint everything, and do it myself most of the time.

And so we begin with the bedroom, which I painted from a horrible lavender color which was so hideous I had to paint it the day I moved in. The prints above the bed are vintage magazine ads (for stockings and wigs) that I got for a steal at an art festival. They are in cheap Ikea frames painted white with mats I cut out of black and white poster board.
I saw this color in an Anthropologie ad. A peacock navy blue with lots of white to balance the dark color.
My little bench that has become a window seat. An Ikea find and awesome extra storage for linens. The stained glass is on loan from my dad. It's been in my care for at least 8 years, but I am on notice that it can be "repossessed" by him when he decides on a place to put it.
The dresser was liberated from my parent's house. It used to be my brother's, and the peeling wood was in dire need of help. I painted the whole thing white, and decoupaged vintage sewing patterns all over it.
Clearly, I have an issue with collecting bangles. I made the fabric flowers, and the portrait I just did at a print making class.
The vanity tray was a great find by my mom at a neighborhood wide yard sale. The little bird is also a mom find from an antique store in East Tennessee.

The bedspread was also a great garage sale find for $5, including bedskirt and shams. I know, ew, linens from a garage sale, but they were in the original packaging and they got a good washing. Including all the furniture, linens, drapes, and accessories, I spent around $350 over the years on everything in this room.