So I have a coworker who's having a baby. Well, his fiance is. Anyway, I found out yesterday that they're having a girl.
This is a disaster!
Not because he's not happy about it, or anything like that... but because I've managed to develop quite the stash of fabric for a blanket for a baby boy. I have almost nothing girly!
And the last thing I need is an excuse to go to Joann's...
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Target Tuesday
Here's a link up I can get behind! I love me some Target, so here we are... Fabulous but Evil's Target Tuesday.
For my first one, I'll admit - I'm going to be pretty boring. I've been reworking the closet in my office/sewing room so that it can better hide-I-mean-store all my fabric and other quilting supplies... so this week... storage stuff. Lame, huh?
These cases would work pretty well:
And the price doesn't seem *too* bad for a set of six.
Something simpler, though, might also work just fine:
And they're a much lower price, for more bins!
So that I don't seem like a total drag, this is the shower curtain I want for our second bathroom / the laundry
room:
Super cute, right!? I love dinosaurs, and we alread have a set of towels that are a similar shade to Mr. T-Rex there... ;)
For my first one, I'll admit - I'm going to be pretty boring. I've been reworking the closet in my office/sewing room so that it can better hide-I-mean-store all my fabric and other quilting supplies... so this week... storage stuff. Lame, huh?
These cases would work pretty well:
And the price doesn't seem *too* bad for a set of six.
Something simpler, though, might also work just fine:
So that I don't seem like a total drag, this is the shower curtain I want for our second bathroom / the laundry
room:
Super cute, right!? I love dinosaurs, and we alread have a set of towels that are a similar shade to Mr. T-Rex there... ;)
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Happy house
One of my favorite parts of having a house is randomly being able to tackle a project. Since hubby and I finished my office a few months ago, there were some lingering projects that needed completing - like the closet. It was still the same atrocious sky blue that it was when we moved in, even though the rest of the room had been painted. I took it upon myself today to pull out the old "organizer" (by that, I mean two sets of wood nailed to the wall with wooden dowels for clothes rods), use joint compound to fill in the holes, and then paint the doors the same gray as the rest of the room.
While I was out getting the joint compound for the walls, I also picked up six 24" wide by 12" deep pieces of white melamine for shelves, as well as white metal brackets to put them up with. I'm still debating whether or not I should paint them the same purple as the trim in the room.
After the closet's painted and the shelves are hung, I'm hoping I can convince Jeff to finish the ONE last piece of laminate flooring that needs to go in there and to put in baseboard around the bottom. I wouldn't ordinarily bother with baseboard in a closet, but the laminate kind of makes it a necessity (there's always a gap around the edges) plus we already have the baseboard painted in the same purple as the rest of the room.
I also learned how to decoupage this weekend. I couldn't find any outlet covers or switch plates that I liked for our bathroom, so I took it upon myself to design my own! After Jeff and I picked out colors for the room at Lowe's (a warm beige called "Basket," a medium blue, and a navy blue), I used some batik fabric from Joann's to cover the switch plates and outlet covers! I look forward to adding more little handmade touches throughout the house - like the quilt that I'm STILL not done putting the strips together for! Oops!
While I was out getting the joint compound for the walls, I also picked up six 24" wide by 12" deep pieces of white melamine for shelves, as well as white metal brackets to put them up with. I'm still debating whether or not I should paint them the same purple as the trim in the room.
After the closet's painted and the shelves are hung, I'm hoping I can convince Jeff to finish the ONE last piece of laminate flooring that needs to go in there and to put in baseboard around the bottom. I wouldn't ordinarily bother with baseboard in a closet, but the laminate kind of makes it a necessity (there's always a gap around the edges) plus we already have the baseboard painted in the same purple as the rest of the room.
I also learned how to decoupage this weekend. I couldn't find any outlet covers or switch plates that I liked for our bathroom, so I took it upon myself to design my own! After Jeff and I picked out colors for the room at Lowe's (a warm beige called "Basket," a medium blue, and a navy blue), I used some batik fabric from Joann's to cover the switch plates and outlet covers! I look forward to adding more little handmade touches throughout the house - like the quilt that I'm STILL not done putting the strips together for! Oops!
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
By-the-end-of-March to-do list
-Finish making all quilt squares into long quilt stripes
-Finish Comfortably Numb, start George Martin book
-Clean up weeds I've already pulled out of garden.
-Pull the remaining weeds.
-The rain has not made this very do-able. :(
-Get garden set up - the long ties are in the garage, all ready to go, just have to get them laid out!
-Buy plants for garden - peppers, a tomato plant, herbs (?), raspberry bush and plant them. It kind of has to stop raining for more than 5 minutes for this to happen. Possibly buy grass seed.
-This may wait until April - Discover's doing 5% cash back at home improvement stores, April through June, so it would be more effective to wait until then! Keep an eye out for coupons, though, in either case!
-Go shopping at Old Navy when gift card arrives (yay!)
That seems like enough, especially since there's only one weekend left!
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Book #11: Switching Time
Book 11: Switching Time: A Doctor's Harrowing Story of Treating a Woman with 17 Personalities, by Dr. Richard Baer
Another book where the title/sub-title pretty much sum up the plot, this was the memoir of a psychiatrist who, over the course of 16 years, treats a woman with a true case of multiple personality disorder.
Spawned as a coping mechanism to deal with a cycle of abuse that started well before she was born, "Karen's" MPD helped her get through years of abuse - from her father punching her mother's stomach while she was pregnant to ritualistic quasi-religious physical and sexual abuse. The journey is definitely interesting to follow as we watch Karen learn of her "alters" and eventually cope with having them.
Perhaps something fiction next...
Another book where the title/sub-title pretty much sum up the plot, this was the memoir of a psychiatrist who, over the course of 16 years, treats a woman with a true case of multiple personality disorder.
Spawned as a coping mechanism to deal with a cycle of abuse that started well before she was born, "Karen's" MPD helped her get through years of abuse - from her father punching her mother's stomach while she was pregnant to ritualistic quasi-religious physical and sexual abuse. The journey is definitely interesting to follow as we watch Karen learn of her "alters" and eventually cope with having them.
Perhaps something fiction next...
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Book 10: The Mirror Effect
Book 10: The Mirror Effect: How Celebrity Narcissism is Seducing America, by Dr. Drew Pinsky and Dr. S. Mark Young.
Oh Dr. Drew. So handsome. Killer blue eyes. An engaging speaker, that time Jeff and I got front-row seats (!) at Chico State. Le sigh.
But oh Dr. Drew, your books. They're not good. I read another of his books, Cracked, about his experiences working as a physician in rehabs. That one wasn't good, and this was a disappointment, too. The book, at 267 pages, could have been half as long and still gotten its point across. The first 100+ pages were spent presenting the problem of "celebrity narcissism" - as if it really takes 100 pages to tell people that celebrities are narcissists, and to explain what narcissism actually is.
The book is based on a study that Drs. Pinsky and Young did where they had celebrities take the Narcissistic Personality Inventory. Predictably, celebrities score notably higher on the NPI than "average" people. Drew outlines causes for this and the consequences for today's youth.
I think I'd have been better off reading the scientific paper rather than this book. At least Drew's handsome on the cover:
Oh Dr. Drew. So handsome. Killer blue eyes. An engaging speaker, that time Jeff and I got front-row seats (!) at Chico State. Le sigh.
But oh Dr. Drew, your books. They're not good. I read another of his books, Cracked, about his experiences working as a physician in rehabs. That one wasn't good, and this was a disappointment, too. The book, at 267 pages, could have been half as long and still gotten its point across. The first 100+ pages were spent presenting the problem of "celebrity narcissism" - as if it really takes 100 pages to tell people that celebrities are narcissists, and to explain what narcissism actually is.
The book is based on a study that Drs. Pinsky and Young did where they had celebrities take the Narcissistic Personality Inventory. Predictably, celebrities score notably higher on the NPI than "average" people. Drew outlines causes for this and the consequences for today's youth.
I think I'd have been better off reading the scientific paper rather than this book. At least Drew's handsome on the cover:
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Giveaway
My favorite part about this blogosphere thing is this newfound chance to win stuff - who knew that people were sponsoring such great giveaways?
Anyway, Rachel over at Stitched in Color is hosting a giveaway for batting - a full quilt size chunk! This may not be exciting, I suppose, if you're not a quilter, but if you are... it's exciting. And you should go enter, and if you're not a quilter, well, you can just give it to me.
Whether you sew or not, enjoy her pretty pieces. Amazing, inspiring work, I think! :)
Anyway, Rachel over at Stitched in Color is hosting a giveaway for batting - a full quilt size chunk! This may not be exciting, I suppose, if you're not a quilter, but if you are... it's exciting. And you should go enter, and if you're not a quilter, well, you can just give it to me.
Whether you sew or not, enjoy her pretty pieces. Amazing, inspiring work, I think! :)
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Reasons my job is dysfunctional, #23
Today's reason my work environment is dysfuncitonal?
Today, during a discussion about the food vacuum sealer thing my boss just bought herself (to replace the last one, which replaced the first one), I mentioned that Jeff and I were considering getting a meat grinder to cut down on the cost of buying ground beef - "cheap beef" is cheaper per pound than good ground beef, at least at Safeway.
After commenting (not for the first time) that we really should be buying our meat in bulk at Costco, she said "Jeff's already overweight."
Um, excuse me?
Apparently her rationale behind making this comment about my husband's weight is that "cheap meat," in her mind, contains more fat that her "good" ground beef from Costco. Despite my protests that the last doctor Jeff saw was actually surprised at Jeff's good health despite his weight, my boss insisted that things could change "overnight," "especially after he hits 50."
Because I definitely should take husband-health advice from a woman who's husband is at LEAST as overweight as mine is?
Today, during a discussion about the food vacuum sealer thing my boss just bought herself (to replace the last one, which replaced the first one), I mentioned that Jeff and I were considering getting a meat grinder to cut down on the cost of buying ground beef - "cheap beef" is cheaper per pound than good ground beef, at least at Safeway.
After commenting (not for the first time) that we really should be buying our meat in bulk at Costco, she said "Jeff's already overweight."
Um, excuse me?
Apparently her rationale behind making this comment about my husband's weight is that "cheap meat," in her mind, contains more fat that her "good" ground beef from Costco. Despite my protests that the last doctor Jeff saw was actually surprised at Jeff's good health despite his weight, my boss insisted that things could change "overnight," "especially after he hits 50."
Because I definitely should take husband-health advice from a woman who's husband is at LEAST as overweight as mine is?
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Book 9: Confessions of a Tax Collector
I think I've fallen a little behind in my quest to read 52 books this year. It didn't help that I started a few duds. :(
Anyway, this time I read Confessions of a Tax Collector: One Man's Tour of Duty Inside the IRS, by Richard Yancey.
The title pretty much spells out what the book is all about: a guy, adrift in his own life, takes a job as a Revenue Officer with the IRS. A former theater employee with an English degree and a fiance who won't actually commit to him, Yancey takes the job to prove to himself that he can commit to something and see it through. Along the way we learn of the way he changes lives - his own and that of delinquent taxpayers in Florida.
I can't really discuss too much more about the book without giving away how it ends, I suppose, so I'll leave it at that. It was an interesting read; I enjoyed Yancey's writing style as well as the look the book gave me into a world I am only peripherally familiar with.
Anyway, this time I read Confessions of a Tax Collector: One Man's Tour of Duty Inside the IRS, by Richard Yancey.
The title pretty much spells out what the book is all about: a guy, adrift in his own life, takes a job as a Revenue Officer with the IRS. A former theater employee with an English degree and a fiance who won't actually commit to him, Yancey takes the job to prove to himself that he can commit to something and see it through. Along the way we learn of the way he changes lives - his own and that of delinquent taxpayers in Florida.
I can't really discuss too much more about the book without giving away how it ends, I suppose, so I'll leave it at that. It was an interesting read; I enjoyed Yancey's writing style as well as the look the book gave me into a world I am only peripherally familiar with.
Friday, March 11, 2011
Weekend
I promise I didn't forget about y'all. Just been busy. Our kitchen floor is ALMOST done being tiled - I had to go buy more tile last night, but still ended up being short two of each color, so I have to send Jeff over to the tile place this morning to get the last few so that, hopefully, we can get it done by this evening, except for the sealing part. Hooray! What a relief that will be, to have that done.
This weekend's to-do's:
-Get Jeff to move stove and fridge back into place
-Epic cleaning of stove, so that it doesn't look quite so much like a biohazard
-Finish second cat mat
-Read, dammit. I've been so lazy about this! - See post!
-Finish data entry for Dan
-Laundry
-Get copies of front-door key made
-Sweep living room and dining room
-Vacuum couches thoroughly
This weekend's to-do's:
-Finish second cat mat
-Finish data entry for Dan
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
March To-Do list
March 2011 To Do List
(Maybe I'll make these a monthly thing, just to keep myself on track. Inspired by a good friend who seems to do well with lists) :)
-Design/sew/stuff/finish cat boxes for front windows - think window boxes like for plants, but for Molly and Wrench. They LOVE sitting in the living and dining room windows, but they can't steal the fleece blankets all the time! I have fabric that matches our living room (even some cute piping to go around the edges!) and the plastic canvas I'm going to use to make them a little more sturdy than just fabric would.
Utter disaster. Let's pretend it didn't happen.
-Finish Pride & Predjudice & Zombies, the IRS tax collector memoir I've started, and at least two other books - I think I've fallen behind a little on my goal to read 52 books this year (one a week), but I'm confident that I'll catch up in summertime, when I can sit on the patio and read all weekend instead of staying inside freezing!
-Get kitchen tile installed, then finish the kitchen - purchase/paint/install door trim, purchase/paint/install chair rail, purchase/paint/install baseboard.
-TAKE A DAY OFF! Friday, March 18th - already submitted for it. :)
-Keep working on couponing - "save" $150 at Safeway over the course of the month. This will coincide nicely with my Discover card's 5% cash back at grocery stores even this month, too!
-Piece together the bedroom quilt - I've got all the squares cut, and even have the backing for it now - now I just have to put all the squares together, and go from there! I think I'm going to make the pattern pretty random - literally just drawing the pieces out from a bag as I go along.
-Continue attempting not to buy remnants at Joann's - epic fail on this part so far, though, as I bought FOUR MORE pieces last night - though to be fair, two pieces are for the cat beds!
(Maybe I'll make these a monthly thing, just to keep myself on track. Inspired by a good friend who seems to do well with lists) :)
-
-Finish Pride & Predjudice & Zombies, the IRS tax collector memoir I've started, and at least two other books - I think I've fallen behind a little on my goal to read 52 books this year (one a week), but I'm confident that I'll catch up in summertime, when I can sit on the patio and read all weekend instead of staying inside freezing!
-Get kitchen tile installed, then finish the kitchen - purchase/paint/install door trim, purchase/paint/install chair rail, purchase/paint/install baseboard.
-TAKE A DAY OFF! Friday, March 18th - already submitted for it. :)
-Keep working on couponing - "save" $150 at Safeway over the course of the month. This will coincide nicely with my Discover card's 5% cash back at grocery stores even this month, too!
-Piece together the bedroom quilt - I've got all the squares cut, and even have the backing for it now - now I just have to put all the squares together, and go from there! I think I'm going to make the pattern pretty random - literally just drawing the pieces out from a bag as I go along.
-Continue attempting not to buy remnants at Joann's - epic fail on this part so far, though, as I bought FOUR MORE pieces last night - though to be fair, two pieces are for the cat beds!
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