Aug. 19: These are not manly urges

I’ll get to the point, but first:

Every time I start out a blog post with “Y’know how sometimes you just get the urge to…” it always makes me think of this moment from the Disney gender-bending movie Mulan:

Mulan: “Sorry [in her man voice] …uhh, I mean, sorry you had to see that. You know how it is when you get those… uh… *manly urges* and you just have to kill something… fix things… uh… cook outdoors.”

Shang: “What’s your name?”

Mulan: “Ahh, I, uhhh, I, uh…”

Chi Fu: “Your commanding officer just asked you a question.”

Mulan: “Uhh, I’ve got a name. Uh. And it’s a boy’s name too.”

I know, it makes only a tiny bit of sense to me too.

---

Y’know how sometimes you get the urge to re-do everything in your entire home? I guess those urges aren’t necessarily manly, but like most manly urges, my re-doing efforts cause an awful lot of trouble for other people that live in my house. I’m super-good at insisting I NEED HELP RIGHT THIS MINUTE AND IF YOU DON’T WANT ME TO DIE WHEN I FALL OFF THIS CHAIR THEN YOU BETTER HURRY.

(I fall off lots of chairs.)

A few weeks ago I decided to simultaneously start no fewer than eleventy projects, all of which would require tremendous amounts of time, imagination, creativity, and paint. Vic hates when my projects involve the dreaded p-word. He’ll forgive me in approximately six years, or when he’s able to walk into the house without being hit by a wall of noxious paint fumes, whichever comes first.

So… I turn to the person who doesn’t stomp and huff when I ask for help. My mom and I are good at bouncing ideas off one another and, although we often make a project harder than it needs to be, we’re a good team. The first time she and I worked on a big project—removing the wallpaper from Katie’s nursery walls and then painting—I remember telling her that it was more fun doing that kind of stuff with her than with my dad because she yelled at me way less.

When I’m anticipating a visit from Mother Mary, I try to line up some activities for us to tackle together. Here are just a few of the tasks I was inspired to work on this summer, thanks to Pinterest and the handful of days during which I provided Mom a comfy-ish slumber spot:

• Frame and hang family photos throughout the house
• Organize and de-clutter several areas throughout the house—baskets and jars and pots, oh my!
• Purchase a few pieces of new furniture
• Clean areas of the house virtually untouched in 16 years (go ahead and judge, but how dust-free are the tops of YOUR cabinets?)
• Re-upholster kitchen chairs
• Make accent pillows for living room
• Replace living room sofa cushion filling—foam is so much better than that awful squooshy cotton they came with
• Make accent pillows for family room
• Scrub microfiber sofa ‘til it looks new—such a pain but sooo worth it
• Corral unsightly cables and cords
• Plants, plants, plants!
• Pretty up master bedroom lamps
• Create artwork for the master bedroom/bath – thanks for the ideas, Pinterest
• Paint the master bathroom/vanity area
• Redecorate the master bathroom/vanity to work with the new wall color
• Write a book

I haven’t gotten very far on that last one, but Mom’s only been gone a week.

In my world, where it seems to be all-football-and-back-to-school-all-the-time lately, it’s a lovely thing to bring a little bit o’ “pretty” into it. Big thanks to my mom for all her inspiration and elbow grease!

Dec. 27: Undecorating for the holidays

My post-Christmas bummed-outedness is predictable only in that it is unpredictable every year. Sometimes I’m ready to tear down the tree immediately after gifts are opened on Christmas morning, and sometimes I want the holiday season to stretch way into mid-January. Much of this depends on when we put up our décor—which is NEVER before Thanksgiving—and whether we hosted any of the family holiday gatherings.

This year we put up the tree the first weekend in December. We hosted no family and, in fact, did not even spend Christmas weekend at home. I have not, even once, felt Christmas-ed out this season. But Christmas is over, and during our drive back from Medford yesterday I planned to undecorate the second we got home.

Then we got home, and I was tired. Sitting in the passenger seat on that five-hour trip is haaard.

This morning I was on hardcore puppy housebreaking duty and got little else done. I’ve lost the urgency to undecorate and, well, to be honest I’ve pretty much lost the urgency to do anything. I still feel crappy—even though I finally got antibiotics to treat my snotty ickiness, they’re taking their time to work—and have my eye on a nice little nap this afternoon. Nothing’s getting undecorated today, I’m pretty sure.

Maybe tomorrow.

Maybe this weekend.

It’s not a super-quick process, because as I put things away, I insist on being very organized about it. Several years ago I transferred our holiday things from cardboard and miscellaneous plastic boxes to a set of red and green plastic boxes. Everything Christmasy goes in those easily identifiable boxes, and then in our attic. I have everything clearly labeled and only pull the boxes I need each year. It’s a system that works well, but it could use some improvement. Here’s an article with some great ideas on holiday storage. And here’s an nice little inventory printable, handy for planning and shopping for next year’s holiday season.

If you have your Christmas décor up after January 1, it’s not a big deal—you’re allowed some time to get it all put away. But if it’s lit-up and trying to be magical anytime after January 1, I will punch you in the nutcracker. CHRISTMAS IS OVER, PEOPLE. TURN THAT SHIT OFF!

Apr. 12: Catching up

Life has been crazy for the past couple weeks, and that’s left me little time for blogging. Once I get out of the habit of posting daily, it’s easy to let one day after another slip by until I realize all of a sudden that it’s been three weeks since I last wrote anything newsworthy <cough!>. I would apologize but I’m not gonna.

And the music meme posts that have been showing up every day? I’ve been writing three or four days at a time and scheduling them to publish every morning. They don’t really count as substance. Don’t tell me you disagree.

So, what’s been keeping me so busy? That is what you’re asking, right?

• I’ve got four games of Words with Friends going at all times. Tell me that doesn’t take a ton of time!
• “Renovations” on my new office/mom cave/retreat continue. I got the art done and hung it on the walls and every day since then at least one piece of it has fallen down. I need to get some better adhesive. Curtains are done, and they have not fallen down (yet). Many of the plain ol’ white boxes have been all colored-up and look cheery, but I’ve got more to do. I’m doing my best to make my office a place of joyful escape, and color plays a huge part in that. Happy happy!
• A bunch of us got together with Kim F’n for lunch on Friday and gave her a little impromptu naughty bridal shower. (Hover over the photos for captions.)

  

  

  

  

  

  

• We nominate next year’s new PTO board members next week and have been talking up the wonders of PTO board membership to unsuspecting recruits. There is a surprisingly high level of interest—it’s very exciting!
• Alumni Weekend at my high school was last weekend. We had a whopping nine classmates (out of 60-some) show up from the class of ‘86. It was a lot of fun re-connecting, even though most everyone who showed up was local and/or on Facebook and we’ve been in decent-ish recent contact. In other words, there weren’t a lot of surprises. We have a gathering planned for October and hope to see a lot more of our classmates then.

• My Relay for Life team is coming right along. We’re up to 13 members, but we can definitely have more! If you want to come walk a lap or two on Relay Day without actually joining the team, that’s great too. Remember, it’s July 16-17 in Clackamas. It’ll be a good time, for sure.
• This has nothing to do with my busy-ness, but I just have to share because it’s such a neat idea: color theme dessert tables. I almost can’t wait to have a party just so I can do this.
• I got Katie the classic novel Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret and have been re-reading it myself. I probably read the book 20 times when I was her age, but it’s been 30 years since then. Reading it again has been surreal—I’m surprised at how much I remember, and how clearly. I loved that book.

OK, I’ve got a bazillion things to get done today, so this is all for now. Lovies to you and yours.

Mar. 28: Daybook

Today…

Outside my window... there are tons of new blooms in the front yard—the daffodils, crocuses (crocii?), and hyacinths have all popped open, and the tulips are well on their way. It’s so cheery and lovely that even with the grey skies today, it seems like spring is on its way.

This weekend, I… enjoyed Poker Night with friends. It was a blast, as always. I remember a lot of loud talking and grabbing of Val’s boobies and way too many kids downstairs and at one point I looked down and all my chips were gone. Someone stole them, I just know it, because how else would they have disappeared? I spent all of yesterday recovering from Poker Night. Yep, this girl overdid it just a bit, but it was worth it. **

**It wasn’t actually worth it. I still feel like someone kicked my head in.

I am thankful that... we went to Medford last week. It was good to get away from home—it almost felt like being on vacation. Thanks for having us, Mom! We found a new bead store that we loved, and got to visit with Uncle Paul and Claire, Nana (stories later, I promise!), my favorite cousin Deanna, and GILLY GILLY GILLY.

I am working on... some new décor ideas for my office. See, I have these IKEA boxes:

…and I want them to look less boring. I found this paper (the photo is a super-duper close-up of the teeny-tiny print):

…that has the new wall color in it, and I hope to combine it with other colors to pretty up those plain white boxes. I’m not sure yet how it will all come together, but if it looks even halfway purty, you can be sure I’ll share a photo or seven.

I need to tell you about something I love: stamped metal jewelry. You know what I mean:

etsy has tons of it, and I am going to learn to do it too. I don’t think metal stamping can really be just a hobby—the supplies are far from cheap—so I might just have to start my own etsy shop. That’d be a darn shame, right? I found this site that tells all about metal stamping, and I’m very excited to get started! Can you just imagine how satisfying it will be to pound out letters on metal? The hammer! The noise! The dents in all my furniture! I predict my anxiety levels will decrease dramatically with the first strike.

I am kind of excited because… Fancy Anthony™ is talking about creating a Stuff Jen Says iPhone app! I have no idea what it’s supposed to do, but it sounds way cool, because, um… STUFF JEN SAYS IPHONE APP. Hello! Suggestions friends came up with while playing poker: a drunk Facebooking translator, a keyboard that creates gibberish, a breathalyzer that locks me out of Facebook if my blood alcohol content is above “legally shit-faced,” and I just realized all of the features have to do with me being a drunk. Hm. Not so excited all of a sudden.

A few plans for the rest of the week: work, a visit with Sarah Vowell tomorrow night, PTO thangs, more work. Tentative plans: daily naps. One can hope, can’t one?

Here is picture for thought I am sharing: It’s more art from Curly Girl Designs. I just can’t get enough of her creations.

Have a good week, my pretties.

Want to blog your own Daybook? Here’s the info: The Simple Woman’s Daybook.

Jan. 3: Daybook

Happy new year!

Today…

Outside my window... it’s beautiful and sunny and clear… and FF!! At 9:30 am it was only 27°, and that, my friends, is FF—or more accurately, F’nF’n. But not F’n like Kim F’n. Toooootally different kind of F’n.

This weekend, I… sprouted a giant zit on my forehead that looks like herpes. Can people get herpes on their foreheads? I also relaxed a lot, because I think this is the kind of zit that zaps all of one’s energy. That’s how I justified laying around so much, anyway. I watched the first half of Season 2 of Flight of the Conchords on DVD—so, so funny. I cleaned up my desk and got caught up with the PTO accounting. I made a list of things to get done this morning, which was very, very long and means this Daybook is gonna be a quick one.

I am thinking... about paint. When we moved our office stuff into Jack’s old room, we decided not to re-paint because there’s nothing wrong with this paint. Here’s the thing, though: this dark royal blue color was fine when all of Jack’s pirate décor was in here, but now? Now I hate it. It’s dark, and it’s not mine. I want to choose the color for this room, because that will make it feel more like mine, right? Right. Now, how on earth am I ever going to choose the perfect color? PANTONE says the color of 2011 is honeysuckle. (<—You gotta click that link to see what PANTONE calls “honeysuckle.” That is soooo not going on my walls.)

I am thankful... that we got all our Christmas things taken down. As much as I hate to see the season end, it’s nice to move forward with the new year, knowing that I’m free of Christmas for at least another few months.

I am going... to run errands like a madwoman this morning. It’s very nice (for me) to have the kids back in school.

Around the house... it no longer looks like Christmas. The house doesn’t have a look of anything right now, really, but-cept that it’s neat-ish. I like. I like very much.

Plans for the rest of the week: I’ve got lots of PTO doodies and some for-pay work, there’s much reorganizing to be done in my too-crowded office, and I’ll relax a bit to watch the rest of FOTC.

Here’s an image I stole from someone else that I want to share with you:

This is just like the light fixture we got Katie for Christmas. Victor installed it yesterday, and it looks so sweet in her room. The colors of the beads go perfectly with everything in there. Best of all, she’s super-excited about it. I love that part.

Want to blog your own Daybook? Here’s the info: The Simple Woman’s Daybook.

Dec. 6: Daybook

Look! I’m actually posting this Daybook thing on a Monday morning, when it’s meant to be posted. I might just be awesome. For today only.

Today…

Outside my window... it’s gross. I don’t really want to talk about it.

This weekend, I… baked two dozen cupcakes in black and orange, and two dozen in green and yellow. Yep, they were for a Civil War game party. If I cared at all about the Beavers or the Ducks, I would have probably put nasty stuff in the cupcakes representing the team I liked less. Lucky for the people at the party, I didn’t give even a tiny bit of a shit who won. In fact, most of the time I was at the party I couldn’t even see the TV. When I heard people cheering, it made me happy. When I heard people booing, it made me sad. Now I have some questions for you:

1. Did you know that Rumple Minze is good in hot chocolate?
2. Can you say “Rumple Minze” if you’ve been drinking Rumple Minze? I cannot. It comes out “rupplemist” or “rumblemist” or “rumplemints.” Wait! That’s it! RUMPLE MINTS. Rumple. Mints. Rumple Minze. Rumble Mertz. DAMMIT!
3. Can you tell that Cassie got me drunk at this party? She didn’t even have to try very hard.
4. I love Cassie.
5. That last one was not a question, was it?
6. I think maybe it’s easier to say “peppermint schnapps.” Also, to make this a question, will you buy me some peppermint schnapps? I’d like marshmallows with it, pretty please.

I am thinking... that pretty soon my in-laws and their families will be in town and I’m very happy about that. They’re nice people. Well, I’m not sure about Sonya. She can be kinda mean, like, ALL THE TIME. The rest of them are decent, I guess. Or maybe I’ll just stay home by myself.

I am thankful... for videos like this on the web. It almost hurts, how funny this is:

The 12 minutes fly by.

I am working on... fun Christmas gifts, etsy-style. That’s all I’m gonna say about that.

I am going... to get our Christmas cards out this week. I am also going to need an editor because right now our Christmas letter is nine pages long, and that’s at least eight pages two many. Oh, and I forgot that last year we used up our supply of CD sleeves, so I had to order more last night and I am going to have to wait to mail the Christmas cards that get CDs with them until the new sleeves arrive.

In other words, I am going… to do a lot of things that are difficult and frustrating and will make me angry and possibly bitter about the holidays.

I am hoping... to check some stuff off my PTO to-do list this week. There are a lot of things to tackle this week. I am also hoping to see Val this week, because I only saw her once last week and it was on Monday and I’ve already forgotten what she looks like. I am also hoping to see Sunshine this week. I saw her a bunch last week, but I don’t think it was for a fun thing even once. We need to do fun things.

Around the house... it’s getting all Christmas’d up. I love it! The tree is in the family room this year—we think we might get to enjoy it more this way—and we’ve got our singing snowmen all over the house. Turns out I’m a little corny when it comes to Christmas décor. Thank goodness for the twitter I read this morning, which put a stop to my insanity, at least for outdoors: “I was going to cover my lawn with inflatable Christmas decorations, but I’m too busy growing a mullet and watching Jerry Springer.”

One of my favorite things... is making fun of Christmas décor. It’s hilarious, what people think looks good enough to put on and around their homes. I love the displays that are tasteful and I love that ones that are kitschy. Everything in between gets pointed and laughed at. SO. MUCH. FUN. And since you’re thinking it, YES, I will enjoy doing that in hell too.

Plans for the rest of the week: PTO doodies, work, a Pampered Chef party at Cindi’s, Wellington’s birthday celebration, the gol-durn Christmas cards and CDs, TiVo catch-up, and a top-secret project I’m hinting at below.

Here’s an image I want to share:

Yes, that’s me and author extraordinaire Pamela Ribon when we met last June. She emailed me last week. I know, I’m such a dork to share that info, but facts are facts, people. She even asked me to do her a favor, which I gladly agreed to because I think she’s so amazing and I would do anything for her. And I probably shouldn’t make a big deal out of it, but when you give someone a vital organ, aren’t you allowed to make a big deal out of it?

Oops. Spilled the beans. The kidney beans.

Oh fine, Pamie didn’t ask me for a kidney. But I’d probably give her one of mine if she wanted it. Unless she didn’t really need it, like if she wanted a spare just in case. That wouldn’t be such a cool thing.

Maybe I’ll tell you more about Pamie later. (Did I mention that she’s the coolest?)

…and the restraining order is served in one… two… three…

Want to blog your own Daybook? Here’s the info: The Simple Woman’s Daybook.

Nov. 30: Daybook

Once again, I’m a day late with my Daybook. I have a good excuse. Prolly.

Today…

Outside my window... it’s icky. Cold, rainy, icky. Sherilee is in Kauai right now and although I’m glad she got to go on a very fun and well-deserved vacation, I’m more than a little bit jealous. Kauai may be the rainiest of the islands, but I’d still take it over Portland’s weather, pretty much any day.

This weekend, I… came home from Medford, tried to unpack a little, and came down with a killer headache. Pffft. However, I got our Christmas card photo done and ordered, so that’s kind of a big accomplishment. I still have the letter to write and CD to burn, and that means I’m not going to stop complaining about it for weeks. Ye be warned.

I am thinking... that Victor just might hate me, or at least be super-duper tired of me. Last night I asked him to read through my blog posts of 2010 to find anything that should be included in our Christmas letter. He actually did it. He was helpful and—I know this sounds mean, but it’s true of most husbands, I think—he is NEVER helpful with Christmas doodies.

I am thankful... for a lovely Thanksgiving day. My uncle and “auntie” brought a friend of theirs to my mom’s, and even Grandma joined us. We had a really nice time—traditional dinner, cool family members, all the things that can be good on Thanksgiving were good for us. Grandma was mostly well-behaved, except for calling Mom eight times that morning. She called me four times (I didn’t know this until just now), asking for Mom. Did she have an emergency? No.

I am working on... figuring out why I just now got nine voice mails from the past week. I don’t know why I didn’t get the messages when they were actually left for me. I don’t like missing calls. I don’t like stoopid AT&T. On a more fun and interesting note, I am working on some really fun Christmas gift ideas. You’ll hope you’re on my list, you betcha.

I am going... to come right out and say I don’t care that Angelina Jolie thinks Thanksgiving is murder, or that Jessica Simpson is engaged, or that a bunch of wackjobs have all sorts of ideas as to why Bristol Palin lost on Dancing with the Stars. News agencies may, however, continue to show many pictures of Johnny Depp. That’s just fine.

I am hoping... to get the house decorated for Christmas this week. We’ve got the tree up but there aren’t any ornaments on it, and there are a gajillion boxes in the attic full of décor. That’s lots of work, my friend, and I’m pretty sure I don’t have the energy for it.

I am hearing... the regular USA network Tuesday marathon of Law & Order: SVU. I’m not watching it, but I can hear it. I think I’ve seen every episode now, and that bums me right out. I’m going to have to find something else to do on Tuesdays. Hawaii Laura, do you have any ideas? Or do you have a more exciting life than I do, in which you’re not able to watch the marathon (almost) every week?

Around the house... the puppy is attacking the kitty, always, forever, every time he hears her little bell. He’s a turd, but she has claws, so I’m not even a little bit worried about her being hurt. I do worry that maybe she’s not getting the sleep she needs, though. Seriously—she can’t move without him pouncing on her. That is the definition of “turd.”

One of my favorite things... is Christmas shopping. I love making lists and looking online for good bargains and gift-wrapping and piling presents around the tree. The only part I dislike comes right before Christmas, when I get stressed over what to give Wellington and Victor’s no help at all. None. Wellington is the most difficult person to gift, like, EVER.

Plans for the rest of the week: A few meetings, a little work, some fun PTO stuff on Friday. What else does a girl need?

All I wanted was a cute pic of Oliver for the Christmas card:

 

 

 

 

 

Finally, I want to extend very happy—and very belated—birthday wishes to my delightful and charming friends, Ed and Sheila. I hope you got to eat lots of good cake.

Want to blog your own Daybook? Here’s the info: The Simple Woman’s Daybook.

Aug. 16: Super terrific happy thing #19

Today’s super terrific happy thing:

The stuff in this etsy store!

An image caught my eye in a blog this morning, so I followed the link and it took me to a treasure trove of wall graphics. A treasure trove, I tell you!

Urban Expressions has tons of these wall decals, and they’ve got a gorgeous catalog that I’d kinda like to live in. Decor for kids’ rooms is adorable, and for adults, there are some beautiful quotes available. Those are my favorites—the word decals—but there are some gorgeous images too, like the botanicals and Partridge Family-like birds. Such fun!

Don’t you think you’d be a happier person if you woke up to a quote like the one above every single morning?

This decor idea reminds me a lot of what I did in Jack’s nursery…

…but looks way better than my handiwork did. I do love the way his room came out, but it sings “amateur!”

One more thing for my list of things to do today: find a room in which I can use one of these wall decals. I just gotta!

May 6: Thursday Thunks #6

Thursday Thunks (TT) is a blog meme for those who need a little kick in the butt to find something to post about. Your blog posts/answers to TT's can be type or pictures, doesn't matter! YOU pick, not us, we just give you the assignment (yep, just like English class... only we won't grade your spelling and grammar).

1. Have you ever performed the Heimlich maneuver on someone or had it performed on you?
   No and no. We discussed the Heimlich at lunch the other day, though, and Mike had a pretty good story about it. Mike has a pretty good story about everything.
2. Do you have a red room in your home (either painted red or red curtains etc.)?
   Our living room has red sofas and the bottom half of the walls are red
3. Have you ever felt like banging your head against the wall?
   Almost daily
4. What’s the dumbest thing you have done after a breakup with a significant other?
   Cut my hair
5. What are the wildest, craziest pajamas you own?
   I have some pirate jammies that probably qualify as wild and crazy because most of my jammies are pretty boring/tame. My friend Debi has an AWESOME collection of pajamas. So jealous.
6. Have you ever ridden in a sidecar on a motorcycle?
   Nope
7. Do/did you go party on Cinco de Mayo, and if so what color was the bartender’s shirt?
   I didn’t go out partying, but I partied in my head because it was Sunshine’s birthday
8. Why does a hat have a bill?
   To block the sun? Is this a trick question?
9. If you were a WWE professional wrestler, what would your stage name be?
   The Librarian (because you’re being entirely too loud)
10. How many keys do you have on your key ring?
    Five
11. What is the oldest picture you currently have in your home? What year was it taken and who/what is the photo of?
    I’ve got some ancestor-y photos put away in albums, but the oldest one I have framed and on display is of me and Kathy on a donkey. I think I was three.

Jul. 20: Such sophistication

The kids’ bedroom re-do project has, in a way, moved downstairs. I was really hoping to confine it to the upstairs region of our house, but it turns out that was pure silliness of thought.

Right now there are lots of boxes and small furniture items set in the hallway upstairs, waiting for a closet or wall somewhere for permanent placement, and also making the hallway quite treacherous. Shuffling three bedrooms involves a lot of temporary storage. Much of this storage has been found in the master bedroom, another room I was hoping could remain clutter-free during this project. Ha.

Jack’s loft bed was disassembled without incident, but its reassembly (?) in the new room has taken some time. One side of the bed had a slide, and Jack had begun to think that made it babyish so he asked Vic to take it off. No problem. The other side has a ladder, which is now quite necessary if we want injury-free dismounts from the bed. Vic made the mistake of offering to put the ladder on the slide end, and Jack loved that idea because he likes whatever is more difficult for his parents. I think Loveliest Lori’s boys must have taught him that, as I’ve heard her use that same description for them.

The bed was almost completely together again when Victor realized one entire side had to be changed if the ladder was going at the opposite end, and that meant the whole thing needed to be taken apart again. It was past 10:00 the night he discovered this, so we told Jack he’d sleep on his mattress on the floor that night and Vic would finish the bed the next day. But the next day was busy with other parts of the project, and so was the day after that. Finally, yesterday Vic went in to dis- and re-assemble and couldn’t find the Allen wrenches. We have a nice set—it looks like a Swiss army knife—that’s much easier to use than the single wrenches that come with some-assembly-required furniture, so we rarely hang on to those little ones and use our fancy-schmancy ones instead. Without them, Vic was screwed. Not literally. In fact, literally, the bed was NOT screwed—no Allen wrenches meant no dis- and re-assemble.

The minute we go out and buy another set, the other one will turn up. That’s how it works, isn’t it? But it looks like we gotta. If you need an assortment of Allen wrenches, we’ll gladly loan you one of ours.

With Jack’s bed only partly together, we can’t get the armoire out of his room to move to the playroom, nor can we move his dresser or desk out of the playroom into his room. Katie’s dresser and hanging clothes are still in her old closet (in Jack’s new room) so there is much screaming when she goes in and starts rooting around in his room for her things. I am so so so ready for this whole thing to be over.

On the “done” side, the playroom table/desk is set up in the playroom now, and the kids’ computer is connected and working. The closet in that room has been cleaned out and I have a HUGE amount of stuff from there to take to Goodwill today. Although Katie’s room is far from finished, it’s painted and really quite pretty—she keeps saying, “I love it so much I just want to squeeze someone!” (Please don’t be like Lennie please don’t be like Lennie please don’t be like Lennie…)

So how did any of this end up moving downstairs? Some of the most fragile items were put in the living room to keep them out of the way during the transition. The other day I noticed that they were all mostly musical—Katie’s electronic keyboard, recorder and ukulele, and Jack’s snare drum and bongos have all been placed near the piano. Add my flute and Katie’s microphone to the mix, and we’re the freakin’ Partridge Family!

In the interest of all things sophisticated, we’ve decided to call that corner of the living room the conservatory, or my preferred term, “conservatoire.” I know, I know—we’re way classy. Because as owners of a fancy set of Allen wrenches (that cannot be found) AND a conservatoire, well, we must be the envy of just about everyone. You’re jealous, aren’t you?

Jul. 14: Decorating and un-decorating

Y’know how you start a project by making a list of the things that’ll need to be done? And you write down something like “paint walls” without thinking that about 400 things need to happen before the paint will actually go on those walls? Argh. That’s where we are now in this major upstairs re-do in the house.

Over the weekend we got the carpets cleaned, cleared out the playroom, and picked up every single Lego in Jack’s room. I pulled the pirate wallpaper border off Jack’s wall, necessitating quite a bit of paint touch-up—not surprising, but just one more thing to extend our to-do list. Katie and I tackled her room yesterday, getting most of the closet cleared but (in my opinion) not nearly enough junk thrown away.

We’ve moved Katie’s bed into her new room, and Jack’s mattress in his new room. They were both excited to sleep in their new, though far-from-finished, bedrooms and because it was so late by the time we moved them, they fell right asleep. Today we’ll move a few more large items. Slowly, very slowly, we are making progress.

Can’t remember if I wrote that Jack has decided to move to Katie’s old room. Originally he had no interest, until I told him that if he wanted different colored walls, he’d have to move. The difficulty with this decision is that his loft bed needs to be disassembled to be moved out of his room, and this is something about which we are not thrilled. In an effort to make less work for ourselves, Vic and I tried to convince Jack to take Katie’s room as-is; the lavender walls are because it’s sunset and the flowers are because Indiana Jones is exploring nature. Jack didn’t fall for it. Dang.

It made me a little bit sad to de-girl Katie’s walls, because it was such a fun room for me to decorate. Here’s what it looked like:

If you look closely in the last photo, you can see the “bee lines” I drew. These go (went!) all around the room. While most of the bees, ladybugs and flowers—hundreds of them, which I made using plaster and a candy mold, and then painted—are in the top 12 inches or so of the wall, this particular bunch is at eye level as you walk in the bedroom door. I loved this room.

As I pulled the pirate border off Jack’s wall, I tried to remember if I had taken any pictures of his room after we pirate-d it. I don’t think we did. This distresses me greatly, but not enough to put the border back up. Here are pictures of his room when it was still a nursery, which Katie’s been studying as she makes plans for her own dog/cat-themed room:

  

This was another really fun room to decorate. I started with the bedding—no longer available at Pottery Barn Kids, of course, so I had to rely on eBay because I make everything extra-difficult for myself—and chose a very light version of the green in the quilt for the walls. I painted unfinished wood frames and filled them with pictures of friends’ and family dogs. Using a paint marker, I wrote dog-related sayings around the room, and added bone and pawprint Wallies for fun. I made curtains out of a duvet cover and used grosgrain ribbon in the quilt colors to hang them. When Jack transitioned into a twin bed I was able to find a larger quilt on eBay—lucky me. It made me kinda sad to undo this room too, but Jack was never the dog lover we expected he’d be.

He’s chosen Indiana Jones for his new bedroom, but he changes his interests so frequently that I’m not wanting to put a lot of work or money into this change. I’m painting the walls, and we’ll hang movie posters or framed Indy art, if he wants. But I’m not doing much more. Check out one lucky kid’s Indy room decor:

Please please PLEASE promise me you will not show this video to Jack.

We’re headed to IKEA again today to pick up some things we weren’t sure about when we went last week. Also, meatballs.