Category Archives: Hearth and Home

Yummy Two

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I have a studio. Do I use it? Not that much! I sit in the living room and stitch and burn and the coffee table is my true studio.  I have a new coffee table, earned with the proceeds from our recent yard sale…  It is part of The Exciting Plan in the works for when I move to my own place in a year’s time.  I am working on a design plan and it revolves around a few key pieces of furniture. I’m selling off several pieces that have been with me my entire adult life.  Liberating?  LIBERATING!  I’m pretty excited. Meet, Isala, from Ikea.

I read Posie Gets Cozy, my favorite blog, and this post inspired the heck out of me and I fell in love with the cabinets. These will be going in my new dining/living area when I move.  I haven’t decided on the configuration yet but this is the inspiration.  It will hold some dining type stuff, some witchy type stuff, and some art type stuff.

It also means that I have a lot of work before me.  I’m working on slip covers for the sofa and chair that are very neutral.  I will be using pillow covers and the like to highlight the seasons, leaving the foundations as is.  This will enable me to make dramatic changes without a lot of expense or work and minimal storage of said pieces.

For years I’ve been storing my grandmother’s ancient kitchen queen with the intention of renovating the old gal and using her to store my herbs and witchy tools, books, and the like. The pull out porcelain enamel bread worktop would have been great for mixing potions. Potions I NEVER make.

She has great bones but this is a sad state of affairs. When my grandmother moved into a nursing home we moved the queen to my parent’s garage. The rope used to secure the doors is still there, 35 years later.  The breadbox has an articulated sliding door which is cool and the original menu for holiday feasts is still inside the left door. I have loved her long but also neglected her. I cleaned the top half last summer to get a handle on the damage and it cleaned up better than I thought.  Sadly, she was full of mold, which I can’t be around unless it’s Brie, and fixing that drawer was going to be hell.  The original drawer front was inside with glass knobs in tact.  I had lots of dreams for us.  And in one look at Posie’s lovely study, I betrayed my old gal and a new dream began.

I am tired of the smell old wood furniture gives to textiles, a kind of sour, musty odor that I don’t like. I want drawers and doors that open and close properly and my time has become my most elusive and valuable commodity.  So off she went with an aging biker couple to a new life and I’m free and so is she. And the coffee table became the first in a series of new pieces.  I am planning on a new dresser soon and then at least one cabinet and the tall narrow cabinet. We shall see if a second cabinet is in the plan as the year unfolds.

I saw this yummy printed linen/rayon fabric at Joann’s about six weeks ago and I knew it was perfect for the autumn pillow covers. I had some unbleached linen that would go great on the back (I’m a total fan of being able to use the backs as art too) and this project was born.  Thank goodness I have a year!!  I have made a vow that all my pillow covers will have zippers from now on too, instead of whip stitching them closed.  Goodness that made a quick clean challenging.

I have plans for winter and spring/summer covers as well and new curtains.  I’m purging a lot from my life that I’ve been carting around and that has included old ideas too.  It’s been quite a busy summer as I work my tail off at work and home and while Mr. Furnace and I continue to work on things, mostly old concepts of what a relationship should or could be. I’m exhausted as I’ve mentioned more than once but excited and inspired.  plod plod plod

So, here is another teaser for items to come in the Etsy shop. I gotta come up with the money for all this, right?  You can see here another unmentioned project, my Samhain quilt top… Probably not ready until next Samhain, just in time to move to my new digs where ever they may be.  The pouches, Miss Mitty in her felted bed, a wooden box that will be the recipient of the recipe design on the sketch pad, and finally, one of the new pouches, both in fabric WIP and in sketch…  Life is good.  Now if only the small staph infection that is on the END OF MY NOSE would heal, things would be perfect.  Must have caught that from one of the unclean, unwashed masses at the yard sale.  Jeesh.

I’m Alive

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Man, life!  I thought August would be slooowww.  And while it is in some ways in others it is not.  Work offered truly excellent incentive to launch as many sites as we can and I’m in the over 20 sites 5 months running.  A record. Sooo Tired.  *headdesk*

We are having a yard sale so I’ve spent weeks pulling stuff out of storage, sorting, and now pricing as the yard sale is this Saturday. God. *bodybed*

I joined a gym and got a personal trainer.  Yesterday I did 6 sets of 10 girl pushups.  If you had told I could do even ONE I would have laughed in your face.  holy crap.  I am going to lose this weight damn it and have finally accepted fully that the only way to eat the foods I like to eat, I need to work my ass off. Low Carb works for me but I can’t sustain it because I tend to miss pasta and breads now and then and don’t get me started on potato chips. I can never eat just one.  My shoulders are KILLING me today but tonight Mr. Furnace comes over (we are adding him to my gym membership today because they have a Friends and Family half price sale right now) and he’s going to give a super duper Mr. F. massage.  He’s pretty darned good I must say. *sigh* and *yay*

I need to remember to have him take a Before photo in all my pudgy glory.  Not that I look bad but in my mind I don’t look like ME.  or feel like me.  Did you know I made the front page of the sports section in my city because my hurdle relay team broke the record?  I used to be BUFF and no lie. Ran 5 miles a day and then did calisthenics, gymnastics, stretching, and walked/biked/skiied/danced.  Not using my body is not a new thing but I’ve neglected my bod for at least 17 years.  I starting taking diuretics for my high blood pressure two years ago, the fibromyalgia isn’t bad but it’s not good, and I want to live a loooooong time. It’s time.  Feels great.  But did I mention my shoulders are killing me?

But here is the best part!  I’m a CRONE!!!! my years of peri and menopause are over.  Yeah, sure, still some hot flashes but the migraines that debilitated me for decades have been gone for an entire year now.  No more agonizing cramps.  No more mood swings (well they have diminished significantly).  My energy levels are rising and I’m starting to feel really great.  My trainer guessed my age at 12 years younger than I am which Made My Day.  So here’s to being a youthful looking crone.

Not sure of the artist, anyone know?

So, I have 5 launches in 2 days to get out the door so I can’t stay.  I haven’t dropped off the face of the earth. Not yet any way. Autumn is coming and I’m excited about some the projects I’ve got going on.

Ooooh and watch for a new post soon on the new circle I’m forming with some friends. Oh wow oh boy, I haven’t been THIS excited in over 20 years.

Drip Drip Drip

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Man, we got snowed in.  Hard to believe but it’s true. We got a whopping 8″ here and then .33″ of freezing rain, a sheet of solid, and I do mean solid, ice on everything.  Which might not be a big deal if you are a flatlander but Seattle is nothing but hills. And I do mean HILLS.  Treacherous.

Snow Fort

Bad phone photo before daylight, snow fort on the trudge to the bus. Had to turn around, the bus never came. I know, the street looks clear but this is on the level. To get to it the bus must navigate a very steep hill.

When the buses in downtown Seattle are stacked up and slipping and sliding and bending in two (they are, after all, articulated) because there is too much snow, you know we had a good one.

I’ve been working from home all but Tuesday this week which was between snow storms. Can you say Cabin Fever boys n’ girls? gah!  Finally got out to the store today plus a meeting. I’m sober and not at any imminent risk of relapse but I can sure get cranky pants when I get too much time between meetings.  Torture. For me and others I’m sure.

Now the grand thaw begins.  This can be worse than the snow as we get large areas of flooding in those valleys.  The side streets are tracks to bare pavement with humps, very tall humps, that scrape the undercarriage of your car as you navigate. The chains have completely torn up good streets with occassional series of severe potholes.

I got my meeting and the steady rain combined with the thaw, the drip drip drip will accompany me to sleep tonight.  Tomorrow I see my guy, Mr. Furnace, for gourmet tacos (we are taco afficianados) and then a roaring fire and some much needed cuddles since the snow has kept us apart.  Which isn’t the worst thing.  Absense DOES make the heart grow fonder when you’re kind of mooney over someone. Yeah, we are drips drips drips and I love every minute of it.