Can't Stop Spending

A few weeks ago, I got it in my head that I wanted a laptop computer. Don't need. Want. Then we added a wireless network to our house and the want got worse. When I asked Steve if I'd be able to sit on the deck and work on a laptop connected to the Internet (sun glare notwithstanding) - he said yes. Uh-oh. The want just got way worse.

There is some level in your brain, where you know there's no turning back. I started thinking about some HP laptops that were being offered at work at a great price (below our cost even) from excess inventory or something. One morning last week, I asked some questions - and by 10:00, I'd bought a laptop. It had to be reimaged (from it's original intended purpose) and our IT person kindly loaded some software for me but by Monday night, I was one very happy camper. It's a little frightening how much I love this inanimate object.

That's why I haven't posted much recently - busy playing with my new toy. I'm moving things from old to new very slowly and methodically. I love having a totally clean machine. The kids used to use both my computer and Steve's, back in the day, for gaming. We uninstalled the obvious stuff but there are so many components that aren't identifiable as important or not. Plus when they were younger, they downloaded stuff willy-nilly.

So far I've got my Thunderbird email just the way I want it. I always spend way too much time trying to configure the Pine Tree Designs email address, even when copying the parameters verbatim from the old machine! Then I realized I had my account on dreamhost.com set up to forward PTD mail to my regular address - so I think all that time spent was moot. But it all works now - my usual woodgrain theme installed as well.

Last night I downloaded Foxfire to use as my default browser, something I've been meaning to do forever because I hear such good things about it. But the thought of "starting over" was daunting. Now I see there's a way (duh) to import your IE bookmarks - but I'm using this as a good opportunity to give my bookmarks or favorites, a good fall cleaning. Maybe I'll end up importing them, but for now, no.

My biggest dilemma now is whether to take the money from my savings to pay for this or have payroll deduction set up, in effect, an interest-free loan. It's something we offer all employees but I could actually extend my term longer than I normally allow - one of the perks of being in the accounting department. So it's hate-debt vs letting the money sit in my savings account earning pennies of interest. The answer will come to me, just hasn't yet.

~ ~ ~

I come from a pretty frugal family so I don't come to purchase decisions easily. But sometimes, once the floodgate opens, look out.

We bought a Dyson last weekend.

In case you don't know, this is a high end vacuum cleaner, an amazing machine. And it's all Gretchen's fault. She tried her friend's, then had to have one. Gretchen can wax poetic about this damn thing night and day. It's a noun, it's a verb. "I Dysoned Paul's room today." So I borrowed hers while she was in FL one week. We have a phrase, "Once you Dyson, you never go back."

I knew I was in trouble when I came home from work one day and Simon had used it in his room. I had not used it yet, so when he said, "Now that's a vacuum cleaner!", I knew I was going to like it.

Steve didn't know diddly about them, nor does he hardly ever vacuum but even he was saying, early on, "Why don't we have one of those?"

I used it a couple of days later and was amazed at the stuff it was picking up, mostly pet hair. When Steve came home, I dragged him out to the garbage toter to look at the giant dirt piles I'd deposited there. "Look! That's our bedroom! And that one is the family room!"

I tried to like our old reliable whatever-kind-it-is vacuum cleaner, I really did. Last weekend we were deep cleaning Lizz's room and I was "vacuuming". I put vacuum in quotes because, well, it's just not the same. I finally said to Steve, "Let's go buy a Dyson. Right now." So we did. Just like that. Life's too short.

We actually bought the model designed for most efficient pet hair pick-up. I'm not sure what makes it so, to tell you the truth, but we fell for it. I think if it had a Flowbee attachment I could suck the loose hair off the pets before it even hit the floor!

I don't love the Dyson as much as I love my laptop, but close.

So that's what Stefani, the non-consumer, has been doing lately. Vacuuming and writing about vacuuming on her new laptop.

A Full Day's Work

Somehow this type of project always takes me all darn day. But Simon worked all day and Steve was downstairs in his office so it was very peaceful and quiet around here. Verona mostly slept on the top of my desk. Only a couple of times did she get so insistent on affection that I had to close her out of studio.

So.

These new pages are up on the Pine Tree Designs website.

Suncatchers

Framed Art

What's New

Jennifer Cards

And the Pine Tree Design Newsletter has been emailed. I've stopped using Constant Contact and gone back to my do-it-yourself version. The stats available through Constant Contact are very interesting and quite encouraging actually, in terms of percentage of newsletters opened and click-throughs (to the website), etc. but it's just not in the budget for now, not when I can do it for free, not counting my valuable time that is.

Plus, as I mentioned another time, RoadRunner does a pretty good job of filtering spam so it wouldn't let my newsletter go through. I put out the word to the 10-15 people on the list with RoadRunner addresses that they would need to subscribe themselves, but only a couple did. (Even my own family did not subscribe - hello??) So like it or not, I put those people back on the list. You people can run, but you can't hide! (Seriously, anyone is more than welcome to unsubscribe at any time - there's a link at the bottom of the newsletter for subscribing and unsubscribing.)

I've had a lot of inquiries about the suncatchers so I'm feeling good about sales of those. I took 4 down to Artisan's Alley on Friday so we'll see how they sell there as well.

Coding the pages and newsletter is tedious but fun and very satisfying. I can't tell you how nice it was to have such a big chunk of uninterrupted time to work on it.

So go take a look! Place an order! [/shameless self-promotion]

Dog Days

It's another Freecycle weekend.

And here's some silliness someone sent me today.

Suncatchers

This weekend is finally when I definitely get the camera manual out and learn how to take better pictures. Really. Anyway. The centers are polymer clay. I'm taking them to Artisan's Alley today at lunch. These 4 are far from the 10 I intended to take at once but sometimes you have to just shit or get off the pot, you know?

RIP Cosmo

Gretchen's dog died the other day. It was actually a little more her ex-husband's dog but in reality they shared custody because the dog followed the same schedule the boys did. The boys and their dad took Cosmo to his vineyard south of here to bury him yesterday. Gretchen was so grateful for how the whole thing was handled, very sensitively - with the boys in mind, she asked me to make a sympathy card for her to send to her ex with a little note. I went for simple and tasteful.

(I used a little rubber animal that has stamps for feet, that Steve's mom gave Simon, a whole set actually, a number of years ago. All four feet never quite line up perfectly, so I finally decided to amputate one leg so I could use it as a single stamp and stamp it where I wanted. I guess simple and tasteful ends with amputation in the name of art, doesn't it?)

I emailed Steve the news yesterday morning and he emailed back he can't imagine what a mess we'll be when Reggi dies. I replied that A) We're not to speak of this, B) We will certainly be able to say that no one in the whole wide world could have loved Reggi as much as we did. I also told him that when the time comes, I'm taking my allotted 3 immediate family bereavement days, HR be damned!

Yep, I'm a dog person, alright.

PS Gretchen - how old was Cosmo? Fifteen? And if you email me a picture, I'll add it to the entry.

Koray & New Color Combos

I have yet to introduce you to our newest pet, Koray. This is Lizz's Beta that she didn't take to Indiana with her. (Koray is Turkish for red moon or something.) I bought him a new bowl - with a lid - because we caught Venus and Verona eyeing him. From a distance. So far. This little bowl came with divider so you can put two Betas in here and watch them go all macho at each other. You can even stack these things - so we could have 4 Betas or more - a wall of Betas! We just might get 3 more fish - I can't see more than that. Until the first cat mishap - and then we'll slap our foreheads, "What we were thinking??"

~ ~ ~

We finished watching the movie Spanglish tonight. Neither one of us likes Adam Sandler (based on nothing but SNL) but we'd seen previews for Spanglish while watching something else so I put it in our Netflix queue. We both liked the movie! But please, don't tell anyone that Adam Sandler made me cry. And not for the usual reason - that idiotic Chanukah song. Good movie.

I spent quite a bit of time on Sunday cutting out pieces for more Suncatchers. More pieces hit that round tin than the floor. I think.

I had the pieces all stacked up, ready to assemble tonight. When I first glanced at them this morning, I realized how nicely the colors go together. Now I've been inspired to veer from my usual monochromatic themes and try some different combinations. My goal is to make as many as I can and take them to Artisan's Alley on Thursday. Maybe Friday.

~ ~ ~

Should have wished my nephew, Nick, a happy 19th birthday yesterday. I was so focused on him coming home from the Marines today, the birthday almost seemed secondary. I have no idea how my younger sister Gretchen has a kid who is 19. Must have had him when she was 12 or something.

Mom's Birthday Breakfast

Saturday morning Gretchen and I took Mom to Perkins for breakfast to celebrate her 73rd birthday. When I asked the waitress to tell Mom to quit whining - and she did! - Gretchen and I knew we had our kind of waitress - saucy! Mom got a kick out of her too - and had more fun than she looks like here.

Gretchen ordered the strawberry French toast

and I ordered Eggs Benedict - and then we each shared half with the other. It was the perfect combo - little sweet, little salty.

Mom apparently had the Equal Half-n-Half Special.

I gave Mom the turquoise suncatcher I showed you the other day and the new one above. I've been having trouble find suitable beads or charms for the center piece so I made my own out of polymer clay. I swirled white clay together with red clay because I wanted that marble effect. The next time, I'm going to make co-ordinating beads out of the same clay for the dangly part. (I've yet to thoroughly check out the Fire Mountain Gems website that I hear so much about. Any other websites you would recommend, Maria?)

I got home about 10:00 just in time to get things done before Nantz, Kathy and Kim came over for lunch at noon. I baked a cake, made the Mexican Lasagna, threw together a fruit salad and put blue corn chips in a bowl - and called it lunch. Steve very kindly vacuumed the house. I gave the bathrooms a passable cleaning. We had our usual good 3 hours of laughing, talking and eating. (Nantz - I'm sorry we forgot to cut you some hydrangeas when you left! Darn!)

~ ~ ~

I spent time catching up on deskwork, then Steve and I finished up watching Season 4 of Oz. Then we rewatched it with commentary by one of the writers and two of the actors - love that! We have Season 5 in our Netflix queue but we'll take a break from it for a while and watch some movies and the next seasons of The Sopranos and Six Feet Under. I also added Queer as Folk to our queue and a Dave Chappelle on stage DVD. I've never seen him but have heard lots about him so we'll check it out. Oh! I added Twin Peaks to our queue too. I never watched the series when it was on TV back in the day. Someday I just might add Northern Exposure too, a show I religiously watched, taped every one and watched over and over. It will be interesting to see if I still like watching it. A guy at work recently joined Netflix and is watching a bunch of old Cheers and Taxi shows I think he said. Those are two of the shows I don't think I ever want to watch again because I watched them sooo much when they were on. Also MASH, which I was a complete nut over, can still recite lines. Have no desire to watch Seinfeld again either, though I didn't really watch that to death like I did these other series I mentioned.

~ ~ ~

Steve and I did the hot tub thing first thing this morning, then I fixed Egg McMuffins for breakfast. Simon's still sleeping, Steve is mowing the lawn and I'm about to make my grocery list and head to the store. Then it's Pine Tree Designs for the rest of today and tonight. That makes me happy.

Pull This

Here's part of the pool room makeover I forgot to show you the other day. I wanted longer chains on the three light bulbs in that room - and found these, which of course, Steve was all over.

I think I've posted about the LiveJournal community Creative Spaces before. I found this new one the other day, Saucy Dwellings. For about a minute I was tempted to join LiveJournal so I could post pictures of my newly painted rooms. I got over it.

Yesterday was Ann's birthday so I sleuthed out her phone number and gave her a call at her lovely home in Washington. I'm not usually much of a phone person, so my spontaneity surprised even me! It was the first time we have ever chatted so it was very cool to put a voice to the writing. She emailed me later that my voice was different than she expected, she expected it to be deeper. I thought she sounded younger than I imagined - and she said she's often mistaken for her young adult daughter on the phone.

Mom's birthday is today so I'm going to stop by the house on my way to work this morning and give her a bouquet of white hydrangeas from our yard. I think I'll get there before she reads this! Gretchen and I are taking Mom out to breakfast tomorrow morning and then our Mom's Excellent Birthday Adventure will be in September. You may recall that for several years now Gretchen and I have spent the day with Mom, doing whatever she's picked out for us to do. The day always ends with ice cream! We moved it to September because I couldn't go tomorrow because I have friends coming for lunch - then Nick will be home from the Marines for a week, then Uncle John and Aunt Carrol will be visiting for a few days. Next thing we knew we were looking at mid-late September. Like I told Ann last night, extend that birthday for as long as you can, I always say!

Happy birthday Ann!

Happy birthday Mom!

Paper

No time to post tonight because once again, I meant to be in bed 30 minutes ago. I didn't get home tonight until 7:00 because I had a massage after work (thanks, Mom, for the wonderful Christmas present!). I haven't had one in so long, it was total heaven. Things have been unusually stressful at work the last few weeks. While I didn't think I felt tense, the boinging of the muscles in my shoulders said otherwise. Like I said, heaven.

Then I spent a couple of hours reviewing about 40 emails from Freecyclers that wanted stuff from the web page I posted the other day. I've emailed all the "winners" to confirm they are still interested, then will email directions. Most of the stuff I'll put in the garage in bags with their names on them, but some of the more expensive & highly popular items, I've asked the people to pick the stuff up when I'm home. One time, one of my first Freecycle experiences actually, someone took their stuff and someone else's too. I think. Can't prove it but it's pretty mysterious. I emailed the suspect and not surprisingly they denied it. The person it was intended for was pretty nice about it. I mean it was free, nothing lost to them. But other than that, all of my experiences have been wonderful.

A couple of friends from work and I went to Scrapbook Creations today at lunch so I could use my coupon which expires tomorrow - for 40% off cardstock. That price is unheard of unless you are buying wholesale online - and those places have large minimum order requirements. So I loaded up, baby!

That little rubber stamp was on their clearance table. It was 10 bucks, marked down 50%. Except it rang up at 90% off. Damn, I hate when that happens. Wish they'd had more - only had a few stamps, nothing else I wanted.

Jen and I share an office with another woman - who has decided she wants to get into scrapbooking. She bought a "kit" on QVC last weekend, during their 24 hour scrapbook-a-thon. This kit has 7000 pieces! I suppose that's counting every tiny brad and doohicky - but damn, 7000?? Jen and I can't wait to see it. So yeah, we dragged her (willingly!) to the scrapbook store today. I know she's feeling a little overwhelmed by it all but we've assured her it will get easier once she gets her bearings and figures out what she likes.

Another one bites the dust!

My Weekend

Steve and I enjoyed our empty nest this weekend immensely. Steve's daughter Lizz moved to Indiana for college on Friday - and with Simon working as much as he does, we really had the house to ourselves most of the weekend. There were a bunch of phone calls between Steve & Lizz and Steve & Lizz's mom - and of course, Simon's not really gone, but so far so good. I think this is a good way for me to ease into Simon leaving home. He'll start his senior year in a few weeks, then most likely attend a local community college while living at home. But this is more how I thought his teenage years would be - he'd be out and about more than he's home. I think we only ran the dishwasher once this entire weekend. I think I mentioned, when Lizz and Simon and his friends are here - we've been known to run it 3 times a day.

I finally got to clean up the basement this weekend. It's been a pig sty since my painting frenzy of a few weeks ago. There are no before pictures, but here are the after pictures.

I haven't seen the top of our workbench in weeks!

I did a boat load of laundry - finally got it all caught up. There were 3 loads of towels alone - don't ask me how. I know, teenagers. (That's my purple painting t-shirt in the front. Most of the other clothes are a bit cleaner than that one!)

I used to have the saw horses set up for when I've been spray painting all these frames lately. But I was able to rearrange things so I could put them away and use this table for my "spraying station". (That's newspaper over a piece of plywood, sitting on the table protected by a pillowcase. It's a table I love but is the perfect size and height for this.)

Here are the paint cans I'll be taking to the county hazardous waste drop off after I call tomorrow to make an appointment. Some of that is paint that came with the house, some is our paint that there's too little of to save.

Here's the paint I'm keeping, each can labeled with what room it was used in. Cans of spray paint, 3 deep, plus other stuff are found on the bottom shelf.

Here's a screen we hung this weekend to separate my Pine Tree Designs stuff from the cat litter area. Steve keeps the litter area really clean but it's always bothered me, worried me that my inventory will pick up cat stink. That's the best place for the litter and eventually that inventory will be moved elsewhere (ultimately into Simon's old bedroom when that becomes my studio). So for now, the screen gives me some psychological comfort anyway.

Here's the real piece de resistance. Steve and I hung these woven blinds (like bamboo, but synthetic) in the pool room. Behind the end screen is excess furniture and other large items we don't want to get rid of. Behind the screens on the left are large shelves. Each of the four of us have our own shelf, plus there are holiday decorations back there, and excess kitchen stuff we had when we moved in together. We're saving it for when the kids get their first apartments, though none of it worked out for Lizz - maybe for Simon. Or we'll Freecycle it.

I had reorganized the Simon and Stefani shelves some time ago and just before Lizz left for college last week, Steve, bless his heart, went through the Steve and Lizz shelves, which had been spilling out into the room. I like to think I can take some of the credit for Steve's new sense of purging. He really did a great job, far better than I expected. Thus we were able to hang these screens this weekend.

We'd been thinking for quite a while how we wanted to hide the remaining clutter to make this section of the basement into more of a room. I finally decided the cheapest and simplest way to go was to staple inexpensive sheets in front of the shelves. I found some lovely twin sheets in pistachio green on eBay - for 99 cents each! Even with the shipping, it would have only cost us $28 to cover the shelves. Except I got burned. Who knows what kind of outfit this was selling these things. Their feedback was good but I should have recognized the big red flag when their company info mentioned they were behind in their shipping and please don't leave them negative feedback. Then I'd get a whiny email every so often saying they'd hired more people and my order would ship soon. One time, when I went online to check on the order again, they were out of business. Bastards. I saved some PayPal email on how I thought I could get my money back, but I never followed up. Lesson learned.

So all of these above blinds cost a bit more - but I like them better. It really looks more like a room now. We stuck one of Steve's old end tables in there, which I immediately decided I need to paint - not sure how I want it to look just yet. But I've been dying to try some funky furniture painting.

I photographed all of the Steve and Lizz things - and a few things from me too - and made this page to post to our local Freecycle list. It's amazing how this concept is catching on everywhere. I read about it more and more - in our newspaper, in other journals I read across the country. When I joined our local group about a year ago, there were 500-some members. Now there are over 3600.

Oh! I just checked my mail - and my post made it across - and I immediately got about 12 responses. There are a few people wanting the same things - but mostly it's across the board. That makes it easier to choose. And two people wrote to say they liked my "presentation" and thought it humorous. I learned the humor part from Gretchen. She often writes very funny things about the stuff she offers on Freecycle. Some people are so serious and demand that their stuff be picked up immediately or don't bother emailing me, blah, blah, blah. Heck, let's have a little fun with this too! Gretchen has met a lot of really nice people - and so have I, though I usually leave the stuff in the garage and they pick it up while I'm at work.

I had to turn my Freecycle membership to No Mail for a while, because it just gets to be too much sometimes. I turned it back "on" recently so I could post this stuff and one of the first messages across was a woman saying she was just getting into rubber stamping with her daughter and wanted to know if anyone had any rubber stamp gear they no longer wanted. I immediately went through my drawers and pulled out about 10 stamps and a few ink pads. I laid them out and took a picture and emailed it to her. She picked the stuff up this afternoon. Love that!

I had a very productive weekend but didn't get the PTD work done that I wanted to. I did manage to sneak a trip in to our newest Joann's - a superstore in Webster. I hit the book area first thing - and found two books about paper crafting that just about made me hyperventilate. I actually made myself stop looking because I was afraid I'd find more books I'd want to buy. I'll show you those later. Meanwhile, I seriously think I need to find a 12-step program for my craft addiction. I keep seeing books and kits about new techniques - and I'm afraid I'll not find them again, or they're on sale - so I buy them. But I never feel like I explore the possibilities of the last thing I bought before I buy more stuff to learn to do. I guess it's fairly harmless, as far as addictions go. Hey wait a minute. Actually, that's not the problem. The problem is too little time. Yeah, that's it. It's not my fault.

Suncatcher

(same on both sides)
Suncatcher

Just Stuff

Want some free advice? If you accidentally get any kind of plant juice on your hands, go wash them. Even if it's an innocuous little succulent growing in your office. Don't just look at the white stuff, think, "Hmmm" - and rub it away on your hands. Because even if you can't feel it on your hands anymore, if you proceed to rub your face - then you too will eventually wind up with a red, slightly puffy face that feels tingly and warm all day.

I'm such a doofus. It's not really picture-worthy or I'd show you. It just looks like I have a sunburn. I think it feels funnier than it looks. I'm just thankful it's not itchy and presume it will go away overnight. (I did wash my face, once I realized what was going on but it was either too late or I spread it around even more!)

I had a nice thing happen to me yesterday. Our company offered the employees an Employee Stock Ownership Program last year. We employees are supposed to have a committee represent us to management to improve the lines of communication. We could apply to be on the committee last year and people did. I did not. I felt like I'd served my time by being the go-to-girl for lots of stuff over my 10 years with the company. The ESOP Committee met several times but nothing ever seemed to get accomplished. They recently lost two members, so I, along with two other employees, were invited to join the committee. (Guess it takes 3 to replace the 2!) Seeing as how one of the original people lost was my mentor I've written about before, I had a feeling I'd be asked to replace her. No one else in accounting would really be interested, to the best of my knowledge.

I've been slowly coming out of my standoffishness lately, in terms of taking on a little more than my share at work. (A little, being the key words.) Without sounding too sanctimonious, I try to live my life as an example - for Simon, for Steve, my friends, my co-workers. I want to be the kind of person that is well-respected.

It actually took my counselor, during one of my spring tune-ups to inform me that life doesn't always work like that. That particular issue was that at that time, I felt I was doing more house-related activities than Steve was - so to fix that, I did more and more. Hoping to inspire him, don't you know? Debbie said, "Nice try, but it doesn't work like that." I was stunned. Now I see that so clearly, all around me. There are people at work, who you just know are flinging sweat from their forehead, "Whew, glad she's doing that, now I don't have to." Not just the ESOP committee thing, but anything.

The only exception might be Simon, being young and still moldable - who, over time, I believe seems to finally be "getting it" that hard work pays off. The boy has two jobs he loves (I wrote about this, right? Abercrombie Kids and cell phone accessory kiosk, both at the mall) - so much, he'd work there for free, he told me. He has been literally working every day, taking all the hours he can get, taking on other kids' shifts. I'm amazed and very proud. The reason is a little twisted in my un-fashion-diva middle-aged mind, but whatever works - he wants new clothes for school. He's going to buy some clothes, not many - like 4 things, but hold at least a shirt or two back, to wear when school starts in September. Alrighty, if that makes him happy. (Remember that 4 things at Abercrombie & Fitch can easily be over $100 without even trying!)

But ultimately he said he's going to triple his car payment to me. I'll believe it when I see it, but at least he finally said it. I'm just pleased as punch that he's busting a move all over August to earn as much money as he can. He won't get as many hours when school starts but close. He only works 5 hour shifts, though he's actually worked a few double shifts recently - so it should still be very doable. Senior year is kind of light academic-wise - was for me too. I took Creative Crafts, English and bunch of study halls, as I recall. There was probably more than that, but it's all I remember. (Like I can remember diddly, 31 years after high school!)

Let's see, what else? My glasses snapped in half last week but the new frames came in yesterday so I'm back in business. Because this year I had new lenses put in the old frames, my back-up glasses were so old, they were non-bifocal. Just fine for distance but couldn't see shit up close. At all. They were slightly bigger than my current glasses and when Simon saw them (I can't believe he even noticed, quite honestly), he "forbid" me from leaving the house in them. I tried to explain these weren't nothin' compared to those giant glasses from the 70s. Or whenever those things were in vogue. Speaking of that, if I see another picture of Paris Hilton in those gigantic sunglasses, I'm gonna hurl. Wait, if I see another picture of Paris Hilton period, I'm gonna hurl.

Microfleur

I dried some Queen Ann's Lace, sweet woodruff and a fern with my Microfleur. I haven't quite decided how I'm going to use them - on cards or framed art, probably both. I need to work on the timing of drying these things - they burn pretty easily! I microwave them for short bursts of 10-15 seconds - just need to figure out how many bursts get the job done. Daisies - forget about it - burned them every damn time.

I attached these Queen Ann's Lace to cards last year but they disintegrated pretty easily. I'm going to try spraying them with a sealer (thanks Von!) and see how that works. If I frame any of them, it will be behind glass, so that might work. Anyway, I'm up to my eyeballs in Queen Ann's lace around the 'hood so there's plenty of experimenting ahead of me.

Happy 16th birthday to my nephew Paul!

Potted Blues

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Saturday with Von

Von was here with her boyfriend, Dave, from North Carolina, for the weekend. Dave's son lives in the area so while they spent time together, Von and I spent the day together on Saturday. She drove out to my house around 10:00 and we sat on the deck and chatted for a while. I gave her a tour of the house and then we drove to Canandaigua for lunch. I wanted to go to The Lumberyard Grill, one of my new favorite restaurants. The sign on the door said they open at 11:00 and we arrived at 12:00 - to find the doors locked. We walked around front and it was definitely dark inside - but I accidentally pulled on the front door and it was unlocked. We walked in, yoo-hooing our way towards the kitchen area where someone was obviously working. I asked what time they open and he said 1:00. Screw that. I have no idea what the explanation was, we didn't ask because it didn't matter. So we had lunch at Koozina's, owned by the same family that owns one of my other favorite restaurants, Boccacinis. I had the lunch special, Chicken Quesadillas and Von had a peach & prosciutto pizza. (Say that 3 times fast.)

We stopped at The Wizard of Clay on our way home. I haven't been there in many years though I used to go semi-frequently back in the day. Their pieces are a little pricey, but they are exquisitely handmade. Their claim to fame is their trademarked BristolLeaf. (They are located in Bristol, NY.) Fresh leaves are pressed into the clay and they burn off when the piece is fired. I'd actually forgotten how many pieces I own until I walked around the store and remembered. Not a lot, mind you - a couple of lamps, a wall weed pocket and a couple of corked containers. All purchased in the DINK days!

They now offer the BristolLeaf in some lovely new colors that were just breathtaking. And they have a new glaze I haven't seen before, Crystalline. We didn't buy anything but had fun looking around. The place is housed in 5 geodesic domes the owners built, probably 30 years ago. Two of the domes are now for rent, I noticed. The last time I was there, many years ago, those domes were used as non-pottery gift shops.

Then we stopped at Artisan's Alley on our way home so Von could see where I'm now selling my wares. The store opened last Thursday and looks great! Pam has my framed pieces displayed on easels around the store and my cards are in a table top spinner on a shelf with my "Custom Orders Welcomed" sign on top. I had left a number of business cards with her too in case anyone inquires.

Artisan's Alley

37 Main Street

Victor, New York

Parking available in the back. I know they are closed Sunday - maybe Monday too, can't recall. The sign is due to be installed this coming week but she usually has an Open flag hung and a fancy Victorian chair propping up the front door. I told Pam I'd send people down there - so stop by and look around when you have a chance. There's a lovely selection of nice quality artwork.

We got Von home just in time for her to leave to drive into the city to meet up with her other Rochester friend. They had plans to visit the Park Ave Fest, which is walking distance from her friend Bruce's place.

Someone at work asked me if I had any plans for the weekend and I mentioned getting together with my online friend, Von. Since we've hung out together twice now, I think we've graduated to real friends!

We had a good day.

Leaves

This thing took me about an hour and a half to make tonight - and now I'm not sure I'm going to take to Artisan's Alley tomorrow. I'm very happy with it, but I'm worried about the frame. It's a wood frame that I bought a year or two ago, that I spray painted black the other day. It was purple, I think. But the purple was kind of a laminate coating over the wood. I'm not really sure. But I'm worried about the black paint coming off. Also, I was a Bozo and bought flat black spray paint, when I meant to buy matte finish. I'm thinking I'll take the other stuff to the store tomorrow and probably disassemble this one, repaint the frame and reassemble it.

That is a leaf stamp, one of a set of four, by my beloved Hero Arts, but I think of this single leaf as a feather. I stamped it on my new Kaleidoscope pad, Autumn Leaves. I visited our new local stamp store today at lunch, Utopia Stamps and Craft. Stamps to 'Di' For went out of business earlier this year, then this store opened. The former owner and the teacher from STDF both now teach at this new store. It looked like Utopia bought a lot of the store fixtures from STDF too. They haven't been open too long - their grand opening is August 13th I think. It looks like they'll be getting more product in. I did see a few things I'd not seen in person before, only in magazines, so that was cool. I bought a little bit of paper, some black brads and Style Stones.

The store is quite a haul from work, not really a good lunch time trip, I found. I figured I was already going to be late so I ran into JoAnn's to look at their ink pads since Utopia didn't have what I wanted. I bought the aforementioned Kaleidoscope Autumn Leaves and a Brilliance pad called Peacock; light blue, light turquoise and light green. Their Mat Stacks were 50% off so I bought one (4" x 6" sheets of cardstock together in a pad) in Earthtone prints that I envision using for more paper quilts.

I made another Bozo move tonight. I noticed the slightest scratch in the frame of the pink baby pins picture. So I took it apart and spray painted the frame. Too red. So now I'll have to buy dark pink spray paint. Oh darn. (Have you visited the spray paint aisle lately? It's fantastic! I can feel myself looking for excuses to buy more paint. It's cheap! It's fast! It's fun!)

I talked to Pam, owner of Artisan's Alley, this morning to make sure she was going to be at the store tomorrow at lunch and she is. She said the store might even be open by then.

Simon is working a double shift tonight and Lizz is at Darien Lake (amusement park) with friends, so once again Steve and I are practicing our empty nest thing. We keep thinking of things that will affect us, our standard of living and our money - like how much we'll save on the water bill without having to run the dishwasher once, often twice and sometimes three times a day!

I'm off to pack up my framed pieces for tomorrow - then off to read my book in bed.

Life is good.

Born to Cut

I absolutely love to cut little teeny, tiny bits of paper. I had so much fun today - my heart was racing! Notice these photographs were taken on a white sheet, using a light tent of sorts. I like the softer, diffused light - something I'm going to have to work with further. But not bad for a first effort.

This frame is 5" square so those corner squares are 1/4". I made this one today as well as the blue and teal pieces below.

These next 3 pieces are 7" square.

These blasts from the past are 8-3/4" square. These were at The Wine Trek and I'm taking them to Artisan's Alley this week.

So I had quite a productive day - I'm very happy. I was able to accomplish so much because I worked half a day (7:00-11:00) so I could go with Simon to traffic court this afternoon.

Piece of cake. We arrived at our local town court 15 minutes early. He signed in and stood in line to speak with the assistant district attorney, who was very nice. Simon accepted his offer to reduce his speeding ticket (16 mph over the speed limit) to a moving violation, reducing the points on his license from 4 to 2. No request or explanation necessary - that's just what they do, just like everyone told us. (I stood with him in line, but hung back and Simon spoke with him alone.)

We went into the court room - there were about 20 people there - and we waited. And waited and waited. The judge came in and finally got things rolling after an hour or more wait. Maybe the ADA was still speaking with "criminals" but it looked to me like we were fully assembled. The judge spoke for 5 minutes on the procedure and started down the list. Simon was about 6th or 7th, which is why I told him we should go a bit early. First come, first served. Each case took 2 minutes - just long enough for the person to declare guilty or not guilty and a fine was assigned. I couldn't make sense of the fines because they were all over the place for the same offense as Simon's. I mean, I guess the judge bases it on any previous offenses and I don't know what else. He was given the lowest fine of the people ahead of him, $85. Plus a $55 surcharge (which was all over the place too - you'd think that would be standard), so the total was $140. I had cash on me but once we saw how things worked, when asked, Simon said he would not pay today. The court clerk gave him a slip of paper with $140 written on it and the date 8/29, which is when he has to have the fine paid. I did not want to front him the money on this. And had I "made" him make his car payment to me on 8/1, knowing he'd be shy of having enough for his fine - but that was his problem to deal with.

It was all pretty painless except for the hour wait, where Simon and I just sat and talked. (I brought a book but left it in the car, not knowing how things would be - or that the wait would be that long.) Geez, Simon is so argumentative and combative! Not in a bad, mean way, just in a constantly challenging way. Teenagers.

The good news is Simon went to work right afterwards. He now has a second job at a phone accessory place at the mall - actually for more money and more hours than he has at Abercrombie Kids. He loves them both - words I wasn't sure I'd ever hear come from his mouth. Between both jobs, he'll finally be where he should be financially, to support his various car and clothing habits. Even worst case scenario for both, he'll be sitting pretty I think. We ran the numbers the other night and I actually saw, for the very first time, the light bulb go off in terms of aggressively paying down his car debt - and building a cushion. It's not to say there won't be stumbles along the way but I feel better about all this stuff than I have in a long time.

So he worked for two hours at the phone place (getting trained), then he must have stopped in at Abercrombie Kids because he called to say he was working until closing. Glory hallelujah! Steve and I have had such a pleasant quiet evening. Even Lizz isn't here, though she's pretty quiet anyway. If Simon's home, he has friends over usually. Their new thing is they bring their computers with them (desktops, not laptops!) so they can play this new game, whatever it is. Meanwhile, it's draining the Internet power away from my computer so badly, it's like I'm on dial-up. Last weekend Steve put Simon and Lizz on a wireless router thingy whatever. It helped but not 100%. Tonight, I'm flying just as fast as I can click - just the way it should be.

Getting this court thing behind us, I mean behind Simon - plus all this paper cutting frivolity, I had a pretty damn good day. Oh, the half day of work was kind of a nice bonus too.

Words

Oh my! Have you seen these? In yesterday's comments, Maria mentioned Wallwords and Willa mentioned Wonderful Graffiti. I just spent probably an hour tonight looking at all the gallery photos on these sites. I think I'm going to put a quote from one of these companies in the kitchen when I repaint it. Not sure which one yet - maybe not even kitchen related. Gretchen, you really need some words on your walls in your library, yes? Thanks Maria & Willa - I had no idea these places existed. I was blown away.

Amy mentioned Konfabulator in her blog the other day. Another colossal time-waster I just loved! What's a Konfabulator, you ask?

Konfabulator is a JavaScript runtime engine for Windows and Mac OS X that lets you run little files called Widgets that can do pretty much whatever you want them to. Widgets can be alarm clocks, calculators, can tell you your WiFi signal strength, will fetch the latest stock quotes for your preferred symbols, and even give your current local weather.

I had just been looking for an electronic notepad type of thing recently and was about to download Post It Notes again but hadn't gotten around to it. I found several similar notepad-like Widgets on the Konfabulator site. Unfortunately I can't run it at home - my operating system is too old. But I can run it at work. I spent a lunch hour the other day looking through all the Widgets offered.

Gosh, I love the Internet.