August Update

Howdy! We're back from our travels and our guests have left, and boy has it been forever since we've posted. There are many new things I've been meaning to blog for a while, so let's get right to them, shall we?

I'll start with the biggest news first, or at least, the biggest project. While my Mom was here, she painted our guest room/craft room. Yes, you read correctly, while she was a guest in our house, actually using the guest room, she painted the room. She is awesome. Thank you, Mom. This is a project we'd wanted to have done for some time, but we kept putting it off because....well, you read this blog & know what happens here. But Mom was ready for the challenge.

We had a variety of thoughts on color; I had previously wanted this room to be a periwinkle that I had seen in a friend's office, but after the change in the pink room (to dark blue) I wasn't sure if that was still going to work. We tried out a couple of paint samples that we had and ruled out both colors, deciding that the "French Lavender" was too bright and the "Spring Green" was too dark.
This shot also gives you a sense of how the room color needs to be OK with the blue room (and also the dining room, since there's also a door between this room and the dining room).

I think it's also the best shot I have here that portrays the original color of the room, which I had come to describe as the color of an old Band-Aid, fabric kind. I thought initially that it was sort of a neutral color, but after a while (this room was my office when we first moved here) I came to loathe this color and its ace-bandage-ish tone.

The room also featured a wallpaper border up by the ceiling:

It was sort of bland; we didn't realize until we were up on the ladder that it's actually textured. The worst part is that our ceilings are VERY high. So we were going to be scraping wallpaper up high above our heads, working on ladders. This part was not fun. Using a lot of vinegar and a ladder was had to lean up against the wall, we managed to get the thing down:


But we realized that we couldn't paint using a ladder that we leaned against the wall. We discovered that Taylor Rental near us would rent a ladder (just $12! who knew?) and then we were also able to borrow one from our fabulous next-door-neighbor, so it all worked out.

Mom did the vast majority of the painting. After about 5 minutes of painting, I came to the conclusion that I do not like, nor am I good at painting. But Mom did a very professional job, getting a coat on the ceiling, doing the color, touching up trim, and painting all of the baseboards (which really needed it).

Here's an after shot so you can get a sense of the color.
What's that down in the lower portion of the picture, you ask? I'm so glad you asked! It's Ella Fitzgerald!


My lovely friend Gab gave me this switchplate ages ago, and I brought it with me when we moved. I just hadn't found the right place for it. This is totally the right place! Hooray!

OK, here are a couple more shots of the new walls:


We're very happy with the color. Thanks, Mom!

That's all for tonight. I hope to post more soon.

Adventures of the Amateur Archivist

We just returned from a visit to see my mom and my brother's family. We had a lovely time. While in Carlisle, I did a bit of excavating in a few boxes in the attic. I was simultaneously horrified and delighted to see the absurd things of mine that had been saved (by both my Mom and by me). We're talking serious documentation. Impressive stuff. Seeing as I don't believe anyone will be writing my biography and needing to visit the Bridget archives, I decided to embark on a serious weeding project.

First, there were boxes of my projects. Years and years of projects, from my early drawings and stories (from first grade) to my forays into various media such as macrame:
(Jake was particularly horrified by the hideousness of this craft)

and cross stitch:
Sadly, other than this digital image, the world will no longer have the physical evidence of my needlepoint abilities. And yes, that is a 4-H project sampler.

So saving my own project is one thing, but I also saved all kinds of other things. If you've ever sent me a letter, I probably still have it. I have a hard time getting rid of such things. In some cases, I have saved the envelops, too. In the eighth grade, I was good friends with a Japanese exchange student who was in my class. She was a most excellent artist, and was always drawing little caricatures of our classmates and teachers. I saved a whole bunch of stuff she drew. Here is a sample:


Yes, she has spelled my name a bit incorrectly. I have chosen this particular artifact to share because it depicts me (in a remarkably flattering and sympathetic manner) sporting my tragic haircut of the eighth grade. Many of you have heard the story of this dreadful, life-altering haircut, and a few of you have seen photos. Even fewer of you saw the actual offending haircut in person (I weep for you). Someday I will tell the sad tale of my haircut (spoiler alert: it involved a perm) and dig up some photographic evidence. For now, this will have to entice to you further reading of my "adventures of an amateur archivist" posts.

So anyway, I thought my saving of envelops and other random -- it has to be said -- crap was a bit, uh, excessive. I felt better when, among my stockpiles, I found these envelops with my mother's handwriting:

That would be two envelops. The larger one says "First Birthday Cards," and was in fact filled with cards that say "You're 1!" Obviously, I am not the one responsible for saving these. But it was fun to see them. In fact, I found a card from my Uncle Hot Dogs. I knew I had a relative who went by the name "Hot Dogs" (he was my great-grandmother's brother) but I somehow didn't realize that he was still around when I was born. Anyway, he wrote something nice in the card and taped a silver dollar into it. Sweet! So that was kind of a fun find. But more amazing is the smaller envelop. In case you can't quite make out what it says, here is the transcription: "Icing off my first Birthday cake." Seriously? Seriously. Inside was a small candle and a very crusty piece of cake decoration. Wow. After formally documenting them for this blog (archive edition), I properly disposed of the icing. Thanks, Mom, for keeping every artifact intact!

Stay tuned for further fun and/or horrifying revelations from the archive.