ahha

i remember i caught a glimpse of this once, ten years ago, and instantly liked it.  it finally dawned on me to check around for it again.  who knew a search of “two women on a park bench” was all it would take.  and it is just as catching as i remember.

only the image is so fuzzy.  i think i have taken it into my mind to hunt it out of the library and scan it.  and then make it into some lovely little prints for mother’s day for my lovely, mad reproducing friends.  even though the process is bound to be somewhat illegal.  fortunately my conscience is built like a tank.

how to make me ecstatic

i just like to stand in the door and stare at them.  sigh.

…no, not the girls.  i don’t know what they are doing there actually, but they do cheer the place up.  now that you mention it.

but the news is that i got new a new washer and dryer!  our friends, brian and mari, just up and gave them to us.  i thought the way to my heart was through my stomach but i may have been mistaken.  this is love.

just a morning pick-me-up from my dad

after i spent all morning sitting on the couch.

Get your butt in gear! If you really want to get a job, get busy, “Your days of idleness are over.” You say, “But there’s nothing to do.” Nonsense, there’s alway something to do. “There’s no excuse for doing nothing.” “The only thing worse than doing nothing is watching TV, at least if you’re doing nothing you might be thinking.” Get in the habit of getting up and eating breakfast and doing the work that’s in front of you, every day. Staying up at night tends to depression. “Despair is a poor excuse for not having a sense of purpose, and having a sense of purpose is the best way to avoid despair.” Naturally the work for the day might be looking for a job. If you’ve done everything you can think of, that could possibly need doing, start studying. Yes, this is work too. There’s no time to waste, “There’s only two kinds of people, those who study and those who watch television.” Improve yourself every way. Be prepared. If you think you can sit around until some wonderful, perfect job comes along, forget it. Those days are over. Besides, what you may imagine to be the perfect job is probably no such thing. It is likely just a miserable way to make money while you abandon your family.

The competition is getting tough. Who do you think is going to win? If you really want to work, think and act like someone with ambition and work ethic. I know this is disagreeable to a lot of people, because they have spent their life learning that there is no dignity in labor. We’re think too smart for that now.  Real work is something to be avoided.

(and the picture is of my thai iced tea.  i was stirring my heart shaped ice cubes and thought, “isn’t this cute?”  it’s still not as completely satisfying as a bubble tea, but i don’t have a jar of gelatinous tapioca snot wads hanging out in my fridge, so a girl has to make do.)

love the one you’re with

it’s my new (old?) decorating mantra.  i have been living with the furniture i primed in october, just waiting for the day i could run over to home depot and sell my soul for paint.  but my soul apparently isn’t worth much and they always want money.  so instead,  i just took the leftover touch-up paint from when my sister-in-law moved out of her apartment.  i can live with that.  except what kind of person buys flat paint?

the kids have already marked up the coffee table, which is the same consistency of a chalk board.  i had to make it off limits until i can buy some high gloss (the way things are meant to be).  this is the coffee table i found for $5, by the way.  with my matching $5 mirror, which is sweetness itself.

my end table was also $5 and my “buffet” (a term that always confuses my husband, “you mean that rolling, hunk of crap, tv cabinet?”) – i found alongside the road for free.  we just put the little fabric panels in and i love it.  it stores all my dishes and serving trays so it is technically a buffet.  i insist.

so things are coming together slowly.  not exactly orchestrated, but i’m not really that kind of girl.  all my throw pillows came out of the clearance bin at pottery barn.  they were basically the only five that weren’t in earth tones, burlap, cow or paisley and i snatched them right up.  i think they are finally starting to coordinate with the room.  once you accumulate all the colors in the rainbow it’s gets easier.

a project that is done?

i don’t believe it.  i tell you, it took years.  it all started when i decided i wanted to paint a heinously ugly, 70’s dresser.  i thought you found those things alongside the road for free.  instead i had to stalk craigslist for months and finally drag it out of a trailer in garden city.  (that’s where they keep them all you know.  a gold mine.)

then i had to wash it, vacuum it, putty over the holes from the ancient, scrolled hardware and then prime it.  and then paint it.  and then paint it again.  painting relief like that is evil.  and of course, when i got it all done i realized i had bought a dresser that was missing a door.  i had to ask myself if i was retarded and then make my brother hand fit me one from an old cupboard door.  then i had to sand, prime and paint that.

for some reason, i could never talk my husband into buying me hardware for this dresser.  after all, i had just took off piles of perfectly nice brass hardware.  what is my problem?  but i held firm.  i clawed open said dresser for three months waiting for my chance.  the chance came (i think it’s called stealing) and the hardware was bought.  …the hardware was never put on.  fortunately, marc was laid off from work.  “look honey!  now you have plenty of time to put on these nice drawer pulls here.  what a good idea.”

eventually the door pulls were put on.  but the cupboard door that reuben made was too big.  (was he retarded?)  so i had to wait until christmas until someone could bring me an electric plane from deary.  then the door was cut down to size and i had to re-sand and re-paint it.  after waiting another month, indeed, the door was put on.  isn’t it swell?  someday it will go in the boys room (not the toy room) with their matching quilts and prints.  after i paint the bunk beds.

kimberly vs. martha

this is my friend kimberly. she wakes up at 5 in the morning and does yoga, cooks her week worth of meals in advance and lines them up neatly in the freezer, she entertains, makes killer onion tarts, teaches cooking classes, has her babies in her living room with a stick clamped between her teeth, dresses fashionably, knows all about flax seed, omega 3’s, lycopene and doesn’t eat sugar. and just like martha, everybody hates her. that’s why she’s my friend. we could make evil plans and take over the world together. i am excited. but first she has to win the vitamix competition. (so she can support me. my evil plans are expensive.)

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*results back on tuesday*

much love*m

my little fat face

my mother gave jael a play kitchen for christmas.  she filled it with dishes, food and real silverware to boot.  …although the butter knives (a.k.a. daggers) always seem to be missing.

girl especially loves it when i clean her kitchen.  then she huffs in and madly starts throwing things about until it’s piled about the floor.  jehu likes it too.  when he hears the ruckus he will rush in and they will both sit on the floor devouring fake eggs and deceptive strawberries for all they’re worth.

personally, i always found fake food highly dissatisfying.  a true evil.  when i see her walking around with her plastic cup of milk trying in vain to suction out the least drop – i automatically feel for her and break out the real deal.  poor, dear child.

actually, she is a bit of a menace.  she probably deserves all those plastic strawberries and impenetrable pretzels.  sort of how i most likely deserve a nice stack of artificial french fries glistening in their sodium suggestive aura.  it’s just not fair.

the aftermath

i had fourteen people stay at my house over christmas.  fun as it was, the aftermath is quite appalling.  i’ve been afraid to get out of bed all day, mostly on account of my kitchen floor.  but don’t worry, i will rally with time.

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aunt natalie got the job of playing santa.  that is gideon in the background unfurling the new british flag for his tree fort.

and here are the boys waxing ecstatic over their new pirate ship.  which will, no doubt, soon suffer hostile takeover by the navy.

here we have natalie sporting her new housecoat, rezon making off with jehu’s bow and arrow and gideon and jehu admiring yet another killing of playmobil.

jael in her peru sweater and mommy wearing her big beautiful ring, as it has been dubbed by the boys.

it’s from daddy.  it was the last package under the tree, duct taped in a cardboard box, marked with a sharpie and cushioned with random bits of recycling.  oh, how he loves me.

reuben, on the other hand, had to buy himself his own christmas present.  a mark III.  he is rather impressed with himself and we had to drive miles up in the hills to shoot it.

my toes froze off.

here we are trying to take the obligatory group photo before we ran out of light.  this is pretty much how it went.

i did successfully corner my three.  i love jael’s new dress from auntie piolet.

and gideon is faring much better after his yuletide tonsillectomy.  other than sounding like a five inch tall girl on helium.  we find it hard to take him seriously.

and the day after christmas my mother rented a motel downtown.  we went swimming, watched dirty jobs and saw how cows get fed down a chipper, visited anthropology and palmer cash, went out for sushi, caught the new sherlock holmes and had a jammy run to the lobby with all the babies for goodnight cocoa.  it was fun.  but i still have to go scrub the floor.  it is disgusting.  *m

happy christmas from the ottos

and we mean it.

a christmas apron

in the event of needing a quick christmas present, aprons do whip up nice.  you don’t need a pattern and you can use whatever you have around.

plus, sewing aprons does cheer a body up.  …then again, so does shopping.  and bubble tea.  and glitter confetti nail polish, to name a few.

still, if you want to give it a try, this is a good tutorial here.  enjoy.  *m