Ceiling Art

*Snort*

I asked Eric to hang some framed animal carcasses for me on the wall in the den.  We had painted them all white to match the new room.  I laid them out in the pattern on the carpet of how I had wanted them to hang and left it to him.  Everyone knows that pictures are to be hung at eye level right?  Perhaps it's best you don't ask someone who is 6'4" to hang your photos and expect them to be at normal height (he honestly didn't see anything out of the ordinary, but I swear I don't have any other frames hung this high in my house). 

All I could do was laugh....and later I shall lower the top row of frames. 

A Side of Suitcase?

I made a piece of furniture!  No for reals I did.   This one right here.  Well not here exactly but right there below this sentence is a picture of it! 

I've run across a couple very inspiring 'suitcase' pieces through Pinterest and I've always wanted to make something.  I had originally purchased my blue hard case suitcase at Value Village last year for $5.00 with the intention of turning it into a chair like that one posted below.  But I just haven't been feeling it lately. 

Besides, I really don't have a spot in my house at the moment to accomodate a suitcase chair which is really about appearances and not about practicality.  Frankly it would just be a "neat-o" clothes holder or kitty chair.  Let's be real.  So when I stumbled across two nesting tables on Kijiji for $20.00 I thought, "EUREKA!  I've finally found a match for my suitcase."  And fit perfectly, they did. 

I ended up spray painting my little table a glossy white to match the room it was intended for.  It took me 4 coats of paint to get it even.  I didn't bother to waste paint by spraying the top, because well, that's redundant since you won't see the top!   Then I, put the suitcase on the floor with the bottom side up and I put the table on top of the suitcase table top down and I let Eric drill four holes.  (It makes him feel like a real man when I let him do stuff like that.  Trust me.)  Then we  he jammed the bolts through the holes and tightened it all up nice-nice. 

Then I flipped that bad boy over and VOILA, a suitcase table that looks like a professional made it.  And it cost me, maybe, $25.00 for all the supplies including the bolts and spray paint.  Now don't try to fool me by suggesting I could find a sweet bad boy like that pre-made for 25 bones cause I just won't believe you!   You wanna know the sweet bonus?  There were two keys inside the suitcase for locking and unlocking purposes (funny how keys do that) so now we have a lockable storage compartment built into my new kickass table for my den!  BAM BAM!  Double the pleasure! 

A Picture Makes a Post

I wish I hadn't lost our camera battery charger.  More importantly YOU wish I hadn't lost our camera battery charger. 

Sadly, my list of drafts not posted to my blog (and his) is growing while they wait for accompanying pictures. 

This weekend, I promise to hunt for a replacement!  Then back to regular blog postings once again, my loyal community.  Much appreciation for your patience (which is ironic since I, myself, have none).

Disco at Home

I've seen a lot of word wall art in the past couple of years.  Between decals, stenciling, and wood letters...I decided to do my own version of word wall art for the new den.  I think it's a unique take on it and frankly it's another successful craft by Holly (in my opinion anyway, and frankly that's all that matters because I'm keeping this one!). 

I purchased four wooden letters from Michael's craft store (I'm thinking this could be one of my new favourite stores) for six bucks each.  Then I spray painted them silver (can of spray paint was $7.00).  Then I glued 10 1/2 rolls of nickels on them (I'm not so sure a hot glue gun was the right route to take as a couple of the coins have since fallen off and have had to be reglued with a different adhesive, but live and learn), which gave me kind of a disco ball effect (from a distance) on the letters.  So eleven rolls of nickels cost me $22.00 but you could probably raid your change jar if you're one of those people.  I'm not, Eric's coffee addiction and Roan's penny candy addiction would never allow me to accumulate enough nickels on my own.

The plan was to hang this homemade $55 dollar art above my couch in the new den on the dark navy blue wall but I decided to just stand them up on a white floating shelf instead.  Up against the dark wall, they look pretty awesome.  I'm excited for the room to come together and to display some of my own handy work.  I don't think I'd have been able to find art work to encompass that amount of space for less than that kind of money from a store.  So I'm ok with high price tag on this craft.

Sometimes

Sometimes you have to make an unpopular decision.  Sometimes people won't like your choices.  Sometimes they'll be mad at you for it. 

Sometimes you just get tired of cleaning up other people's messes.  Sometimes you get fed up being the one left holding the bag.  Sometimes it sucks feeling shitty for someone else's wrong doing.  Sometimes people need to be made aware of how their actions affect others.  Sometimes a personal reality check is all it might take.  Sometimes it's hard to understand my reasons when you're mad, and that's ok.   

That Old Familiar Feeling

There's something to be said about the comforting feeling I get when things revert back to a past normal for me.  For basically the past year Eric has been working either steady afternoons or steady midnights.  (Yuk, yuk and more yuk!)  I'm not lost without him as I'm a superdeeduper independent gal and all, but it's been topsy turvy to say the least.  It's hard for an entire house to remain quiet in the evening hours and it's hard for Eric to shut out the outside world to get proper sleep during the daylight hours.  It's safe to say that he was definitely ready to be done with this particular shift. 

So on Saturday following the dreaded (yet inevitable according to him) phone call informing Eric that his employer was laying a bunch of people off for 'lack of work' the demeanor in the house immediately changed.  Yah, pretty much just like that.  For him anyway.  Me?  Well of course I stress about finances.  But that's not really a huge issue when I think about it.  I survived all on my own for quite some time before Eric and his salary came along and I can persevere again if need be.  It was just really, REALLY nice to have two salaries again.  I won't lie.  At least unemployment insurance is an option this time if all else fails. 

I guess my point of this post is the comfort of having him around again.  I like being able to do stuff around the house with him (even if he hates it).  Seems like that kind of got away from us for a while.  Well, back at it!!  I also like having dinner together and preparing it together, even if he does stick goddamn Tempe in my freakin' stir fry.  And I really like that old familiar feeling of sitting side by side in bed on our laptops, blogging.  Yah folks, you read that right, he's posted FIVE new blog posts!! I shit you not.  We also throw the odd game of Scrabble in there too, but now he's getting good at that so I'm not feeling too superior anymore.   And I'm also looking forward to the day he can do drawings on the computer again for his old boss and a new book so I can curl up in the crook of his arm and go to sleep while he works.  That was cool too, even if it made things harder for him and he hates it. 

Today he got the chance to go work with a friend's father, who has a contracting company, cutting huge pieces of wood with chainsaws.  I know it could take a little bit of time and practise to get his skills back, but I have faith he can do it.  He's just that guy that seems to be decent at everything.  And big wood and powerful saws make him a happy lad.

So here's to new old normals my friends! 

Out of This World Transformation

Phew!  It was a hectic weekend (sort of).  I'm sure it felt more crazy than it was due to the fact that I had been beaten down by a head cold.  I was lucky enough to be able to help a hair stylist friend out and participate with her in a hair competition on Sunday (uh, hello free haircut and colour!!).  Not so lucky to have a head full of cement at the same time, but I persevered. 

So starting on Friday I began the preliminary transformation.  And in the span of 4 days I sported 4 different hair styles. 

The first pic was just plain old me!  The second picture was after two bleach out sessions and one colour wash attempt at magenta.  The last picture is what I'm actually sporting now - A more work appropriate hue, brown (but currently darker than it should be because of all the magenta underneath).  The below picture is actually after a second colour rinse (to further enhance and brighten the magenta) and sitting under the hot spot lights on a stage for 45 minutes while the lovely Miss Erin (hair stylist extraordinaire) Coursol cut off all my luscious (fried) locks. 

So I'm tired just typing it out, four hair makeovers in as many days.  No wonder my follicles are aching!  It was a pretty decent experience.  Unfortunately Erin didn't place this time around and that's no fault of the audience that's for sure.  We had total randoms coming up to us to tell us before the winners were announced that we should be taking top prize and after they were announced, we had people telling us that was a bullshit call and we had been robbed (ok those are more my words but the message was the same).  Which was a tiny, silver lining in Erin's day.  The masses loved her.  That's really what was important.  Oh and of course Vincent Petti voted us number 2!   And he's like totally a celebrity in the hair world, dontchyaknow? 

So now I'm just trying to figure out how to rock this hair style, it's a big change for me.  Bold and daring but I'm digging.  And of course I secretly like that Eric thinks I look like a Romulan from Star Trek.