Yesterday was yet another dreary, cool and rainy day in a string of such days. And so it seemed a perfect day to destroy my clean and pretty new dining room by filling it with all the crap from the laundry room and painting. My bogus trip to IKEA has left me with no organizational unit to fill the newly painted laundry room, but that is neither here nor there.
Gone are the weirdly mustardy beige walls and ancient linoleum floor, replaced by three white walls and one pink wall and a floor that I can't decide if it is shabby chic or just plain shabby. Which ever it may be, it is better than the crumbling, blue, water-damaged linoleum that was there before. And this means that I finally get to use my washing machine and dryer instead of the old ones that came with the house! (Well, after I have Jeremy help me move them from the workshop...)

Now I get to drag Dorian around with me today on a quest to find some appropriate storage furniture and a work table.

**************************

And in totally unrelated news-- I had this conversation with Dorian a couple of days ago:

Dorian: Mom, you're the greatest woman in town!

Me: You think?!

Dorian: Well... maybe Miley Cyrus is.

The fact that Miley does not live anywhere near our town, probably has never heard of our town and quite possibly will never visit our town did not matter to dear DeeDee. So, currently, I have a 4.5 year old obsessed with Miley Cyrus and a 7.5 year old who is in love with a video game character. Lord have mercy on me this summer vacation!

Mental Health Day

Jeremy's boss decided he needed a mental health day on Friday, but it really turned out to be one for me. And not just because I had had 2 kids home for spring vacation* for 6 days at that point either.

No, I took the opportunity to strong-arm Jeremy into helping me paint the dining room-- an event I've been waiting for for too long. (Note that this post was written one year ago exactly.)

We picked white for the dining room, since all the other rooms have color, and my dishes are all different colors and I didn't want too much clashing. And my cousin pointed out that I don't want to have a "clown house." Unfortunately, all I could say when it was done was, "It's so... white." So we hung up our artwork, and it is better. Now we just need an appropriately sized table.

And lest it seem finished, I have this little reminder until I make it to the hardware store to buy one of those silly plates to cover the chimney flue:
Now I just need to do the laundry room... I've got the paint-- I just need the time.

*During vacation, we went to an artist's workshop and Sebastian's picture was taken for the paper.

My 'do is a don't

I just had to cut my hair because I was putting plastic over the window in the kitchen.

How on earth does that make sense? you may ask.

Well, let's just say that when I leaned forward to inspect the plastic to determine whether or not there was a hole in a crease (there was), my hair got sucked into the motor of the hair dryer I was using to shrink the plastic. I turned the dryer off, but not fast enough, and then had to cut my hair or spend my life with a hair dryer hanging off the side of my head.

Another glamorous day...

Trying to catch up

I'm feeling rather behind on things lately, mostly due to my complete inability to refrain from adding more projects to my life. So, I'm working on knocking a few things off the old to-do list and have made some progress in the last 24 hours.

This morning I put the first coat of paint on the floor in Dorian's room.

And last night, I started the fronts of Sebastian's cardigan. He picked out a couple of cables including one he thinks looks like DNA. That DNA cable should be a DNR. I hate it. It looks fine, but it is a gigantic hassle and I am going to have to tell him that I will definitely not be putting those cables up the sleeves as he requested. And I made (gasp!) a mistake at the beginning of one of those cables and even though it will probably annoy me for life, it happened far too long ago for me to be willing to rip it back and fix it. Oh well.
And later today I get to mow the lawn and make dinner for some friends before Beatles RockBand takes over our lives.

Please don't remind me about the quilt I haven't finished or the Halloween costumes I need to start making.

Rainy weekend activities

It is nice to have a rainy weekend every now and again to catch up on things instead of running off to find a spot of sand at the lake. So, did we make good use of our time? I'd say so.

Yesterday, Jeremy and I primed the walls in what was the music room. We did, that is, until we ran out of primer with only 7 square feet to go. Then we went out to lunch and to the grocery store. A brief respite at home and then we were off Chez Flapdoodle for a pizza party to celebrate a variety of things including their refinancing of their house and our friend Henry getting out of the "clam shell" he has been wearing all summer after breaking his spine. Yes, his spine.

Today was spent making banana muffins from some fruit fly magnets, taking a quick trip to the hardware store for more primer, and blocking Dorian's sweater.


All that remains is to sew it up, add a collar, and insert a zipper I have not yet purchased. Details, details.

I also harvested some stubby little carrots. 4 months of growing for that.
And our first eggplant! Yum!

I also went to see Food, Inc. It was okay. But here's the thing. Even though I am all for organic agriculture and try to shop locally as much as possible, that movie was so over the top at some points that I basically left the theater wanting to eat a Mickey D's hamburger just to spite the filmmakers. Whoever was in charge of the score saw fit to have a horror movie soundtrack during portions involving Monsanto or slaughterhouses. We got it already! And any time there was a corporate farm or a corn field depicted, everything was brown and dusty; but if an organic or small farm was on screen, all you could see was green mountain vistas and idyllic red barns. Please. And don't make Stonyfield yogurt out to be some fabulous company whose president is raving about all the tons of pesticides and antibiotics that aren't being used because they are "organic". Well, I have to ask about all the oil that went into both the plastic packaging that went swirling past as the film went through the factory and the trucks that will transport these dairy products across the country.

But enough of that little tirade. If you've been under some sort of rock lately and have no idea about sustainable farming or the horrors of corporate agribusiness, maybe you should see the film, but otherwise I wouldn't waste my time if I were you.

After I came back from the movie, Jeremy and I painted the ceiling in the former music room, and then I broke out a pane in the window simply by painting the frame. And now for the room news: the music room aka Dustin's room is going to be Dorian's room (or miniDust's room). The drumset will go in Sebastian's room. Dorian is excited to have his own room, since he never has, and I think Sebastian will enjoy having a room of his own again.

After dinner, I cut the boys' hair.

And now I have 2 hours to kill until Mad Men...

Happy House-iversary!

Yesterday marked the first anniversary of when we bought our house. Twelve months ago, Christine watched the boys so we could sign our lives away and initial repeatedly to be handed 10 copies of the key to our house. And a very short time after that, we embarked on 11 crazy days of getting the house somewhat ready for us to move in. I'm still working on making the house livable and from what I hear, I will spend the rest of the time that I own it doing so. Fine by me.

And the good news is that the insurance company was satisfied with the purple garage and the fixed window and the invoice for the trim being painted and has graciously allowed us to pay them hundreds of dollars to continue having their insurance. They had our back during that whole sewer pipe debacle, so it's definitely worth it.

So, here's to our half-painted, 129 year old, humble abode-- well worth the expense and effort!

I finally got my purple fix

The garage is finally done, and since it required the purchase of a second gallon of paint, I had enough left over to do the 2 back doors.

And today we went blueberry picking and I made some nice purple jam. Never did get raspberries, I'm sorry to say. But that's okay. The blueberry jam tasted pretty awesome on the corn fritters I made with my first Walker Farm corn of the year. No better corn in the world. And I also managed to put three bags of kernels in the freezer to enjoy throughout the winter. Good stuff.

What happens when Jeremy is gone

The first day (after crying quietly for a few moments) I take the children for a walk to the farmer's market on the off chance that there will be raspberries. We just get a small container to eat on the spot. No jam today. Then we head to the thrift store and buy a Spiderman comic pajama top for Sebastian and a DDR shirt for me. Who cares that it's a child size shirt? It says, "I can't dance without arrows." We go next door to the discount natural foods store where I stock up on such necessities as organic pop tarts, all natural strawberry daiquiri mix, and cheese filled pretzel sticks.

We stop a couple of times on the way home to gossip about the 16 year old pregnant girl down the street and my neighbor who passed away recently. We arrive at home where I leave Dorian unattended for 10 minutes and come back to find this:

The kids have a minor breakdown later when it is discovered that Wipeout has been postponed by the President's press conference. I put them to bed, then somehow don't go to sleep myself until 1am. I did watch Very Young Girls about prostitution in NYC on Netflix Instant and get some knitting done, so it seemed worth it at the time.

The second day we keep ourselves busy by going out to lunch, enjoying the lake despite an obviously emotionally disturbed child terrorizing us, and then going to the library to pick up Dorian's prize and fill out their reading program cards. Sebastian has read 46 books so far and Dorian has read 18 books all by himself. We go home to have a little dinner which Sebastian proclaims seems more like lunch, and I prepare to take the kids with me to knitting night.

I bring what the shop owner calls "cuptails" that I manage to make taste like liquid Jolly Ranchers. I also bring what I hope is enough workbooks and magazines to keep the kids occupied so that I may actually knit. I do manage 10 more rows on my sleeves before the kids start acting up and then Sebastian finds a way to get his finger stuck in a peg hole in the adjustable table. It almost didn't come out, but it did. We cleared out shortly thereafter. Again I put the kids to bed on time, but stay up until 1am. This time I tried to watch Lisa Kudrow's show The Comeback but it just wasn't doing it for me. So I cut it off halfway through the third episode and wasted time online instead.

Two days down, the last day is a lazy one. Well, for the kids anyway. I puttered about the house doing laundry, weeding, and sanding and spackling the spare room. We played some Memory (I kicked their butts) and they watched some AstroBoy. After they went to bed, I watched Birth, a lame "mystery" starring Nicole Kidman that I would not advise anyone watch. But I got more knitting done, so it achieved its purpose.

And now Jeremy is home and life can go back to normal, ie. my falling asleep around 10:30pm.

Busy busy busy

It has been yet another busy weekend around the Hott Pocket house.

Jeremy and I began painting the garage, which I think is looking pretty awesome, but makes the actual house look poopy. We have less than half to go, but I definitely need Jeremy's help to reach the tippy top because I do not want to tip like a top off the ladder. This is not the best picture in the world, but it is the most accurate color-wise.

Yesterday, I was lured by cupcakes to the yarn store which was hosting an event with someone from a local organic wool company. Marin was very nice and very talented and the cupcakes were very delicious. I found myself a little jealous of her and the yarn store owner who both get to knit all day and get paid for it. However, if I were to be paid for knitting, I know one of two things would happen: a) I would immediately lose my inspiration/resent knitting or b) I would develop a horrible case of arthritis. I was also tortured somewhat by the obnoxious truth that there are more projects in the world than I can ever hope to produce. So, to remind me of that I have more yarn in my possession now as we each got to pick 2 skeins to bring home and they are totally mocking me while I slog through the sleeves for the summer sweater. I am staying strong and not working on anything else, even though I just got all this:

The yellow and the 3 skeins of gray are the boys' future sweaters. The multi-colored ball in the middle is a self-striping yarn I found in the clearance bin which is begging to be a pair of mittens for the boys. And the 2 skeins on the right are the 2 freebies I got which are a cotton/wool blend and very plushy and are asking to be made into fingerless mitts/arm warmers/coziness that I think I may keep for myself.

And today, after painting the garage in the morning, I met Christine to see Away We Go at the matinee. I really enjoyed it. It was very funny and I love Maya Rudolph and her character was very Christine who I also love. I do not love John Krasinski, but I thought he did a good job. The first 2 couples they go visit are way over the top and a bit much, but I have to admit that I have met people like that, so it wasn't entirely unrealistic. Overall, it is a good exploration of family and home and life and how even perfect isn't perfect. I highly recommend this one. And I don't care what Jeremy's wheel has to say about it in the future.

Plans for some purple UPDATE

Today is going to be all about purple. Well, maybe not entirely, but my purchases today are going to focus on purple.

First, Dorian and I will be heading to the farmer's market to get some raspberries-- I hope enough to make some jam. Every year we get coupons for the market from WIC, which is the awesomest part of that program. I figure I might as well spend them on things I might not normally buy based on their expense. So, first, we stain ourselves purple with raspberry juice.

Then, we are off to buy a wire brush, a sander, a ladder and some purple paint for the garage.

If I don't finish painting our garage in less than a month, we lose our homeowner's insurance. And if I have to paint a garage I don't even use, I might as well paint it purple, right? (The "poolside blue" on the right is the color for Dustin's room.)

UPDATE: I have been totally betrayed by the purported purveyors of purple today. Not only were there no raspberries at market today as I was promised there would be, but the store where I bought my ladder, etc. no longer sells paint for some reason. Boo to all that!

The home and garden report

Today's news brought to you by my dirty fingernails and eyeglasses.

It has been raining a lot here. Some might say too much. The only thing I can think of that is good about it is that I never have to water the garden. And lots of things are blooming!

The day lilies:

The rosebush I uncovered last year, and the bachelor buttons Dorian and I planted this year:

The miniature rosebush Christine gave me as a housewarming present last year:


And the copious amounts of grass I cannot seem to keep out of the kitchen garden. It rains so much that I can barely keep on top of mowing the lawn, much less weed. Because I'll tell you what: the kids want to go to the lake and so do I and it sucks to have to waste precious lake time weeding the damn garden. So, after I took this picture, I went back out and spent an hour weeding between rainstorms. The peas are almost finished, so I will be planting another batch soon. There are green tomatoes on all the plants except for Mr. Stripey. The second round of radishes is doing well, and there are baby cucumbers on 2 of the plants. God, that looks shameful!

And, I was a little overly eager in picking this carrot:

Lots of greenery, but not much of a root.

And now we go inside, where Jeremy and I have almost finished the wallpaper stripping and spackling in the music room. Soon, it will be painted and I can get the drum set out of my bedroom.

And because I don't want to leave you with that picture, here is a more pleasant one:

Jam! And lots of it. Last year, I didn't get to make any strawberry jam, so this year I have gone a little nuts. So far I have made

• 2 12oz jars,
• 4 8oz jars,
• and 4 4oz jars of strawberry rhubarb jam
• 8 8oz jars of strawberry jam

All of which required 5 lbs of sugar. Yum! That should last us until blueberry season at least. We now return you to your regularly scheduled web surfing.

Making headway

I resolved that this weekend I would complete a project because I am feeling a little overwhelmed by how many I have going currently. I also wanted to make progress on a couple more and have been pretty successful so far.

Yesterday, I inadvertently participated in Worldwide Knitting in Public Day by taking my summer sweater project to the lake. I am close to finishing the back, and that is certainly progress.

Then I came home and worked on my shirt for a while until the machine fought back and I surrendered. I got up this morning and finished the hemming by hand, which is actually the proper way to do it and the machine was really just stopping me from cheating. Remember, kids, cheaters never win.

So here it is:

I took on the bias tape and the interfacing and I survived. One project down, one million to go... Pardon me while I go back to stripping wallpaper.

Not totally slacking

I know that my percentages on the knitting projects have been completely stagnant, and there hasn't been any info about the picnic quilt or anything else. Things have been quite busy around here what with broken pipes and volunteering and gardening and stripping wallpaper, so the crafting has fallen by the wayside.

But I just couldn't take the fabric draped over my chair in the laundry room, all cut and ready for sewing Dorian's second pair of pants. So the other night I finally bit the bullet and got started. And then Thursday I finally finished them:

That's Dorian's special pose. Ask him to pose for a picture and that's what you get. Go ahead. Try it for yourself.
I know it is hard to see the pattern. You can click on the picture to get a closer look. This time I added a large side pocket. And when Dorian saw it, he decided he needed two. That is not happening. I am done with this project. Done. Check it off the ever-expanding list.
And then yesterday, I just couldn't wait to try one of the radishes. This one is purple, but we also have red and white. I know it is small, but I am impatient. I did get 4 slices out of it so we could all try and it was the juiciest radish I've ever had. And just the right amount of spice.

I also planted the garden on Friday. Here's what we've got growing:

• snow peas
• carrots
• parsley
• basil
• Swiss chard
• pickling cucumbers
• lipstick peppers (red and sweet)
• jet star tomatoes (red)
• Mr. Stripey tomatoes (yellow with pink stripes)
• chocolate cherry tomatoes
• sun gold cherry tomatoes
• green grape tomatoes
• dusky eggplant
• Easter egg radishes
• red and green lettuces

I also planted some mint and some oregano. And there are blooms on the black raspberry canes... Oh, it is so hard to wait...

I was almost going to whine...

But I won't. We all know you don't want to hear me drone on for the millionth time about too much volunteer work for school when we all know what the definition of the word "volunteer" is. So I promise I won't tell you that I'm in the middle of 8 days of volunteer overload which just had 2 more tasks piled into it. Mum's the word.

Instead, I'll give you the good news. The good news is that today the bill came for the sewer pipe (I know bills are not good news, just be patient) and if the insurance company holds up their end of the bargain, I will be paying about $1000 less than my original prediction. Can I get a "Hallelujah!" over here? It's still more than the $0 I would like to be spending, but it is no longer terrifying me.

The big dig

After all this:

...and this:...and a whole lot of disgustingly gloopy tangles of tree roots, I can flush again. (And thank goodness, because Dorian also laid some pipe today. Twice.) I may be significantly poorer, but after 4 days trapped in the house without any appreciable access to water (no showers, minimal flushing, no dishwashing, no laundry) I can honestly say I will never take that utility for granted again.

If only I had some more flowers to take my mind off of things...

Thanks to the home colonoscopy that the plumber performed today (without drugs, mind you) I now know that our sewer pipe is broken 7 feet below the sidewalk. And, because I love hanging around the house waiting for workmen and having nothing to do but housework that I can't do with no water, I will get to hang around again all day tomorrow (4 days in a row!) while they excavate part of my yard, including taking down part of my beautiful fence (which, somewhat luckily, was not to blame for this problem, as was suspected). All this joy for the low, low price of a few thousand dollars!

Remember how I wished so long and hard that I owned my own home? Well, strangely enough, I'm still happy that I do. But I will be more careful in the future about mentioning how lucky I have been that everything has been less expensive than anticipated. (I am still thankful that it was, though, or we certainly couldn't afford this little disaster. And I'm not sure we can, but we'll have to.)

At least I'll have the shitty PTA meeting to distract me this evening. Nothing like a cat fight over who gets to be president next year to help you forget your blocked up pipes and your hemorrhaging savings...

Some pleasant distractions

Let's pretend for a moment while we look at the pretty flowers that that's all I need to think about, shall we? Rather than focus on the shit in my life, both literal (ie. sewage in the basement) and figurative (ie. paying for the removal of sewage from the basement), I will now try to enjoy the brief bit of 90 degree weather and the blooms that came with it. I suggest you do the same.

Just in case you're wondering...

...why I talked about doing fun stuff with my brother, but then the only picture on the boys' blog was of hanging out on the couch and the only picture on my blog was of me and a daiquiri, then you should go look over here at the pictures he took.

...how our fence looks, check it out:

(Yes, it is going straight through the quince bush.) (And yes, the kids like to climb on it as much as you imagine.)

...who did most of the interior decorating in this house, I have a new theory. Ed Gein. I noticed the affinity for peachy beige some time ago, but the dining room takes the cake. We started stripping the wallpaper, because there is no better time to use a wallpaper steamer than during a heat wave, and under the sallow plaid upper layer were several other layers in varying flesh tones. Your average drugstore make-up department has less skin colors than this place. Witness:

...what is more disgusting than the crusty scab covering Sebastian's nostrils after his week of noseblowing, you'll love this one. I went down cellar to turn on the outside water so the kids could run in the sprinkler, and I made a gruesome discovery. There was approximately 2 inches of water on the floor and it didn't smell good. So I asked Jeremy to flush the toilet so I could see what happened. I almost wish I hadn't. The waste water from the house is draining right into the basement. At least it should be covered by our home warranty.

I'm the king of the castle... you're the dirty rascal!

So, yesterday, I finally got off my butt and called the fence man who appears to be not only the only game in town, but also in a 20 mile radius. Now, in my defense, I did need to wait until enough snow went away that an accurate measurement could be made. That day had come, so I I made the call which went a little something like this:

Hott Mama: Hi. We are looking to put in a fence on our corner lot. Would it be possible to have you come out to do an estimate?

Fence Man: Ayup. Are you apt to be home of an evening?

As a matter of fact, I am. And I am definitely willing to be home to meet with someone who talks like that! So he told me he'd come by one evening this week, but he'd call to let me know when. (I thought this was particularly gracious of him considering our roof man calls at 7am to let you know he's on his way. Or doesn't call at all and just starts removing my chimney.)

Either evening is earlier than I believe it to be, or he was feeling the economic crunch, or something, but he called this afternoon to ask if he could stop by before 3. He has come (well, his son did), he has measured (again, the son) and now I get to eagerly await the $5 million dollar estimate. As we all know, it will be worth it.

This town is full of nuts

I love my house. I really do. And I love that we have a biggish yard. What I don't love is that our yard is right at the corner, totally exposed to any crackpot passing by, or, you know, living across the street. If it isn't one of the TP-less neighbor children begging to come over, then it's the woman who throws all her snow back out into the newly plowed street hollering to me from 50 feet away about my garden.

Well, now I've met a new crazy who is chockful of information he is more than happy to share with me. After a rousing game of "soccer" yesterday, the boys were playing on the ice pile next to the porch while I dug in the garden. I can't help it. The spring fever has me in its deadly grippe. Suddenly, I hear a voice announce something about "little daredevils" and turn to see a guy I can only vaguely describe as a Caucasian male, 16-30, wearing a hat and child-size backpack. We'll call him "Shaun"-- mostly because that is what he later told us his name was.

I sort of smirk and go back to my digging, but he continues to lurk around at the end of my walk, finally asking if I am working on a garden and offering me "tips to grow the perfect garden." I politely demure, and again go back to digging, avoiding the lingering snow piles. At this point, he seems to have gotten the point and walks across the street to the corner where he removes a red lighter from his pocket, drops it in the gutter, and kicks it down the sewer grate. I shake my head, jam the shovel into the dirt, and hear him yell, "Hey! You know your ball is way over here?" "Yes, thank you." The ball was about 5 feet from the sidewalk, still in our yard, minding its own pink swirly business.

I turn my back, dig, and hear the sound of the ball being kicked and hitting the telephone pole support wires in the corner of our yard. I look up to see him running back from the street to put the ball back pretty much where he found it. "I'm putting your ball back here because it blew into the street." I sigh and tell the kids they have 5 minutes left until we go inside, hoping against hope that they will stay where they are and not engage this man-boy in any way.

Ha! They of course hear the 5 minute warning as an invitation to run around the front of the house to roll around on a different ice pile right where the sidewalk should be. I kick the dirt clods off the shovel, lean it against the house, and go around the corner to see Shaun now lingering near the snow. "Dorian, please move away from the street," I call just as he rolls off the snow into the road. Shaun picks him up and deposits him back on the snow and gives the kids various warnings about the many dangers of snow and ice while Dorian yelps excitedly, "The man helped me up, Mama!" and Sebastian says, "Thanks for the advice, sir." "You can call me 'Shaun'-- 'sir' is my father's name."

Then, he starts asking the kids their names. "Where did you get the name 'Dorian'?" I don't know why I said it, because it isn't even true, but I mentioned The Picture of Dorian Gray. He surprises me by asking if my Dorian is two-faced, thereby displaying some knowledge of the story. I told him not yet and gave the kids the one minute warning. Then he asks if I know why Dorian Gray was inhuman. "Why's that?" His answer involved a voodoo woman, among other things, immediately shattering my briefly high opinion of him.

I inform the children the time has come to go inside, and after a cheery goodbye, Shaun vanished as mysteriously as he appeared.