fa la la la la

 

So it’s been awhile since I’ve written, mainly due to too much Christmas crafting and sickness in our house.  Both the husband and the child have been in various stages of colds, coughs and stuffiness for the past two weeks.  How is it that the person with the least amount of sleep/rest has been able to stay well???  Well here are a few highlights, more to come.

Made these pillows for a friend, a bird pillow and a leaf pillow – they turned out better than expected, which is always nice. 

And lastly, we bought a painting yesterday at the Collective in old Ballard.  We usually just wander around in there while I mutter about how I’ve seen this on craigslist or we should be able to find something like that at goodwill, when we came across this abstract painting.  It had no price so of course I asked, out of curiosity.  It reminded me of two paintings my parents have, which I love.  When I was little I remember studying them, trying to figure out what the shapes/colors were, imagined seeing clowns, or people, or animals etc.  So when I asked, the girl said I think it’s $75, but I need to check.  I thought, did she mean $75 or $7500?  I was pretty excited to hear $75.  She checked and it was actually $150.  But we got it for $130.  It does need a frame and has no signature but I really like it.  It was hanging in the shop vertically, but when we brought it home I thought it looked better like this. 

Here it is on our wall.

So which way do you think it goes?  A, B, C, or D?

ooh i want that in 2007

OK, since I’ve been lazy about uploading pics from all my wonderful christmas crafting and gift giving and getting, I’ll save my 2006 christmas wrap up (ha ha) for a later date.  Meanwhile, inserting links is easy enough and I’ve been checking out all the sales online and have stumbled upon a few items I would love to buy:

From Pottery Barn Kids: These great mini morrow chairs for little D.  I think we’d get the honey, although white or black would be cool too.  This slotted bookshelf, also for little D.  And these classic car toys are pretty cool.  And this isn’t on sale, but let’s get it too! 

Some other items for little D: this fabric hamper for $18 from garnet hill could be used for toy storage and this speja tunnel and koja tent from ikea for playtime.

I’ve also been scheming to organize our house, particularly our basement and upstairs (my studio is up there, and our guest bedroom, perhaps soon to be playroom?), and have these items on the list:

• We need a 2-drawer file cabinet.  Actually we need two.  One for my studio and one for our home office (basement).  I’ve been searching and searching for something cool and affordable and have yet to find anything.  We might just settle for either metal ones or something from ikea.  Check out these $800 beauties…WTH!  (Update 1/19: Ikea had nothing so we ended up with a HON pale grey one for our office.  Still searching for the studio…)
• Dining room table and chairs – we have a hand-me-down turned leg table and chairs, probably from the 30s which is just a bit too large and heavy for our tiny dining room.   We’d love to find something teak or walnut from the 50s, 60s, 70s with a nice light airy feel!  Have been checking craigslist and missed a nice teak table with awesome chairs for $215… I need to be a bit more vigilant checking I guess.  (Update 1/19: found a teak table on craigslist for $45 and he delivered it!  Not in the best shape but perfectly fine for our needs.  It’s very similar to the one we grew up with at my parents.  Now we just need the chairs.)
• Also for the living area, how about these narrow wall shelves for art display?  I don’t want it to look too busy though, since our space isn’t too large.  I was thinking two rows. (Don’t need them now that we bought that painting, but they are still cool.)
• For my studio, I already have a nice thrifted 1960s sewing table and chair and a craft table, but would really like one or two of these white agerum bookshelves for magazine, book, and art storage.  I really need to get my magazines under control!  Maybe I should upgrade my white cardboard holders to the cheap ikea wood ones and do this neat chalkboard trick, thanks to Blair at Wise Craft.  I also need some sort of magnetic or cork board.  We just might be looking at a big trip to ikea.
• This cool felt clock in charcoal and white – although I might decide I need to make one myself.  I really liked these haba kid rings and this stocking from mahar drygoods, so maybe a combination of stacked felt dots with a simple gray background? 
• We also need: a new tv/media storage cabinet, since we are still using the cheapest of cheap ikea ones from graduate school days; perhaps a new coffee table if any – we have a very cool chrome/glass one with extremely sharp corners, maybe we’ll replace it with the poang ikea ones, to be converted to chalkboard tables at a later date? (Update 1/19: decided to just remove the coffee table and keep it the space open)

This seems to be have become a to-buy list for myself… yes we did win the lottery

spread the soft tree love :: eat peppermint bark

  

Finally I can share my soft trees with you!  I made a small forest of them for my siblings and mom for St. Nicholas’ Day which we celebrate (December 6) with small gifts and family dinner.  Thanks to littlebird for sharing her pattern and all the inspiration here.  Everyone liked them!  They are the perfect project for me at this point since they are super easy and quick.  We like instant results!  Now that I’ve given all mine away I need to make some for myself. 

We also put up our tree today – the husband is the light-put-er-on-er and he also ended up doing most of the ornament hanging :: once again he did an amazing job!  Little D was also enthralled by the glowing lights and shiny baubles.  He has also just started to crawl, meaning there is some forward motion to his floor movements.  Yay!

And I made peppermint bark.  When I was working in my pre-Little D days, one of my co-workers always brought us a tin of the Williams-Sonoma peppermint bark - I ate it in like one day, of course I shared it too – sort of!  And since I’m not working now I was missing it and decided to make some.  And with Little D around keeping me busy, I’m not eating as much of it.

t’s peppermint bark

Melt 1 lb semi-sweet chocolate in microwave, add 1/4 tsp peppermint extract.  Spread with offset spatula on parchment paper to about 1/8 inch thickness.  Cool.  Put in fridge for awhile.  Meanwhile smash 10 candy canes in ziploc baggy.  Take the now cooled semi-sweet chocolate out of fridge.  Melt 1lb white chocolate, add 1/4 tsp peppermint extract and 1/3 of the smashed candy canes.  Spread with offset spatula over semi-sweet.  Sprinkle remaining candy cane pieces on top.  Chill.  Cut or break into pieces.  Eat.

I used Ghiradelli chocolate chunks from Trader Joes. 

And if this doesn’t make you feel sad.

gifts for me… and for Little D

    

I am looking forward to receiving these items in the next few days:

- very cool pendant from blackapple (for me!)
- a very cute stuffed pea from blair (wise craft) to go along with the little pea (for Little D)
- the paintings above, number 5 Elm-er and 32 Obstacle, from Amy Ruppel (for me, but I really wanted 43 In Tune!)

Since I don’t have time to create I’m buying others creations!  Now I just have to get to those Christmas gifts.

heartbreaking

Along with the nation I’d been following the Kim family story very closely…  I felt very connected to the story – perhaps superficially - because they are my age, have a baby the same age as Little D, are part asian, were visiting relatives in Seattle and Portland, and just seem like people we’d be friends with, and really, that it could have been my family taking that holiday trip.  Yesterday I was driving along a little after noon and listening to NPR, and was horrified to learn that they had found James Kim’s body… perhaps because I’m sleep deprived but probably not, I was brought to tears.  I really feel for his family and cannot even imagine what they were/are feeling.  What would we have done? 

Needless to say my thoughts are with Kati and the girls and his family.  And am giving lots of extra hugs and kisses to my family.

The lastest heartbreaking news.