Our house was burglarized today!!!
As you can imagine, it really sucks. In addition to the many many reasons why this sucks, they stole our camera. So I can’t show you the carnage, or my pretty new dining room. Whah.
Please leave me some really nice comments to remind me that I should belive in humanity.
A few weeks ago on our 6th wedding anniversary, Andy and I began a crazy awesome project in our house – tearing down the interior walls of our front office. We had a really small (but cute) living room, separated from the kitchen by a long hallway. And the only place for communal eating was a really small (but cute) breakfast nook.
Before, Living Room, December 2008
What you see is what you get, in this picture. We’ve lived with this small room for 6 years (Andy for 12 years – good God, time flies). Now you can see why we expanded our entertaining area by spiffing up our backyard a few years ago. If you were standing where I was when I took this picture, and you spun to your right, this is what you would see:
This was after we started ripping up the floorboards, so it wasn’t always this jankey looking.
And if you spun slightly more to the right, you would be looking toward the kitchen
So that room that Andy’s body is facing, that was his office. It no longer exists. Uncle Rainer came over to help us rip down the walls and properly dispose of the wires. Here he is in the office:
Poor me, they kicked me out and I had to go shopping. This is what it looked like when I came home. Andy is standing very close to where Rainer was in the above picture. Crazy huh!?
Oh my. As you can tell, we have had to do a lot of spackling and painting. I think we’re going to be all finished with it this morning. Then I’ll install the new drape hardware that I bought from West Elm, hang the sheers from Pottery Barn, and the drapes (that I hope I will like!) from Pier 1.
And, most exciting of all, we’ll move in the dining room set I bought off of Craigslist last weekend. I am so pumped about it. I was shopping for a new table, and the cheapest that I could find (that I also liked) was $700. In addition to that, new chairs are like $150. EACH. I was not about to spend $2000 for a set. I made a goal of spending no more than $700 total for an entire set. And I did it! And I LOVE what I got! It’s hardwood, with beautiful lines, a leaf so it will extend to seat eight, and has six chairs that still have the freaking plastic on them! Oh yes. I majorly scored. (Thanks for letting us borrow the truck, Dennis!)
I will post again within the next few days with the final results. I can’t wait!
I have to tell you the news.
1/9/09 feels as light as 12/24/08 felt heavy.
Aunt Susan had intravenious chemo 24 hours a day for 7 days. Then we waited for a week. Yesterday they took a bone marrow biopsy. Today we learned that the white blood cells (the source of the original problem – leukemia) are coming back as healthy non-leuk cells!!!!!!!!
This is SUCH major news!!!! Such fantastic, beautiful, Earth-shattering news. Thank God. Thank Universe. Thank Li. Thank Dao. Thank everyone who does, ever has, and ever will love Susan. Everyone who gave up good vibes, prayers, thoughts, cards, calls, visits, homemade meals, on and on.
ADDITIONALLY, yes there is even more good news, my mom has been confirmed as a positive match for bone marrow!!! So if Susan needs it, she has a donor all lined up and ready to give!
I can’t even tell you how I feel.
Today is a very good day.
If you are ready to have your heart-strings tugged and to shed a tear, please contact me for the link to her blog. I had it posted here for a few hours, but then I thought I should just pass it out to those who request it. Please don’t be shy. Any of you are welcome to ask for the link. Susan is the most open, immodest person you could ever meet. I encourage you to check it out. It might shake your world up in a good way. These (only!?!?) two weeks I have spent with her have been richer and more valuable than anything I have ever experienced. WOW.
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU. I feel like screaming from a mountain top. YEEEEEAAAAAAAHHH!
My BFF Amy Stumbled me a post from the blog Making it Lovely, and now I am obsessed with it. The author, Nicole, is so talented that I cannot think of an appropriate adjective to describe her mad skills. Okay, I guess I just did. Girl’s got MAD design skills. With fashion, graphic design, stationary, interior design, landscape design… Her blog is a real pleasure to read. I have been going back and reading her archives. It’s mega eye-candy and mega inspiring. Click the link above when you have a few hours to get sucked into the intarwebs.
PS: If you like her blog, vote for her here; for Apartment Therapy’s blog award, The Homies.
I have very sad news, and I have to acknowledge that before I can feel like I can post anything fun and happy again. I think it will be good for me to get it off of my chest. It feels so strange when something major happens. Everything else seems so trivial, but the little things are the spice of life and I think it’s important that I allow myself to continue to participate in things that bring me joy, like Stitchify.
On Christmas Eve one of the people who is closest to me in the whole world was diagnosed with leukemia. Regular readers know her well by now. Aunt Susan. Her diagnosis has shocked us all. She eats very well, exercises daily, and is an exceptionally positive, loving, and caring person. I would have never imagined that she would become sick.
She had to check in to the hospital less than two hours after her doctor gave her the news on Wednesday morning. She will be there for the next three weeks, receiving the best care possible. Please pray/hope/vibe/meditate/what-have-you for her to have the strength to maintain her fantastic positive attitude, to be in the maximum comfort possible, and to be cured. These things really are possible and I have faith that they will come true.
(PS: your well wishes were very effective on my grandpa. I think he is well enough now to even fly out here to visit his Susan, his daughter. Thank you guys for your efforts.)
If you are a loved one/friend of Susan’s or mine and are interested in up-to-date information on her status, you can contact me for the URL of a blog that my uncle is setting up through a cancer support group. We’ll be doing at least every-other-day updates and posting pictures (she’s a photographer and so is my mom; they’re doing a bit of photo journaling).
Thanks for your support. <3 Julie
I am on my third of nine days in a row of no work/classes/homework/anything! It is freaking fantastic and I am so happy! I was supposed to visit with family in DC, but Andy couldn’t get off of work. So here I am at home. I wish I could have seen my family, but trust me – I am making the most of it and having a superb time just being at home in my craft room!
I made a set of the crocheted snowflakes that I posted about a few days ago. I used Royale Metallic Crochet Thread that I bought at Michael’s. It’s bright white with a strand of sparkles. It calls for a size 7 hook, but I didn’t have one, so I used a 6. For the fabric stiffener I used Api’s Crafter’s Pick, also from Michael’s. It worked really well. Martha Stewart’s crochet patterns were well written, and I’d say the skill necessary is Intermediate.
Here are my flakes after being dipped in the stiffener and pinned to dry:
#1
#2
#3
#4
As you can see, #3 was way more complicated than the others. The pattern wasn’t; but the pinning sure was. The glue started drying before I was finished. I won’t make another #3, but the others were great. I believe that Martha came to the same conclusion on #3 as I did. I noticed that her Ice Crystal Garland only uses #1, #2, and #4. Hehe. Busted. I figured you out, girlfriend. And I can sympathize! Here’s her garland. Isn’t it pretty!?
This was a really fun project and didn’t take long at all. I’m going to keep making these so I can have my own pretty garland. Here are my flakes after drying overnight.
I stumbled across a tutorial of Martha’s for making snowflakes out of plastic six-pack rings. So cute and easy! I just emailed the responsible party at my office and I’ll have a load of these rings in no time, for more flake making! Yippee!
It’s hard. But my husband is SO sweet and supportive. Even the pets are cheering me on:
(Me + that chair+ that computer = the past few weeks. Blech.)
