scaling heights

 After hanging around upside down for the last 6 months, colorful Mr. Striped Sock Monkey decided he had had enough. So he set his sights on higher things and began to climb.  

 Who would have imagined he was determined to scale the Eiffel Tower?!? Who would have thought he was capable of doing it?!?

 Quietly he had set his sights on scaling higher heights. Little by little he felt he could do it and knew he had to try. 

Now he has the best seat in the house and has no more headaches from hanging upside down. Who wouldn't love a perch near the top of the Eiffel Tower? And he would have never known he could do it unless he tried :)

HAPPY FRIDAY!!!

Eichler homes

YESSSSS! I've been wanting to do this post for some time now! A while back when we took the Mouse to his banjo lesson, I was stunned to realize that his teacher's neighborhood was a tract of original *Eichler* homes from the 1950's! :-0 I was completely bowled over! Upon asking his teacher about it, I learned that this was one of Eichler's few southern California tracts. Most of them are in the San Francisco area. Out of 150 something homes in this tract, only 50 something remain in their original state. 


Driving through the neighborhood taking photos was a real treat for me - not so much for the leery homeowners who thought I was casing their neighborhood :/ Many of the homes were unfortunately in ramshackle condition :( And even worse, many of the homes had been remodeled and looked downright hideous. HID.E.OUS. But most of the homes that had been carefully preserved or painstakingly renovated to celebrate/accentuate mid-century modern style, were truly stunning.


There are 2 models - one larger with a 2 car garage, and one smaller with a 1 car garage and extra parking pad, and a larger entry way. For those of you who wouldn't otherwise know, the front door does not lead to the inside of the home in traditional style. It leads to a large courtyard that the rest of the rooms of the home surround in a U-shape manner. This was Eichler's vision of "bringing the outside in". Very "California Mod" :D

I chose 5 of my favorites to show you. ENJOY THE TOUR!  

Aren't they amazing? A dear friend of mine, Cheryl, found out that every so often on certain Saturdays, you can sign up for a tour of some of these homes! It is sponsored by the Gamble House (famous Arts and Crafts style movement). If you are interested and would like more information, click *HERE*. It would be a marvelous opportunity to see several of these Eichler homes in one day! (and BTW, the Gamble House tours sound amazing as well) All information is on the above link.

Happy Eichler/Mid-Century Modern Day! :D  

refrigerator irony

All right, I admit it - I've been a little cranky lately!

I blame it on the heat! Yeah, the heat. I'll come out of it, right?

RIGHT?!?!?

Hehe - I hope everyone had a FAB 4th of July! We sure did :)

God Bless America! Let them eat cake!

 Happy 4th of July everyone! I'm so very grateful for my country, and feel blessed every day, to live here in this choice land :)


Sooo..... I'll probably never be a food stylist (phooey!) but here is the bundt cake the kids and I made for Independence Day! I found the idea on *Pinterest* (OF COURSE!) and thought it looked fun. It was very easy, and it turned out GREAT! 

 It's super cool because not only is the outside red, white and blue, but when you cut the cake, the INSIDE is red, white, and blue too! Ah, the magic of creativity and food coloring, hehe :)

YUM!!!

Wishing all of you a safe, happy, patriotic 4th of July! xoxo

projects, projects

~ antique croquet balls make me HAPPY ~

Hey gang! It's been a few days, and now we're heading into the July 4th weekend. Yay! Thanks so much for your sweet comments here and there regarding my last post - much appreciated.

I've been up to all kinds of projects lately! I keep meaning to post them but the last 2 times I tried, I was so tired I literally fell asleep sitting up with my laptop on my lap! :-0

The photo above shows all my antique croquet balls - and a few leather cricket balls - in my favorite antique doll cradle (I used to collect primitive doll cradles, but just have my favorite 2 now). I took all the croquet balls out of my big glass jars, and now I'm getting them all ready for a photo shoot. I've been wanting to do this for a long time! Hopefully the photos will end up on my skins for Zagg, and in my new notecard sets, etc. 

 And here are my glass jars! I did some rearranging in my kitchen - and have more to do, of course - and now everything is out and accessible. I'm debating over some cool labels or not.... what think ye?

 The dog treats look so cute in the huge jars - I actually like how they turned out the best! 

And of course you can't have boys and all their friends without fishies. It's a staple in their diet. This container is on the kitchen table now. It's ginormous: at least 2 gallons, and I bet it will barely last through the long weekend! Mark my words! 

Pedicure love!!! This one I did myself, in a moment of desperation fatigue stress frustration spare time, when I knew it would make me feel sooo much better! And of course, it did! It always does! 

 Do you see what's missing? THE RED BED! It sold on Craigslist - in fact it was sold, disassembled, and gone in just a few hours! I have a plethora - PLETHORA! - of ideas for what to get next, and I am so excited! It won't be for a while though. And by the way, the quilt that is on my bed now is my mother-in-law's wedding quilt, made for her by her sisters. Isn't it so lovely? I treasure it :)

{This cute little red table is still for sale on Craigslist too. It's 42" across and is a great table. I'm hoping to use that space for a kitchen island of some sort}

DONE!!! I had a really enjoyable time working on this puzzle. I always forget how much I love doing them. It's just peaceful somehow. And several nights Matthew brought his guitar in and we sang while I worked on it - that was awesome. Now I'm trying to decide which puzzle I want to do next. 

Ahhh... my prized pink croquet ball... happy happy joy joy!

Stay tuned for lots more projects, etc... I'm on a roll! :)

DC IV

 So this is what it's finally come to... a diet Coke IV... intravenous diet Coke fed smack dab directly into my veins! :/ HAH! MADE YA LOOK! :D This is NOT diet Coke - this is IRON! Which happens to be - ironically - the same brown color as diet Coke! And that was highly amusing to me :D  

Yesterday was my last iron infusion (I hope!) - WAHOOOOO!!! My hemoglobin count is almost within normal ranges now. I have teeny tiny, extremely naughty veins that do not like to cooperate. So I will not miss the aftermath of all that poking! It hurts, it swells, it's lumpy, and it looks hideous :/

Funny though... I will miss the nurses and the peace I felt at the infusion center. I'll never get over the first time I walked in there and saw all those patients hooked up to their IV's receiving chemotherapy. Some without their hair, some very cheerful, some so ill. It has been a humbling experience and a faith building one as well. Not a day goes by that I don't stop to express my gratitude for my blessings AND my trials. So... I continue trying to find the right meds for my EXTREMELY ANNOYING lupus. And starting from square one with a new rheumatologist :/ But it's all good my friends - IT'S ALL GOOD!!!

HAPPY FRIDAY! AND 4th of JULY WEEKEND!

Stay tuned for more blog posts throughout the weekend!

plan B

 Remember the pom pom I made with my old tie dye shirt? And how I was going to make quite a few of them to sew onto my big puffy pillow? (click *HERE* if you need a refresher course) Well, I was still unconvinced that I liked how it turned out. So I went to Plan B.

 I got me some multi-colored yarn. ("THINK YA GOT ENOUGH DYNAMITE THERE BUTCH?") I had seen a simple tutorial on Pinterest where you wrapped the yarn around the tines of a fork to make little pom poms. How hard could that be, right? 

 Apparently, there are 2 kinds of people in the world. Ones who can make pom poms, and ones who can't. I would belong to the latter group. Because no matter what I did, they looked ridiculous. 

 I couldn't even get them in focus when I tried to take some photos! Pathetic. So I'm smart enough to know when to throw in the towel, and I think now would be the time. I have a few other tricks up my sleeve, but they do not involve pom poms. I'm a bit humiliated but I'll survive.

And then there's that :/