kattitudes

Oh my, it was LOVELY!

I have not seen my only uncle and his wife, my dear aunt, for almost ten years. And my only remaining Grandmother - my precious, dear Grandmother - whom I absolutely adore and I do believe that the sun rises and sets upon her - visited also.

And yes, my Mister and I were able to wreak amazing transformations upon our home (now it is a home, no longer a house). Amazing. In fact, we are currently most of the way through a most unique infection that oh so many of you will recognize.

We have been calling it the “as long as we are here fever”. And that is truly the best description. I admit I suffer from a significantly higher degree fever than poor Mister, who simply has to keep up with the ever increasing list of “do you think we can get this done by tomorrow/this weekend/Thursday/March?”

“As-long-as-we-are-here fever” symptoms are varied from case to case, but all involve an invocation of differing varieties of the namesake phrase. Victims fall sick most commonly during a flurry of home improvement activities, and if proper precautions are not taken, inevitably, one or more of the participants will be heard to say, “you know, as long as we are here, we might as well (fill in the blank, which could include anything. Literally anything, including something innocent like changing the curtains in the room, or, in our case, painting the entire three floor house, steam cleaning the floors of all three levels of our home, changing all the window treatments, getting new furniture and rearranging through the house the furniture we did already own, and creating an entire new in-law suite for my wheelchair bound father on the first level of our home).

Yes, I believe that in retrospect I actually did achieve all my goals. I even recovered said ottoman I originally mentioned.

Lest I believe for one moment that I let crafting and creative pursuits slip by the wayside, I am proud to say that I finally (and I do mean finally) re-opened my eBay store. Tonight I am in the process of listing a number of the jewelry pieces that I have been making over the years. But I admit, I am having a new and unusual problem.

Does anyone else suffer from this problem? Having used so much of our budget to update the house, it is definitely time to contribute to the household budget as much as possible by selling some of my larger budget creations. But I am finding that as I prepare to list these on eBay, I just do not want to let them go. I have easily sold the smaller pieces without issues, but some of these pieces I just adore myself. There is the problem with making things that you love. It is hard to let them go!

On the flip side, if we do not let our creations go out into the world, then we would never have room for the next creation and the next, or the next challenge. So I guess it is just as well that I bid these pieces farewell and hope they go to a home where they will be as loved as they were with me. Oh, but I hate to see them go. Anyway, there are only so many pieces of jewelry one human being can logically (or tastefully) wear anyway (or so I keep reminding myself).

Now that the house has been internally remodeled, there is a new sewing place, so I hope to start listing some of my sewn creations along with the jewelry. My baby sister-in-law is preparing for her wedding in July, so we are still working on making so many of the things for that event. She has asked me to make the jewelry for all the bridesmaids and the groomsmen, along with her jewelry and whatever her groom will wear, so that is a combined total of jewelry for 22 people. I will have a lot of pictures to post for jewelry suggestions!

I hope you all had a fantastic Easter and the Spring season has sprung for you and yours in a wonderful way. There is a lot to do this time of year. Are you keeping your head above water?

So sorry about my absence, dear friends. Things became mad, but oh my goodness, I accomplished things that I have not accomplished literally in years.

My last few posts inspired ME. I got to thinking about everything I had been talking about, and by golly, I decided that I really needed to make sure that I practiced what I preached.

So, as a result, to be blunt, I spent January working my butt off.

My house - no. This place is finally my home. My home is well on the way to being completely organized, as it was when I lived in London. I have been in the process of literally touching every single possession I own, determining if it brings me joy or not. If it does not, out the door it went.

The process is probably half done, but the house looks 100% better already. It literally looks like a different house.

The enjoyable part is that my husband is on board with this entire change. Bless his heart, he has waited patiently while I picked paint color after color after color….. after color all the while knowing that he agreed to paint the entire house from top to bottom. I am just a wee excited at this point!

I love, and I mean I LOVE the fact that I am finally digging deep into all the various supplies I have for making utterly incredible things, both for myself and for others. As I am opening drawers and pulling out the back of closets, I am finding the most amazing caches of horded treasures. Seriously.

I actually ran across a stock of gemstones that I had collected for years, forgetting that I had them. I was waiting both to learn to set gemstones and purchase the tools I needed to carve the gold, and I am finally ready…but I forgot that I owned this stock of gemstones. This is the beauty of organizing…I have literally saved myself a significant amount of money with these finds. And the upcoming items to share with you all? Oy. I cannot wait to get working.

I have family visiting from the other side of the country at the end of this month. I am trying to accomplish some major home DIY renovation projects before they arrive. As I work on these projects, I intend to keep you all in the loop.

Some of the projects that we have planned include building my own built-in bookcases (which should be interesting, to say the least). I need new window treatments, to reupholster at least three different chairs, build an ottoman, and I have a number of art projects to finish for different walls around the entire place.

In the meantime, we have Valentine’s Day that I need to start to address tomorrow. Plus I have a family wedding that was just announced in July, so lots of wedding planning and crafts this year too. And of course, as always, because I am obsessed, lots more jewelry. Oh man, I have been embroidering with beads lately and experimenting with a few different techniques. I will have to dig out the camera and try some shots for you.

I just cannot get over January. We finally picked themes for both guest bedrooms and are in the process of renovating and decorating.

Oh! I forgot this. We both went through every single pieces of clothing we owned. Amazing. Everything in the closet and drawers were re-cleaned and re-evaluated. If we did not wear it, it went out. If it was serviceable, it was donated. If it was no longer wearable, we are either using it ourselves for craft projects (so many of those coming up with the house renovations and redecoration) or for the DIY projects. Our wardrobes still have work, but they are well on the way to being more organized than they have been in many a year.

I found that as I worked all through January, it became a self-sustaining work. I would go through a project, thinking I had done it and was happy with the results (my wardrobe for example). But then, after I was finished, I would start thinking and realize that I would be happier if I were to let go of more of my older and/or more tattered clothing. I am finding that over and over. As I work, I find that I am willing to do more, clean more, go just a little further, organize just a little more. It feeds into itself. And as I get more done, there is less and less to do, so it gets easier and easier. The trick is just to start.

That is where January went. 2008 has started so well. I hope you are having as much fun in your year!

This is an important year. Well, actually, every presidential election is important. We are a democracy, which means that every four years, we (the people) have the unique privilege of getting to argue with our neighbors and strangers across our nation, both in print and online, in the media and through the airwaves, about issues that we each individually hold dear.

Strangely, we seem to have morphed into a nation that does not give a tinker’s damn about the other person’s issue, as long as we can out shout them on our issue.

Usually, I keep most matters of politics out of the blog, but as I age (like fine wines and cheeses) I am getting even more opinionated and I figured that since it is my blog, I might as well go on record.

My record of choice is that we should make a choice. There. How is that for controversial? Actually, I have much more controversial views than that, such as how some of these fellows are downright dangerous to our nation, but that is as common a theme as any that you hear every four years.

When I first started at University, I thought I wanted to be an economist. I loved the theory of how people used money. I thought that was so interesting. But then, I took my first political science class, and I was lost forever. I found my love. The theories of why mankind came together. Why we argue. Why we make the choices we make. What draws us as a community. What draws us into a community. Political theory - I just loved it. Even now, I remember with such fondness how much I enjoyed deciphering for my first time all the texts that students of politics had done a hundred million times before me.

I then became involved in student government and learned a quick lesson in how dirty you must be in order to succeed. Wow. It was more than I could accept, I freely admit to that now. In my experience, there was really no place for honor in politics. Most really did have to sell their soul and at such a little price and young age. But that is another story for another day. Someday I will have to tell that story because it really is an interesting one.

However, my foray into government was on a major scale as my student government (that I did spent a few years in quite successfully) was for a university with a population of some fifty thousand people. Yes, it was indeed a large scale school. My working budget was close to nine million dollars. It was a lot of responsibility. And it gave me an unexpected insight into the personalities that get involved in politics and what they are willing to do and become to be successful.

It is hard to separate all the rhetoric that spews from the candidates mouths. I am honest. If you are not a political junkie, then the machinations and contraptions of the election process can be about as interesting as the Internal Revenue Service.

Even the “easy to read” help-you-pick-your-candidate handouts I have seen are no help because they are usually a boggy mess of information that is too much for this sound bite familiar world. It is no insult. We spend our time thinking about issues, but do not necessarily need to spend fourteen pages evaluating the fine nuances of how a candidate feels about the issue. We want a yes/no answer. Sometimes it is as simple as that.

As a result, I am really liking the oversimplistic quiz that my local news station put together to help you pick your candidate. Just like any other blog quiz, it allows you to choose how strongly you feel on an issue, and matches you with the candidate that most closely lines up with your values.

What I like is that this quiz gives you results for all the candidates (it shows you how closely they relate to your answers by percentage). The quiz also links to all types of additional information on each candidate and their stance on issues, so that if you feel like reading an additional 14 pages to get the detailed nuances of how each individual feels about the matter at hand, that information is available to you right there.

Hopefully, if you are as of yet undecided, this will help make your voting choice much easier. Once that choice is made, it truly is important for you to get out and vote. Our nation is built on our votes. Yes, America will survive if you do not vote. But you have the right to vote. You get to vote because you are an American.

Sometimes it feels like all we get are taxes and tickets and more taxes. Get yourself one of the best benefits of living in America. Take part in the seminal American process. Vote for our leader. Vote for your boss. Say who you want to speak for you so that you can spend the next four years happily able to join in arguments by saying either “hey, I didn’t vote for him/her” or “hey, at least I voted for him/her”.

At this time, I have posted, I believe, all the other Rankin Bass movies (and we know that I absolutely adore them. Just adore them).

As we end our Christmas holiday season, I just cannot let the New Year celebration pass without posting the last of the holiday ensemble: Rudolph’s Shiny New Year.

While we are in the beginning of the year, if you are anything like me, you do not want to take down Christmas. You waited and waited until the last acceptable moment, until you feel like your neighbors are looking in the windows at your Christmas display and laughing.

Or, if you are smart, you go for the full and official twelve days of Christmas. Either way, a lot of people still have their Christmas displays proudly up.

The only reason why I do not is that long ago I set aside New Years Day as the day to take down Christmas. It gave me a goal on the day itself, something easy to work towards that would give me a sense of accomplishment when the day was done.

On New Years Day, I spend the day de-constructing Christmas. And as I did, I thought so much about what I wrote on New Years Eve, about bringing JOY to life by organizing myself. And I found my first (and our first) way.

By taking some extra time (yes, it was a little more involved, but not that much), I organized all my Christmas storage. That is to say, I did this:

Before packing anything away, I put all the storage boxes on the kitchen floor and cleaned off the kitchen table. I then pulled the empty garbage can close and I was ready. I evaluated my Christmas items and broke them down like this:

Christmas tree (each tree got their own ornament box broken down and labeled, so now instead of one huge ornament box, the different trees I put up are pre-segregated into their own boxes and I can put them up as I choose)
house decorations (multiple boxes, divided by size of decorations)
outside decorations
fabric everything (stockings, tree skirt, table linens, costumes etc)
lights

Then, this year, I broke the Christmas display of my entire home down in pieces. I picked one section and put that box on the empty Christmas table. Then, before I started, I created my first piece of JOY by emptying out that storage box of the years of accumulated everything. Old pieces of broken ornaments. Crumpled tissue paper. Rusting metal ornament hangers. Tinsel from a kazillion years ago. Everything - out of the pool. And started over again with a clean storage box so I knew each and every thing that was going into the storage box.

This year, I went with the Flylady admonition - if it did not make me smile, I got rid of it. Period. That is going to be my mantra this year. And no worries. If you are not familiar with Flylady, you will be oh so soon. Anyway, back to it.

I took down the trees and packed them away individually, each tree’s ornaments in their own box. Then, for the first time, I actually taped the boxes shut for my poor Mister, who always wrestles to get these into the attic without disaster. He adores this year already for that addition alone.

Outside decorations finally were segregated into their own box so that I can set that aside on Thanksgiving Day and get it done a little bit sooner than this year (you don’t want to know. Really).

Finally all the house decorations ended up in the same box instead of sprinkled throughout all the boxes as a surprise addition. It wasn’t that my boxes were a mess. It was that at the end of packing, I would push in additional decorations wherever there was room. This time, I just got the extra box I needed and used it to bring JOY to my Christmas decorations and as I am encouraging you - Just Organize Yourself!

Fabric went into a separate box so that I could put the heavy stocking holders in that box in safety. I wanted a box that could safely be moved (or dropped) without anything breaking. I say this because my Mister tripped coming down the stairs this year (he is fine, thank goodness, just stumbled) and dropped the box with the heavy stocking holders in it down the stairs. And as I heard crashing and banging all down the stairs, I thought to myself “hum, as I pack this year, I need to make sure that does not happen again”. So I did.

Planning ahead is a most important part of finding JOY! I have a mental file (as we all do) that runs in my head all the time. I list all types of things, plans, activities, hopes, dreams and occasionally, I remember to do some of the things there.

What I am trying to accomplish this year is making the transition from recognizing when I first approach something that by the time I am finished with it, a change needs to be made. Instead of waiting to act, if I do it NOW when I recognize the need, before I know it, I can tell myself that I have found JOY because I will have Just Organized Yourself. Finally.

I do not need perfection. I already know that. I have talked about that. But disorganization brings disquiet to my life. Disorganization brings discontent. And disorganization brings wasted time, wasted opportunities and in my case, wasted money.

On New Years Eve, I wished for you all to find just one moment of joy and hold on to that memory. My idea was that if you find just one moment, even if you are having trouble finding joy on a regular basis, when you feel that one moment, you get hungry for it. You remember it and you long for it. And you want it and you will find that you are ready to do what you have to in order to recreate it.

My moment of joy was in London. I was prepared for the Christmas season. We were having a true wave of guests coming to visit from America literally week after week after week from October through January with no break between. I was so excited but I knew I needed to be ready as we lived in an oh so small two bedroom home in downtown London. So, starting early that year, I literally went from attic to the cupboard under the stairs in that house. I went through every drawer. I would say I went through every box, but by the time I was finished, there were no boxes. None. I had touched every single possession we owned and every possession we owned lived in its place.

It was incredible. There was no superfluous in the house. Everything we did not need was donated to charity or went to the dump or recycled. By the time our guest season started, there was little for me to do. Even my Mister remembers the JOY with so much fondness. I had so much time every day to fix dinner. Every day I would light the candles in the house and wait for him to come home from his walk off the Tube. I had so. much. free. time. every. day. that I can scarcely describe it. I had nothing to clean because there was nothing to clean. Everything was in its place. I knew where everything was. And I loved everything in my house.

It was a time of perfect peace. My Mister and I both agree that we want the house back to that in the worst way. That is our mutual goal this year. We want that JOY back. It is going to mean some extra work, I admit now. But honestly, in the great scheme of things, I did not spend that much more time yesterday putting away my Christmas display than I did any other year. I was still done at the end of the day. And this time, at the end of the day, my Mister and I sat together and just grinned at each other over the taped and labeled boxes like - well, like kids on Christmas morning.

There was a lot of joy there. And it carried over this morning when my Mister had to go back to work. Already I am ready to tackle another major project, buoyed by the good feelings of yesterday. This might not be a miracle where you live, but trust me. Around here, this counts under the 1862 Goodwill Act of Miracles, Wonders and Phenomenons.

A few hours away from a new year and another new beginning.

The end of the year and the New Year holiday always leaves me so introspective, which is great (as long as maudlin does not creep in there). I find that I spend time evaluating where things are and where I want them to be. Sometimes it is internal and sometimes it is external. Do you do the same?

This year it is a little of both.

I keep wanting to talk about external issues on Kattitudes. I want to talk about my home. There are different thoughts that immediately spring to mind.

First, the positive; what am I doing that makes my residence a home and a place of comfort? Then, the not-so-positive; what am I doing that sabotages that effort, either consciously or subconsciously? I want to talk about that this year.

I have the talents (and obviously you do too, because you are here reading this) to make such beautiful things, which means that you can make beautiful things for your own home.

But when I look around at my home, there are days when I know that my home is not beautiful. Enough said. We all have our reasons. I want to change that this year.

I have a lot of personal introspection that happens during the last week of the year too. I really gave up New Years resolutions. I just do not believe in them anymore. I am a professional procrastinator. And a perfectionist. Combined, the two are a deadly combination.

Over the years, I recognized that within the first two weeks of the New Year, my resolutions were fond memories (at best) and (more often) filed directly into the “save these for whipping posts when you are at your lowest point please”, if you know what I mean.

Not for me. I hit forty this year. That scared me and energized me at the same time. Well, maybe not. That is not the description for which I am looking. Oh, I know. The ticking got louder. Much louder. And some days I cannot hear for the sound. Those are the days that I know that I cannot wait for the start of a new year to change what I want to change and be who I want to be. I just do not have the time anymore.

I have spent and sometimes still spend so much of my life waiting and then racing ahead planning, then waiting and racing that I forget the now. Now is living. Now is being alive. Now is our life. Now is my life.

This is it. This is what we get.

Some think they know for sure, for absolute sure that we get more. Bully for them. I do not.

What I know is that this is what I get and I want to remember it and enjoy at least as much of it as I can. Don’t you?

If you are here, reading this blog, you found it because you have creative skills enough to be searching for how to make something. I know I do. When is the last time I used my skills to make my life beautiful? To make my home beautiful? To make my life full of peace?

When I am full of peace and joy and comfort and cheer, only then I can share that with others.

This year, find peace within yourself. Find peace for the first time or again.

Find joy. Even if for a moment, find a moment to feel joy and remember how good that moment felt.

Give yourself comfort so that you might offer it freely to others.

Bring cheer to yourself every day so that you can fill the life of anyone (or everyone) you meet with cheer.

And with these thoughts, I am slipping away to prepare for the evening. Even though we will not be at our home, I know I will still carry on my father’s tradition, witnessed so long ago as a young girl. His grandmother always slipped away from their festivities at midnight to open a door or window in the home to let out the old year and let in the new. Dad always did as I grew up, and now habits dying hard, out of love, I still will. I doubt that the New Year would overlook my house if I did not, or that the Old Year would fester if I did not let it out, but I would not take the chance, when my family paved the way so well for me.

My wish for all you creative folk is that the new year treats you well. Time can be so cruel.

I have new skills to learn in 2008. I have so many creative skills I have yet to explore fully (having just learned enough to get by literally). I received some amazing crafting gifts for the Christmas holiday, so I am going to be doing an incredible amount of jewelry making in 2008. I am also starting off the year with in depth crochet and cross stitch and menu planning and cooking. Plus I am determined, absolutely determined to teach a class on family budgeting this year, so I am going to be practicing through Kattitudes on that. And back to organizing! We are going to find joy this year, by Just Organizing Yourself (hey, it might be cheesy but if it works that is all that counts). Oh, I have so many plans, but I might as well save that for tomorrow and the next day and the next.

We will talk again in 2008. Best wishes to you in the New Year. May you be healthy and happy and wise.

And of course, as required by Universal Law, I had to get my yearly ick-fest- must- spend- a- few- days- under- the- weather- right- before- the- holiday out of the way before I could actually celebrate Christmas itself.

In fact, I think it is a Christmas tradition as much as Christmas itself. I am required by Universal Law to get sick. There is just not enough eyerolls around to deal with that.

But thank goodness that I get obsessive enough in advance that plenty enough gets done early that by the time we get to this point, I am well into the “meh, if it isn’t done by now, it didn’t really need to get done anyway”.

I am into my cruising into the holidays and loving it stretch. I love this part. The build up. My sister will be here early tomorrow morning. We spend the day cruising around getting the last few little diddle things - just enjoying the crazed atmosphere of the neighborhood. We always save Christmas Eve to get our stocking stuffers together. We will make one last run to the grocery store for the diddley snacky things we think we might want, but the big run gets done this afternoon (should have been finished Friday, but there was that whole sicky thing to deal with).

I will look through my arsenal and see if there are a few treats left to post or a few movies left to enjoy. There might be a quick gift or two to pump out if you are in need, but at this point, it is all about the enjoyment.

Sit back (or lean forward if you are that type of personality) and just breathe in the vapors. This is the good part. Enjoy the ride. Christmas is upon us. Savor it for all you are worth. These are the moments upon which memories are made. Make them good ones.

I just love the simplicity of a gift like this. And when I say simplicity, I mean wow. Wow, this takes a few minutes and the ability to install a snap in a ribbon.

This is a watch face that can be purchased at a thousand different craft or jewelry supply stores online or at your local malls or shopping areas. You can find the watch face findings literally in every craft supply store under the sun. Every one, bar none. And the same with the eyelet snap (and for the record, if you like the jeweled part, you will be looking for a rhinestone snap).

That is all this is.

A beautiful velvet ribbon this time.

An eyelet snap.

A watch face.

As an interesting variation, a second piece of velvet ribbon was used to make a bow, and then sewn onto the first ribbon as a permanent decoration. If you liked the idea, you could sew it on using regular thread, or if you were not sure, you could sew it on using a snap which means you could take it off or leave it on according to how you felt that day.

If you decided to use a snap, I would provide a decorative button or something along those lines with an additional snap on it to cover the empty snap on the ribbon, if that makes sense to you. Something so as not to just leave an empty snap sitting on the velvet ribbon all day.

Anyway, it would not take that long to put together some really spectacular watches for gifts for all your girlfriends. You could make a gift of one watch face with multiple ribbon watchbands so that your friend could change the band as her mood changes.

What a neat idea for a friend that changes her clothes as often as she changes her mind! And since you only need enough ribbon to go around a wrist, the cost would be minimal, which is perfect for our budget conscious Christmas plans.

If you are gifting jewelry for Christmas this year, so many searches have happened on my blog for wire wrapping briolettes. I think that the briolettes are starting to get a little dated, and that is perfectly fine. They are still gorgeous stones without a doubt, but I also think that it is time to start expanding a little from the standard single briolette on a strand and hold the catsup, no mustard, if you know what I mean.

Even this minor variation is a nice change. The three briolettes are in the same color family, but vary enough in the size to make the visual punch capture your eye immediately.

One other distinction about this particular piece is that the wire wrap is not obsessively neat. There is an artistic messiness to the wrap job, as if to emphasis that a real live person or artist did this work, rather than a machine in the outbacks of some factory somewhere.

So, do not be afraid of making your jewelry look a little funky and a little off the track unusual. It is that unusual look that makes your pieces memorable and makes people really search through the jewelry box to find that “really neat piece that Cousin Susie made for me that one year”.

Very interesting 1936 Fleischer Studios cartoon that is often considered a Christmas cartoon. Not a particularly funny cartoon (as was often the case then), but very memorable.