Another Project Brought to You By...

So in conjunction with the patio I also needed to upgrade the willow furniture I bought from someone on Craig's List. Love Craig's list.

I love black painted furniture (as evidenced by my dining room set) so I decided to spray paint the willow furniture black and buy new cushions. I am so pleased with the result! One thing I discovered is that I am incredibly out of shape in my spray-painting muscles. My pointer finger on my right hand has been numb for 2 days after spray painting for 3 hours and I couldn't hold a pen and write all day Monday. I hope I recover. I don't want to be on disability due to spray painting injuries.

What do you think?!

Summer 2009: Year of DIY

Since I use my blog so seldom but do email many people with pictures of our house projects this is now house project central.

Quick rundown of this month's project: Staining the back patio.

Clean concrete, choose stain color, choose second stain color because the first is too light, apply second stain color with sponge roller to give it dimension, seal patio with glossy sealer. This took only two weekends. If it wasn't for the dry-time required it could have been completed in a day.

Things I've learned:

Nothing turns out like the pamphlet pictures. Ever.

The guy who built my house cut major corners.

My grass never survives the summer, no matter how hard I try.

Fiona insists on thwarting my healthy-grass efforts.

Even if you try not to, you will still get the stain on the house.

Here are pictures of the progression. I also spray painted my patio furniture. Pretty.


"New" willow furniture, brand new cushions. Can't wait to actually use them. I've since planted the planters and painted the red chairs and the willow furniture black.


Clean concrete ready to stain!


Stain applied, wind-blown and not consistent.



The second color, applied with sponge brush.


Finally, all done! Painted furniture, glossy sealer, potted plants, clean BBQ. Awesome. Come on over everyone!

How I Long for a Ball at Pemberly

So it's no secret that I'm a Jane Austen fan. I read my tattered and worn Pride and Prejudice and Persuasion a few times a year. The spine is cracked for each and the pages are pulling from the binding and no matter how many times I read it I find something new or gain a new perspective on her ideas. She is so incredibly timeless. I think her works speak to so many and are so well written and human because of the sadness she faced in life, which is a recent revelation I've had. Her stories worked out for her what life did not or could not.

Because of this thought (and the fact that I've recently finished P&P, S&S, Emma and am on Persuasion now...) I want to partially reprint one of the best passages (there are many) I believe she's ever written, one of the best love letters from literary history.

I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means that are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own, than when you almost broke it eight years and a half ago. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an earlier death. I have loved none but you. ...

-Jane Austen, Persuasion, 1818

Becoming Jane, a movie with Anne Hathaway and James McAvoy covered the details of her life to a fairly accurate degree. It was heartbreaking to see and consider the truth in it. I don't think anyone could have written with feeling the way she did without going through her pain.

That is all. Class dismissed.

...and that's OK.

Hi Gang,

Probably no one comes around here anymore and that's ok, but I'd like to give a brief update on life while I wait to be inspired for a cooler post.

New job is going well. I have been so busy and working long hours that it's pretty much been consuming me since I started in September. And that's ok. I love it, its exciting and fun. For those of you who don't know, it's a full service ad agency in Boise. www.drake-cooper.com.

School is going well. That is the other project that is consuming the rest of my free time and that's ok. Only 6 classes to go and I graduate with an MBA in Marketing-woohoo!

So the rest of my free time has been just trying to stay sane. I have lovely fall pictures I'd like to post. Hopefully I'll get to that soon.

And here is a picture to ponder from www.stuffonmycat.com. I laughed so hard that I just had to share. (Check out the site, there is so much more hilarity there.)

I wonder what he's laughing at?

Just for Cher!

This is a farmer-type dude and his little teeny JRT dog. I took this with my cell phone at the Boise Saturday Market (which incidentilly people are NOT allowed to bring their dogs to anymore thanks to a stuck up sticky-beak city health code officer-this was the last dog weekend) with Cher's mismatched car/driver contest in mind. He was just ambling along with his little friend so I snuck this shot. Very sweet.

Time on my hands

So... since I am currently unemployed I've got time to take more pictures. Here is one of them. I've been too grouchy to post anything for awhile but have gotten some great shots in the last month...

Enjoy.

Local Men's Room Hand Dryer's alternative use discovered:

Finally a convenient way to get bacon while visiting the washroom!