Jenyfer Matthews

You saw part of the mountain of boxes I have to sort through on the Wednesday post. It is not only the sheer volume of stuff that makes this challenging, but the way the boxes are labeled.

I deny having every sewed any of my quilt patrons!

It’s a good thing I’m fluent in pigeon English! I do believe this includes “purses”.

And this box contains and African DRUM.

I admit – this one had me stumped.

Apparently “KW” means kitchen ware and “flavors” referred to spices!

I think they could have been more accurate in this label…

They could have labeled it “ducks”!

Then there were things that I bought in Egypt and they were very specific and confident in how to label! This is a small padded bench / seat I bought that is fashioned in the manner of a camel saddle.

I was really hoping that this label didn’t mean what I thought it meant.

And yet it did… sigh. I could have lived without seeing all those shopping bags again! (Or the bag of dead tennis balls or the half a dozen flat soccer balls they packed)

Really, I have to find humor in this situation or I’d cry. So much that should have been purged was shipped. And apparently there was one weak link on the packing team who had an aversion to using any sort of packing paper to cushion things. I have found boxes where there is a jumble of things tossed into it, one of which contained my cast iron skillet on top of the rest. A mirror I quite liked was packed in a box of toys for some reason, wrapped in my son’s fleece blanket. It broke. I am putting any associated bad luck on whoever packed it. And why did they box up empty suitcases? Could they not have used them for quilt fabric or clothes??

While I am busy unpacking household things, I left the books to my husband. It may not sound like much, but just take a look at this.

Having hefted the boxes of books into his cave for him to unpack, I am dropping some not so subtle hints that he needs to think about weeding his collection…

I’m back!!!! Did you miss me? It is absurd how much I missed my site. I felt positively stifled. What motivates hackers anyway? The joy of making trouble?

Tomorrow is my birthday and getting my site back up and running is a great gift. Another good present? 150 boxes to open.

Yes, our last and final shipment from Egypt finally arrived! What you see above is ONE of TWO piles of boxes, each of roughly equal size. My sewing / work room is crammed so full that you can’t really walk in there. I’d have taken a picture but I could get far enough back from the first row of boxes!

I can’t wait to start opening everything to see what treasure is there. Also, what trash. I already disposed of about 5 pairs of old tennis shoes that the children outgrew while we were away. I’ll bet there are plenty of clothes like that too. There might even be things that weren’t meant to be packed up – like the step-ladder that belonged to the furnished university apartment we occupied in Cairo. Oops! (See what happens when I’m not around to supervise things?)

Don’t worry, my day won’t be nothing but toil. I am going to make my own carrot cake with my favorite recipe, but I’m already planning where hubby and the kids will take me to dinner

In spite of the fact that I didn’t bake anything except a pumpkin pie (our neighbors stopped by on Christmas Eve and brought some cookies which we set out for Santa), and in spite of the fact that I bought a duplicate DVD for my daughter which I realized in the nick of time and replaced with another and a video game for the wrong gaming system which I didn’t, I declare this Christmas a success. Everyone seemed pleased by their presents and there was good cheer all around. You can’t ask for much more than that.

Both the kids profess to still believe in Santa, though I think that time is running short – at least for my daughter. She’s asked me point blank about the Tooth Fairy (I evaded the question) but has not asked about Santa. One reason that I think that Santa survives scrutiny is because he is so much nicer than me.

I don’t buy my children things constantly – I’m pretty much a birthday / Christmas kind of mom. I’ll get supplies they need for school or sports, but other stuff? Special occasion or allowance. Santa ends up bringing all the things they children have been begging for all year that I have said ‘no’ to – like the Pillow Pets I have denied the all year. He also WOWS them with gifts that they didn’t know they wanted – this year he brought them a portable ping-pong table. How can mom compete with that?

Not only that, Santa fills their stockings with candy and goodies that Mom has to try and put the brakes on – after all, Santa isn’t here to pay their dental bills. Santa is a great guy, isn’t he? I kind of wish he still brought me things!

At any rate, we have all survived another Christmas, even if there wasn’t any snow. Bring on the new year…

Not even a MOUSE!

I have seen neither ears nor tail of my mouse visitor, dead or alive. (Yes, I choose to continue to think of it as a “mouse” though a few people have suggested that it sounded too large to be a mouse – I don’t wish to follow that train of thought!) My holiday wish is that s/he has vacated the premises never to return.

I hope that wherever you are, whatever you are doing, you have a wonderful weekend full of joyful surprises.

Apparently my standards of clean with regard to my home are fairly high, judging only on the last several homes I’ve moved into. If my mother were alive, she’d shake her head in amazement because I’m sure she despaired of me when I was a teen living in her house. I never left dishes sitting around, but my room was pretty cluttered to say the least. (My own turnaround gives me some small hope for my own children’s habits!)

When I first move into a house, I have to give it a thorough cleaning. However it may degenerate after that initial cleaning is beside the point because at least by then it is my dirt (I’m sure all the former tenants of my homes have felt the same, ha ha). I know that I’m totally settled in and comfortable in a new place when I’m willing to walk around barefoot.

Not that I actually go barefoot that often, but it’s the idea of it. When we lived in Cairo, I made everyone take their shoes off at the door to try and keep from tracking so much dirt and muck off the streets into the house. People are constantly spitting and sometimes worse out in the open, so it just pays not to wear your shoes in the house. I typically would switch my outside shoes for flip-flops in the house. I don’t like walking on grit and the floors seemed always to be covered in sand.

When we moved into our house in Michigan, I wore flip-flops around because the house wasn’t clean. I washed the walls, had the carpets professionally cleaned, and was just about approaching the point when I might have gone barefoot when the weather turned cold and I switched to slippers. After yesterday, I not only don’t wish to go barefoot, but I don’t even want to take a shower. I may in fact switch to wearing workboots.

I saw a mouse in my kitchen.

It was early in the morning and I had just gotten up to make the children’s lunches for school. All the lights in the kitchen were out so I flipped them on and made my tea and booted up my computer. I had completed packing lunches and was sitting and looking at my email when I thought I saw a flash of movement from the corner of my eye. I turned to look and saw nothing so returned to my email. A few moments later I heard an odd noise. I looked up and saw the mouse sitting on the back burner of my stove eating something.

Never have I wished more for a remote control gas stove so I could have fried his little furry butt!

I saw the mouse clearly from across the room. I couldn’t see its body because it was behind a lunch bag, but its head seemed pretty big and it didn’t seem particularly worried about my presence as I stood up and walked around to the stairwell to call my husband upstairs. I opened the front door, somehow thinking that I would shoo it out of the kitchen and that maybe it would be scared enough to just run outside.

My husband came upstairs and he looked in the kitchen to see the mouse licking a smudge of peanut butter off a piece of paper I had just pulled off a fresh jar in the process of making lunches. When the mouse noticed my husband, he dove behind the stove. My husband pulled the stove out at my direction, me still hoping to scare it out. Not even banging the stove with a broom handle produced results so the mouse was either hunkered down or gone. I did the only thing that I could do and went straight to the store and bought some “mouse chow”, aka rodentcide on my receipt. I put some behind the stove and under the sink, but concentrated mostly on the garage which is probably where the furry beast got in.

What am I, the Pied Piper? The mechanic just pulled a second wad of mouse nest out of the AC vents in my car, which I had chosen to believe was a leftover from the country mouse I spotted in my engine as I was leaving Minnesota this summer. I’m really hoping that it is the cold weather that brought the mouse inside because I haven’t seen any evidence whatsoever of gnawing or droppings. Maybe my banging on the stove with the broom will have given it the message that it isn’t welcome!?

There’s no way I’m going barefoot now – though it’s not as if I plan to step on a mouse either!!!

Last week I mentioned a few projects I’d thought up for myself. Here are the results.

How happy was I when I went to Joann Fabrics and found a plain wreath form 50% off? Add a couple of bags of ornaments from the thrift store / garage sales and it looks very festive. I’d like the ornaments to be a bit more dense, but the beauty of this project is that I can just keep adding to it when I find appropriate ornaments. I have gobs of tiny globes coming in my shipment from Egypt and I’m sure I can spare a few for the wreath!

This is currently hanging inside, at the bottom of the stairs next to the laundry room door (where I get to see it all the time, LOL). There is a storm door over our front door and I don’t think the gap between the is wide enough for this full figured wreath and glass ornaments. Can’t you just imagine what would happen the first time the door slammed?? Maybe next year we will have a different house and it will get a more glamorous location.

And what do you get the man who has everything? Well, you can do what I did and just repackage something he already has! When we were going through all the things that we got out of storage, we found a bag full of beer coasters my husband had collected here and there over the years. I decided that they would be better appreciated on display than forgotten in a box and voila! Cool, unique present.

I got the frame at Goodwill and arranged the coasters using poster putty – that way they can be repositioned if necessary. Also, I didn’t want to GLUE any of these in case any of them did actually have any value! I was so enthusiastic about how it came out I almost gave it to him early, over the weekend, but I resisted. I can wait two weeks more

(Don’t worry – I got him another present too!)

I’m pretty much done decorating for Christmas. I bought a couple of small, prelit, table-top trees last week – one for upstairs and one for downstairs. I have to admit that it is absurd how much pleasure looking at my little green tinsel tree, hung with ornaments I’ve picked up at estate sales, gives me. The children were slightly less impressed and somewhat worried about where we would put “all of the presents”. (Just how many are they expecting??)

Like most things, this tree looks better in person! Clicking on the picture to make it bigger helps too

I normally would get a larger tree but I was going back and forth on the idea of real vs. fake trees. I like real trees but they are messy and my daughter has a lot of allergies; fake trees are more convenient but the ones I liked most were $$$. My procrastination paid off this week because I got a great fake tree for 70% off between the clearance price and a register coupon I had.

You know it is pre-lit because I would never take the time to string all those lights! And it’s a good thing I settled for the 7′ tree because it’s nearly brushing the ceiling as it is!

How are you all doing with your holiday preparations? No cookies here yet, but there is still time. And if all else fails, I know where some Girl Scouts live!

I learned something about myself this week. I guess I always knew this, but I am happiest when I have lots of things to do. Too much down time and nothing to do just brings me way down.

Isn’t that kind of sad? I had two days this week where I didn’t have much on my agenda and I couldn’t even really enjoy them because I was mopey. Clearly I need help.

(Actually, I’m sure that I’ll get over it when my quilts and DVDs arrive and I can spend an afternoon hand-quilting and catching up on House)

I ended up making a to-do list for myself for the remaining days this week. Even if I don’t get to everything on my list, I do feel better when I can look back at my day and see what I did get done.

I came up with a few small projects to entertain myself. One is to make a present for my husband using some things he’s been collecting for years. I won’t be more specific than that for now but I’ll post a picture soon. I also decided to make a new Christmas wreath. I really like the looks of the ones that include glass ornaments but I didn’t want to pay what they were asking for them at the store. Since I have bought a few boxes of vintage ornaments at estate / garage sales this fall, I have more ornaments than I need. I went to the store and bought myself a wreath form to which I will attach the extra ornaments. Voila! What could be more fun than that?

I will also admit that though I am now in possession of TWO cookie guns, a new-to-me vintage rolling pin purchased at an estate sale, and have been browsing cookie recipes frequently, I have no desire to bake any cookies.

I am still working on finishing the last dresser and all I can say is WOW. So far, it is looking really, really nice. I am taking my time with it so I don’t expect it to be picture worthy until sometime next week, but don’t worry – that is one project I will enjoy showing off.

One funny note on the painted dressers: the paint on the top of the dressers is a bit sticky. I don’t know if it is the finish (satin) or if it is too applied too thick but not only do certain things (like paper) stick to the paint, but some things leave impressions – like the teeth of a beaver skull my son has sitting on top of his dresser. Ha! Talk about adding unique character to a piece!

Otherwise, I have also finally starting tinkering with my latest book again. There was more written than I remembered and I am starting to add to it bit by bit as well. While looking for that file, I found some notes on another book idea and that one sounds really fun! I also thought up two other ideas for black comedy / mysteries. If only I didn’t need to sleep at night maybe I could get some of this stuff done faster…

Oh well – guess I won’t run out of things to do anytime soon!

Just ask anyone who knows me: It’s not very often you find me at a loss for words, but it seems to be the case this week. I just can’t think of much of anything interesting to talk about.

Things sort of feel like they are settling down a little – there were a couple of days this week when I thought about what I needed to get done and the answer was not much. Kind of a nice feeling. I know it won’t last though – I did get a message from the moving company to say that they have located our shipment. It is in NJ and as soon as it is released from customs, it will travel overland to Michigan and eventually to our house. So this is just a little lull before the house is full of boxes again and I am whirling around trying to find a home for everything.

In preparation for the shipment being delivered, I am trying to get done refinishing the last of the dressers so that the room where I’m currently working on it – my so-called sewing room (Ha! Where NO sewing has been going on!) – can be more available for overflow. In spite of the fact that I don’t really know what I’m doing, the dresser is coming along nicely. I will post pictures as soon as I am finished.

I mentioned in my last post how Nora Roberts reportedly writes a new novel every 45 days. A quote that I like that has also been attributed to her is that you can’t edit a blank page. In the spirit of this, and because for the last week or so the story I abandoned a year ago has been on my mind, I got back to work today. I had some good feedback on it when it was fresher which got me enthusiastic about looking at it again. Having just read it again, I’m not sure if I like it or if it’s boring. That’s the trouble with trying to judge your own work. Ugh. Guess I will forge ahead though – maybe it will get better!

I have at least nearly finished up all of my Christmas shopping, aside from stocking stuffers. My shipment better arrive soon – our stockings are in it!

I went grocery shopping today, because it’s my habit. Usually after having the family home all weekend, our cupboards are bare by Monday. I got home and realized the error of that assumption when I had very little room to put anything away. My husband went shopping yesterday and I guess I wasn’t paying attention to how much he got! Oh well – if we get snowed in this month, we won’t starve!

I once read an article in which Nora Roberts, an author I love, said she started writing while stuck at home on a snow day with her two small children. Another interview I read last week said she writes a book every 45 days. EVERY 45 DAYS. That rate does explain her prodigious output, but it also makes me feel like a real slacker. Even when I’m actually working at writing industriously, I can’t write nearly that fast. I know it’s not constructive to compare myself to someone who is apparently one of the fastest and most successful writers on the planet, but every 45 days…amazing. And something to think about.

After procrastinating for something like a month, I finally got started on the refinishing of the last dresser today. In the end I stripped it all down and sanded it thoroughly in preparation for an application of Danish oil. I didn’t want to try and mess around with a separate stain and finishing topcoat. The Danish oil is “one-step” in so far as it can contain a stain color and it soaks into the wood and dries, giving it some protection against moisture with a more natural satin-finish look. At least that’s what I’m going for, and if it works it will blend with the other dresser we have quite nicely (when it arrives). I’ll let you know how it goes.

Speaking of our things, last week we got an email from the moving company in Egypt saying that our shipment had arrived and that we should contact the local movers on this end who will be delivering our things to us. I did that, and the local movers said that they had not received any paperwork so as far as they were concerned the shipment was not here. Okay. Today I got a phone call from the local movers today saying that our shipment has in fact arrived, but that the paperwork does not list their name as a receiver so they are having trouble claiming it for us. Great – you know how I love a delay. Taking a deep breath and hoping for the best is as much as I can do at this point.

Seems odd to think that this time last year I was preparing to go visit my friend in Cologne, Germany and shopping in the Christmas markets there. It’s slightly more exotic than Target!

I am happy to say that I am mostly done with shopping and decorating. I was debating the merits of real vs. artificial trees. I love a real tree but they are messy and I wondered how my allergy prone daughter would deal with a real tree in the house. The fake trees are more convenient and tidier, but the ones I like best are way $$$. As a stop-gap, I bought two 48″ prelit tinsel trees, one green and one silver. They are shiny and tacky but they make me ridiculously happy. I may just run with them and wait and see if I can get a satisfying fake tree on clearance after Christmas!

There is probably a cheesy fake tree in our shipment – if it ever arrives…

Better do it yourself, as the saying goes. Too true.

It’s been that kind of day. The kind of day you spend running around from place to place and still feeling like you aren’t getting much done.

After much errand running in the morning, the landlord’s son came by to replace a unit in the horribly inadequate track lighting fixture in the kitchen (it’s so bad, I have a lamp on my counter). In the process of working on the fixture, he switched off the breaker (after shocking himself) which in turn zapped the configuration of my wireless router and in turn cut off my internet.

Any other plans I had for the afternoon were put on hold as I set about trying to get the router back up and running. I finally broke down and called my internet provider. After going through all the same steps with an automated system, I got on with a live person who told me that they didn’t support my particular router and the best they could suggest was that I either hook my computer directly to the modem with a cable or I get them to come and install a new modem with a built in router. Um…huh? I got this router as part of my sign-up “bonus” and two months later they tell me they don’t support it? Not only that, but I have to pay them a new installation fee plus a monthly rental fee on a new modem.

I don’t think so.

I let them set up an appointment for the installation but when we got off the phone I went back to work and successfully reconfigured my router myself. Ha!

So, I don’t have much to show for my time today but I do at least have internet – and a way to waste MORE time! (Why doesn’t sitting on the internet feel like a waste of time they way running errands does??)

I also have an appointment to get new tires on my car in two weeks. If the two days of snow this week are an indication of how the city will maintain the streets here in the winter, I am going to need all the traction I can get!