the august bed

 

 

 

 

the weekend in pictures

 Just a few pictures. I spent the weekend in a conference hall in South San Francisco. It was fantastic. I was really wanting to make my way to San Francisco proper but that did not happen. At least, not really. We did manage a mini walk combined with a visit to an ice cream shop but mostly, I sat in a conference hall and played with blocks.

 

 

 

 

 

in gammy beaujolais 's garden

 Last Sunday mister and I drove down to Los Angeles to bid farewell to a woman who has greatly inspired me. Mother to my roomie and dearest neighbor-friend, Carol (who wished to be called Gammy Beaujolais by her grandsons) was a laugh and a half. Full of humor and creativity, Carol gave me a home when I needed a safe place after a heartbreaking time. I spent many days in her garden, surrounded by cats, the sound of wind chimes and fountains, drinking icy-iced water with lemon as I sat in her shabby chic garden chairs before shabby chic was a household phrase; chatting with her as she simultaneosuly cared for her plants and pulled at her hair. I spent almost a year hunkered down in her spare room with a hippie bedspread tacked across the wall full of windows, my quilt topped bed as my throne, a trunk as my bureau,  and a rolling rack of vintage dresses ready to be worn. I had no phone and no plan and loved every minute I spent there. It was a time of reflection and figuring out who I was and I do not think I would be the me that I am had I not had those lovely days spent in her company and in her garden (even when she would talk me out of my vintage as it looked better on her anyway). This post is for you roomie and for you Gammy, may your garden be in full bloom for always and forever.

love,
squeak 2

looking for a little grass shack...

the leader of the pack

 

 

a nice crowd

 

mister sings along

A few weeks ago, the mister, nephew, a sister a-go-go, and I headed out to Baywood Park to hang out with the Baywood Ukulele Social Club. After lunching on yummy sandwiches at The Back Bay Cafe, we headed out to the lawn near the bay to lay out a pair of blankets before settling down for the entertainment. Jim D'Ville, our fearless leader, is a right nifty uke leader. He teaches you to play by ear and encourages even the lamest of us uke players (I'm refering to myself here) to play along. Mister and I did not bring our ukes but will definitely bring them along for the August meeting if we haven't left for our mini road trip. Ukuleles are still proving to be the hipster instrument. Check out your city to see if there is a social club floating about, you never know.

*cross posted to goin' with the a-go-gos because...well...we went somewhere fun! 

diy: upcycled box organizers

I really wanted to WOW you with this one but it being August (wha?) and all, I feel like if I do not get this post up, it will be 2013 already and I will have never shared it.

Space is limited here in the tiny casa, even more so if you account for my many, many collections of stuffity-stuff. It took me almost ten months to get any of my supplies organized mostly because I really wanted to do it right, whatever that means. I thought that if I could organize it perfectly prefect my life would be calm and I could move on to the next crafty endeavor. Truth be told, who am I kidding? Even if I did actually organize it perfectly perfect there is no way I would keep it up as I am not exactly a type A person, ya know? So here you go, a mini diy for organizing your crafty crap. If I had a room to put it all in it may very well be organized quite differently. Since I do not have a room but a plastic shed, this is what you get. Enjoy!

Mister works at a small company that receives and sends a LOT of packages. These boxes were recycling bin bound so he swooped up a bunch and I made them pretty. The first thing I had to do was pick out fabric. And since, like I said, I am NOT an A type personality, I went with whatever fabric I could find in whichever box was open.

 

I then cut out pieces of fabric and ironed them as smooth as I could, making sure to roll them up all pretty for a picture.

 

All of the boxes were flipped so that the ends were facing up. I brushed on a coat of mod podge using a foam brush.

 

 

Next, I smoothed a cut of fabric over the whole sticky surface and continued utnil all my box ends were covered.

After the mod podge dried, I used my handy-dandy fabric scissors (the ones with the green handle) to trim all the way around the edges. It was a little hairy at times but I managed.

 

 

 After these sat in a heap in the living room for a few weeks (see? definitely NOT a type A) I got to adding labels which I made by folding over smallish rectangles of fabric in half and stitching all the way around. A trim with pinking shears or scissors evened them out and those too were tacky-glued atop the fabric covered boxes.

 

 

I used Bic permanent pens to label them up after they were filled with crafty chaos.

 

Finally, I stacked them into my ugly plastic storage shed, shut the doors and then sat down for a jar of iced coffee and a cookie (or two). The best way to fit the most into the shed as it was (mister put shelves in it back in Los Angeles and it housed my fabric) was to store the boxes on their sides. It isn't nearly as pretty as a fancy crafty blogger would have or share but it works and now I can find my twisty bits and whiz-bangs. I can also see some of my favorite fabrics in use (I tend to horde fabric and not use it but I am trying to remedy that quirk of mine). Now I can throw a crafty night and actually find my crafty bits.

31 days of red, white, and blue

All last month I challenged myself to swaddle up in red, white, and blue. It's a thing I like to do but haven't done since 2009! It was a challenge as I have oodles of blue (I have a thing for navy) but not so much red. Thank goodness for thrift stores and a run to old navy (which yielded happy skirts I will definitely wear outside of July so shush). And now, with that wee bit o' fanfare, I give you the collage mosaic edition of my last 31 days.

 I tell ya, I got so used to it that when I got dressed this morning I kinda forgot how to wear other colors. Don't worry though, a purple shirt was pulled over the noggin long with my trusty jeans and a pair of new happy orange flats. Last night was spent dreaming over the new Boden catalog and I do believe a pair of boots might be in order if I can make some moolah. Anyone need a blog banner a la jek? Garlands? Doodads? Cookies?