Sad Day

I broke my pansy platter.  It was probably my most favorite wedding gift.  It always cheered me up to look at it.  I used it for almost every party we've ever had at this house.

It crashed to the floor while I was trying to dig my second favorite wedding gift out of the cupboard- this hand painted salad bowl.  I guess I'll have to just look at this one when I want to be cheered up from now on.  

Cancer Sucks

Well, I'm finally up to sitting at my computer after missing 2 weeks of my life.  For anyone who doesn't already know, I had an emergency hysterectomy on Sept. 30, and was diagnosed with ovarian cancer.  I had a rather large tumor on my left ovary.  It's stage 1C and had only spread to the other ovary, so that is good news.  I find out on Friday about chemo and whatnot.  Here's a photo of Nellie and me, celebrating the pathology report with soup and salad at Tomaydo/Tomahdo.

My sister took pictures of my CSA shares while I was down for the count, but I haven't downloaded them to my computer, yet.  I was able to take my own photo of this past Saturday's haul.

Good thing I've been eating lots of veggies.  Seems like that will give me a leg up on getting through chemo and beating this thing.

Maybe next week I'll feel like catching up on the school stuff.  We actually did a medium amount of school work today.  I think next week may be back to normal.

New Scrapbooking Room!

I'm thrilled to be finished with the redecorating/reorganizing of my scrapbooking room!  Just in the nick of time for our German exchange student who will be arriving this evening!

Here are some before pics from shortly after I started dismantling the room.

This had been a little boy's room when we moved in 6 years ago.   I never changed the paint or the window treatments.

My brother helped me put up these wire shelves when we moved in to hold my scrapbooking stuff, but they were not sufficient.  I guess I acquired more stuff over the years, too.

The TV was always a thorn in my side.  It took up precious space and was inconvenient to view from the whole room.  I originally put it in there so that the kids could watch movies while I scrapbooked, and that plan did work out well when they were little.  Now they can watch movies in their own room, and they don't want to hang out with me 24/7 like before.

I wanted a guest bed in the room, so I bought this daybed frame shortly after we moved in.  It was the cheapest thing I could find at the time, but I never really liked it.  It was coming apart, too, so it was time for it to go.

I had small bookshelves in this corner with more scrapbooking stuff on them, but I had already taken them down when I realized I should take some "before" shots.

Here was my little personal corner.  I had all the important stuff within reach, so I could just swivel around and get it while working.  It worked for me for a while, but now I have too much stuff and it was difficult to unstack everything while I was working.

Since my life now revolves around Pinterest, I started gathering ideas and pinned them onto this board. I liked the look of the hot pink, bright orange, and lime green together, and since I already had some lime green things, I decided to go with those colors.  I loved the treatment they did to the shades in this picture, so I decided to try it.  I love how the room turned out.  It's fun and cheery and it will work out well for scrapbooking and guests.

Here's the new look:

I really like how the colors look together.  The second craft table is also stored under the bed.

My sister Nellie made me this most excellent duvet cover.  I got the new bed at Ikea, and finally made some scrapbook pages to put in those 3 frames that I've had forever.

I added a cord trim to the window treatments (different from Pinterest idea), and made a little valence from balsa wood and fabric, which I hot glued to a curtain rod.  Nellie's scrapbooking stuff is on this wall.  We can put the second table up next to mine and she can just swivel around to get to her stuff when she wants to join me.

To the right is the wall that the bed used to be on.  I got the Antonius shelves at Ikea, and they are perfect for my stuff. In this picture, I have the table pulled out like I would when I'm working.

In the corner, I hung the Ikea shoe bins that I had in my other little corner.  I'm keeping some paper, photos, and other supplies in them.  I also hung my Cricut mats on a hook.

View of my work area from the other side.

Here the table is pushed back against the wall to give more access in and out of the room when not crafting.

Nellie convinced me to paint the built in dresser green, and I'm so glad I listened.  It looks adorable.  My mom gave me her old small flat TV, and I ran the wires around the bottom of the closet to the plugs and cable, and it is awesome.  No more big clunky TV in the way.

Pretty soon my whole house will look like an Ikea catalog.  This bag holder and the storage cups are all from Ikea.

Got this idea from Pinterest.  Glued a cookie sheet to the bottom of a shelf and glued magnets to the bottom of the glitter glue bottles.  I think I need stronger magnets, though, because a slight bump will knock them down.

I hope our guests will enjoy staying in here, and I can't wait to invite some friends over to scrapbook with me in my new room!

Eddie broke my camera.

So, I've been using Nellie's camera, but this is really cramping my style.  I've been so used to having the camera out to take pictures of school stuff and delicious food.  Whatever will I do?  Maybe if I'm a really good girl, Santa will bring me a camera for Christmas.