This is day 2 of Clearing Space, a personal challenge for the month of February wherein I will release clutter from my environment, as much as I can in 15 minutes on any given day, 15 minutes being my limit when it comes to housework. Which could be why the place is a mess in the first place.
And because this is an art blog, I will take arty ‘after’ photos.
Today’s challenge: The dining room.
We have, in real estate parlance, a formal dining room. Formal as in a designated room of it’s own, not in what goes on there. Oh sure, Mr. Spouse and I dress for dinner. . . in the same clothes we wore all day. And sometimes, if it’s a weekend and we’re feeling particularly slovenly, the same clothes we wore the day before.
I guess the point I’m trying to make is it’s a formal dining room and we rarely eat there naked.
Naked dining being informal and that just wouldn’t do now, would it? Besides the obvious spilling problem, Mr. Spouse would discover the secret behind my skinny jeans. And I already know his truth. Pluh-eeze. Let’s just say we’re at the point in our relationship where clothing is preferred, not optional.
Lately the diningroom has become the UPS drop zone although FedEx has been known to encroach upon it too. It’s the place where important packages languish on the table. Languish, like the lazy bums they are. UNOPENED. And those that were opened are languishing empty, little packing peanuts and wads of paper proving great amusement for the cat. And for the little dogs who are NOT SUPPOSED to get on the table but they do.
I know they do because I am their mother and mothers know these things. And besides, I’ve seen them up there (insert your favorite expletive meaning shit here).
The table seats eight, but recent clutter creep has banished the two of us, Mr. Spouse and moi, to the far end. Dining in the kitchen nook is not an option, as least not yet, as the kitchen table is where mail, magazines and laptops dwell. Let’s not forget the laptop case that has become the favorite resting place of Kitty, she of the packing peanuts in the dining room fame.
Note to self: When Kitty dies bury her in the laptop case. She would be very happy there for all eternity and then you have the excuse to buy a new case. Red, the red one.
So being that the kitchen is farther down on the clutter clearing calendar and dinner is an every night affair (about the only affair in my life, trust me) I decided to tackle the dining room today.
Dining Room
Fifteen minutes. That’s all it took. I’m still wondering why I didn’t do this before. I mean, really, why did I wait so long?
Be back tomorrow. As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
Life is good. Life is SO good I can’t stand it!!! Yesterday I discovered Judy Wise is teaching cold wax online!!
Handsprings! Backflips! Dance break. Shake it out, just SHAKE IT OUT!
Ahhhh…much better now. I really need to cut back on the sugar.
Why all the enthusiasm? Well, let me explain. I love oil and cold wax. Love it love it LOVE IT! I did some pieces with it last year.
This one is Dunes. If I remember right it’s 2×3 feet. I sold it last October during the studio tour. You can see more of my cold wax pieces here.
Everything I did with cold wax came from being self taught, from piecing bits and more bits of internet information together. Flying by the seat of my pants. But I’ve taken a couple of classes from Judy in the past, Plaster Workshop and Hot Wax. I adore her. So when I heard she was offering this class, my all time wish list of if I could take ANY painting class this would be IT class, I signed up, just like that. And then, because the class is beginning RIGHT NOW, I ran to the lumberyard and had them cut a sheet of quarter inch birch plywood into eight 2×2 feet panels. And I bought some sticks of pine to support them.
Then I came home, batted my eyes just right and asked Mr. Spouse to lug out the chop saw. I certainly know how to use the chop saw but Mr. Spouse, in a fit of manliness, decided he would chop the pine.
So I let him.
And then I put on my Arty Life construction hat and began building cradled panels.
First I laid everything out one panel at a time. Then I squirted wood glue on the sticks, one at a time. Set the panel on top, lined everything up and shot ’em with the nail gun.
That’s when I realized men take everything about their tools seriously. Check out the name on that sucker. RIGID. I dunno, it just seems so in your face, so yo, babe check me out.
And that’s all I’m gonna say about that.
Change of subject.
Arty Life is getting a makeover soon. How much of one I’m not sure, I’ve just got these Bigger! Better! ideas roiling around in my head. Now all I have to do is figure out how to implement them. Photography! App reviews! Stuff!!! I think I’ll be rolling them out in early February. Stay tuned.
And if you haven’t seen it yet, I’ve begun photographing my horses every morning. A daily photo journal of the ponies and moi. You can check it out here.
Until next week, my sweetums. And, as always, LOVE to hear your comments. Because you are my best beloveds EV-AH!!!
Thirty years ago today, on a sunny Saturday in upstate NY, the first Saturday without rain in six weeks… Mr. Boyfriend became Mr. Spouse. Poof…Just. Like. That. Said, “I do”, gave me a ring, signed some papers and hitched his star to mine.
And vice versa.
The next day we hopped in the Rabbit and headed out to northern California. Back to Mr. Spouse’s job. Back to the place I went to school.
A few days later, somewhere in Colorado, I wondered if I’d made a mistake. A big one. Driving cross country in Volkswagen packed with everything I owned (except the dogs who would fly out later), looking for all the world like the 80’s version of the Joads, was NOT my idea of a honeymoon.
It was only the thought of my maid of honor slapping me silly that kept me heading west.
I’m glad I did.
Thirty years. Like any long term relationship there’s been up and downs. Growing pains. Growing together. Over the years we’ve lost four parents, one brother, several friends and too many dogs and cats. We’ve birthed two children, one who’s gone on to have his own. We’ve been through the terrible twos, the teen years and hormonal hell on both ends.
We’ve been through Little League. And Iraq.
Basketball. And Berkeley.
Remodeled houses, three of ’em. Built another from the ground up. And stayed together through construction madness. Which was nothing, really…
Because we’ve built a life together. Layers and layers and textures of life.
This one’s for you, Mr. Spouse. Happy Anniversary!
Mr. Spouse likes to play in mud. Big boy mud. Concrete. He has his own mixer. Actually, it’s his second one, the first having gone belly up a few years back. Because he used it that much. Seriously. One concrete marvel after another.
But until this weekend he never got to realize his big dream…countertops.
It was the one thing he was adamant about when he offered to build the new studio. I agreed, as long as he understood it’s a working art studio. His countertops will not be precious. They will be used. Most likely abused.
He was okay with that.
First he built the forms on the base cabinets. The lower section is my office area. Computer, scanner, printer, stare out the window at the squirrels office area.
Saturday morning we got up bright and early. Too early for me since I’d only gone to bed a few hours before.
My job was to mix the color into the dry cement. I don’t remember how many buckets I mixed. I do remember grasping the stir stick in both hands and feeling like a witch hovering over her cauldron. My lower back remembers it too.
I had black concrete dust in all my pores. On my clothes. Under my clothes. But not in my lungs because I wore a mask. Which in the end was the only part of my face that remained clean.
The first plops buckets of wet concrete hit the forms.
First layer gets troweled.
Then covered with a sheet of steel mesh before layer number 2. The edge is reinforced with rebar. You’ll have to trust me on this.
Lots of troweling. Lots of waiting. This is Mr. Bobby, our concrete friend, with his handy-dandy concrete vibrator. This excited the concrete and allowed Mr. Bobby to have his way with it. ‘Nuf said about that.
By late afternoon it was looking good. Starting to firm up. Forms were popped. Edges repaired. More troweling. Mr. Bobby and Mr. Spouse were both adamant that I NOT scribe into the oh so tempting, oh so succulent, oh so WILLING countertops in process.
So I decided I had better things to do. I headed down to the old studio to photograph art. I’m setting up an e-commerce site and need better photos.
Sunday Update
Show and tell!
Yee-haw and Yowser! Doin’ the happy studio dance, oh yes I am! Because Mr. Spouse is a handy man indeed. The weekend construction man super hero!
And in a couple of days we’ll be coming up on our 30th anniversary. The traditional gift for 30 years is pearls. The modern gift, diamonds. In our family it’s looking like concrete. And that’s okay with me!
Oh. My. So many adventures in Arty Life land the last couple of days. Brace yourself because this post is going to be skipping from one thing to the next, each topic guaranteed to make you more dizzy than the next.
First…and only because it happened minutes ago and I’m still as jumpy as a tweaker from the adrenalin rush…my brush with wildlife. There was a bear rat in the hay shed. Big sucker. But I was BRAVE. Oh, indeed I was, even with flip flops on my feet. No girly screaming like I did with the mouse. No. This time I was brave enough to stomp and shout with a very big voice like a very scary person. And bang a couple metal trash lids together like a one woman marching band. And Mr. Rat was so impressed he fell off one shelf and jumped down from another. The last I saw was his bare naked tail as it disappeared behind the hay.
Begone with you Templeton!
Now that I’ve impressed you with my wildlife management skills…you ARE impressed, aren’t you…now we can move on to Precious Man Dog (AKA Bean, AKA Benny) If you read Friday’s post, you’ll recall PMD was sorely in need of a haircut. Being a poodle mix the hair just grows. And grows. I let it grow over the winter to keep him warm. Dreadlocks happen and matts and clumps of thick, dense felt take over. Then in the spring I take to him with scissors and we start the cycle all over again.
So this was PMD last week.
This is him today, half the size he used to be. But so darn cute I can’t stand it.
Sophie is in the middle of her spring trim. I have to wait until she’s dead asleep before I can get certain spots. Like her chest. Right now she’s sporting a whole lot of chest hair. Throw a couple gold chains around her neck and she’d be a ringer for Burt Reynolds.
Okay, now it’s time to move on from critters, both wild and domestic, and get to art. Got a couple works in progress to show.
This is acrylic, 2’x2′. Don’t have a clue where it’s going but will know when it gets there. Layers and scribbles. Layers and scribbles.
This one is also acrylic, 36″x48″. Still very much a work in progress. Oh crap…as I’m writing this I’m wondering if I put the lid back on the jar of Titan Buff…well, let’s hope I did because it’s dark and I’m not heading back down to Studio Grande.
Speaking of Studio Grande, Mr. Spouse got some sheet rock up in the new! improved! Studio-Grande-to-be.
He was hoping to have it all rocked this weekend but it was slow going. Hard work indeed. But this is how Mr. Spouse relaxes from his desk job, he builds stuff. And I’m not complaining. By the way, this photo was taken after 6PM. Still good natural light, at least at this time of year. Even more when the tarps come off the skylights.
A gentle reminder that Wednesday is Random Acts of Art. I hope some of you will join me in sharing where you hide your treasures. You can send me photos before Tuesday (like, today) and I’ll post them on the blog. Or you can post the link to your own blog anytime between Wednesday and Saturday.
I’m posting art every day on my FaceBook page. Pop on over and check it out. And while you’re there, do me a GREAT BIG HUMONGOUS favor and click the ‘like’ button (for the page) if you haven’t done so already. And if you’ve already liked my page, pat yourself on the back because you are my BFF and I love you…truly love you… almost as much as I love chocolate!
And Studio Grande-in-progress has HALF a roof. Just half. The other side being nekked plywood. The skylights are in, all four of them. But Mr. Spouse wasn’t sure of the flashing, the stuff that makes them water-tight. With the storm door now open and rain/snow predicted all this week and beyond, he tarpped ’em, Danno. Just to be safe.
The side that has the roof, you know, shingles and stuff, did not leak at all in last night’s rain. That side has been the major leaker in the past so we are very pleased.
But the nekked side has two tarps. Because it leaks. This is the view from the back door of our house.
And this is the hobbit door. It will be painted red. And the bungee cord will be replaced with a real door knob.
There are other things to be done inside, less dramatic as far as photos go but enough to keep us busy since all outside work is on hold until the weather clears. Which could be weeks.
I say us but I really mean Mr. Spouse. It’s my studio but his project.
