Solicitors

When we first moved into "the Truman Show" almost nine years ago, we were bombarded with solicitors.  Foreign kids selling "their artwork".  People wanting to maintain our grass, our water, our lives.  Spiritual beings bringing us messages of salvation.  Individuals who thought we needed magazines, peepholes in our doors, and windshields replaced on the front drive.  Even though we had a huge no soliciting sign on our front door, there were days, always in the summer, where we'd have three or four of these types in a day.  It got to be exhausting making small talk, listening to the smooth talked message, and then declining the service.  Because of the soliciting, we just quit answering the door and kept the blinds closed a lot.  There is always so much confrontation with solicitors, when they know the "no" is coming and it makes me uncomfortable.  Gives me a stomach ache.  Stresses me out.

In the new house, I can't block us off from the world.  The front door is all windows and glass.  And whats worse?  My children are like little dogs...when they hear a knock or a doorbell ring, they race to the door because it's got to be something awesome waiting for them.  Now, most of the time it's a neighbor or the UPS man, but  a lot of the time it isn't.

Last fall, as I walked out to get the mail, I counted four different solicitors making their way around my street.  I raced into the house, headed upstairs and grabbed a piece of paper.  In all CAPITAL LETTERS I wrote a quick note, "NO SOLICITING.  Thank you!" and taped it to the window right by the door bell.

For the most part, it works.  People either read the sign and leave us alone, we aren't home, or I'm able to yell at the dogs stop the boys before they open the door and let the strangers in for a drink and some cookies.  Please know that this is an issue we work on daily - the whole door thing.  They are getting better and haven't actually opened the door for someone for a long time.  They do though, still rush the door to see who it is and then if they don't know, they run away, thus, requiring me to answer the door and see what someone wants to sell.

Anyway, flash forward to this afternoon.  We had just had a UPS delivery - new shoes for Disneyland - and were watching Star Wars Clone Wars.  The boys were a little pumped up.  Just as I walked into the bathroom to use the facilities the doorbell rang.  I heard the rush of their little, new shoe wearing, light saber wielding feet rush to the door.  I yelled at them from the bathroom "DON"T ANSWER THE DOOR" and finished what I was doing.

I suppose I could have just ignored the fact that the doorbell rang.  I'm not sure which is more rude.  Ignoring the door after my boys have made it obvious that we are home or saying "no thank you" several times, some forcefully to the solicitor.

Today our friendly neighborhood door knocker was Carl.  He was large and in charge and a smooth talker.  He talked a lot about "pay it forward" so much so that I thought that was the organization he was representing.  He started off nice enough, asking me about my life and stuff....the usual.  The he pulled out a giant bill-fold of little packets.  The first one he wanted me to write my name and that he was courteous.  Sure, I could do that but there was a catch.  If I signed, I had to buy magazines.  Now, the magazines were for me and would be sent to the homeless shelter and the Ronald McDonald house.  Um...okay.  I continued to listen and then told him that I wasn't interested in giving him $60 for magazines that I didn't want or need.

The next billfold came out to tell me that for a smaller donation, I could send magazines to charities and not get any for myself.  I declined.

Then the next billfold came out for me to give him a cash donation.  Here's the thing.  My husband and I donate 10 percent of our income to our church and that money is used all over the world to help people in need.  I give money to St. Jude's children's hospital and the disabled American veterans regularly because they send me address labels and cute little notebooks with teddy bears on them.  I donate to food drives whenever I know of one.  I tip generously every where I go.  I do my best to be charitable and generous.

Ross bought magazines from a lady last November because he thought she was nice.  We've never ever received one of those magazines.

I was not going to buy magazines from Carl.  When I told him this, he got a little angry and challenged me, asking if I believed in giving people an opportunity, in "Pay int forward", and why was I making him go back to his hotel room to tell his son he didn't make any money today.

Holy guilt trip batman.

It didn't work.

I didn't buy.

He yelled "God Bless" as he stomped off my porch.

My sign told him not to ring the bell.

Being Crafty, day three

There are a lot of blank walls in my new house. They are begging for decoration. They are also begging for a new wall color because the brown just grosses me out, but that's another blog post.

Anyway, there is a lot of blank space. I have a basement full of frames and artwork that just doesn't work in the new house - wrong sizes, wrong colors, etc. so I've taken it upon myself to try and liven things up a bit, decorating wise, and tackle a few different projects on my own.

I spied via pinterest weeks ago a beautiful painting that can be purchased from an etsy shop.  ( On etsy, I saw this.)  I loved the colors and the simplicity of the artwork and thought that it would be great to have something like this in my home....but, it would need to be on a grander scale because I have so much blank wall space.

One day last week when the boys were coloring I decided to color too.   With the painting as my inspiration, I thought, "gosh, wouldn't it be fun to have something similar to that painting but done like the seasons?"  "Why yes, yes it would I answered myself" and came up with this idea.

So, with a map in hand and some colors thought out the boys and I headed to the hobby lobby for some blank canvas' and paints.  We ended up buying 6 paint colors and 4 canvas, the total cost coming to about $30.  Not bad considering the painting that was my inspiration was $60 and I was planning on doing four paintings.

On Saturday, while my three boys were playing trains and watching football I set to work on my art at the kitchen table.  I'd spray painted each canvas white before I got started and sketched a few swirly circles to get me started.  If I do say so myself, I thought that the end result turned out pretty cool.  A very simple and inexpensive series of art to cover some of my naked walls.

Now, I just need to figure out where to hang them...which wall is begging to be covered.

Borrowing the idea

First, I love Pinterest.  If you don't have a pinterest account, sign-up for one.  It is the most lovely, refreshing way to get lost on the internet.  It is full of pretty and powerful and crafty and clever.  I have yet to find anything icky on Pinterest.

Second, I created my pinterest account when we moved into the new house.  This house was (and is) a blank slate with more wall space than I know what to do with.  I've spent most of my summer, when I get a few minutes to browse online when the boys are commatose in front of Phinneus and Ferb, looking at beautiful things I can do to decorate my home.

The problem with a site like pinterest is that a lot of what I see and think is lovely isn't something I have the time, know how, money or tools to do.  That however hasn't stopped me and I've taken matters into my own hands for a couple of projects.

A few weeks ago I found on pinterest a beautiful piece of art.  It was a blank canvas, with a quote on it in raised wooden letters, all painted white.  I followed the pins through the links and found that it was a custom art shop in the UK that would make such art for you for about $250 dollars.  I don't have that kind of money, but I have a hobby lobby close by so the boys and I ventured out.

I bought some blank canvas' (they were 2 in a pack for five bucks), and some wooden letters and set out to create my project.  I knew that this project would go in my room, that I wanted some song lyrics to be my text and I wanted it moderately mushy.  I settled on a section of the chorus to a Death Cab for Cutie song, "I will follow you into the dark."  This is one of my favorite songs, and back when I was pregnant with Wyatt and a hormonal mess, it brought me to tears driving in my car on several ocassions when I'd hear it on the radio.

Enough said.  My text took three canvas' and I had one left over.  I also had some gold metallic craft paint left over from painting treasure boxes the week before so I settled on a really bad ombre effect on the final canvas to even out the installation.  (I call it that, like it's real art, not a craft project in my garage.)

Anyway, the final product was hung today and I must say that I think it looks really great up on my wall.

Here's to decorating the blank slate house (and to my continuing love affair with pinterest.)

Stage One: Glue wooden letters onto canvas.

Stage Two: Spray paint each canvas/letter combination white.

Stage Three: Let dry, paint fourth canvas gold.

Stage Four: Hang on wall.

Stage Five: Admire handiwork.

 

Five Hundred Dollars

About a week before Ross left for Australia, I started making a list of things that I wanted to do while he was out of town.  You know the list - one of those massive and overly ambitious "Ill show you how capable I am doing everything on my own" sort of lists.  Well, after about 4 days the list got whittled down to the manageable stuff, but I still got quite a few things down.

I decided to pull some money out of my savings account for the "home improvement" project fund.  And, with the help of my sister, my dad, and some babysitting from my mom, here's the short list of everything that I got done in two short weeks.

• Hang blinds in all the house (10 windows to be exact).  The blinds were of course, all the wrong size so my dad and I had to hacksaw our way through this project, and I had to return a couple that just weren't going to work.
• Paint and create a map wall.
• Print and display cute cell phone pictures on cork boards.
• Make and hang a head board for my bed.
• Dig a distinct flower bed all around the house, pull out the grass, plant flowers and tall grasses - i.e. make the house look a little more civilized.
• Hem living room curtains.

These were the 5 major projects and I came in $6 under budget. There were lots of other little things I had to do like yard work, and house work, and laundry, and shavy jones work, and taking care of the kids, but finishing these projects on my own (with my family's help) felt like a major accomplishment.

The New House: Part 2

As of August 3, we'll have been in the new house for two months.  Can I tell you Internet friends and family that I'm really liking the new house.  We so totally fit in this house and can so totally live here forever ("Unless we move to Switzerland" says the bubble bursting husband.)

My favorite part of the new house is the kitchen and family room space.  I love that this house has a formal family room that, when we have guests, is situated as such that the guests cannot see the mess that the kitchen and family room may be in.  That, my friends, is a lovely thing to have - hiding spaces.

I love the open feel, the flow, and all the space.  Oh, this cooking and baking girl loves the space.  Our second weekend in the house I made over 100 cupcakes for my brother's Eagle Scout Court of Honor and wasn't crowded for one single second.  I love the island, and the dark cabinets.  The house is way to brown for my tastes, but I'll remedy that soon enough.

As I said, the kitchen leads right int the family room. I can be cooking or at the kitchen table and still keep a view on the boys and all their furniture climbing and wrestling. Which of course, they now have the space to do. Something in the old house they could not.

All the rooms in the house are still a work in progress of course, but this one is starting to take shape.

AAAaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!

Wednesday morning, I was standing at the kitchen sink and noticed something strange out the window in the neighbors grass.

I looked and looked and looked and decided it was a dead bird.  A dead bird that was not in my yard.

I forgot about it.

Yesterday morning I was standing at the same kitchen sink looking out the same kitchen window and noticed something strange in my grass.

A dead bird.

The same dead bird that the day before had been in my neighbors yard.

How do dead birds move?

Thursday is "mow the lawn" day and after a morning of running errands I couldn't delay any longer.  I had to move the dead bird.  (I just threw up a little in my mouth)

I got a shovel, some gloves, a plastic bag and a rock (to hold the plastic bag open).  I also had two helpers who were SO EXCITED to see a dead bird ("Mom, I've never seen a dead bird before....can I help?")

I thought the bird would be stiff and I could just flick it into the bag.

The bird was not stiff.  It was squishy.

blahhhhhhhhh!

I got it in the bag, in the garbage and out of my grass.  I felt bad but knew that my grandma would be proud of me for getting rid of the bird (Internet, remind me to tell you the store of when my grandma picked up a snake in my yard while my mom, sister and I stood in the house and screamed!).

Fast forward.....

I noticed a little dirt pile when mowing the lawn yesterday afternoon that was a new dirt pile.  I didn't think anything of it.  This morning I walked past a big picture window in the living room and looked more closely at the dirt pile.  I took a picture and texted Ross this message:

I'm concerned about this pile of dirt.  It just appeared yesterday.  This morning I noticed a big hole in the pile.  Do you think we might have a critter?

Time out:  Why me?  Why does this stuff always happen to me?  It's all because he's going out of town for work....things are going to fall apart.  It's going to be like the movie the money pit when tom hanks walks into a room, onto a rug, onto a hole and falls through getting stuck for hours until Shelly long comes home to rescue him.

Just a little while ago I had to take some garbage out and decided to get a closer, but safe distance away, look at the hole.  I rounded the corner of the yard and was not only greeted by a pile of dirt and a hole, but a little critter venturing from his earthen home into my flower bed.

I calmly walked back into the house, cursing the critter gods, and grabbed my camera.  When a paranoid girl like myself see's such critters, it is best to document them for the husband who never believes me.

Once I showed the boys what was going on, the critter was a great baby sitter for a good 15 minutes.  Every time it came out, they banged on the window and yelled, watching it duck back into it's home. 

Why is it that every home I own must be invaded by critters?  Why?

I'll tell you one thing...I haven't worked so hard on my grass and flower beds so that they can be attacked by critters.

I'll tell you another thing....I'm terrified of critters and may not ever go outside again.

In a nutshell...

We did science experiments

We tried to make movies

We ran errands

We took notes

Some of us ate hot dogs

Some of us at Chipotle corn salsa

We cleaned the BBQ

Had the family over for Sunday dinner

We learned new games

Had naps in the sun

And little Miss Molly had to sing a song with her crazy screaming cousin.

The New House. Part 1.

Phew!  The last week of our lives has flown by.  Last week was so overwhelming for me, because I'm a control freak spaz, that I texted my mom to tell her I was having a nervous breakdown.  She left a meeting and called me immediately, helping me calm down.  She reminded me, in a nice and comforting way, that I am a control freak spaz and that in situations like moving to a new home, I have to take it slow...that everything cannot be done instantly.

At times like that, I wish I was magic like on "Bewitched".  I wish I could be Samantha and just wiggle my nose and voila!  the living room is put together.

Speaking of living room, that's the only part of the house that is, for right now, 100% organized.  The furniture is in place, the pictures are hung, and civility abounds.  No boxes, no papers, no dust.  It is compete.  I still need a big area rug that's got a lot of pretty red in it, but I'm pretty comfortable with how it looks.

I'm really liking the new house.  I like how our stuff fits in the house, matches the house and how it really feels like home.  To be completely honest, I sort of have forgotten what it was like in the old house.  I'm glad that I've got so many pictures.

Speaking of pictures, here are a few of the very brown living room.

The yard at this new house is a bit of a disaster. The grass is totally dead, but we're working on reviving it. While waiting for the moving truck last week, my work crew pulled all the weeds out of the flower beds. That was so appreciated. With a little time on my hands today (thanks Haley, Molly, Willie and Parker for taking the monkeys to the zoo) I was able to plant some flowers in the front.

It makes my heart happy to have flowers. And I can hardly wait for them to fill in throughout the rest of the summer.