First World Problems

OK, firstly, I've got a plant blooming in my bathroom.  


It's December and my addled plant, which I drag in every winter so it doesn't die, is sprouting flowers. What's more, the flowers smell and the odor is quite potent. Not potent in a bad way, mind, just strong--like honeysuckle.


Here's the thing: the fact that it smells like honeysuckle in my bathroom means it smells like April in there.  And I don't want it to smell like April, I want it to smell like the holidays.  Give me cinnamon and cloves! Give me oranges! Give me evergreen! Do not offer up some floral nonsense.  It's disconcerting when I'm bathing. How's a girl supposed to relax? 

In continuation with my whole The-plants-Are-Feeling-Amorous-Therefore-Are-Out-To-Get-Me theme....


Say You: The plant is out to get you because it's blooming? 


Say me: Clearly. 


Anyway....this guy?  

Ignore the shadows that scream "amateur photographer!" 

He also lives in my bathroom. I discovered last night that the bastard and his posse are staging a full-on invasion: 

Say you: All I see in the reflection is a blue towel that is folded different from all the others...


Say me: OK, disregard my towels* and look closer:

Seriously.  Ignore the shadows.

Do you see that? He's literally growing across my bathroom wall. If I hadn't caught this, in another month's time he would have connected with the little trollop that lives across the room (also seen in the mirror), they would have gotten naughty and soon enough there would be the birth of a swamp monster via my shower head: 

This is totally the swap monster I prevented from being born. Not a museum relic.

Thank God I now have that plant's number and I can let it know who's boss. Many thanks to Fiskars scissors, who made my bad-ass dominance a possibility. 


Lastly, I'm so done with glitter (after I finish this current series of ornaments) it's not even funny. 


It's OVER. 


We're getting divorced. 


I mean it. 


Really. 


Just look at what it did to my Otter box:

All I did was drop my phone on a Christmas ornament that was in the drying process. Now I'm forced to walk around with unwanted unsolicited bling.


Let me tell you something: Elmer's glue? It works. ->


Song of the week: 





*For the record, I did not fold that towel. I blame The Geek. 

Sharpies! For the Languid Approach to Crafting

Or, 


Yet another reason why I'm a Sharpie Slut.  


There are people out there who take their crafting seriously.  


There are people who make honest attempts and do it wrong. 


And then there are people like me.  People who like the idea of crafting and like the results of crafting and can sometimes go into a manic-y crafty phase, but for the most part feel it's an awful lot of damn work, not to mention messy, thus laziness tends to trump desire 78% of the time. 


To wit: 


Why on earth would anyone feel the need to dig out all the paints, paint brushes, cups with water for rinsing the paint brushes, drop clothes for the inevitable mess from the paint and brushes, and cleaning cloths for said paint and brushes and WHY  would anyone walk all the way to back of the house to retrieve all that paraphernalia when there's an office right there in the kitchen and said office has what?  


Say you: Sharpies! 
Say me: YES!  Sharpies that hello?  Don't drip. And don't spill.  Winner, winner, chicken dinner.  Right here. 


So, in continuing with my new, posting-gratuitous-pictures-on-the- blog entries theme, allow me to show you Little Missy's creations from last week.  


First though, the step-by-step instructions: 


Items you need: 
1) Sharpies.  If you're particularly indifferent, you can whittle this down to a singular Sharpie. Color: black. 
2) Cute little pumpkins 


The project  


1) Give the pumpkins and Sharpie(s) to your kid 
2) Let her draw on the pumpkins. 
3) Drink wine surf Facebook surf Pinterest Sit back and watch your progeny create. 
4) Feel smug because you run a craft paint free establishment. 


Time for the project: 15 minutes.  Time for the photos: Well...read on. No matter that I was languid with the craft. Clearly I can't hide my OCD tendencies. 


First I took this picture of her creations mid-project, to demonstrate my ability using the uber-close-up feature on the fancy camera. And to be all arty: 

I thought it was a nice little vignette. I would have been satisfied with just this picture. But Little Missy's immediate response upon the viewing was:  


LM: Aww...you didn't put the Dracula one on top?  


Significant oversight on my part, not letting Dracula be King of the Pumpkins.   


Bad Mom!  


So I told her I would and take another picture.  


LM: You need to wait until I get ALL the pumpkins done and then take a picture of all them.  


Silly me, leaving those other pumpkins out.  As I social worker, I should know better than to exclude and discriminate against certain members of the gourd population.  


Bad social worker!   


So she set to work getting all the pumpkins decorated and soon enough declared them ready to go.  After she took the time to arrange them just so, I snapped the shot: 

Say you: Very cute...
Say me: Hold up!  


I'm sure you couldn't help but notice that there is something drastically, horribly wrong with this photo.  I simply couldn't let it stand as it would enormously affect the overall quality of my blog. Which is exceedingly high, as you know. 


Here, let me help you out:

Can you just see how that random brick and the planter in the background simply ruins the snapshot?  How can you possibly concentrate on my daughter's little Sharpie wonders with those eyesores completely screwing up the composition? 


Right.  


You can't. 


It's simply impossible.  


So I took another picture:  

Say you: Very nice! No more brick, no more planter. 
Say me: Hold up!  

The little fella there on your left is kind of fuzzy and in the shadows.  That simply won't do. After already disenfranchising these guys once that day, I was in no mood to deal with the ramifications if I did so again.   


Obviously, another shot was in order:

UGH!  

And again: 

Ew. Disaster.  


SY: What's wrong with that one?  It looks fine!
SM:  SHUT. UP.  I can't display a pumpkin pyramid that's off its horizontal axis!  

Letting a picture like this stand would imply I have low standards.  It would imply that I've used Sharpies on an actual painting project in my home!  


Wait...


Never mind.


Moving on.


But before I do, let me just say this: those blasted pumpkins were hardly cooperative during this whole endeavor.  Since the earth kept rotating around the sun (can you believe the nerve?), resulting in the sunlight, you know, moving, we had to re-arrange the pumpkins accordingly more than once. Oftentimes there was mutiny: 

Little bastards.  


Finally, after taking like, 20 pictures, I got one I could live with: 

There!  Observe, if you will, the finished shiny, Sharpie fun-time Halloween happy, happy, joy easy-peasy-with-no-drips project!  


SY: Umm...I hate to point this out...
SM: Don't go there...
SY: ....but....
SM: Seriously?  DON'T...
SY: I can see the planter in the background again. 
SM: *Looking at the picture in stunned disbelief* 
SM:*Now looking at you and wanting to maim you*

HERE!  Satisfied?  

SY: Well, Dracula's a wee bit fuzzy. And the corner guys are not looking straight...
SM: Get off my blog.  


I thought we were done with the project. I really did. But after the impromptu photo shoot on the deck, Little Missy went on a scavenger hunt and found this, not to mention a buddy, not pictured here:

Aw, hell.  


Sharpies weren't going to really work on a warty, bi-colored gourd*.  


I Really, really did not want to get out those paints.....


.....thought hard....looked around office....


Eureka!! 

->


PS: Did you know there was a band out there called The Gourds? Oh, the power of the Googles...

Warning! Revolting DYI Project

Or, why I'm a Sharpie Slut, episode #3.  


So.  


You may or may not be aware that this year was the Year of the Bathroom here at Mattek Central.  And I really mean "year".  In January we declared that we would tear down the bathroom and start from scratch.  Here it is August and it's still not done.  


I have a few photos from early on that I'll treat you to.  But really, you don't need to know much more than the tile in the bathroom was peach and rust.  


That's right.  


I can't make these colors combos up.  Take a gander: 

And it gets better!  Check out the floor we had going: 

Can you see the spot where the original tile layers missed the pattern?  Honestly, we probably lived here for five years before anyone noticed it.  I thought about trying to keep the original floor for that little quirk alone, but was able to let go in short order.  Brown and pink and gray?  No thanks.  


So, at one point this is what we were living with: 

  
What?  You don't have your throne sitting on 2 x 4s?  


Fast forward, like, eight months: 

What was once a tub/shower combo (complete with rotten studs around the old window) is now just a shower.  The Boy gave it its maiden voyage this morning, actually.  The verdict? Water not hot enough.  


Say you: So this is the DYI project?  The bathroom? 
Say me: Lord, no.  The Geek did the lion's share of the re-do and we paid to get the tile installed. I simply painted (one side) of the door.  


Little Missy said she did NOT want to get rid of the checkerboard pattern we had on the door before the remodel (it was a light brown and tan).  My neighbor had the nerve to suggest magnetic paint would be "fun." 


I acquiesced.  


Herein lies my first mistake.  


Have you ever painted a checkerboard pattern?  I mean with black and white paint?  And decided it would be Oh-so-fun to make it magnetic? And just for kicks, did a faux technique on top?  


Seriously, don't go there.  


Biggest. Pain. In. My. Arse. EVER. 


The Project 


Time required: If you're like me, and put steps off, three days.  If you're not like me, it's easily a one-day project. 

Materials you will need: 


1) Your sanity.  Once you acquire that, you will let this go.  Should you be unable to locate it, you will also need...
2) Magnetic paint.  I used Rustoleum brand, because that's what they had at the store.  
3) White latex paint
4) Black latex paint if you're even more anal than me.  
5) Glaze and top color for faux technique.  Obviously I used the wall color pictured above.
6)  Square tool, measuring tape and a light colored pencil for marking your checkerboard pattern  
7) Paint brushes, painter's tape, towel for spills, wet rag, old t-shirt, latex gloves 
8) Black Sharpie 


OK, first of all, magnetic paint isn't actually paint.  It's primer.  So already you're adding extra steps because you have to paint over it at least once.  And because it's black, (the can says it's dark grey, but they lie.  It's black.)  the painting white over it is troublesome.  Secondly, that shit is expensive.  Almost 25 bucks for a quart, and believe me when I tell you, you need a lot of it.  I went through 3/4 of a can on one side of a door.  If you want a wall done, you'll need at least a gallon and probably two.  


So, get after it.  Start painting!  But I'm here to warn you, one coat simply does not do the trick.  I painted my door four times to finally get my test magnet to stick.  Also you need to MIX the paint well before each application.  Why?  Because the way they make the paint primer magnetic is by mixing in iron powder, powder which sinks to the bottom pretty quickly.  Because, you know, it's iron.  Also, you will not be able to use big, powerful magnets on this paint.  Just little ones, like the cheap freebies you get from businesses or magnetized plastic letters.  


After you  paint prime the door four to five times...


Say you: you said four times.  
Say me: I just quit after four times.  It probably wouldn't hurt to paint it a fifth time. 


...and let it dry, then you get to MEASURE.  


YEAH!  


Love it.  


(ahem)


Before I get to measuring though, one more thing about this damned primer.  It doesn't behave like regular latex paint even though it's water based.  It takes quite a bit of scrubbing to get it off your hands (and you will get it on your hands) and be prepared to get out the mineral spirits for cleaning the brushes, because soap and water simply doesn't cut it.  


Now for measuring:  


Grab your measuring tape and measure width and height of the door to figure out how big your squares need to be.  Fortunately, my door is 24" x 80", so my squares were an even 8 inches each.  I think this is close to standard size.   Using your square tool and colored pencil, map out your pattern.  Measure twice before you start painting!  You would be amazed how those lines can creep on you, even with a good ruler.   (I would like to point out that mapping out these lines took forever as I had to re-map three rows.) 


Now, take your painters tape, and tape off every other square and start painting your white squares. I would start with one or two just to see how you're doing:   

See those white spots?  That was me telling myself which squares needed to be which color.  It's not a bad idea.  


Let dry.  Paint round two.  Then peel off your painters tape.  And curse.  Loudly.   

For the love of all that is holy in this world, why, why, WHY do I get sucked into buying and using painter's tape?  WHY?  It never works for me.  Ever.  I am so good about making straight lines and pressing the tape down so it's nice and firm on the surface and inevitably the damn paint creeps where it's not supposed to go and I have to go back and fix it.  It makes me crazy. 


The Geek got all clever and suggested I paint the door on a horizontal surface as opposed to leaving the door upright, thereby defying the laws of gravity.  In theory, that was an excellent suggestion.   


In reality?  

Excellent. Checkerboard as interpreted by Jackson Pollock.  


Naturally,  I'm  forced to fix each and every one of those wonky lines. 


I didn't put wine on the list of supplies, did I?  I should have.  


In retrospect, I probably should not have used paint that was old and required re-hydrating. Better yet, I should have just not re-hydrated the paint, as older, thicker paint would probably have been harder to paint with but not have colored outside the lines.   


No matter.  I was stuck with an abstract impressionist checkerboard that required immediate attention.  


First I tried fixing the lines freehand.  Which was an unmitigated disaster.  Then I tried a ruler-and-paint-brush method with black paint to fix the spreads: 

That didn't really work very well.  I painstakingly painted along the ruler with a detail paint brush. I went through three different rulers, which took 30 minutes, before deciding on one that leaked the least amount of paint while offering the "straightest" line.  Which wasn't very straight. 


There were color mishaps along the way:  

Then the ruler broke: 

At which point I was ready to throw, I don't know, perhaps a gallon of paint at the nearest wall.  


I didn't.  


But I was still stuck with straggly lines.  


Then it hit me. 


Hello!  Sharpie!!  It's permanent ink and really, really dark and dependable and behaves in situations which call for straight lines and, most importantly, is in abundance at my place.  


Say you:  A Sharpie on a paint project that's going to be on display in your home?  Have you no pride? 
Say me: None.  


It took me about 30 minutes to clean up that mess.  I didn't go over every line (I left the ones I had "fixed" with the paint and ruler alone) but I disguised the worst of the lot.*  Let me just point out that looking at black and white checkers for any length of time is disconcerting.  It almost made me dizzy and when I looked at my kitchen walls after staring at the black and white, I felt like a Merry Prankster.  


Since I opted out of painting black paint over the black primer because I'm lazy wanted to save some money,  I was ready for the final phase. You could, of course, paint the black paint over the black primer. But why?  Why had that additional headache of none-working painter's tape producing not-even-close-to-straight lines, when you're just going to add a glaze mixture on top? 


Exactly.  


Toss the black paint.  


Faux technique:  


Mix a glaze to pigment ratio that you can live with.  The more pigment (paint) you use, the darker the final color will be.  For this I used a 4:1 glaze to pigment ratio. 


Dip that old t-shirt in the glaze mixture and start rubbing, then quickly wipe excess mixture away.  Work fast because the glaze dries in a hurry. Note the texture on the primer is quite rough and a bit harder to work on.  If you want your glaze to be darker, add another layer.  


Ta da!  

Yes, that little-bitty circle is a magnet.  Don't look too closely or you'll see the lines that aren't perfectly straight. 


Go ahead.  I dare you try this at home.  -> 


*I've gone back and looked at the door a few times.  The places that I didn't fix with my beloved Sharpie drive me crazy. But not crazy enough to take down the door and mend them.  So I'm going with the argument that imperfect is good because it's hand-painted.  Besides, magnets can mask all those blemishes, right?  Right.  

Mega

Oh, these are just dying to be bought, aren't they?  Thirty MEGA JUMBO crayons in a cool little plastic container.  And better yet: They're sold in the art section of a book store.  

Instant panache.  

And who doesn't want panache scattered amongst their art supplies?  

Plus, look at those colors! Sure, the classic Crayola 64-ct box has more than twice as many colors (and for the record, it's simply an abomination to peel the labels off crayons until absolutely necessary.  And even then it kills me), but here's the real question: Does that box have panache?  

I think the answer is clear.  

Say you: So how much were they? 

Say me: You're changing the subject.  -> 

"Marbled" Paper

I interrupt this regularly scheduled blog for a Mommy Blogger Craft Post. 


I'll give you some time to hurl.  


(...waiting....)


(You drank some water on sucked on an Altoid, right?) 


OK.  


So.  


Summer doldrums kick in pretty early and I thought making marbled paper would be a happy, happy, fun, fun, minimal cost project.  Before we go any further and in the spirit of keeping with this year's theme, "minimal cost" translated to $9.50. 


I saw a Youtube tutorial on it, but I'm going to give you the step-by-step complete-with-pictures post, thereby channeling my inner-Mormon-Bloggy-Mom.  But I'm warning you.  I digress from their style in that some of my pictures are fuzzy, and I'm just not one to care enough to re-stage the photographs. My pic of the day isn't fuzzy, which is good enough for me.  


Say you: You have an inner-Mormon-bloggy-Mom?
Say me: Apparently.  


Ready?  Here goes.  


Materials you need: 

• card stock or regular paper 
• food coloring
• shaving cream  (Yes.  I'm serious) 
• A scraper of some kind
• a fork (Trust me.  This all comes together)
• plates
• big towel to cover your work surface  

Prep time:  Five minutes
Time distracting the wee ones: 1/3 the time it's going to take me to blog about the whole thing. In other words, not nearly long enough. 


Step one.  Get out your shaving cream: 

Step two: Spray out an alarming amount of shaving cream onto your allotted plate.  Don't freak about using a plate.  This is soap for crying out loud.  It will wash off.   (Please ignore paper plate in the pictures)

Before we go any further, can we just talk about how fun shaving cream is?  No joke. That stuff is as squeezable and irresistible as a fat baby.  I mean really, you can just stop right here and play with the whipped shaving cream, it's so mesmerizing....


Onward.  


Next, take your food coloring (gratuitous picture alert)

Pic of the day

and put dots of color randomly on your mound of cream: 

Oh, let's add one more color, just for shits and giggles. 


Say you: I don't think Mormon Mommy bloggers use the word "shit" in their posts. 
Say me: I bet this ex-Mormon Mom uses worse.  


Anyway, one more color.  Just for shits and giggles: 

Now for the fork.  Take your fork and swirl those colors around, but not to the point that they're mixed completely together.  You know, "marble" it.  

(Do you like how I kept the fork in the picture?  More artsy, no?)


Next, take a piece of paper and squish it down on your mound of cream and swirly colors.  This, my friends, is why the first thing you did was place a towel under your work surface....


Say you: You said step one was getting out the shaving cream! 
Say me: Did I?  Oh.  I guess I did.  Well, step one SHOULD be covering your work surface with a towel.   


Anyway.  Squish. 

Pull it off 

And scrape away the shaving cream: 

Ta da!  (please excuse the REALLY blurry picture.  My hands were covered with all kinds of shit)


Say you: There's that word again
Say me: Bite me.  
Say you: I don't think a Mormon Mommy would use such a retort.  
Say me: Bite me again. 


As I was saying....


Ta da!   

If you're so inclined, now is the time to clap with glee and hurryandmakeanotheronebecauseWOWsosocool!  


 The excess on the scraper can be reused to cover the remaining paper, not the mention the leftover shaving cream sitting on your plate.  You can also add contrasting color to this used mixture for a more vibrant look. 


At this point, you're free to use your paper for all kinds of silly crafts home projects. 


Here was the end result of our endeavors: 

I would also like to point out that we tried this method, which was referred by a Mormon Mommy.

Disaster.  


I know she insists you get "beautiful results".  Which I suppose is one to describe oil spots on paper: 

 Trust me when I tell you that this was pretty much the way it went for all my efforts.  So I sorta improvised, wadded up the paper and dipped it right into the coloring:  

Which simply resulted in more coverage on oily, now-scrunched up paper.  And stains on my picnic chair:

And my picnic table: 

Did I mention I forget to wear gloves?  ->

Benefiting

I tend not to buy "Pink" products.  

No, I don't hate women who've had breast cancer.  


Yes, I'm aware of the statistics and realize it could be me someday. 

Yes, I want to see a cure.  

But do I think the concept of buying something in the grocery store to aid a cause is a bit disingenuous?  

Yes.  Yes I do.  

And don't try to equate The Pink Ribbon campaign, which you can't deny is close to the saturation point, with Suzi Smith from the local elementary school knocking on my door and selling me overpriced wrapping paper or candy because it's the not the same thing.  

Well, OK. Essentially it is.  But I'm not going to deny some cute kid the opportunity to peddle raise money for the The Man her education.  Besides, local school systems around the country have slowly been gutted over the years, teachers are under attack and I'm a huge supporter of public education. 

But I'm going to go out on a limb and say Bic isn't hurting. These marketing techniques, called "cause-related marketing", are wildly beneficial to the bottom lines of companies who throw a pink ribbon on their packaging.  There is no true philanthropy, right? I would call it schadenfreude if I was a cynic.  

(*cough*)

To be fair, Bic's money (which is to say, YOUR money if you chose to buy the product) is going here,  the gold standard for donating money for breast cancer research.  Of course, you could just give them money directly and cut out the middle man, yes?  ->