One month.

Today, The Mister is coming home! He's been gone since February 28, so you can probably imagine how excited we are. :) While this hasn't actually been our longest time apart by a long shot, this month has been particularly busy. Since my husband left one month ago...

• My laundry room floor has been installed incorrectly TWICE. (Most recent iteration earlier this week. I'm in vinyl flooring HELL)
• My barely-one-month-old tire got a 3"-long siding nail stuck in it and was unfixable. Thank goodness for the warranty (This was yesterday's disaster)
• My toilet leaked
• My washing machine leaked
• Porter knocked heads with another kid hard, threw up, then went to sleep, making me terrified all night long that he had a concussion
• My beloved grandpa died unexpectedly, devastating my entire family. I had to load up my kids and drive four hours to the funeral alone.
• My dog got sick the day after my grandpa's death, requiring an emergency trip to the vet, a $100 antibiotic and a frantic search to find somebody willing to take my sick dog for the weekend while I went to the funeral.
• My mom slipped on a piece of food in a grocery store and tore her ACL and then had the subsequent repair surgery
• We had two major snowstorms, one of which was the day of Maren's birthday party, which meant we had to do a pinata in my living room
• Some little stinker girl was stealing food from Maren's lunch and snack repeatedly and we had to get the teacher involved to stop it
• I made the disgusting mistake of buying California rolls sushi from Costco
• I had a mouthful of canker sores all at one time, making eating and drinking anything absolutely miserable
• Porter dumped a giant new bottle of nail polish remover, a lip gloss, and a $45 bottle of face serum down the bathtub drain while I was downstairs vacuuming up the neverending dog hair because Bronco is shedding his winter coat
• My vacuum died
• I haven't cooked in a month so we have eaten terribly
• I basically quit blogging

On the upside, this also happened:

Maren turns 8

• Maren turned 8 years old and I managed to pull together a fun birthday party for her mostly at the last minute with my Party Ninja skillz
• Porter started preschool, giving me five hours of blissful alone time each week 
• I was honored be able to give the eulogy at my grandfather's funeral
• My dad came out for a weekend to help me around the house and give me some moral support
• We got to see much of my extended family at my grandpa's funeral
• I thrifted some cool stuff including a 1943 letterman sweater

My friends were so, SO wonderful! They brought me dinner, invited us over for dinner, watched Porter to give me a break, volunteered husbands for fixing the toilet, took my sick dog and loved him for a weekend, brought brownies and ice cream and flowers and cupcakes when I was sad, consoled me and commiserated with me when I complained on Facebook, jumped in to lend a hand in the indoor pinata debacle, sent condolence cards and texts and generally lifted me up and supported me in so many ways. I am truly blessed! I couldn't have made it through this without them and their kindness.

Porter's first day of Preschool

And now, The Mister is on his way home. Sure, I complained about being home and facing all that nonsense alone but I know I had it better--he spent the month in the barracks (hello, cinderblock walls and hard furniture) with a stranger for a roommate and eating in the chow hall (just like living in the dorms. When you're 40 and married and have two children.) and the course he was taking was HARD--much, much more difficult than he had anticipated. He got the highest grade in the class and I am SO proud of him!

Bring on April! 

Where I've been

Hello, friends! I've never been a terribly consistent blogger but it's even unlike me to go nearly an entire month without a peep. This last three weeks has been a bit rough, so blogging has been the last thing on my mind. The Mister has been out of town for a long time and will be gone for a little while yet. His stepping on an airplane seems to be my house's cue to fall apart, and in the first week he was gone we had both a leaky toilet and a leaky washing machine. Thankfully, I have kind friends willing to lend handy husbands and my dad came for a quick visit so we managed to get all the water mopped up. I'm crossing all my fingers and toes that nothing else springs a leak or bursts into flames before The Mister comes home!

An update on my laundry room situation: it's still not done. Seriously. We've gone beyond ridiculous and have approached Ludicrous Speed (name that movie). The last time I posted, my vinyl flooring was supposed to be installed that day but was delayed a week because somebody failed to get it ordered. Well, they did finally show up the following Monday and the installer did both my bathroom (not related to the laundry room disaster) and the laundry room. It's a long story, but the gist of it is that the floor in the laundry room looks TERRIBLE. Completely unacceptable. From there, it was a fight between the contractor and the insurance. Today I finally got a call back from the contractor that they will start work on this next Monday and then hopefully in just a few days it will be ALL OVER. I'm so, so very ready for it to be finished. The good news is that I have had my washer and dryer back in service even though the floor was crap, so I have been able to wash my own undies in my own house, a welcome occurrence after more than a month and a half without that convenience.

The most difficult part of the last three weeks has been undoubtedly the unexpected passing of my dear grandfather. He passed away last Wednesday. I supposed when you're 87, death is not exactly a completely unexpected occurrence but we were all very unprepared for it and it was very difficult, especially without The Mister to lean on. It was hard for him to be so far away and he was not able to come back for the funeral service, but I know he supported me the best he could from across the country and I am thankful for that.

My grandpa was a great, great man. The finest man I've yet known, in fact. Here's a link to his obituary, if you're so inclined. I had the honor and privilege of giving the eulogy at his funeral service. He was a man of integrity and honor. He was a hard worker who also knew how to have fun. He was devoted to his family and always put them first. He was extremely generous to his family and many people and organizations in his community. I have him to thank that I was able to go to college, go on my Study Abroad to London, and graduate without any student loans. He was the kind of man I'd be proud to have my son grow up to emulate. I will miss him terribly and hope that I can honor his legacy to be the kind of person that he was.

Now, I'm scrambling to get ready for Maren's birthday party on Saturday. Last year I had everything planned and organized and all ready to go. This year, I'm throwing it together at the last minute. I'm still not entirely sure what we're even going to do besides eat cake, open presents and whack a pinata. Thankfully the girls are old enough now that I don't have to have every single second planned out--they're happy to play and talk with each other and their attention spans are longer. Unfortunately the weather forecast is for 29 degrees and 4-8" of snow, so I can't just send them outside to run around. I'm not exactly thrilled that we'll be doing a pinata inside the living room, but there just isn't another option. I'm sure I'll get it all pulled together and I know it will be fun, but I sure wish I had about two more days to get things prepared!

What should be happening today, but isn't

What should be happening today, but isn't? The vinyl flooring in my laundry room and hall bathroom, that's what. (Insert a really CRANKY face here)

Last week the Project Manager called and scheduled the vinyl floor installation for this morning at 9:00 a.m. Oh, I was so excited! I knew the jobs were small enough that they'd be finished by the end of the day and had planned to start my very first load of laundry as soon as the washer and dryer had been hooked up again. And then I planned to do laundry for about the next 36 hours straight to get myself all caught up again. I have never looked forward to doing laundry in my life but I can tell you that pretty much nothing would make me happier at this point.

Yesterday, the Project Manager called and said that the installation couldn't take place today because the vinyl I chose was a "special order" and wouldn't be available for a few days. So hang on a sec--I emailed my vinyl choices to the Estimator on Friday, February 15--more than a week ago. SOMEBODY dropped the ball BIG TIME--I don't know if it was the Estimator or the Project Manager, but I am MAD! If they had ordered my vinyl last week when they were supposed to do it, then it would have been ready to install today. Instead, I get to continue haul my laundry to my friends' homes for YET ANOTHER WEEK. Ooh, I am STEAMING MAD!

Not to mention the fact that my husband removed the toilet in the hall bathroom yesterday morning, a few hours before the Project Manager called. The Estimator wanted to charge us $200 to remove and replace the toilet--a fairly simple DIY job--so we opted to do it ourselves and The Mister had it all done and ready to go for the installation this morning. There's no point in buying a new wax seal and reinstalling the toilet, when we'll just have to do it again in a week. Only now there's a new complication--The Mister is leaving on Thursday morning to go out of town for an entire MONTH--so now I have to see if I can 'borrow' one of my friends' husbands to come and put the darn toilet back together when the vinyl is done next week. AND--I'm down one toilet for a week! That's not a crisis as we have 3 others in the house, but STILL--it's a needless hassle.

I swear, every friend or family member I've ever known that has had to use a contractor in their homes said it ALWAYS took longer than expected and ALWAYS was fraught with headaches and extra hassles. Count me in among them. At the end of this, it will have taken more than an entire month for those bozos to complete THREE days of actual work. Believe me, I can't wait until the job is done to write a LOVELY evaluation of their services for the agency that recommended them. I'm getting my typing fingers ready right now.

Tick tock, a broken red clock

Yesterday, there was a tragedy in my house.

Okay, fine, it might not exactly qualify as a tragedy, but I'm still sad! My beloved red plastic retro kitchen clock fell right off the wall and met with an untimely end on the wood floors. I thrifted the clock back in 2008--I was surprised to see that I've had it so long!

When I first bought it at the thrift store for 80¢ the clock mechanism didn't work. I fixed it by buying another 80¢ clock at the same thrift store and using the working mechanism in it to replace the non-working one in my red clock. Pretty thrifty and smart, if I do say so myself!

Now I'm on the hunt for a new retro-style wall clock. All day long yesterday I caught myself looking at the wall where this one hung! There's actually a carriage-style clock hanging directly on the other side of the kitchen so if I just turn my head in the other direction there's still a clock--but force of habit has me looking at the empty spot. If you know of a cute clock I need to see, let me know!

Soda-lighted it's Valentine's Day!

Possibly one of my favorite vintage Valentines ever! Found via Pinterest.

PS--The visit with the Project Manager yesterday went well--as I type, there are dudes in my basement building a new subfloor! It's a Valentine's Day Miracle!

The Laundry room saga...stalled

So, an update on my basement situation. Let me remind you what my laundry/food storage room looked like back on January 25:

And let me show you how my basement looks today, February 12:

Well, to be honest, that's not totally accurate. Cover up the machinery in the corners of the second photo and that's what it looks like. Astute readers such as yourself might notice that there has been NO CHANGE. And that, of course, is the problem.

The mold/water remediation guys packed up their big blower machines and left on Monday, January 28. We contacted the restoration/building company the following day, they called me back on Wednesday and their estimator came out to see the job on Thursday. Since then, we've been waiting for the project manager to contact us; he finally called last Friday to schedule a time to come see the job tomorrow. So that means for the last two weeks we've been sitting around and twiddling our thumbs because we're totally at their mercy. Two weeks more of doing my laundry at my friends' homes. Two weeks more of having to buy groceries that I know I already had down on my food storage shelves, but can no longer locate because all the food is boxed up and piled in the basement family room.

So the project manager will come tomorrow, look at the job, and then assign out the work to subcontractors. And who knows when they'll show up or how long it will take them to get the work done and my laundry room back in working order? It could be another few weeks, if things continue at the same (glacial) speed that they have so far. Monday marked one month since we filed our insurance claim and back when we did that, I naively thought it would all be over and done with by now. Wrong!

So after you read this, do me a favor and be thankful for your washer and dryer, if you're lucky enough to have a set in your home. You might even give them a kind word and a little pat if nobody's looking. I know that I took my ability to do laundry in my own home, on my own terms and timeline completely for granted before. You can bet your Tide With Bleach I won't be making that mistake again!

The 1940s White Christmas Ball part 2: What we did

My last post talked about what we wore to the Ball so today I can tell you what we did once we were all gussied up!

The 1940s White Christmas Ball was held in the Wings Over the Rockies Air and Space Museum, a facility that is housed in an airplane hangar. It was such a perfect location for this event! There was plenty of space and there was no shortage of interesting exhibits and things to look at.

The centerpiece of the party was the stage where there were all kinds of entertaining performances throughout the night. There was a Polynesian band (who of course played "Mele Kalikimaka"), a fantastic swing band called the Hot Tomatoes, an Andrews Sisters-style trio, and more.

Because this was the White Christmas Ball, there were nods to the movie sprinkled all throughout the hanger: the iconic "Welcome to Bedford Falls" sign, movie cameras and lights, and this sign:

"White Christmas" wasn't the only movie referenced--there was also a really fun backdrop from "A Christmas Story" where you could have your photos taken with Ralphie, who was wearing the pink bunny suit and carrying a Red Ryder BB Gun.

There were other photo ops but they had long lines so we didn't do those. I also found out after the party that there was a whole area outside with roasting chestnuts, ice carving and a glass blower. I was so disappointed that I missed it, although it FREEZING outside so we probably wouldn't have spent much time out there anyway!

We loved walking around the museum and looking at the aircraft and all of the really amazing displays.

We probably had WAY too much fun walking around and posing for pictures!

As with the other 1940s events we've attended this year, half the fun is just people-watching! I saw some really beautiful vintage dresses.

 I think The Mister was the best looking and best dressed guy there. :)

We definitely need more occasions for him to wear a white dinner jacket!

I have to admit I felt pretty va-va-voom myself! A slinky red dress, lots of sparkles and long evening gloves will do that to a girl. :)

I'm so glad that we decided to go to this event and will definitely plan on doing it again next year. I'm already planning my outfit for the 1940s WWII Ball in June!

The 1940s White Christmas Ball part 1: What we wore

These photos are almost two months old but they're too fun not to share anyway! You may remember that back in June 2012, The Mister and I attended the 1940s WWII Ball (part 1 is here, part 2 is here).

Then in August, some friends joined us and we went to the 1940s and 50s Voodoo Island Tiki Ball, put on by the same organization that does the other party.

 

The organization puts on a third event called the 1940s White Christmas Ball, and since we'd had such a great time at the other two parties, The Mister and I decided to go! The dress for this event was formal or dressy 1940s attire, which to me means one thing: SPARKLES! I was only too happy to pick through my collection of vintage rhinestone jewelry to find some sparkles to wear.

While it would have been wonderful to wear a long evening gown, finding something authentic 1940s in my size is pretty near impossible and even if I had gotten lucky, it would have been crazy expensive. I ended up wearing this dress that The Mister actually picked out for me months before--it's by Stop Staring, a company that makes beautiful retro-style dresses.

It has a 1940s-style sweetheart neckline and a cute little faux peplum around the waist. Since it's not really an evening dress, I had to make it fancier with my accessories. I added a big, sparkly brooch with long rhinestone dangles to the bodice.

The brooch is a (thrifted) vintage Kandell &Marcus NY and it's gorgeous! It's over 4" long and makes quite the statement so for this occasion it was perfect.

SPARKLES!! I wore a pair of long black evening gloves, a wide rhinestone bracelet, beautiful rhinestone clip earrings, and the star-shaped brooch was pinned in my hair. I carried the black beaded bag, a sentimental treasure that I bought way back on my study abroad to London in 1998.

I also wore nude back-seam stockings with a black Cuban heel and a pair of low-heeled black pumps. Finding authentic 1940s shoes in my size is even more unlikely than finding a dress, so I did my best to find shoes that had the right silhouette (rounded toe, mid-height slightly curvy heel) and ended up with these Clarks. They were okay in a pinch, but I really wish I'd been able to find the black suede version in my size because they would have looked dressier.

For my hair this time, I decided not to do Victory rolls and instead to go for an old-Hollywood starlet kind of style. When I found this photo of Scarlett Johansson, I knew it was exactly the look I was going for!

For makeup, I did pretty much the same colors as I used for the summer 1940s WWII ball, with the iconic 1940s dark eyebrow and red lips to match my dress. And fake eyelashes, of course!

The Mister decided to go full-out Humphrey Bogart and rented a white dinner jacket and tuxedo pants.

Of course we had to add a red carnation in his lapel! He even had the perfect cufflinks for the occasion:

They're hard to see unless you click the picture to enlarge, but they commemorate the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the wartime intelligence agency that was the precursor to the CIA. I don't mind telling you that The Mister looked HOT!

Tomorrow I'll post pictures of us at the actual event!

PPM

I'll be upfront. This is plainly a Poor, Pitiful Me post. Nothing interesting here, no fabulous projects or cool thrifted stuff, just some complaining.

This is what my laundry room looks like right now. Yes, that is dirt you can see below the metal floor joists. Suffice it to say, we're not exactly having the best few weeks ever.

In the last three weeks, there hasn't been a single day when one of us hasn't been sick. Maren started it the first Monday back to school after Christmas break, then The Mister was hit with the flu for the remainder of that week. Porter was sick on Sunday and then Monday afternoon Maren came home sick again and spent the remainder of the week on the couch, ill with not one but two strains of the flu. On Sunday I woke up sick and the next day, Monday, Porter woke up with it too and we're still suffering. I don't think Porter and I actually have the flu, just a really nasty respiratory/sinus infection. And I have a big canker sore, can I whine about that one too? Compounding the illness is the issue that I haven't had a decent night's sleep in weeks. While the kids have been sick they've been up multiple times per night, and guess who they want? I feel like a zombie. A hacking, sniffling zombie.

And then there's the issue of the basement. Two weeks ago we noticed that our sump pump was going off repeatedly, all day long. The Mister ventured down into the crawl space below the house to check things out and found it wet. We called the insurance and a plumber, who found that the pipe leading from the sump out of the house had a crack in it, so the water was leaking right back down. Because this was behind a wall, we're not sure how long it was leaking but it was long enough to completely rot the subfloor in that corner of the room and cause mold to grow. The day after the plumber arrived, a recovery team came in to get everything dried out and to remove all the moldy and rotted materials.

Once they finally finish (which will likely be sometime next week) we will have to get a reconstruction team to come and fix it all. They'll have to put in new drywall, retexture the walls and repaint, put in new subfloor, remove the remaining vinyl flooring and install new vinyl flooring. I think we're looking at another 2 weeks or so of work once they can finally get started.

In the meantime, I have no washer and drier, which I realize is not an emergency-level crisis. Plenty of people live in places with no W/D and survive just fine. For crying out loud, we didn't have one the first 2 years of our marriage because we lived in an apartment so it's not like I'm not capable of hauling my clothes somewhere else to be cleaned. Having sick children and being ill yourself doesn't make that task particularly pleasant, however, and I'm lucky to have plenty of friends who have offered the use of their washers, for which I am truly very grateful!

I realize that everybody has problems, most of which are probably far greater than my own. You know that saying about how you probably wouldn't want to trade troubles with anybody else, right? By next week Porter and I will feel better, progress will be made on the basement issues, and I will start drugging my children if they don't quit waking me up in the night. Okay, I'm kidding about that last one. Maybe.

If you've made it through all this whining, please feel free to leave a complaining and whining comment of your own! Go ahead and let it all out and I won't judge you or tell you to quit being a complainer--that's what friends do. Then we can all just pull up our big-girl pants and get on with dealing with our troubles, right? So, spill it.

Weekend Junk Finds

In my quest to lighten up my basement, still no thrifting for me! I even took another box to the consignment store and made another pile of stuff to donate, so I'm making progress! Feels good, but I won't deny I miss the treasure hunting. :) Here are some more past finds I haven't shared.

This trio of beautiful vintage NOS postcards is from an antique store but they're in almost pristine condition-- in fact, I think I'm going to frame them! I have always loved this style of postcard, where the name of the place is in big letters that are filled with pictures. Also, I love to collect travel souvenirs from places that are significant to me so these are perfect! I especially adore the one in the center. It's from the valley in southern Colorado where my parents grew up and my grandparents still live. And yes, they grow potatoes there. :)

In fact, I found this cute vintage chalkboard in a thrift store in that very same valley! This one went into my Etsy shop and sold soon after.

I found this beautiful shabby platter on a fun trip with some girlfriends. It was on the top shelf in the loft of an antique store, covered in thick dust. I'm going to hang onto it for a future pink/blue/shabby style booth that I'm planning for an outdoor vintage market this summer.

I found this globe on the same trip. Actually, it was the same trip where I bought the globe I showed last week. Two globes in one day! This after we swore we were limited to buying only things that would fit in our purses. HA! That was one packed car heading home, let me tell you. Lucky for me that I was the driver, or I'm pretty sure I would have made the trip with a globe or two on my lap! This globe is not particularly old or decorative (like last week's 1939 beauty) so I'm almost tempted to do something fun like cover it with chalkboard paint. We'll see.

And one darling find from the local thrifts. This cutie pie mug has two sides. If you're feeling chipper when you wake up, you can drink your morning coffee from the "Good Morning! Darling" side with the warbling bluebird.

And if you're feeling cranky, you can use the "Good Morning You Ole Grouch" side with the owl in the rain!

The mug is currently available in my Etsy shop here.

Did you make any fantastic junk finds this weekend?

In my Etsy shop: Winter Whites

Things in my basement are NOT GOOD right now. A leaky pipe, a rotted subfloor and mold mean that my food storage/laundry room contents had to be completely removed and shoved into the rest of the (already full) basement. Not sure how long it will take to fix, or how much it's going to cost. Suffice it to say, things are not happy. I have no idea when I'll be able to do laundry again so I'll be toting my dirties over to friends' homes for the next few weeks. Dee-lightful!

One of the reasons my basement is already full is because that's where I store of all of my inventory for my Etsy shop. So in an effort to clean things out and make the basement a little less crowded, I've been on an Etsy listing spree. This week I've chosen to list a bunch of white things in a section called "Winter Whites". I may add more listings as I find more items in my stash to fit the theme, but this is what I have so far:

A trio of white milk glass handled sugar bowls. I have two of the bottom version. I love how they look like trophies!

https://www.etsy.com/listing/120727361/vintage-milk-glass-trophy-shaped-sugar

https://www.etsy.com/listing/120726871/pair-of-vintage-milk-glass-trophy-shaped

A gorgeous ironstone leaf-shaped bowl dating from the 1800s:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/120539904/antique-1800s-white-ironstone-china-leaf

A sweet little white bowl with a perfectly shabby patina:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/120538367/vintage-aged-white-cream-brown-patina

 An antique Homer Laughlin dish with markings that date it to February 1921:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/120537566/antique-vintage-homer-laughlin-hudson

Another antique ironstone bowl dating from the 1800s:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/120541583/antique-1800s-white-ironstone-bowl-dish

And a vintage Sterling China bowl with a gorgeous shabby patina:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/120542806/vintage-white-cream-shabby-chippy-patina

A beautiful carved Mother of Pearl necklace with a rosary-style chain. This would be so pretty on a bride! Love the glow from Mother of Pearl.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/120725277/vintage-antique-mother-of-pearl-rosary

 Two different sizes of new old stock vintage German pressed glass buttons:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/117480631/vintage-glass-buttons-white-and-gold

https://www.etsy.com/listing/117754018/vintage-glass-buttons-white-and-gold

 And a vintage aluminum Cuban cigar tube filled with vintage Mother of Pearl buttons:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/58803203/vintage-shell-buttons-in-a-vintage-cuban

I've brought up my inventory boxes from the basement and I'm hopeful that I'll be more likely to get it listed if it's staring me in the face, so to speak, rather than buried down in the cold basement. Wish me luck!