I know...get a life

...but I just got completely fixated on the fact that Stacy London (whom I enjoy very much on What Not to Wear) is clearly wearing two completely different shoes in every version of this ad I've seen in magazines and on the website listed. One is obviously a tall, pointy heel and the other a curved-toe flat. A Photoshop blunder? Or some secret trick in a hush-hush contest I should win for noticing? How could smart people getting paid to do this kind of work let something so off slip by? Hmmm....

I could junk every day

After the game, I took a few things to my booth (it really is a sad little space right now and I'm wondering if I should just close it out until I can devote more time to finding good stuff for it). As usual, I took a box in and came out with a box of purchases. Just a few little things.

I saw a few other cute things as I browsed that I left behind, including this little dog. I like the box with the photos in the background, too.

I'm sure I could find some use for this chippy recipe box, and I thought the pillow would be cute on my porch bench with some of my Halloween decor when I put it out. Only $2.50.

Ryan has Macauley and Megan convinced there is a wild baboon living in the woods behind our house (Megan always calls it the "bamboo"), and I know he would like one of these masks (also each around $2) to pull off a major scare. I don't know that 2 six-year-olds could recover from such an experience.

I flipped through this book quickly to see who made the list (Helen of Troy is all I remember now). It might also look cute with some Halloween decor with its coloring and quirkiness.

I always stop to look at this huge old photo of some women in a general store. You can enlarge it to see more detail. I think it's really charming and if I had more wall space in my kitchen I think it would be a great piece. I also liked the black scale. I have one, but you know. It is priced much higher than most I see so it must be really special.

An art teacher has the booth these colorful wooden animals were in and I am always drawn to her stuff. I also thought the little Miss Muffett case (only about 7" around, I'd say) would be cute somewhere if I had a more colorful palette around my house.

What did make its way into the box headed to my house: an architectural piece I think I will hang over a door in my dining room, a rusty black owl lantern I will use in a Halloween scheme, a little USA creamer and a metal talc canister that will go in one of my bathrooms.

A diminutive weathered birdcage that I didn't need and don't know where to put yet, two rusty black metal planters, a cracked ironstone mug and a black and white trimmed restaurantware crock that I will also use in some Halloween decor.

It was hot inside STD today with no air-conditioning (and outside at about 86 degrees today), but I had fun looking around. I always do no matter what I find.

Stars in our eyes

We donned our Niners gear today for the showdown between Ryan's longtime favorite team and the Minnesota Vikings, who have one of our all-time favorite players Brett Favre at the helm these days. Brett pulled off one his trademark last-minute (last second actually) wins, so Ryan was disappointed his team lost but not as much as usual. To prep for the game, Macauley and I went to Walmart, and Macauley put together his own list.

We got several of these items, but not all of them. We were kind of rushing around the store and cut through a middle aisle that had bras and underwear all down one side. Macauley looked at me and shook his head and said seriously, "This is NOT my natural habitat."

Megan came over to play and Booker was up and around like normal. I noticed tonight that he had chewed on his stitches a little and it looks like one or two are missing right at the bottom of his incision. Megan's mom gave me some Neosporin-type medicine that smells really potent that she said her dog hates the smell of, so I'm hoping that slathering that on will repel him from chewing anymore. I can't see us getting the collar back on at this point.

Big project of the day, though, was the poster about himself that Macauley is taking to school with him tomorrow. He is the Star Student in his class this week and had to make a display of things about himself and things he likes. I worked on it for a couple of hours, between sending photos to Walmart, finding images online to represent Macauley's varied interests and then cutting everything out. No idea if the kids are supposed to make it themselves (I don't really see how they could) or what. Ryan said I went overboard, but Macauley seemed proud of it. I think it captures him well.

Motorheads

We aren't much into car shows, but we went to the ANPAC Car Show for Kids on Saturday to support Ryan's cousin Larry who was showing his new Lamborghini Diablo. Macauley actually is really interested cars I guess, now that I think about it, so he got a kick out of seeing some of newer ones and getting to hang out with his cousin Georgia.

There were some kids activities set up and a McAlister's sweet tea booth, so Macauley and I hit those while Ryan and his cousin toured the show.

Ryan's favorite was this GTO. Personally, I was drawn to the sweet Delorean...I just knew Michael J. Fox would step out of it any minute in his puffy vest (life preserver) and cram a bunch of vegetables and egg shells in the back then zoom off.

The Lamborghini won the Kids' Pick trophy (all the kids who attended got to vote for a favorite) and Macauley marched right up to the podium with Larry and Georgia to accept the award like he had something to do with it.

The three of us celebrated their big win with dinner at Nakato. It was delicious and I totally overate because Macauley doesn't like the vegetables or salad that comes with his dinner so I eat them all. We don't go there as often as we used to. It just doesn't feel right without Joe there. He was always so gracious to us over the many years we've been going to our favorite place, and I'm still sad and angry and regretful and confused at his untimely passing. I guess I feel like we didn't know him nearly as well as I wish we had now, but he knew us. I wish he was still around.

We came home and Ryan and I watched Adventureland, which was so so. This weekend has somehow seemed to last quite a while, which I've loved and which makes going to work tomorrow that much harder.

Poor Book

I had to take our sweet old D-A-W-G in for surgery yesterday, and it was an all-around terrifying and humiliating experience for him. We found out a year or two after we adopted him, through x-rays taken after he got hit by a car, that he had several pellets or buckshot floating around inside him, evidence that at one time or another in his previous life he must have been shot. This sweet boy did not deserve that--no animal does. One of the pellets had been working its way toward the surface on his leg for a while now and after watching the spot get progressively more oozy and gross, I finally took him to the vet to have it worked on.

He is so scared of going to the vet and I always think he thinks I'm abandoning him and that I don't want him, so I put it off as long as possible. I had told the vet when I made the appointment that I didn't want to drop him off and go, that I wanted to stay with him until he was put out to avoid those abandonment issues he struggles with. We arrived at 7 a.m. as instructed, and the guy acted like he wanted me to drop him and leave. He said I could stay but that he wasn't planning to do the surgery until around 9. Why did he have us there two hours before then? Frustrating. So we sat (thank goodness for my new iphone and all the apps I've downloaded: Boggle, Jeopardy!, Scrabble) and three hours later, the guy came out and gave Booker a shot to relax him. A half hour after that he took Book back to the OR and brushed me off, so Booker did end up having to watch me leave him, even drive away in my car. I know it's maybe being a little too sensitive, but he's just a sweet dog and so devoted to me that I hate to do anything to let him down or make him sad.

I picked him up around 4:30. The vet cut out the irritated/inflamed area in his leg but no pellet was found. It had either already worked its way out or there is something else wrong with him that is totally unrelated. The vet is having some tests done so we will see. Booker was terrified of the Elizabethan collar, and even though it's supposed to stay on until the stitches come out in 10-14 days, we lasted only a couple of hours with this pathetic sight and took it off. He is noticeably back to his old self mostly this morning, and we are keeping an eye on him so he doesn't lick or chew at the incision. I think he's forgiven me for putting him through all that. Especially since I've been wrapping his pain pills in honeybaked ham.

Detail-oriented

My parents gave me a gift certificate to TJMaxx for my birthday (what a great gift!) and I found this scarf there on Saturday, after my mani-pedi. Ryan took Macauley and two friends to the Discovery Center so I had some time to myself. I'm loving the big buttoned pockets on the ends--perfect to warm up hands or stash my phone and keys while I'm shopping. Such a lovely detail.

On the topic of details, a little visual test for you: I was flipping through my latest copy of People and for some reason I took a closer look at this ad and zeroed in right away on one particular detail that is totally not right. Click to enlarge the picture and see if you spot it yourself (leave a comment if you see it) and I will post the answer soon. You know "they" say doing little games like this each day wards off dementia and memory loss in old age...

I'm adding a hint: Look very closely at Stacy.

Numbers and letters

I painted the set of mismatched numbers I found at the flea market a couple of weeks ago. For now they're propped along the top of the wainscotting in the foyer, but I think they might look better hung on a wall in less of a lined up row. I'm not sure where though, and I don't want to make that many nail holes until I'm ready for a long-term commitment.

I also tried to make one of the fabulous wreaths I've seen made out of book pages or sheet music and found it to be much harder than I thought. I couldn't figure out how to make the curve, so I ended up stacking and stacking pages and now it's almost square. I'm thinking of layering some other pages rolled a little differently on the top of it all...I wonder what the secret is to these things? I had planned to make two, one for each of the French doors to my office, but this one ended up about twice as big as I thought it would and took way more figuring and fretting than I am willing to put into another one.

I've been trying to warm up the scrapping juices and do some new pages, but the farthest I've gotten to that is a blowout shopping spree at Michael's. I found some inspiring paper pads and a chipboard chunk that should get me started. It's kind of overcast and threatening storms here tonight, so maybe I'll get inspired and do something. Or just head back to the couch and while the evening away. Seems like when school is in that's all my evenings are good for...just resting up for the next day. I haven't had a real zest for my day job these days. My number project totally made me think of counting down the days until summer, which is not encouraging when we're only a month in to the school year. But I'll keep showing up.

What took me so long?

I don't know why I wasn't before, but now I am just enchanted by ironstone. I have started amassing a small collection in the hutch in my dining room, and every time I walk by it makes me happy. I know lots of people have collected ironstone for a really long time, but I am just getting started. Isn't it interesting how your style and what you're drawn to evolves over time? In the house we lived in when we first got married, the kitchen was all about color and my Fiestaware dishes (which we still use on a daily basis, but aren't out on display). In our last house, the kitchen was more French country, with roosters and rabbits and reds and golds (most of which has been relocated in the bonus room in our new house). But these days, I'm drawn to ironstone, tarnished silver, rust, and black and white. I am in love with the cabinet I found in Billings over the summer, and I would say this cabinet and its contents are a good representation of my aesthetic now.

I am not an educated collector and don't plan to be really. Some of my pieces have an "official" ironstone stamp and others don't (because they aren't, but I still love them). When I was in line at STD paying for the gravy boat in the top left cubby of the cabinet the other day, a man walked by and said, "Nice boat." And then he came over and looked at the stamp on the bottom and told me it dated to the 20s or 30s if I remember right. I noticed him start working in a booth I have bought a few of my pieces in at great prices, and I should have gone over and talked to him but I didn't. I haven't spent much on any of my pieces, which makes me like them even more. Little finds, you know?

I am planning to hang these platters in a collage on the wall in the dining room, but I think I want a few more and I don't want to start putting nails in the wall until I have a better idea of how the arrangement will end up. I found one of them yesterday at Spring Creek. My sweet husband took me to the tearoom and already wants to go back for more of the chicken salad.

We also stopped by the Fall Open House at Leola's and I got this little metal dog. And who should I run into but Debra of Common Ground, who I feel like I know through her blog and all the thoughtful comments she posts to mine. I saw her talking to someone and I thought I recognized her from her picture, and then I heard her talking about blogging, so I knew I just had to go up and see if it was her. It was! It's really cool when your blogging world and your outside life come together and when you can peek in at the lives of other people who like the same things you do, like ironstone and little dogs and tattered books and clocks. I'm always inspired to hop up and head out to the markets to find more of what I (we) love.

Some nesting

Found a few treasures for the nest here lately, including a gigantic dictionary and a cute little nest to put under a cloche or something. I also found a few pieces of ironstone and a cute H cup that I've seen at Anthropologie. And I got the cute little pitcher from the Common Ground booth at Spring Creek!

I like the clock plate to go with some others I use at Christmas, and the egg cup is cute for Easter of course. I really like the brown floral teacups, but they might go to my booth. I'll be keeping the little scotty dog coaster for now.

I'm going to work on these mismatched numbers I found--leave some wood, paint some black and maybe others white, and then set them along the top of some of wainscotting probably. I've been a little more into feathering my wardrobe than my nest right now, but these are a few things I've picked up.