If money grew on trees...

I {heart} this yo-yo quilt from my beloved Anthropologie.


Oh yes, this quilt that three people somewhere in this very universe (according to the product reviews) have already shelled out $498 for and bought (plus tax, people, and maybe shipping, who knows).

How these people apparently have a $498+ budget allowance for Anthropologie bedding is beyond me.

On the other hand, the sick and twisted part of me thinks that $498 is not all that far-fetched.

Not that $498 isn't a boatload of money, but hear me out. If that Oklahoma quilt took my mom and I countless hours and hours and hours to accomplish, can you imagine how many hours it would take to make a yo-yo quilt? Those babies have to be made by hand, every last one of them.

Regardless, since there is not a surplus amount of $498 in my piggybank specifically earmarked for only one single Anthropologie item, I have a very strong feeling that this might be on my list of things to try and duplicate in the coming year. Don't hold me to it, but if I don't try to replicate it, it probably isn't going to be living in my home any other way.

What's interesting is that the furniture store, Ethan Allen, came out with a yo-yo quilt a few years ago. My mom gave me the ripped-out catalog page to drool over, and one day this summer, I got the guts up to walk in there, bypass the feeding frenzy of sharks (i.e. salespeople) and head straight to the bedroom furniture to see it for myself. It is covered completely in smaller, same-size yo-yo's that would take even longer to make since you would need somewhere in the ballpart of a kajillion of them to make a quilt. And the Ethan Allen version is priced at the low low price of $749. Oh yeah. See, Anthropologie is looking more and more affordable now, right? Pshaw.

Moving on...

I {heart} this crochet tablecloth from there as well.



It is the low low price of $128.

For that low low price, my four-year-old would need to keep himself and his ten little sticky fingers far far away from it. Maybe my husband, too, for that matter.

Now picture my own smiling face after hearing the news from my dear mother who informed me that she has an entire drawer full of crocheted doilies my grandmother made.

Cha-ching. The money tree in my brain just sprouted some leaves.

Replication is a form of flattery, don't you think?

The cat's meow

*I am well aware of the fact that upon publishing this post, the chances of me turning into the Crazy Cat Lady are quite high, especially once the blue hairs start sprouting on my head. With my quilting and NPR-listening and feline love, I really don't stand a chance, do I?








I tell you, I never thought I would love those crazy kitties as much as I do. Even if you are not a fan of cats, there is no way you could meet Harry and Sally and not think they're halfway cool. I had wanted a cat for several years, but my greatest fears were getting a cat that would either hide under the bed all day or have a terrible personality. As my husband, a new fan of cats himself, pointed out, you can't force cats to love you. Dogs might be easier to manipulate, but cats, not so much.

I had no reason to worry.

Harry and Sally are such good kitties. They both are very outgoing and affectionate. They both have super soft fur, almost like mink, which is so nice. They both love to purr and purr and purr. I don't know about you, but I think purring is one of the greatest things about cats. They are both mostly laid-back, and they both are fine with all the dogs. Getting a second kitty was also a great idea, hands down. They are best buddies and don't like to be separated.

Having a both a female and a male has been fun, too. They are so different from each other.

Harry is a true male. He walks like a hunter, slinking around ready to pounce on any prey that might come his way. (Sorry, Harry, there's not too much to hunt as an indoor kitty, huh?)

Harry is downright obsessed with my ponytail holders. That boy can sniff them out anywhere, and once he finds one, it's toast. In fact, as I type this, I realize I need to pick up another package of them next trip to the store because he has taken almost all of them.

Harry also seems to have a fascination with water. He loves it when the bathwater is running, he loves the dishwasher, he loves a sink full of dishes, and numerous times I have caught him with his head down the garbage disposal, hoping to find something tasty.




Crazy cat.

Harry loves boxes, paper bags, and any nooks and crannies he can possibly stuff himself into. The crazier the place to roost, the better.




Unlike Sally, Harry has already morphed into a true feline, perfectly content to snooze most of the day away once he finds the perfect roost.






But he also makes time for television.




That boy loves him some primetime goodness.

Sally, on the other hand, is such a diva. She this amazing strut, swishing her little rear end like she is Tyra Banks. She also loves walking past the dogs and running her tail all over their faces likes it's her own personal feather boa. Yowza.

She is my purring machine. They both purr, but Sally really purrs. Sometimes she is purring so loud you can hear it in the next room. She also will let you know when she has not received adequate love. Almost every five or ten minutes, she will let out these crazy loud meows, calling for you to shower her with more attention. It's so cute.

She loves to lay on her back and have you rub her belly while all four paws are splayed out in every direction. The more kisses you can provide on her little nose, the better, as it just makes her purr even louder. She is definitely a little lover, and her favorite place to lounge is on a warm lap.




They both love two places in the house and will often fight over who gets to lay there -- either the shelf in the kitchen where all the paper bags are, or the tray in the living room where our paper recycling gets stacked. They've both grown so much since we got them, but I'm hopeful that Sally will still remain a bit smaller since she was the runt of her litter. I miss the tiny kitten phase, but notsomuch the crazy tiny kitten phase. They've both been fixed so there will be no baby kitties in our future (whew!), and Sally was declawed since she was constantly sharpening her claws on the furniture. Harry has never done that, so we've allowed him to keep his claws, although the verdict is still out on that one. There have been two times I've seen him get that gleam in his little eye and reach up quickly for a quick sharpening session, so we'll have to see. I am hopeful he was just testing me, haha.

I know they both see me right now as the "FunSucker". Oh yeah, I suck the fun out of everything for them. Sally has a penchant for toilet paper.




Let me just say it was cute the first time to be picking up teensy bits of shredded toilet paper all over the house. And Harry had a penchant for climbing up and practically knocking everything off the shelves. Yipes. This fascination seems to have ended, but let's just say I'm already nervous about Christmas trees and am planning a strategy including water guns. They also love the crafting.










Oh, the fun fabrics they can cover in their fur, the spools of thread they can bat all over the house and under the furniture, the straight pins they can carry around in their mouths (wish I was kidding) -- it's pure kitty heaven for them, kitty h-e-double-hockey-sticks for me...

Having kitties has also changed my husband. He went from being very anti-feline to very much loving them both. And talk about a naive new kitty owner -- the first few days we had Harry he gave him a bath (no joke), which is a crazy idea to most cat owners. Then he took it to a new level when one of the employees at Petsmart convinced him to buy these "claw covers". Oh yes, my husband was crazy enough to first TRIM Harry's claws (Harry was not on board with this idea), and then GLUE these silicone claw covers on them. Seriously. I was laughing my head off. But hey, they really work! And apparently my husband wasn't scared off by the experience at all and is planning on trying to replace them every two months. Oh my heavens...

Splendor in the Grass never looked so splendid...

Looks like this will be the second day of musical posts, but I feel it's my job to alert you to new music, to broaden your horizons and expose you to music you might otherwise pass up. Oh yes, I take this job very seriously, folks. I am an iTunes junkie, a library floozie, and a mix-CD mistress. I live, eat, and breathe music. In my little world, there is a perfect song for every situation, a soundtrack to every day. Just call me your own personal musical therapist. And I'm free! Who doesn't love that?!

Last week one of my most favoritest bands, Pink Martini released their fourth album, "Splendor in the Grass". (Yes, I know that "most favoritest" isn't speaking properly, thankyouverymuch, but I don't care.)





Just like their other three albums, this one does not look to disappoint. Every single one of their albums is so refreshing in the sense that there is a wide variety of songs on each one, making it more satisfying like an uber-cool mix CD that your most suave and sophisticated friend made just for you (if you have friends like that). Again, this is also one of those albums that would be a perfect backdrop for the ultimate in swanky dinner parties.

Honestly I'm not even sure how to describe Pink Martini -- I guess, to me, they are like a mini-orchestra of the world. Their music spans all sorts of genres, and the talent and education oozes out of this bunch. To put it lightly, although I am a big Pink Martini wannabe and would love nothing more than to go on tour with them, I'm not educated enough to even be their shaker girl, and I've got a bachelor's degree in music. My sister-in-law and I went to see them early last year perform with a local symphony, and the even the guys just playing the shakers had degrees from Harvard or Yale or whatever.




They just ooze cool. If you ever have the chance to hear them live, don't think twice! I love this quote I found on their band's bio page:

"Americans don’t really sing together anymore … except for church … or maybe the shower. At the turn of the 20th century, every middle-class American household had a piano. And it was the focal point of the house … people would gather around it and sing together. Music was something everyone participated in. Everyone played an instrument or sang … whether it was an American folk song like “Oh My Darling Clementine”or “Home On The Range”or an Irving Berlin song like “What’ll I Do”or Gershwin’s “Someone To Watch Over Me”, everybody knew the songs, knew the words, and could participate. But then the radio came, and then the television … and soon it was all over. For me, Pink Martini is partially an attempt to rebuild a culture which sings and dances."

Here's a YouTube video I found with one of the quirky songs from their new album, called Bitty Boppy Betty:



This album is also on my ever-expanding iTunes wishlist. I need to start a separate piggybank just for music purchases...

Normal as Blueberry Pie

Nellie.

Whoa, Nellie.




That girl has done it and come out with a fantastic tribute album to Doris Day. (And please don't tell me you don't know who Doris Day is. Please.)




I mean, come on, who doesn't love Doris Day? The lady who implored us with her sweet syrupy voice to "please, please, don't eat the daisies" -- yep, good ol' Doris.

I've been a fan of Nellie McKay for a while now. She first grabbed me with "The Dog Song", a clever little ditty about life with dogs. Boy, can I ever relate to that song...

Anyway, this will be my next album purchase on iTunes fo sho. Watch the little video below to learn more about our dear friend, Nellie. If you're yet to become a fan of this type of music (Doris Day, Frank Sinatra, etc.), I highly recommend it. It's great background music especially for dinner parties, etc., but watch out -- you might find yourself a big fan quicker than you think!




And here's a nice little write-up about Nellie in Vanity Fair Magazine if you want to read more...

Say "cheese"! (Or actually, don't.)

Two Saturdays ago I had the privilege to attend an all-day photography workshop with none other than the talented Ashley Ann. The workshop, a "SnapShop" (don'tcha just love that name?), lasted from breakfast to dinner, and the main aspect covered was learning how to shoot manually with a DSLR camera, along with photo composition, how to capture life on film (as opposed to just taking pictures), etc. It was a great day -- beautiful weather, gorgeous peak color on the trees, fun meeting other creative girls, and let's not forget, a whole glorious day to myself to relax, enjoy some adult conversation, and feed my creative soul. Thanks again to my husband for Daddy Daycare!

The workshop was at Ashley's adorable farmhouse, and let me just say, not an inch of that house was to be found that wasn't touched by her artistic hands. She has such a unique and fun style, and I had just as much fun gleaning ideas from her decorations as I did learning about the camera. She has mastered the art of DIY, and there are her own unique creations peeking out of every nook and cranny in her house.

To get an idea of her style, first go and check out her daughter's amazing nursery.

Seriously, I'll wait. Just go check it out...

Cute overload, right?

Just take that times about a zillion, and you'll have her house. Yes, the perfect backdrop for a day of creativity and learning.

The truth is, since buying my camera a few years ago, I had already taken a photography class. Right after getting my camera, I signed up at a local camera store for a six weekly sessions in which I learned all the technical terms under the sun of how to shoot manually. And yet, since taking that class, I have only shot in automatic mode. Why? Because I think it was all too technical. I would consider myself a pretty smart gal, but the technical terms I learned in that first class only helped me as far as my knowledge. I never mastered how to put that knowledge into practice.

Enter Ashley Ann. Her SnapShop workshops were exactly this -- like spending a day with a good friend showing you how to master your camera. She gave us all the technical terms, but she described them for us in a way that was so much easier to understand. All day long I was experiencing "lightbulb" moments! We had two practice sessions of shooting at her house before we headed out late that afternoon for an actual "photo shoot".

The following are pictures I took, all in MANUAL! Woohoo! Sure, I have a long way to go, but the fact that they even turned out made me pretty happy. First I'll show you the raw images of the best shots I got:














I know, I know. Adorable models, huh?


Then I tweaked the photos a little bit in my iPhoto program to make them more like the ideas I had in my head. You can click on any of them to open them up for a closer look:














The goal I have for myself is somehow to get from point A to point B -- to go from taking the photos in manual (and automatic) and tweaking them in iPhoto to taking the photos in only manual and having them be so awesome that they only look like I tweaked them in iPhoto. That means I have a lot of practice hours and bad shots ahead of me, learning to find the right balance between shutter speed, ISO and aperture. Oh, and trying to find places that have more natural light to shoot in.

(By the way, you can read Ashley's summary of our day and see the photos she took of the same models here.)

If you're in the neighborhood and wanting to learn how to become a better photographer, I highly recommend SnapShops.

Count me in.

After surfing Blog Land, I was reminded of the fact that November is National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo, or something like that).

Since I posted yesterday, and this post certainly should count, I figure I am well on my way to being of sound mind and body to be able to post something, anything, every day this month.

So here goes.

See you tomorrow, lovelies...

Halloween!

Here it is.

The reason my house is a pit.

The reason I have lived as a hermit for the last few weeks.

The reason some might classify me as bizarre, crazy, weird or any other number of interesting titles.

Bah.

Enough of the reasons, who cares.

Here's what you really want to see...












I'm afriad I've set myself up from here on out. My boy, apparently quite secure in his mama's skills, has told me numerous times already that next year he would like to be a porkypine.