Negating Resolutions

{note that even my drawings have typos.}

I’ve changed my mind about my New Year’s resolution.  I know, I know.  A proper flake would have the decency to wait until March to toss in the towel, and here I am in the middle of January waving a white flag.  Still I have to be honest and admit I can’t devote time to planning parties when my attention is elsewhere.  And by “elsewhere” I mean home improvement projects and crafty, crafty goodness.

I blame it all on the glittered dinos.  Crafting, it turns out, is the new chasing the dragon.  Just ask anyone (except most of Hollywood).  All you need is one reasonably successful project to push you down a path of no return, a path that involves glue, scissors, paper, swear words, endless hours of frustration, things that suck, things that are cute, blisters, burns, bleary eyes, wounded egos, math, and the satisfaction of a job well done.  It’s a wonder I haven’t taking up crafting sooner.

The stamps finished me.  I was wavering in my resolve before, but it wasn’t until I used some stamps The Mister bought me (on a whim) for Christmas that all was lost.  My niece’s birthday party was on the 9th and, not wanting to do my typed gift tags again so soon, I decided to stamp her name on my favorite tags.  Well now, I thought.  That was certainly satisfying. It turns out stamping is like playing office, only better.

{Right around here is where my alarmed classmates from law school call each other and make plans to stage an intervention.}

Some of the projects I have in mind to tackle this year include:

• Redecorating the living room
• Redecorating the den
• Painting the rest of the kitchen Polo Green when The Mister isn’t looking
• Decorating the master bedroom
• Reupholstering the dining room chairs (unless I buy the table and chairs God feels I deserve).
• Sewing curtains for the kitchen
• Sewing slip covers for the ottomans (i.e., EPIC FAIL)
• Making this wreath
• Buy three cats

Maybe not the cats.  Mikey and The Mister are allergic.

A Primrose Path

This has been the scene around here for most of the week. Two sicks boys, lots of T.V. watching. I am pretty sure Mikey coughed every last germ out of his body between the hours of 2:00am and 6:00am yesterday morning. Coughed them on to me, that is, since I was trying to snuggle him back to sleep. A complete failure, by the way. Viral pathogenesis, on the other hand, was a smashing success. I spent the better part of last night convinced I had a brown rice cracker shard lodged in my throat. Alas, there is no cracker, just a common cold.  It could be worse.  I could have a man-cold.

I feel a bit like this guy, the only primrose I have ever met with entitlement issues. We live in a desert-like environment. Not actually the desert, but certainly not coastal, either. Consequently, most of our home and garden shops feature drought resistant, sun-loving plants. Our home, on the other hand, sits beneath two sky-scraping trees that cast enough shade year round to make it seem like winter in Sweden. Everything we bring home promptly dies a sun-starved death, so most of our beds are barren because of this. Two beds flank our side entrance, the one everyone uses to enter the house. Tired of greeting guests with dirt, no matter how loamy, we went to Home Depot just before Christmas and appraised them of the situation. The only plant they could recommend, and halfheartedly at that, was a primrose. We bought a few as a test run and, for the most part, everyone seems to be getting along except for this guy. His fellow bed mates can go a week without watering, but this primo donno is all “up in leaves” if I so much as let 24 hours pass without paying him attention. If this primrose was a person he would be Jon Gosselin.

Two hours and two cups of water later. I rest my case.