Copping it, Washing it ...

... 'Bout to go, and get some compliments! Today is National Thrift Shop day here in America (we'll celebrate just about anything), but I'd argue every day can be Thrift Shop day if you try hard enough. Don't believe me? Just take a look at the freaks with extreme flipper-mentality over on the TicTac who've turned junkin' into something weird now. Hey, in this economy, I appreciate anyone making a buck whatever way they can, but making thrift-store-shopping your ENTIRE personality, while you take cool old stuff, paint everything greige, and rub dirt on it is ... Weird. I don't care how you slice it. Speaking of slicing, remember that six month stretch a while back when everything was cake??? 

"Is it a real baby, or is it cake? Let's cut it open to find out."

NO!!! Ay, Dios mío deliver us from these terrible fads! Once upon a time, even the internet was a slower place ... I don't mean because we all had dial-up, it's that we didn't just mindlessly scroll seconds-long drips, and drabs of algorithm-fueled & fueling data, and constantly consume like uncultured swine. We turned on the computer, we went to legitimately interesting websites, and engaged with what would now be considered long-form content compared to what's out there now. There were no For You Pages designed to outright murder your curiosity, and atrophy your attention span. If you wanted a more curated web-surfing experience, there were certainly places you could go for that, but it wasn't the norm to be force-fed material masquerading as honest-to-goodness "suggestions." 

Alright, so why am I waxing nostalgic over the old internet? because that's where I got the idea for the above project ... With my morning coffee, I'd read this woman's blog (both of whose names I've sadly long since forgot - I need to look around, I think I have my old blog roll saved somewhere in a list 2 external hard drives ago) about her creative life, her husband and herd of kids, and here nearly completely white interiors (way before farmhouse black & white became a thing), and I thought she was the bravest woman on Earth simply for that alone. Or she was just the biggest bitch behind the scenes and everyone inside the home was too scared to spill anything! Either way, I was a fan. In one of her posts she took an old rickety art frame, slopped some whitewash all over it, ran some hanging wire vertically and stapled it to the back, and then took a daintier wire and affixed at least one (maybe more?) heart shaped rock to said wires. And I thought, heyyyyy waymnt, I have a budding collection of heart shaped rocks of my own that I've gathered from local beaches, er, along the way, some chicken wire from my dad, some aluminum anodized wire, all I need is to get my paws on a large frame! 

Two house moves, a trip to the local Goodwill with my brother-in-law, and a smattering of mis-tints from Lowe's later, and I was all set! 

Now, of course this amazing technicolor nightmare wasn't the original plan. Unlike the blogger whose posts I followed borderline religiously, I paint all of my frames black, and always have. I discovered early on, when you're broke, a bottle of 72 cent craft paint in a black satin, or gloss finish can turn a bunch of mismatched gather ups into an instant collection, and no matter the current fads, black always looks chic. Take it from the little kids that lived next to me in my apartment days when they yelled out, "Whoa lady, you rich or sumthin'???" after getting a little peek inside my place when they came 'round to pick up their pals to go run amok on the playground. I was very much not rich, indeed, most of what furniture I had managed to hang on to was found curbside (which is the fancy way of saying "in a dumpster") at college, but what I had I tried to keep nice. I was raised by hardworking people who understood soap and water, and elbow grease always goes a long way. There is no way any of those kids remember me today, but through the years that has been one of my very favorite compliments - the most honest folks in the world are drunk people, and children so I will always consider it praise of the highest order! Even now, if I put out a new trinket, or hang a new picture my mom will tease me with an exaggerated, "Whoa lady, you rich or sumthin'?"

So if I always paint all of my frames black, how did that monstrosity come about? Well first, we should take a moment to appreciate the original piece I brought home ... I mean, who doesn't love a psychedelic vase of flowers depicted in wool crewelwork? No, you're not having a stroke, I took the photo with my first iPhone, and I didn't know how to disable the linear tilt shift feature quite yet, so  you'll have to excuse the blur. As for the piece, the frame was sticky, and the needlework reeked, so it was always going to have to come apart just to get washed. I thought the fabric would be brilliant for a lapel on a patchwork tweed jacket, meanwhile the frame was sturdy, cleaned up alright, and had enough texture and character to remain interesting once lacquered in black. And that's what I did, I sanded and sprayed, and sprayed, and sanded it to a gorgeous mirror-finish. Everything had gone perfectly ... In fact, it was one of those times you take note of exactly how well it's all going, and then as the third coat was drying a bug managed to land in the paint, and strut his ass allllllll over a ridiculously noticeable area of the frame, and the more I tried to free him from the goop, the worse it all got. I'm not a furniture, or tchotchke flipper, I do not have the patience to completely strip something like this and start over. I thought, maybe, I could just sand down a patch and have another go, but it was no bueno. Perhaps stripping it wouldn't have been that big of deal, but I just didn't have it in me at the time to start all the way over with no guarantee that I could keep anything, or anyone else from landing in it. I did get out my stripping gel, and scraper, but nothing I had was heavy duty enough to handle the job, but once I got through the scraping, and rinsing I kind of liked how it came out ... Some black, some gold, a little bald wood. So I raided my paint cupboard, and started layering what I could find, and came up with what you see above. Now, not everyone is going to love it. In fact, no one has to even like it at all! I feel compelled to mention the framed piece does make more sense if you see it with my dining room rug, though that thought might horrify some of you further, so forget I said anything at all. To me, the whole point of decorating your house is to fill it with what you love, and stuff that means something TO YOU. 

I do not live in an Instagrammable house, and I will never decorate for clicks and likes.

What I have managed to do is amass what speaks to me, and I've been able to make some things I like out of other things that were going to end up in a landfill, or washed up on an African beach already being suffocated by copious amounts of litter rolling in from the West. The tweed jacket with the funky lapel is still pending, but overall I think this little project was a win (accidents and all), and very much in the spirit of National Thrift Shop Day.

Hypnotized, Mesmerized

"August is the slow, gentle month that stretches out the longest across the span of a year. It yawns and lingers on with the light in its palms." 

- Victoria Erickson

Round and Round the Garden

Don't worry, I won't be tickling anyone's under there at any point in this post, but I have been going round and round the garden a lot lately playing match-maker with my Daylilies ... In fact, I think I'm down to the last few days of this love connection before one of my flower beds turns into a full blown maternity ward. For my fellow flower pervs out there, I've been spending my time cross pollinating the deepest bordeaux red petal, and chartreuse throated Pardon Me, with Nashville Star (I believe?) which fluctuates between a gorgeous oxblood red to sparkling rusty orange with a vibrant golden throat. The latter I acquired from my dad several years ago ... I was down for a visit on a weekend he was loading up to head South for the Winter (it must've been the same weekend I got the chicken wire and bird bath stand that I turned into a mannequin, boy that really was a while ago!). Anyway, he was offloading a bunch of stuff and on his final mosey as he passed the corner of his shop he picked up this sad little plastic pot that housed what looked to be Cousin It's little sister ... "Think you can do anything with this?"

When I Dip, You Dip, We Dip!

With cookout season in full swing, I figured it was high time to share my most tried and true, time-tested dipping sauces with all of you. These recipes are incredibly low effort, full of simple ingredients, but deliver such a satisfying payoff, which sums up my cooking style 100%. I don't live to be chained to my kitchen, following a bunch of complicated steps, with ingredients I had to go on a treasure hunt for. If that sounds like you, you've found the right place ... If you like it complicated, you can still do that, and let these sauces be the easy accessories that elevate the whole ensemble! Let's get started.

Lip Service

I'm on a quest for the perfect tinted lip balm, and I have not found it ... YET! It's not that I haven't done the legwork lipwork, it's just that no one brand is delivering on all of my requirements. Why not just shut up, use a lipstick or a gloss, and be done with it already? Well because, and my 35 (nah, she was half dead, she wouldn't care), 25, and 15 year old selves can NOT believe I'm about to say this, but sometimes lipstick, or a lip gloss is just a little too much. There, I said it. I can't take it back now, mostly because it's true!

Ok, so what do I want? Oh, the million dollar question, indeed! 

Abracadabra

The illusion of freedom will continue as long as it's profitable to continue the illusion. At the point where the illusion becomes too expensive to maintain, they will just take down the scenery, they will pull back the curtains, they will move the tables and chairs out of the way and you will see the brick wall at the back of the theater.

-Frank Zappa 

Happenin'

“Some people make things happen. Some people watch things happen. And then there are those who wonder, 'What the hell just happened?'” 

-Carroll Bryant

I'm using Carroll's version of the notion brought forth in Nicholas Murray Butler's speech on Charter Day at the University of California, March 1931

This month I think I've been all three of these people at one time or another, and sometimes (exhaustingly) all at once. Okay, so where do I start? Where did we leave off? Well ... How 'bout I jump into it by putting it this way: If the month of June and I had a conversation, it would look a bit like this.

The Cup Runneth Over

"My father told me something when I was very small to instill confidence in me, 'Nobody in the world is worth more than you, but nobody's worth less,' it is an egalitarian view that I've carried around in my life. That's why I am for free schools, free universities, free healthcare, and free babysitting. Because our society could afford it.

In America, people think social democracy is some kind of communism. They think capitalism is freedom. It's not. It's only freedom to exploit people."

-Stellan Skarsgård