who needs a dining room...

...when you never cook anyway!

welcome to my new favorite place at home....dining area turned craft/art space! it's a little slice of heaven for me, and i owe it all to my darling and generous husband, who surprised me while we were at ikea yesterday and bought me a new, and may i just say....GIGANTIC, table for my space.on the other wall is my answer to the clip-it-up, aka pegboard and hangers. it works like a charm, and holds all of the thickers, rub-ons, and embellishments you could dream of! :)previously, i had been using an itty bitty little computer desk, which was fine...but nothing like THIS! i have room for my computer now, there is plenty of work space, and everything i use frequently is right where i can get it. kirk put the table together yesterday, and i spent last night and today cleaning, purging, and getting things back in order. i LOVE it!

the table is the melltorp, in the dining table section of ikea. a steal at $69, it is a whopping 70" long, and a very nice depth of 30". it is solid as a rock, easy to clean, it's perfect. and the fact that kirk surprised me with it makes it all the more special.

yeah, he's a keeper all right. :)

prior to re-organizing my space, i made this little card for my aunt's birthday, i think it turned out pretty cute.after last week i can only hope that tomorrow brings a fresh perspective. there is a spot of good news before we even get started: we get tuesday off for cesar chavez day! woo hoo!

i hope we all have a great week!

the legend of the 80's mixtape goddess

the current "office" challenge over at tally was this:

- puke green paint, splattered
- pepto pink as an accent color
- blurry OR 2 of the same photo

voila:i like it. i miss my tape deck! my car has a cassette player in it, and doing this layout makes me want to go get some casio 90 minute titanium blank cassettes and make a mix....*sigh*....

in other news....car is out of the shop, all fresh and starty. i am feeling much better, with a lingering cough but i have rejoined the living, and that's a good thing. getting ready for lunch with a good friend, and the weather outside is absolutely SoCal perfect. it's a good day.

happy weekend!

in the shop

the car, that is. just renewed our rental car for another week. poor little GTI is without a starter, so we're waiting for the mechanic to find one under cost. *fingers crossed* it seems i am also "in the shop" as i have succumbed to whatever virus this is that's been going around. i feel like a little family of miniature fire-breathing dragons has made their home in my throat for the past 4 days. i'm home sick from work today, can only manage to be out of bed for about 45 minutes before my body lets me know it's time to rest again. boo for sickness. may our little car and i feel back to normal soon. on the positive side, i've logged in several hours of movie-watching goodness while laying on the couch, which is nice, even if i am missing half of them by sleeping.

haven't been all that crafty, so nothing to show you today.

dad sent some new and uber-cool ATC's this week, i am thinking of a project incorporating all of these little masterpieces together.

well campers, time for some tea and chicken soup before i hit the couch for another round of sleep and flics. hope you have a great week!

the middle of month 3...

update on the ol' 2009 goals:

- haven't had a diet coke, or any drink with aspartame, since December 31, 2008. i feel great. so far that choice has been worth it. i even made my doctor confirm it at my physical...he said, and i quote, "that is a very wise decision."
- kirk and i have added sodium to our ixnay list. slowly but surely we are getting rid of a lot of sodium in our diets. and triglycerides, i.e.: bad fats.
- have not been as consistent with the 3/week activity - but i have come close, and recently started my nightly walk/jogs again, which has been great stress relief. after this week i won't have to work until 9 two nights a week, so that should help.
- i am doing well with being creative daily, i have found that although i don't sit down in my "studio" each day, i am utilizing my right brain often. feels good!

will be updating the etsy shop within the next couple of weeks, so if you are interested, keep a lookout. sold out of pattern paper sets, so may add some more sets of those...maybe another mini-kit, who knows what's up my etsy sleeve? :)

finished a couple more 52Q tags, will post those to flickr so you can see them on the right. looking forward to a new ABC prompt from Rachel tomorrow. never too late to join either of those art journal groups, so have a looksee!

just used a gift certificate from christmas at scrapbook.com, loaded up on some new stamps and transparencies, can't wait to get those. i am officially a hambly FREAK, waving my flag proudly. if you have not used hambly rub-ons, you are missing out on something very special.

car is giving us hassle...starter is burned out, also needed a new battery to the tune of $90...our wonderful NON-DEALER mechanic got it "temporarily working" until he can get the $375 part ordered. ugh. i hate cars. NYC sounds so good when this crap sneaks up on us....anybody living back east that can point me in the direction of a decent social work job would gain my long-term indebtedness! :)

we've got a new temporary social worker starting tomorrow at work, looking forward to fresh energy in the office, it's been pretty tense around there since the holidays. gearing up for a crazy summer w/lots of staff on various types of leave. not me, unfortunately...i might be able to squeeze a long weekend in there, but that's about it until fall. wow, that sounds like a long time.

no images for today's post. but how about a video to make up for it? my friend geoff posted a link to this on facebook the other day and i was busting up. he makes a good point. have a great week!

straight up nothing to say

not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing. ;)

blognews: i added some slideshows to the sidebar on the right for the 2 mini-art journals i've been taking part in this year, so i don't have to do a new post every time i complete a card/tag.

worknews: still have a job, thankful for it, but it has been stressing me out a bit. nothing new, too much to do with too little time. we are seeing the economic stress filter down to our foster families, thus filtering down to the kids...tough times. we'll pull through.

homenews: let's see....dishes in the sink, laundry piled up to here, dust you can write in, hmm...might be time to get off the computer and do something around here.

othernews: kirk and i both have relatively clean bills of health after several recent doc appts. both of us need to eat healthier and exercise more, nothing new on that front. :)

are you asleep yet? thought so. i'll put you out of your misery and leave you with my most recent "office" challenge layout for tallyscrapper:
yes, i actually sewed that "she" onto the LO. i found out, several pokes and a huge mess on the back that you can't see, that i HATE sewing by hand. i would have made a terrible austen girl. :)

have a great week!