ORGANIZING * BAD CANDY

I love chocolate. It's in my bones to love chocolate. Chocolate and peanut butter is a particular favorite. Reeses Peanut Butter Cups, Baskin Robbins Chocolate Peanut Butter Ice Cream, Peanut Butter and Chocolate Fudge....you get the idea. I had a coupon for a new product called the Reeses Whipped Candy Bar. Dollar off 2. At Walgreens with a sweet tooth, I grabbed a couple of these and used up that coupon. Got in the car, tore it open, took a bite.......hmmm......that's not really mouth watering. I must be wrong. Try again. This thing is actually dry. I was hungry, so ate most of it before I wrapped the wrapper around it and took it home to Steve. I studied the wrapper of the second candy bar, and saw THIS : 40% less fat?!? Who are they fooling? Me I guess.

My desk is still neat as a pin, and it makes me so happy to sit at the computer now. Except I didn't tell you that at least a few pieces of paper from the desk landed on the floor behind the desk, in an already partly messy sewing room. Have a look: If my mom taught me anything, it was to not let things get to the floor. That's the ulitmate in slob her her book. And here I am. So....in the spirit of what moved me on Tuesday, and in honor of bead group, which isn't happening today due to out of town-ness, busy-ness and ambivalence-ness, I am going to clean this up. Now! It will be a thrill and a pleasure to show the "after" picture by the end of the day. It's nice and sunny in here, and when I return, I hope to show a completed darling brown bed jacket/house coat along with a neat imagination-inspiring room.

I haven't started yet, because it wouldn't be honest not to show the hallway where I was going to probably dump everything from the sewing room! Here it is...not as sunny, but not bad as hallways go, with a nice little path between the stuff on the bookshelf and on the floor and hanging over the railing. I'll probably keep the ironing board there, but move the bookshelf into the sewing room. Until then.....I am busy organizing....Signing off at 12:00 noon.

It's now 10:00 PM, with all the similar interruptions that I had Tuesday, I've almost accomplished my goal. The sewing room is neat, and I've even finished a few projects. Altered a skirt, sewed Peter's button on, sewed up some pockets on a pair of slacks, Freecycled a puzzle, and brought the room into its new organized state: The hallway is improved, but not yet camera ready. The curtain rods are gone, stored in a specially sewn appropriately shaped pocket, and stored away where I can find them. The brown fleece jacket is appliqued, and ready to sew tomorrow. Here are the pattern pieces. I would have finished it tonight if the serger had been set up with the brown thread. It's not difficult to change threads on the serger, it's just my own little mind block, since it can't be done as quickly as changing thread on a sewing machine. Yes, the sleeves are pieced together. I hope it won't look too cheesy when finished. I didn't want to buy more fleece!

IMAGE IS EVERYTHING - MY DESKTOP

Today is a historic day. President Barack Obama is now in charge! I've been watching the inauguration all day, and it's been quite awesome. However, life around here does go on, and I cannot live one more day with a messy desk. Anyone who knows me knows that I abhor disorder. It is with embarrassment and trepidation that I show the following picture, taken a minute ago:
At this point, if you just want to skip the day from now, about 12:30 PM straight to 11:30 PM, you can go to the end of this post and see the After picture of my desk. Let me say that each of those pieces of paper has something VERY IMPORTANT (suuurrre) on it. The cords are looking bad. That red checked fabric sample cutting is wonderful, but the only thing I'd make with it might be a skirt. The books are from the library, but how can I ever use them to learn about Photoshop when you can see that my Christmas present, Adobe Photoshop Elements 6 for the Mac is still wrapped in shrinkwrap sitting on top of my printer? The keyboard is off center from the monitor. Pens are everywhere. My glasses are not folded neatly where I can get to them. The year at a date calendar is still 2008. The seam-binding/braided rug makers have been there for a week. (Those are going straight to Freecycle). You can't see the dowel rods, bookmark, or my Mom's iPod that I'm supposed to fill with her music. I spy curtain tension rods on this desk too. THAT'S IT. It is 2:15 PM, and I will not write here again until I can show an After picture to eclipse this awful Before picture.

OK, it's 2:30, and I have to go do the school pick up. So I'm signing out on the desk. I have done nothing but list the bias tape makers on Freecycle, otherwise, it's still as you saw.
I don't even believe myself sometimes....I am just now signing back in (5:30) for this job of clearing off my desk in order to make it a space where someone can think and work. What have I been doing? Picked up son from school, made Risotto because I was starving, made Kraft Macaroni and Cheese for son, read Tribune, ate, cleaned up after making the two food items, got the mail and read the mail, changed the plastic on the bird cage and gave Pretty Bird fresh food, gave Car Bunny new ribbons in anticipation of Valentine's Day, started a load of laundry, got the clean laundry off the line and brought it upstairs. And more. It's called multi-tasking. Someone has already claimed one of the bias tape makers. Yea!
Here's Car Bunny before the ribbon:

It's now 6:30 and I have to sign out again to carpool some kids back to school for Social Dance. I'll be back, though. In the meantime, I've eliminated a lot of those paper scraps. Yea!
I'm back now, 7:15. I've got an hour to complete this desktop. I've got pretty pink file folders and I'm furiously labeling and filing and tossing. There's a great new song by Ray Lamontagne called You Are The Best Thing. I'm going to try to find that and listen to it while I work. Then I've got to go and pick up the boys, then I'm done for the night. I have no idea why the above sentences are underlined. OK, back to work....but first, here's Car Bunny all spiffed up for Valentine's Day, posing on the unfinished map of the USA quilt:

I picked up and dropped off the boys. A headache inducing trip, but no headache. It's funny, they were so loud and quite obnoxious and immature (I know...what did I expect) but there at that age where the best thing the adult can do is be quiet and keep her ears open. I was just wanting them to quiet down a bit though. All of a sudden an AC/DC loud song comes on the radio.
What's that song? Who's that? And they all quieted down a little. So thanks to AC/DC. Who knew? I'm signing in back to the desk at 9:00. It's 11:20 and I've finished my project!!! I will admit that there is a small little group of papers that I will try to deal with tomorrow. A Freecycler is going to pick up all the bias tape makers tomorrow along with two big pieces of fabric. Otherwise everything has been recycled, spoken for and filed. If I had my druthers, the mac mini would be under my desk but not on the floor. The little yellow box and small scratch paper pile and address book would be filed away. And you know what...I just made a file with a year at a glance calendar and the little address book. So those are now off the desk. The yellow box carries pens, scissors and the remote control because this monitor is also a TV. I'm going to think about this. If I could really clean out the file drawers, there would be room for the yellow box and contents. So the desk would have only keyboard, phone, camera charger, mac mini and printer. THIS FEELS GREAT!!! I feel like there are possibilities. Like I might get my imagination and creativity back. So, with no further ado, on this historic inauguration day, may I present my new desk. Maybe I could make a pretty cover for it....(Just imagine it without the calendar which is under the right corner of the computer next to the yellow box):

It's 11:30. Good Night!

FREECYCLE IS FABULOUS

Freecycle is a yahoo group that anyone with a Yahoo email address can join. You post stuff that you want to get rid of so that it doesn't end up in a landfill. Last year I unloaded......
Virginia Bluebells - an invasive plant in my garden that I wanted out!
This was the best freecycle ever because one lady brought chocolate and I made a couple of new gardening friends
Christmas Ornaments
A partly burned but still in good shape gold pillar candle
An art deco kitchen chair that I couldn't sell on Craigs
An old lampshade that came with a lamp I bought at a garage sale
A bag of Fabric scraps
Three freebie Wall Calendars
A black silicone pot holder - the person who took this left some amazing brittle in return - he uses these pot holders as a brittle surface so that it's easy to peel
Half used page a day calendars
A huge Circus Poster from my husband's friend - what was it doing HERE?
Loads of books from Valerie
A Suede vest from a Rummage sale that Peter didn't wear on halloween
Old Piano music
Extra ceramic and plastic pots for plants
An expandable trivet that had lost its luster for me
A costco cookbook
A little birdsnest for a crafter - it turns out a woman has a birds nest theme in her house!
oh, and there's a guy who collects star wars anything - I had books for him.
And lots more that I don't remember

I got a few things too. Today I picked up half a bag of rock salt because we had none when it was so icy a couple of weeks ago. The ice was really scary, and this would have
helped. The woman who gave this rock salt has started a blog about freecycling. She is going to freecycle something every day this year. I love the idea, and am going to try to freecycle things 3 or 4 times a week.....that's 150 - 200 things out of here! I mean someone came and picked up long fabric cardboard tubes even! To use to make palm trees for a party.
I also got two loveseats that I thought would fit down our basement stairs but didn't. So I had to re-freecycle those to the next person who had contacted the original freecycler. The next person came and got the loveseats the next day.
I picked up a huge amount of fabric from a drapery-making company. I've already used a lot of the fabric for window treatments and to make casserole carriers.
I gave a couple of bolts of the fabric to a friend to give to a woman who supports her children and grandchildren. I may have to freecycle some of the rest of that fabric this week, because, honestly, although it's beautiful, I don't have a good use for it.
Sometimes people post "wants" on Freecycle. Like the time someone posted a "want" for a baseball mitt, broken in, for a 7 year old. Guess what? I had one and freecycled it to a new home where it spent at least a few nights under a pillow instead of in a forgotten box in a basement. The 7 year old was thrilled. I love that he slept with the mitt.

Has anyone noticed the new look here at herheartonhersleeve.blogspot.com? I was having a difficult time lining up my words and photos in my last post, and the little borders around the photos were particularly wrong. I thought. So they're gone! This post is really about Freecycle, though. And other ways of getting your stuff recycled and re-used without leaving home. We all have a responsibility to our planet to keep it clean and to keep the landfills free of things that can be re-used. Please?

And one more thing....when the freecycle community doesn't want your stuff, you can list it on Craigslist in the Free category. Within a day or so it will be GONE. Like the shoulder pads and the curtain swag holders. Yea!!!

SWEATER PURSE

My Sweater Purse is finally finished and I'm loving it. Looking back to my post of February 10, 2008 - has it been almost a whole year? - I see that I'd inadvertantly

shrunk the Eileen Fisher sweater, then since it didn't fit anymore, shrunk it again on
purpose. Then I looked at it for a year, thinking about how I was going to make this
purse. What I did was use a large embroidery needle (bodkin) and some heavy duty
carpet thread and stitch up the bottom of the sweater. Next I cut off the buttons and
sewed up the front of the sweater. Then came the big step. Cutting off the sleeves.
Once this was done, the shape could be ruined, but I did it, using my new Gingher scissors (which I love, and which are worth it after all). Now I had to sew up the
armholes, but in a way that would keep the sides of the bag looking smooth. This
took some doing, and even now, it's a little bumpy. Which enhances the home-made-
ness, right? Almost there. I sewed the buttons back on where they looked good, and
cut one of the sleeves into strips. Sewed the two strips together on the short side,
and attached them to the bag inside the collar.
I had some blue on cream cotton toile fabric that I'd gotten through Freecycle, and
sewed that into a lining with a zipper. Carried the purse a few days. Couldn't stand
my zipper closure. It was a pain to get into the purse. Took out the lining, cut off
the zipper, and re-inserted the lining without a protective top. I just have to be
constantly careful to not let everything spill out of the purse. Today I'll go to Hancock
Fabrics, where notions are 50% off in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, and I'll buy
some of those magnetic snaps.

IRINA PALM * MAMA MIA * NEVER LET ME GO * DARK SHADOWS

Irina Palm - One of the best movies I've seen in ages. It's a story about what a grandmother will do for her beloved grandson. It stars Marinanne Faithfull and she's wonderful. Not for the faint of heart, but I won't say anymore because I don't want to give it away. Lots of great scenes, but my favorite is near the end when Maggie has tea with her girlfriends. This is good - especially if little obscure movies are your thing.

Mama Mia - Fabulous! This is my favorite Meryl Streep movie ever, and although she is the main character, the movie is still about the story, the scenery and of course the music and dancing. An absolute credit to the stage show, full of energy and laughs.

Never Let Me Go - by Kazuo Ishiguro takes place in the UK in the later years of the 20th century. Halfway through the book, loving it, I realized I had no idea what it was about or where it was leading. And still I read. To the point where I finished it all in a mad-dash-hours-long-read this morning. Any thing I say about it will give something away, and this is a story best revealed layer by layer. In my search for cover art I discovered another cover that is maybe preferable to this one, which is the one I read. Still, my cover would be of the building and grounds around which much of the book revolves. Should there be a label for posts called "going off on a tangent"?


I'm off to take pictures of my sweater purse, so that this post can be about more than books and movies. Which after all are asides from life since they take you out of your own reality into someone else's reality. It's obvious that other realities are places I enjoy, as also evidenced by my obsession to certain reality shows. What a great genre. Where was it all those years? Oh...it was there, they called it soap operas. I was there too! When I was in 7th or 8th grade, knowing that my grandmother had watched her "my shows" for years, a friend had me over to her house to watch two new shows, A World Apart about Patrice and All My Children about Erica Kane and all kinds of other people. Patrice was played by Susan Sarandon, and didn't last long. Erica Kane is still going strong. We also watched Dark Shadows at 4. The other two were on around noon, so we could only watch those during the summer. Dark Shadows is the source of my now limited knowledge of Vampires, Witches, Warlocks and the like. It was a fantastic show. I loved Victoria Winters. She was so nerdy in a way, just like me, but she was in the thick of the action at Collinwood. My grandmother was the only one to support the soap opera habit. I remember her trying to watch Dark Shadows, but she couldn't get there. She watched One Life To Live, Search For Tomrrow and As The World Turns. She said that by watching those shows, you could know how to live your own life. And that at the holidays they were the best because everyone was all dressed up and the houses were decorated and all was at its best. Just like in real life!
Click here to watch the first episode of Dark Shadows. You'll see Elizabeth Collins and Victoria Winters and hear the opening music.

THE MIDDLE PLACE * RENDITION * CHARLIE WILSON'S WAR

I just finished a book this morning because it's due today, and we've got negative high temperatures and a blizzard scheduled for the next few days, so I want to make my library run today. Oh, and did I mention the plumbing problem? We have water, but it can't run down the drain. Think about it.

The Middle Place by Kelly Corrigan: Someone forwarded me a youtube email of a woman reading an essay about women in "the middle place" between their parents and children. It used to be called the sandwich generation by my mom when she was caring for her elderly parents while raising her own three children. Kelly's book and Kelly's middle place involved her diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer, at the same time her Dad was being diagnosed and treated for bladder cancer. Except the cancer is like a bit part in the story for me, because her book is really about family relationships, and about being the loved daughter and loved sister in her family. So many people will relate to her relationship with her father, a gregarious positive happy family man who loves people and lives life with a flourish. Check out the Kelly Corrigan Video.
The Middle Place is a lovely valentine to Kelly's parents.

Rendition - An old friend called last week to chat and catch up, and it turns out that even though our views are similar, our politics are different. She suggested that I watch Rendition and Charlie Wilson's War, and I had been passing them both up on the On Demand menu for weeks. Rendition is a political thriller about torture, not too graphic not to watch, and it's very watchable. Some people might watch this and come away with the opinion that torture is justified. I watch this and think that torture is wrong. Two wrongs don't make a right and I wish there didn't have to be a saying about turning the other cheek and an eye for an eye is more crime and more pain. How can the bad things end if they continue? How can permanent peace come out of the violence of war?

Charlie Wilson's War - Tom Hanks as a partying congressman from Texas who has a spot and clout on the house appropriations committee. This movie would have you believe that he and a cia agent, with Julia Roberts' (she plays Texas' sixth wealthiest woman, a former Miss Cotton Bowl with political interests that weren't made clear in the movie) encouragement were responsible for funding the secret 1980s and 1990s war in Afghanistan. This is the one where the Soviets were trying to take over Afghanistan, but eventually retreated. Then the Taliban took over. You know the rest.
It was better watching than I thought it would be. Thanks Tom and Phillip Seymour Hoffman.

I'm off to see what's doing with the plumbing on the home front and the movie shelf at the library. The library. Always the same and always different.
For some reason, blogger isn't letting the paragraphs of this blog snap into perfect shape today. But I think I like it. After a year, we are making some cosmetic changes here at herheartonhersleeve.blogspot.com. Just like the Tribune. Cosmetic changes are OK with me; it's the content changes I can't stand. I want Gasoline Alley, Hi and Lois, Beetle Baily, BC, and some other old friends back on my comics page along with Dear Abby. And I want the TV guide in the paper every day. That's all. And it's too much to ask.

SNOWING LIKE CRAZY

It's a snowy Saturday; here's our fountain from the window of my office/sewing room.

In the meantime, I finished a great little book.

When You Are Engulfed In Flames - David Sedaris never disappoints, and this latest volume is no exception. I love his honesty and crazy way of thinking that ultimately makes sense to me. It's funny/not funny and never sarcastic. The written equivalent of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Sometimes, you're just "David, you're not really going to go THERE?.......and you're reading, and too late, he's already there. If you're wondering about the cover, then I'll just hint that it's about gift buying and writing in Tokyo.

Of course no one remembers that last year, I showed a picture of the Eileen Fisher sweater I shrunk that I didn't even know was wool, really. I've tried to shrink and felt a number of clothes I didn't like, but this sweater decided to be the one. My intent was to make a purse, and I finally did! Last week! Sewing by hand with heavy duty button thread! And then I carried it for a couple of days and decided my pretty toile lining wasn't working out because the zipper was too short and I couldn't get into my purse
and root around as I am wont to do, looking for a pen, my wallet, the changepurse...
So, today I'll finish it by maybe attaching some black fabric to the toile and creating more of a tie closure.

Peter Perfect - No, I'm not talking about my son....there's a new TV show on Style about this brit, Peter Ishkans, who runs a successful LA hair salon. Small business owners who are about to crash and burn for one reason or another call Peter to come and help them save their business. He does Small Business Makeovers! I love it. His accent is like Super Nanny's accent, not upper class, but not cockney, either. For example, he says Buh-uhn for Button. He says that "Image is Everything". He also makes over the people at his salon, and he teaches them to keep their business clean and organized, and to think about every little detail of their business. Here's a link to a little preview video: Peter Perfect Video Don't laugh at me, it grows on you!

To Tell The Truth - Now it's on at 2:30 am following Whats My Line. I'm watching because the guests are sometimes people who are now famous and well known by sight, athough they weren't at the time. The female panelists are very corny, but the men are quite charming. It really points up the excellence of the What's My Line panel. And, no, I'm not watching it in real time, by then I'm upstairs doing my last email check of the night, or reading if the book is really good. Gotta love the DVR. It's revolutionary if one is a tv watcher. If you weren't around in those days, try this link to see what it was like in those days: To Tell The Truth Video

TOP TEN MOVIES -CONTINUTED

An Officer and a Gentleman - Way to Go Paula!

THE HILLS ~ THE CITY ~ BROMANCE ~ AND MORE!

I finished a great book, and have meant to write about it and recommend it, but now I can't find the reminder scrap of paper among all the scraps with all the reminders on my desk. If my camera weren't malfunctioning I'd take a quick picture to prove to you that my desk has more reminder scraps on it than anyone else's desk.

I have a confession. I think Mtv might be my favorite station. The Hills is over for the season, possibly forever, but The City has begun, and it is great. I've always loved sensible pretty Whitney, but now that she's got her own show, she's really as goofy as all the rest, and better than ever. Anyone can admit that they like The City. Cases could be made for interest in the world of New York fashion, New York scenery, life in New York. However, the fact that Bromance is a don't miss for me is a little scary, even to myself. It's the same premise as Paris Hilton's My New BFF, where the celebrity, (Paris in that case) gives a group of people weekly challenges and missions, and each week chooses a winner (someone who is generally protected from elimination that week) and a loser (the eliminatee). On Bromance, it's Brody Jenner looking for a new BFF to join his posse of guys who go around LA and sometimes to Mexico partying. What a life. Brody is darling and funny and smart. Did I say What a life!? And guess what, it's Monday night, so I get to see a new The City and a new Bromance episode! Yea! Sorry, those purple titles are not links.

Last night I finally took that shrunken Eileen Fisher sweater, cut off the arms, and hand sewed it into a purse shape. Tonight I want to line it and put the shoulder strap on, and tomorrow I want to carry it. Which means maybe I'll go somewhere tomorrow, because I kind of wanted to stay in. Except I have to go somewhere because the ice is all melted and this is a chance to walk on dry sidewalks no matter how cold it is out there. Today I walked to the library and checked out the pattern drafting book again as well as the iPhoto and iTunes how to books. Ooohhh! The scrap with the name of that book just slipped out from underneath my keyboard:

The Red Scarf - by Kate Furnivall Was a wonderful book. Taking place in Siberia and a Russian village in 1917, and then the 1930s, it's a story of human endurance against the background of the Russian Revolution and the ensuing events that occurred in a small village. The main characters, Sofia and Anna are strong compelling women who just lived one day at a time and did what they had to do to survive.