I try to avoid house decor trends.  Don’t get me wrong.  I think chicken kitchens are cute, and it’s a hard fight to resist covering Cecilia’s bathroom with rubber duck decor.  It’s just that I’m scarred.  When I was in junior high, my mom let me go all out with the very trendy, very colorful sunflower theme.  My bedroom was painted green and marigold yellow.  Sunflower curtains. Sunflower bedspread. Sunflower, sunflower, SUNFLOWER! A few years later, after that fad had passed, it was bit embarrassing to have folks in my room, and there was no way of covering it’s BRIGHT YELLOW walls.

As an adult, I’ve tried to keep my home a bit more classic.  I like pieces that can be switched out easily without much cost or effort.  I’ve painted all the walls very neutral colors. Even Cecilia’s room is tan.  That’s how devoted I am to a neutral, trend-less house. However, recently I found something I just can’t resist - Keep Calm and Carry On poster.  I’ve seen them in several magazines and websites, and I just think there adorable.  It’s a good mantra to have in your life, especially if you’re a mother of a toddler who’s entering her terrible twos.  Plus it has a very interesting background story.

There are some great Etsy sellers that offer the poster at reasonable price, and you can customize the size and colors.  I paid $15 for my print (including shipping), $5 for my frame (Goodwill!), and $7 for the mat (Hobby Lobby). That’s just $27 for a 16×12 piece of art!

Starting with our courtship, I’ve been after Chris to keep the hvac unit off when the weather was nice.  I just have a hard time making sense flipping the thermostat from heat to cool without an off period in between.  There’s something refreshing about opening the windows and airing out a dusty house after a long winter.  Unfortunately, with Chris’s allergies, sleeping the windows open cause him to develop sinus infections.

I guess it was a good thing he had his sinus surgery in January and had his sinuses scraped out because our heating unit went out the week before we started our hardwood floor refinishing.  We figured we could live without it for a while since it was a nice temperature outside, it would be off during the renovations, and we were staying with his folks for a week.  Besides, hvac repairs can be expensive.

That was nearly a month ago. So far, so good though.  Early spring in Tennessee can be pretty enjoyable.  Plus I was hopeful that it was just the heating part, not the air conditioning.  Until today. It reached 87 degrees - 79 in the house.  No air conditioning.  We called the repair man.  He came. He went.  And $125 later, the house is still 79 degrees.

Chris also informed me that the Jeep’s AC went out too.  Ugh.

I’ve had cats my entire life. I love cats. In fact, I had one until I moved in with Chris, and then I had to give her away because he’s deathly allergic. (It was a very hard decision - my kitty or my boyfriend. Ridiculously hard.) Then today we have this adorable stray show up on our back porch.  She’s super friendly, even to Chris, and the baby loves her.  Pretty kitty loves Cecilia too.  The only thing is, if we keep her, she must to be an outdoor cat - for Chris’s health and my sanity. I just couldn’t add to the chaos, not to mention the pet hair.

However, it makes me wonder. I’ve never really been a big fan of outdoor only cats. I guess she would end up being more of a neighborhood cat. Our street already has lots of hobo kitties, which is alarming.  If I don’t find her picture on a flyer or on the side of a milk carton, I’m going to take her into a cheap vet for a once over and spay.  I’ll make sure to get her shots up to date, including her rabies vaccination, but that leaves me with a question.  Do I get her a collar for her rabies tag?  It would be registered in my name.  Do I go one step further and get her a pet id?  I don’t want her picked up by Animal Control, but I’m hesitant to be financial responsible (beyond preventative care) for a vagrant feline.

Here’s her picture (shot with my phone).  I’ve named her Roxy.  (All my children, human or beast, have a song with their name in the title. Do you know which one is hers?)  She’s mostly white with some muted calico markings.  She’s got blue eyes that are a little crossed, and I think she might have six toes on her right front paw.   Also, her meow is almost completely silent.  My neighbor, Jimbo, offered to help watch out for her and feed her.  What do you think? What would you do? Do you think outdoor only cats are okay or cruel?

This week I started letting Cecilia explore in the kitchen while I cook and clean.  Previously we’ve strapped her into her highchair, but with her new found walking ability, she’s can no longer be pacified with Gerber baby puffs (or baby cheetos as the pediatrician calls them).  She wants to GO! GO! GO!

A few days ago, during her adventures, she discovered the Tupperware/Spice cabinet and had lots of fun pulling out all the lids and walking around with a very musical container of mustard seeds.  It was so cute, and since Tupperware lids have a lifetime warranty, I was more than happy to let her play with them.

Tonight, however, she found flour jar and dove right in.  For a split second, Chris and I debating stopping her, but it was way too cute.  The end result - a huge mess.  But flour is cheap and a smile on my daughter’s face is priceless. However, I’m going to have to find a new home for the flour.  She’s not likely to forget that fun soon.

I know I’m always preaching going green and using earth-friendly methods.  However, I do believe that there is a time and place for conventional ways.  For example, last spring I battled a small army of black ants that were trying to invade my home.  In addition to the usual storing and covering of food, I drew chalk lines, dusted my window sills with pepper, and sprayed my counters with vinegar.  We still had a few ants, but I managed to keep them at bay.  This spring, when the ants returned, I tried the same methods, but they didn’t have the same results. I even tried tracking them to their nest in order to pour boiling water on it, but it didn’t work.  Ants seemed to be sneaking their way into every room of the house.  When I found ants crawling across Cecilia’s changing table several days in a row, I knew it was time to take action.  You can mess with my raisins, but you better not mess with my baby.

I invested in several anti-ant remedies - stakes, sprays, traps.  I even mixed borax with pancake syrup.  The repellents worked, but they seemed to pick up and move somewhere else nearby.  Frustrated, I started to track their path again when I noticed that they were flocking towards the grill cover yesterday.  I thought they had found a source of food, and I thought that would be a good place to spray.  Little did I know that grill cover had become their new home.

Despite suffering from a miserable case of hay fever, fiery hatred for the ants started to bubble inside of me as I grabbed a bottle of bug killer.  I sprayed and sprayed, but every time I unfolded more of the cover, I found more ants.  When the first bottle ran out, I grabbed a second bottle.  When that was empty, I grabbed a can of Raid for hornets that was originally purchased to kill a nest of carpenter bees in our carport.  (They’re still there, but I weighed the risk.  Outdoor bees with no stingers vs. ants that bite and enter my house.)  After all was said and done, my arm was sore from holding down the triggers on the bottles, and there was carnage all around.  It was like a Arthropod Hiroshima.

I won’t lie; it felt good.  I won the battle.  Though there were a few survivors, I killed thousands upon thousands of them.  I made no exceptions.  All ants were fair game.  All that the remaining ants could do was run away.  That is until I pulled out an old bottle of Windex with ammonia.

Warning - These pictures give me the heebee-geebees, and I was there.  

My stepmother is an audiologist so I grew up with a knowledge of decibels and its affect on hearing.  With my recent war on dog hair, I’ve become acutely aware of the volume of the vacuum cleaner.  I love my dyson, but I love Cecilia’s hearing more. At first, I tried leaving Cecilia in her pack’n'play while I vacuumed in the other room, but she was upset by the loud noise and disappearance of her momma.  I also tried waiting until Chris was home so he could hang with her while I vacuumed, but that didn’t happen as frequently as needed.  Two weeks ago, I ordered a pair of Peltor Junior Earmuffs.

I was a little worried that Cecilia wouldn’t tolerate them, but I was happily surprised that she was completely ambivalent.  Now I can clean the floors without permanently damaging her hearing, and, as an added bonus, she looks stinkin’ cute in them!

(That’s a drink coaster in her mouth.)

Spring is in the air, and I’ve managed to keep my gardening fervor at bay.  In previous years, I’ve planted way too early and watched with great alarm as a late frost killed my tomato plants.  Of course, the last frost date for this zone (6b) isn’t until April 6th so I’ve got a while to go before I can plant in the ground.  However, it’s getting to be time to start seedlings.  In fact, I’m even a bit late for some varieties of vegetable.  Thankfully I’m not growing those from seeds.  I’m quite the novice when it comes to seeds, and some plants, i.e. tomatoes, are more likely to survive if I buy them already thriving.

Actually, I prefer live plants most of the time.  Unfortunately, there is one variety of squash that we’re addicted to and is only available as seeds. Last year, I tried to grow it but failed miserably.  After all, it’s difficult to force yourself out of bed to water your garden in the morning, and it is especially difficult if you’re a sleep deprived new mom.  In order to get our fix, Chris, Cecilia, and I loaded up and went to the farmers’ market every Saturday morning because there was one farmer that grew it.  And on the weeks he wasn’t there, there was quite a bit of sadness in our house.  (I might be exaggerating a little bit, but if we thought about it, we were sad.) This year I’m determined to grow my own.  We’ll probably still go to the Market on Saturdays, but we’ll spend our money on other things, like local honey and watermelons.  (We all know I don’t need to grow watermelons again.  I was too successful at that.)

Despite my failure, I did learn a couple things last year.  First, the supplies to start seeds can be a little expensive for something that you plan to either put in the ground or throw away.  Second, you shouldn’t use paper to mark your seedlings because it will wash away when it rains, and you won’t know which plant is which until you have four butternut squash vines growing.  This year, I have a new method, a cheaper method - yogurt cups!  It’s always bothered me that yogurt comes in a #5 plastic, which isn’t recyclable in our area.  How can something so good for your digestive system be so bad for the earth?  Anyway, I thought I’d give the cups one more use before tossing them in the trash.  I also marked the appropriately labeled the cups with a permanent marker.  Take that rain!

So here are my kids.  I might plant a few more veggies in the next few days.  It just depends if I’m craving yogurt. (As you can see, I ran out of yogurt cups and had to use a few traditional peat moss pots.)

At the beginning of the year, I mentioned that I’ve been buying meat in bulk when it’s on sale and storing it in our deep freezer.  I generally try to keep it around $2.50 per pound.  This is often a challenge because I only buy lean, healthy meat, which rarely goes on sale, and I spend the first part of Sunday morning scouring the newly posted sale flyers of our local grocery stores for the latest and greatest deal.  Some weeks are jackpots ($.99/pound lean 93/7 ground turkey), and some weeks are flops.

In addition to meat, I check the other groceries on sale and match them to my coupons.  If there is a product I know I’m going to purchase, whether to replenish our dwindling supply or because it’s on special, and I don’t have a coupon, I’ll do a quick google search.  Those searches are usually a bust, but one out of five times, you find something worth printing.

A couple weeks ago, one of our local grocery stores had Cheerios (all varieties!) on sale for buy one, get one free.  Cereal is one of those items that I only buy on sale, refusing to spend more than my arbitrary $2.50 per box.  I’ve found that most stores rotate their cereal sales week to week, and anticipating this, I had hoarded away all my Cheerio coupons.   Before leaving the house, I did a quick Google search and printed off a few additional coupons.  Then I went to the store and stocked up.

All in all, I bought 12 boxes of cereal that day.  (I stopped at another grocery store on the way home to pick up Honey Bunches of Oats.  It was on my way and only $2.16 per box.)  I know this seems crazy, but the price of cereal is rising because the price of wheat is rising.   Now we’re set for a couple months. Given some people might not like cereal that much, but you can always mix other things, like eggs, into your breakfast lineup.  Thankfully, we’re cereal people.

I’ve mentioned that we bought this house with the intentions of slowly fixing it up.  Of course, two years ago we didn’t anticipate getting pregnant and bringing home a baby.  Needless to say, a lot of those big renovation dreams got pushed to the back burner.  Unfortunately, this didn’t stop me from daydreaming about the variety of projects that I’d like to undertake (or rather, have Chris undertake).  This was especially true as I spent hours and hours sitting on the couch nursing my sweet young baby while watching too much HGTV and staring at the wall.

I wasn’t staring with boredom;  I was staring with animosity.  You see, our fireplace is horrendous.  It has an excessively large hearth made up of white painted brick that spans the entire living room wall.  The fireplace has an unnecessary, frilly detail, and the fireplace screen is an ugly 80’s brass.  We loathe it.

The plan was to rip it out and redo it sometime this year, but then things got a little shitty.  With my recent resolution to save money, it’s just not practical to renovate until we’ve built up a savings and paid down debt. Poo. But then one day, I was watching HGTV, and they painted a fireplace screen with high heat spray paint.  Eureka! (Please note that I know and acknowledge that spray paint isn’t super earth friendly but sending your dated but functional fireplace screen to the landfill isn’t either.)

Last week, while wandering the aisles of my local home improvement store, I picked up a can of black high heat spray paint.  (They only had black, white, and BRIGHT silver.)  I had a new mission!  All I needed was for Chris to remove the fireplace screen and doors and paint.  Easy, right?

First, I taped up the glass.  You can see the fugliness of the brass.  (You can also see the reflection of Lucy’s rear end.  I think that’s fitting.)  Then I cleaned the visible surface area.  I did this while Chris watched an episode of Battlestar Galatica.  It looks like a good show, but I never got into it.

On Saturday afternoon, Chris took the screen apart.  (If you’re a BSG fan, you know that it airs on Friday night.)  I thought that it would be pretty easy to remove, just loosen a couple screws.  Boy! Was I wrong! It took Chris several hours to get it apart.

You know what was easy to do?  Spray painting!  It was a bit windy, but the stuff dries fast.  Thankfully nothing blew into the wet paint.

The can said that it would take 2 hours to dry, but we decided to wait overnight.  This was mainly for Chris’s sanity.  I didn’t think his soul could handle disassembling and reassembling on the same day.  Okay, maybe that’s an exaggeration, but he said he wanted to wait and I was in no position to argue.

So four hours and an endless supply of curse words later, the pretty new doors were in place and looking like a million bucks!

Here’s the vertical picture.  What’s all that crap on the top?  Oh, that’s the stuff that use to decorate my house until the baby became mobile and tried to stick it in her mouth.  Now it just sits up there collecting dust.  Maybe I stop watching renovation shows and start watching decorating shows.

Two years ago when we were house hunting, I wanted an older house. I grew up in a subdivision where all the houses had roughly same exterior and floorplan, and I knew I wanted a home with a little more personality and character. The first time I saw pictures of our 1950’s home, I knew it was the one. With a long front porch and two mature maple trees in the front yard, it has a cozy, friendly look to it. We put an offer on it just a few hours after touring it the first time.

Fast forward two years and my infatuation with my adorable fixer-upper craftsman has been dampened by the responsibilities of home ownership. Maintaining any home is hard work, but maintaining a home with personality and character is even harder work. After all, personality and character is earned through age, and our blessed place is starting to wrinkle…literally. She’s starting to crack and sag and clog. Yes, clog. Remember those beautiful, mature trees? Apparently their charm only masks what’s going on below the surface. Their roots system is wreaking havoc on our sewer line, and it all started with a gurgle.

Last summer, just as the bathroom renovations were coming to an end, I noticed that the nursery bathroom would bubble while I did laundry. At first I figured it was just a side effect of the renovations, but when other pipes started slowly draining, I knew it was something else. At first we tried several quick fixes - vinegar, plunging, draino - but nothing worked. It only took a few days for things to completely stop flowing, and we had to call a plumber to snake our main sewer line.

Clearing our pipe wasn’t an easy job. We spent several hours trying to locate our clean-out, before we finally determined that there wasn’t one. The plumbing service eventually removed one of our toilets, used a camera to locate the line, and used a gigantic auger to clear our pipe. Afterward, they informed us that we needed to replace the entire line and until we did it would just happen again. And eight months later, just outside our 6 month warranty, it did. Not prepared to pay for a multi-thousand dollar repair, we paid to have it snaked again and vowed to replace the line at the beginning of 2009.

When January rolled around, I convinced Chris that we should wait until it was absolutely necessary; I was hoping that we could buy some time to save up the cash. Like clockwork, the toilet started gurgling the day we filed our tax return, and within a week, the drains started slowing down. We scheduled our line replacement for the next week.

Things got a little harder over the next seven days. Desperate for some clean clothes, I ran a small load of laundry. That forced grit (from my face wash, not raw sewage) to gurgle up the shower drain. We also had to stop using the dish washer. Then the toilets wouldn’t flush and I started making runs to the nearby Mapco to go number 2. With piles of laundry and dishes all around me, I felt the walls caving in on me.

Finally, today, the line was replaced. It took out part of our driveway and some of our bushes. (We did, by the way, save the asshole tree that did this to us.) It was pretty painful to write “thousand” on a check, but it’s a lot cheaper than paying for sodas and coffee at the gas station every time I needed to poop. (I couldn’t, in good conscience, not buy anything after pooping in their potty.) To celebrate, I ran the dishwasher, started a load of laundry, and flushed a toilet.