Society of Stampaholics

Random Thoughts, Resolutions and Regrets

Hello, all!

We are just back from Florida where I've had a terrific visit with my in-laws (including my eldest and youngest sisters-in-law, Kathy and Laura, nieces and nephews Andrew, Katy, Kelly, and Michael, and Spouse's Uncle Bill and Aunt Ann.

I never announce prolonged visits on my blog for fear of returning home to find we've been robbed. I took my laptop, of course, but despite my good intentions, barely turned the thing on. (Well, how could I when Spouse is out on the dock reeling in fish, or there's a rousing Boggle tournament going on, or the thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle is beckoning, or that elusive of all pasttimes - a NAP - is mine for the taking?)

Some highlights: spent a small fortune at Whim-So-Doodle (LSS in downtown St. Pete); ate a fried oyster Po' Boy sandwich with chipotle sauce at the Hurricane that has made it onto my Top 10 Sandwiches list; got an eReader for Christmas that I am hopelessly in love with (am re-reading Little Women - FREE download, y'all!); and got the high Boggle score.

Some downers: spent a small fortune at Whim-So-Doodle; gained 9 pounds in nine days (driving in a car for four days was the biggest culprit); the stamp I sent to Suzanne was returned today for a lack of postage (I believe it was a whole 3 cents and I'm disgusted with the US postal service for such nitpicking when I know full well that I've spent a small fortune in the last year buying excess postage for lack of a five-cent stamp. As Fred would say, They owe me, gammit!) 

More Random Thoughts

Gulliver's Travels was a very sad and wasted opportunity (it could have been brilliant but was dull and vulgar).

True Grit may have all the critics a-twitter but it lacks the charm and thrill of the original film with John Wayne and Kim Darby. (Matt Damon is tremendous, though. His character is awkward and you feel embarrassed for him - which is true to the book but would never have happened in the hands of a lesser actor; most stars would have insisted on turning him into a stud instead of having the courage to present him as he is. Damon puts so many of his peers to shame - he'll win an Oscar for his acting one of these days.) 

If my wedding anniversary was December 29th, and my SIL Kathy's birthday was December 29th, how come her son Dan got to fly to Spain for vacation on December 29th but we were stuck here? (That's just Wrong.)

Spouse got a mandolin for Christmas. Gigi got a Wii. Yesterday they spent the entire day enjoying their new gifts. Spouse doesn't know how to play a stringed instrument. Gigi couldn't be coaxed from her Littlest Pet Shop game with its monotonous and garrish theme music playing in a never-ending loop. They were so occupied they never noticed the painful sounds issued by the other's activity. 

I did, though. (And no amount of ear plugs will drown out either of them.)

More Wrongness.

Today I received all the mail that had been held, and it is a true testament to my guilt at neglecting my blog and its readers that I sit here now. Because, man, oh, man, am I itching to get upstairs and play with all my new goodies!

Resolutions

I hereby resolve in 2011 to:

1. Submit my work for publication;
2. Visit 5 blogs/day (AND comment);
3. Comment on at least 5 photos/day over at my Flickr groups;
4. Use up 1/3 of my paper stash and NOT buy any more new paper until April 1;
5. Make at least 3 cards/week;
6. Exercise at least 30 minutes/day 3 times/week;
7. Get my blog back on schedule;
8. Thoroughly clean one room and tidy two rooms of my home/day;
9. Refrain from beating Spouse and Child when they don't help me with #8;
10. Re-open my etsy shop.
11. Figure out a way for us to all have a cyber yard-sale / stamp and/or materials swap; and
12. Finish my flipping YA novel.

THERE! That's a dozen things - one for each month out of the year. If I play my cards right, perhaps I'll manage to actually accomplish at least three of them....

Regrets

I really do regret that I've not managed my time better so that I could visit more blogs, leave more comments, and give away more stuff. I also worry that I don't respond enough to people's comments here. And I'm afraid that my Flickr participation has sorely fallen short this last quarter as I've gotten more involved in Gigi's school through the PTL. So I'll have to fix that!

Y'all got any resolutions and/or regrets? I'd love to hear 'em!

Sticky Deliverance, Part I OR I Do, Too, Remember When the Car Caught on Fire

I am constantly amazed that I am attracted to scrapbooking and card making. You know why?

Because I have Glue Issues.

I'm not even kidding here. It started when I was a child.  I remember my first jar of paste with the little brush in the lid. After the first couple of uses, I grew to hate any art class that involved glue - which was pretty much all of them in the first grade. I'd look at other kids happily brushing their construction paper with their paste and wonder how come they didn't have it all over themselves like I did. Even that kid who liked to eat his paste managed to keep himself goo-free. Externally, anyway.

And you should know that I have always hated being sticky. My second real memory involves my outrage at being drenched in soda when my mother leapt from our burning car. Now some of you might think my memory is more rooted in the trauma of finding myself in a burning automobile, but I can honestly say that toddlers are not experienced enough to realize that fire is life-threatening. Heck, they don't even know there is such a thing as life-threatening anything.

At least this toddler didn't. And it's not the fire I remember. It's the stickiness.

We were on our way to the Sunset Drive-In Movie Theatre because that's what you did when you were Young and Broke on a Saturday Night in the Summertime. We had driven through a fast food joint to get provisions because the drive-in fare was over-priced. Again, that's what you did when you were Young and Broke on a Saturday Night in the Summertime.

So there I am, sitting on my mom's lap (ah, yes, light years before our current safety standards required child seats - we weren't even wearing a seat belt), and on my lap was the cardboard tray of burgers and fries and - most importantly to this story - the drinks. Drinks without lids, I might add.

Man, things were primitive back then!

I don't remember what was going on prior to my parents noticing flames shooting through the floorboards. My memory kicks in with motion: I am watching my mother's legs swing from the car and, simultaneously, the tray of goodies is cascading downwards, drenching me with coke.

I am Furious. What is the matter with Mommy?! (I think I even hollered, "Have you lost your mind?" - which has always been a favorite question of my mother's - much like "Have you been smoking crack?" is a favorite question of mine.) She knows I don't like being sticky! What about my french fries?

Yes, sadly to say, I cried over my lost french fries - NOT the trauma around me.

I would probably still do that.

But the french fries were replaced by a candy bar given to me by the lady serving drinks at the bar (whose parking lot obligingly offered a place for us to pull off the road so we could flee our Flaming Ford). That was sort of memorable, too, as it was my first trip to a bar. (Another amazing aspect of the past - you could take your kid into a bar - and he could even buy you a drink and a pack of smokes.)

The place was a typical working man's tavern. Fried food and stale cigarette smoke greeted us at the door. A mirror ran the length of the wall behind the bar and there was a very annoying fluorescent light that kept flickering. The bartender asked my mother if she wanted a drink. My mother - green from shock and not a drinker, anyway - thought she meant a soda and liked to choked death when she took a drink of Double Cola liberally enhanced with bourbon. (My mother, by the way, insists I don't remember this - that I only think I remember it because I've heard the story so often. She's wrong. Being doused with soda and left to sit in stickiness is not something one easily forgets.)

(If any of you are wondering why the car was on fire, I have no idea. Something Went Wrong, obviously. And I'm sure the car was a lemon anyway, because that's what you drive when you are Young and Broke - no matter what the season.)

So to get back to my point - what was my point? 

Oh, yeah. My aversion to being sticky and my early distrust of adhesive products. And I think I need to continue this story in another post or no one will ever read this ... this ... novel I'm writing today.

Living with Crazies

One thing you should know right off the bat: I live with a bunch of Crazies.

This is nothing new. I have always lived with or near Crazies; I was raised by some Crazies, and my sister is definitely Crazy. (Although there is a certain charm to her particular brand of insanity. For instance, it's much more fun to listen to her tell you the plot of a movie than to go see it yourself. She inevitably starts somewhere in the middle and works her way backward and forward at the same time - and then asks you to explain why the protagonist would want to go and do such a thing?! She also has a habit of shrieking "Giiiiiiiiiiiirrrrl" and grabbing your arm at the most exciting bits - usually right before she forgets what happened next.)

I assume this is simply a matter of over-stimulation and not a manifestation of genetic malfunctioning.

At least I hope so.

(I think we can thank my paternal grandmother for my sister's flightiness. My grandma was a Talker. A FAST talker. She talked so fast and so much that one time she actually left the house without her skirt. From the waist up she looked pretty good, but London and France were definitely in evidence as she chattered her way right into the passenger seat of my dad's car. Even more impressive was her reaction to being told she was missing her skirt. Without stopping for so much as a single blush, she continued her oratory all the way up to the house, through the door, and back again - properly skirted this time - with her gums still flapping like the sails of a clipper ship rounding the Cape of Good Hope.)

I know what you're thinking. And all I can say is... well, it's obvious I never had a chance, isn't it? I was doomed to converse at rapid speeds! And to change subjects with no clear or understandable reason!!I'm hardwired for it - you can't fight genetics, baby!!!

Now, where was I?  Oh, yes, the little brook of insanity that babbles through my family. Unfortunately, I will have to continue this discussion at another time because the Crazies I currently live with are grumbling about how some people have been on the computer all day and are they expected to eat Rice Crispies for dinner . . . again?

Sigh.

I really need a wife.

How did the madness start?

When we bought our house, I was quite pleased to get a small, oddly-shaped room under the gables as my personal space. My windfall had a lot to do with the condition of the room. The previous owners hadn’t finished converting it into a living space. The naked drywall is gouged and pitted; there are no baseboards; the wooden floor is buckled and flawed (and not in an artistic, charming way, either); the ceiling is low and spackled in such a way as to produce shank-like spikes – which actually cut my forearms during an exuberant stretch one afternoon!

In addition to the defects already listed, only one of the room’s electrical outlets has been wired. The only window is too tiny to afford an AC unit, and it’s located behind a three-foot-wide chimney column, so the lighting is minimal. Oh, and let's not forget about the climate. The heat/AC registers are a ruse – the former owners never actually got around to putting in the duct work, (a fact they failed to share with us before we bought the place) so you freeze in winter and swelter in summer (which is another reason it really stinks to have a window too small for an AC unit).

So it’s not exactly the best place to hunker down for some intense creative endeavors. It may be sweltering, but it's my inferno. It’s mine. All  m-i-n-e. And that right there is enough to make me fight off all comers.

And that, of course, is when IT started. My supplies expanded and filled the room like pioneers heading west after the Louisiana Purchase. As a result, the idea of Manifest Destiny has taken on a whole new meaning for me. And I’m starting to feel the pinch as there are now “more farmers than fields.” (Can you tell I recently read some James Michenor?)

But here's the really sick part. I am so attached to all my pretty paper and embellishments that I never seem to use most of it for fear I will wish I had kept it back to use in some later project. Which appears to be reasonable – until you realize that “later” will never come.

Riiiiiight. . . .

 

What's in Your Attic?

If you remember, I said in an earlier post that my creative space is located in our attic. It's because of the state of the attic that I got the idea of taking my problem public. I was shocked (shocked, I say!) at its condition. This is not your classic “it-looks-like-a-cyclone-came-through-here” sort of a mess. No, this situation is far more subtle.

Granted, there are spots of real estate up there that resemble urban decay, but it’s not the mess as much as it’s the sheer amount of stuff that is present, all of it oh-so-carefully tucked away in boxes, giving one the impression of order, but if you lift any random lid. . . .

It ain’t pretty.

For instance, I own no less than four pairs of the same model of Fiskers scissors because I’ve misplaced my “one” pair three times only to find them again after purchasing yet another pair. (This is but one example of redundancy – don’t even get me started on the ribbons.)

It wasn’t always like this! I started out with very little stuff, really. But they say that you grow to fit your space, and I didn’t have my own space in the beginning. . . .

Birth of a BLOG

I started a BLOG a few weeks ago but decided I wanted to move it to Typepad. So here's the first entry....

I’ve been toying with starting a blog for months, but no topics inspired me enough to take the plunge. After visiting my attic, I now have a reason – or, to be more accurate, a compulsion. Maybe there’s somebody else out there who has this same problem and we could support one another. Maybe somebody will have some advice on how to solve this little problem I have.

 If you like to create things with your hands or enjoy rubber stamping, scrapbooking, etc, you and I share some common interests. If you have too many craft supplies, we may be sisters in spirit. If you are guilty of hoarding your scrapbook supplies and embracing your stash like a miser with his gold, we may have been separated at birth.

They say the first step to beating an addiction is to acknowledge you have a problem. . . .  Okay, I’ll bite.

I HAVE A PROBLEM. 

There. I’ve admitted I have a problem in front of the whole world, more or less. Which brings me to a second problem - which I'll address in my next post.