Yes, Folks...

...THAT IS A DISHWASHER!!!

In my kitchen, hooked up and working! As I'm typing this its whirring away, scrubbing 2 bowls, a plate, a fork and three spoons. I realize that's probably a huge waste of water (although I put it on the Energy Saver mode) but I just coudln't wait to try it out!

I'm not sure whether or not I was more excited about the washer/dryer or the dishwasher. All I can say is that appliances rock!

P.S. This is my 150th post!

Cutesie Curtains

Just a quick post to show off the super-simple but super-cute curtains that I made for the spare/office/craft room. I bought some $5 canvas valances at Target, and some ball-fringe trim at Joann Fabrics - add a couple hours with a needle and thread, and voila! Cute, vintage-looking curtains for a total of $14.

Progress in getting that room done has been slow lately, as has the dishwasher situation, but I have reason to hope that there will be real progress on both fronts this week!

The Living Room

The AC at the museum is out today (and its supposed to be 101 degrees outside), so my boss (i.e. me) is letting us all work from home - yay!! I do fully intend to sit down and work on a huge stack of grant applications today, but I thought I'd take a few minutes to do a blog post first! Bess reminded me some time ago that I never get around to posting pictures of my finished projects or room decor. After I spent hours cleaning my house in preparation for the 4th of July cook-out this weekend, I decided it was a good time to take some photos of the living room - it very rarely looks this put together and organized! Its the first room in the house that I can really consider "done". I still need to come up with another solution for the TV/VCR/cable box/rat's nest of cables and wires, and eventually I want to put up some crown moulding. The rug in this room is also temporary - the color works, but its not big enough and I'd rather have some sort of natural fiber woven thing to go with the bamboo window blinds. Otherwise, I can pretty much check the living room off the "to-do list".

Hopefully by the end of the day today I'll be able to put up some photos of the mostly done spare room/office/crafting room, as well. It's just about done and looking pretty good!

4th Fun-ness!

I had a crowd of people over last night for a backyard cook-out and some fireworks watching. It was the first test-drive of my backyard for entertaining purposes, and all in all I think it did pretty well. It hasn't rained here in, oh, 3 years or something, and its been in the 90s for weeks on end, so sadly my grass and many of my plants are pretty much dead. So, I bought a picnic table and cute twinkly lights to hang in the trees to dress the place up a bit. The lights definitely made the scene - I only wish the photos above could have come out better! Anyway, there was a lot of great food (even my first attempt at grilling kebabs didn't go too horribly!) and good friends, and the fireworks display at the end of the night was pretty great too. This might just become an annual thing!