Thanks for hanging out with me and being so supportive. When we moved here 3 1/2 years ago, I did not know a soul….(turns out I did, but I didn’t know it then!) and sharing the renovations online with my friends and family in different corners of the world made me feel a bit less lonely. Sorry, it’s late and I’m getting sappy on you.

That said, we are starting to feel more settled here and I’m now at a crossroads for how best to proceed. I closed the booth this year for many reasons, but mainly to lower overhead and to open up the ability to sell upholstered pieces. The lack of HVAC at the mall made it impossible to take upholstered furniture down there without it getting covered in railroad soot from the open bay doors. I’ve been teaching myself upholstery beyond the simple stuff I already knew, and I got a pneumatic staple gun for Christmas…whee! So what’s my next creative outlet?

Do I open an E-bay or Etsy store and deal with all the shipping hassles so a broader audience can buy my finds, or do I find another antique mall better suited to sell my wares? Decisions, decisions!

All I know is when I see a beat up piece of junk with good lines, I feel compelled to save it and there’s not enough room for all of my rescues.  Some people run animal rescues, I run a furniture rescue and I think my darlings are breeding in the basement since I can barely get through these days…and I need to clear a bigger area for my upholstery workspace. What advice do my readers have for me?  I’ll keep mulling things over as I start pulling together a round up for Thursday…you be thinking too, so we can discuss. Out with a pup shot.

photo via Getty Images via Daily Mail

The CC wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t IMPORTANT.  The first game of the Six Nations Rugby tournament (England v. Wales) is Friday and he can’t find anyone broadcasting it in the US.  The second game will be shown here on BBC America, but in a bizarre battle of broadcast rights etc.. he can’t get live streaming online for the first game.  If you have any clue about how he can watch this game, please put the poor man out of his misery.  He is miserable.  We will make it up to you…trust.

photo via Daily Mail

To be honest, if I get to see him play (although he’s not starting this game) it would be favor to me too.

PS…I subscribed myself via e-mail just to make sure it was working and the scary disclaimers..sheesh..rest assured, I will NEVER share the e-mail address of a subscriber…I hate spam more than you…I promise.

Ty Mattson of Mattson Creative has open sourced his design for Nashville flood relief, and since no one else seemed to be using the design…I opened a Cafe Press Shop with 100% of proceeds going to the Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee.  I’ll keep updates and everything local on my Twitter as usual.  It is WAY too cool a design not to be produced.  The We Are Nashville site has another t-shirt design as well.  Viva Nashvegas!

To get this design on everything from a thong to a onesie…go here.  It’s for a good cause!

UPDATE 5.12:  Lift Up Nashville is Now selling the poster of this design among others…Yay!

photo via evenshift on flickr

We are def among the lucky ones.  I have power, phone etc.. again and am really seeing for the first time how horrible it is out there.  Tiny photos on my Blackberry didn’t really convey the magnitude of damage to the city.  My neighborhood got off lightly given we are in the hills.  A few mudslides and trees down, but all in all..unscathed.

I can’t believe the mailbox held on!

I took this at the top of the road in between storms.

Our front yard…like I said…we were lucky.

We are on strict water conservation because we lost one treatment facility and nearly lost the other one by less than a foot of water…close one. The Minors are never too young to learn about how to take a Navy Shower.  Residents in other nearby areas are not so lucky and must use bottled water or boil their water for awhile…if they still have a house to begin with.

photos via evenshift on flickr

It’s going to be a long expensive cleanup, and with the gulf disaster, attempted Times Square bombing and Sandra Bullock’s adoption, there will be very little help/awareness coming toward our community.

For ways to help with either time or money, please go here.  Thanks for listening on behalf of all those in need.

Why do I support Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution?  Here’s why:

My kids have always taken their own lunch, but this year, both of them asked if they could go through the lunch line.  I said OK, and volunteered to help the younger kids in the first weeks of school get the hang of it.  There was a breaded chicken sandwich, tater tots, peas and carrots and fresh fruit OR fruit juice.

I naturally started serving up both peas and carrots and tater tots on each plate until I was told that they have a CHOICE of ONE vegetable.  Me: “Are you telling me that tater tots are considered a vegetable?!”  and the lunch director sighed in an exasperated way and said “I know, it’s not right, but yes.”  NO WAY.  I gave the kids both ANYWAY and she didn’t rat me out.

I won’t go on about how fresh fruit and fruit juice are NOT EVEN CLOSE to equal choices.

Our family has been watching the show together, and the statistics on our health as a nation are staggering.

If you don’t have kids, you can support it for the sake of our nation’s health care system, and our life span.  We have the first generation expected to have shorter life spans than their parents.  Who will support the aged if the youth die prematurely from poor health?

He needs one million supporters to take it to Washington DC, and as of this posting, we are not even halfway there.  Please consider?  Click the badge below to sign the petition…and thanks for reading my rant.

I’m talking about the pack of Coyotes in the forest. They sounded a bit like this, but a LOT louder/closer and much more agitated.

I couldn’t get back to sleep until almost 5:00 am it freaked me out so much. They have several sounds, and this pack had obviously just made a kill.

Killin’ time is usually when we hear them at night….it gets very frenzied sounding and I don’t seem to be able to get used to it. In the past, they always sounded like they were several ridges over, but last night I could have sworn they were only on the other side of our hill….maybe a couple of hundred yards. Luckily, the Minors slept through that one.

Not cool. Too close.

I was relieved to see both fawns alive and well this morning.

I brought my Chinese Pug painting by Paul Edelstein in from the bedroom and I think I like it there.

As for the shelves, I moved out all the classic literature paperbacks, which was a significant chunk! Now they are in an upstairs closet ready for The Minors first English Lit class.  The rest of the books are still filling up the bottom cabinets, but neatly stacked now.  Need. More. Shelves.

Going through all the books got my spring fever kickin’…I don’t think I’ve mentioned my love for all things Sir Terence Conran and Diarmuid Gavin… I possibly have all their gardening books…it’s a sickness.  I can’t WAIT to get the landscaping finished.

Below is a perfect example of why I never have enough bookshelves.  I picked this up at an estate sale for $1.00, who wouldn’t?

Look at it…a nice condition, hardback biography of Zelda Fitzgerald, not to mention a fab cover.  How could you NOT want to read that?  Have I?  Well, not yet…but I WILL.  I have lots of these….sigh.

We spent Valen-New Year hanging out in front of the fire in here…eating spicy pork pot-stickers for lunch and Gorgonzola fondue for dinner.  Don’t ya love days like that?