the animal inside

In true curb trash stalker fashion I snagged this sad derelict bassinet, sawed off the broken rocking legs (with my teeth, in a crazed excitement) and then got distracted and threw it in our playhouse where it lived for about 2 years serving mostly as a sandy catch all, and if you ask me a perfect place for stray neighborhood cats to deliver their babies.

Every once in a while, with the will of a thousand toddlers, I get the urge to paint furniture. Faster than you can say HOA nightmare, ALL the things end up in my driveway where I alternate painting projects in between coats. The process starts as an innocent spur of the moment Saturday decizshe and usually turns into one couch and a chained rottweiler short of a 2 week white trash lawn party.  In short, crap gets done. And then little back burner projects like obsolete/haunted house baby beds get a second chance at life.

As much as I like to spray paint for a quick fix, the blue on this was a saturated beast. I blew through two cans of spray paint before I realized I would need about 40 more cans to cover it all. Instead I used my critter sprayer and a used air compressor I recently scored for $100 bucks. I threw about three coats of a sunny yellow I had in my garage (from another forgotten project obvi). So much faster (and cheaper) why do I fight it?! Then I covered the inner board with some batting and ikea fabric I bought a year or two ago for like 5 bucks aaaand...

Now my kids have a place to keep *all their stuffed animals where I will hate them just slightly less ;) 

(*only about 1/5 of them pictured, waahhh)

team Boo ♥'s you

Merry Christmas! love the Dikes

If you are wondering why you didn't make our Christmas card list this year please take back all the "she's not even that cool anyway" thoughts you had and know that you are in good company. I don't mean the "Carolyn is lame" company (geez louise)...rather the part where you didn't get the $1 stylish cardstock of our jcrew styled family ironically strolling on an abandoned railroad track or in a dying meadow leaning against an old tractor tire to hang on your fridge (and then promptly throw away in a post Christmas cleaning frenzy). 

In other words: We didn't send any. Like, not even to my mom.

When I went on a blog hiatus a year (and a half) ago, I did it with gumption. With drive and purpose. I was determined to learn and grow some talents. My goal for the year was to "be deliberate". Basically to stop merely day dreaming about what inspired me and open the glorious vents of creation. 

I went to school to take some great creative courses, I thought of all the things I would finally do to my house now that I 'd be freed up from my computer. I wrote lists of adventurous things I would do with my kids. My husband got accepted to Pharmacy school in Portland, OR (a longtime dream home destination of mine). Stars were gonna allign and my mind was going to explode prisms of (mossy) awesomeness. I was going to gloriously return as a centaur with the sun glaring through my flowing hair as I came over the crest of the metaphorical blog mountain. "THE HILLS ARE ALIIIIVE WITH TEAM BOO BLOWING YOUR MIND!" I would sing, power tool and paintbrush in hand.

What happened next was a slightly less romantic version...

 

(artwork by David Penela)

Not only can I NOT run as fast as a horse with the grace and power of an Amazonian warrior, but the last year an a half just so happened to be some of the most mentally challenging years of my life so far. (And I've experienced clinical depression in my life...aaand an out-of-wedlock pregnancy. booyah). So fast and SO slow simultaneously. I'm not particularly a dramatic person, and I don't want you to feel like your stuck in a Nickelback song, but I have been...how do you say? Bitch slapped. 

ok, at least derailed. 

I realize life is so very rarely smooth sailing and when it is, it is fleeting. It wasn't smooth before I took a blog break and it sure as matching floral curtain lederhosen isn't now (maybe the worst month of all of them?). I've always been about making things full of life and sass regardless of circumstance. But now I see that you can't wait until everything is "just so" before you jump. Unless you are skydiving...or doing a magic show. I REPEAT: If you are either skydiving or doing magic please make sure EVERTHING is "just so".

Seriously though, I have to be willing to fail before I can succeed, right? RIGHT?? (nervous laughter)

Sure, I might be wearing a Mexican Lucha libre mask and an dowdy apron now, but I am learning more now about my capabilities than I ever would in a community college. And maybe that's just the extra 'sass' I needed to 'wrestle' my trials and personal fears (get it? cause I'm wearing a wrestling mask?). The only difference now is I haven't documented life and what inspires me like I used to. Life is insane and thrilling and fascinating and weird. Like Jack Black on cra....actually, I guess just Jack Black. 

I will be back...hopefully sooner than later. Perhaps I will emerge over the hilltop like a magnificent mythical creature, or maybe I will be a slightly chubbier amateur wrestler version of myself, but either option will be ready to party. But until then "Get that corn outta my FACE!"

team Boo ♥'s you