Four Women and Some Projects... Part I
I'm not sure how the tidal wave of projects started, but before we knew it we were waist-deep in paint, material, sewing, fixing and cooking. Actually, I take that back. I do know how the projects started. Four women. Four women that love projects. Four women with one week. Together.
The plan had been in the works for about a year.
My mom, my Aunt Shirley {Mom's sister} and my Aunt Bobbie {Mom's first cousin} would arrive in Chicago for a week, and we would diligently work on our family genealogy, getting it into scrapbook form.
The week came, they arrived, and we promptly aborted all plans to scrapbook and instead pulled off make-over miracles in our home. {We did, the last evening, pull together some plans to work on the scrapbook independently, because we just didn't get to it that week.}
Our kitchen chairs, through the years, had collected spills of all sorts. Disgusting. But Aunt Shirley came prepared with material and voila, within minutes, they had that project done. {And they also did a dining room chair, too. Speedy gals that they are.}
And, speaking of kitchen, they just whipped up some curtains for that room. Love them. Didn't want to give up any light nor sight. And they did it.
The plan had been in the works for about a year.
My mom, my Aunt Shirley {Mom's sister} and my Aunt Bobbie {Mom's first cousin} would arrive in Chicago for a week, and we would diligently work on our family genealogy, getting it into scrapbook form.
The week came, they arrived, and we promptly aborted all plans to scrapbook and instead pulled off make-over miracles in our home. {We did, the last evening, pull together some plans to work on the scrapbook independently, because we just didn't get to it that week.}
Our kitchen chairs, through the years, had collected spills of all sorts. Disgusting. But Aunt Shirley came prepared with material and voila, within minutes, they had that project done. {And they also did a dining room chair, too. Speedy gals that they are.}
And, speaking of kitchen, they just whipped up some curtains for that room. Love them. Didn't want to give up any light nor sight. And they did it.
Confessions of a 40-year-old. I hate mini-blinds. Hate them. All those extra cords and junk hanging down. Plastic and ugly. Downright nasty. {So sorry if you own them.} So we got to business making curtains, after a lengthy visit to an INCREDIBLE textile warehouse. {Post coming tomorrow on this visit. Deserves a post of its own.}My living room curtains, over nine years, have faded terribly. Embarrassingly. Mom and the aunts to the rescue.
Aunt Bobbie, accurately named the fix-it gal, took tools I didn't know existed, and worked her magic on all the mini-blinds and curtain 'issues'. She took apart, re-adjusted, and moved to different windows, so that we are now 100% covered. Meaning, all windows that don't have curtains, have functioning mini-blinds so that once night-time arrives, the mice and bunnies can't see into our home. 100 % covered. This seemed to be of utmost importance to all the 'older' women in the house. And I use that term affectionately.
And my personal favorite of all the curtains fashioned, are the ones for our upstairs guest room slash scrapbooking room.
Hard to see by this picture, but I love the detailed beading on the top!
With Aunt Shirley, master chef, at the helm, we ate umpteen new recipes. Jack especially loved this part of their trip.
We visited Breakthrough Urban Ministries womens' shelter, and brought and served them a noon meal. {More coming in the next post.}
We painted our dining room. For whatever reason, when we moved in, I was into purple. And so, we painted our dining room purple. {That's a good husband for ya.} Sadly, I liked it for a long time {not sure what that says about me}, but the last couple of years I have wanted to rid the purple and embrace the taupe. So that's exactly what we did. Aunt Bobbie, bless her heart, tackled the painting project. I got the easy part; painting the bulk of the walls. She did all the taping and cutting in of paint. The hard stuff. {She also painted the living room curtain rods to suit the look we were going for.}
Ta Da....
We made door "cozies" to keep out the cold winter air.
Between all the work, we did manage to get out and play, too. You can't come to Chicago and not have deep-dish pizza. Lou Malnatti's of course. {In my humble opinion, the best 'pie' in Chicago.}
We managed to spend some time shopping. A given with four women together.
By the time the week wrapped up, exhaustion had set in. But it's that good kind of exhaustion. You know, the kind where you feel very productive. You crossed off projects you've had on your list for oh, about 5 years. And you've spent oodles of time with some of your favorite people on earth.
Doesn't get better than that!