Song of the Day

A little Gillian Welch & David Rollins for your listening pleasure. I played this over and over in my car today while I ran errands. It went nicely with the rain and the gray.

Paper Fettish: A Confession

I've often wondered if I should be Catholic. Why? Because I LOVE to confess. It makes me feel so much better. Something about laying all my dirty laundry out there in front of someone does wonders for my sanity. I bet a priest would either proclaim me his best pupil or he'd start complaining to the other priests about the looney woman who comes in twice daily to confess every neurotic thought or odd thing she's done. He'd probably sit down at his weekly 'Meeting of the Priests' and say "Okay guys, I'm at a loss. This woman is making me doubt my priesthood. I just don't have the patience for people like her."

Alas - I am not Catholic, so I'll just have to confess to you guys when I do something I'm not proud of. Today I am confessing that I think I am addicted to paper. Actually, I KNOW I'm addicted. It's been years since I gave in to that notion. But now I'm trying to rein in the paper monster. I've been knee-deep in the stacks, cleaning up my office/craft space and the more I sort through piles the more I realize the depth of my problem. Let's just say that I have a LOT of paper – scrapbook paper, wallpaper, notebook paper, empty notebooks full of paper, notepads, printer paper sample books, pretty stationery, more scrapbook paper, origami paper. And each piece is so beautiful! So pretty, in fact, that I'm a little hesitant to use it. Oftentimes I'll decide to make something but refuse to use the prettiest of my papers because I can't stand to mar their crisp perfection.

Ugh.

So, my confession here is two-fold. Not only am I telling you that I have a paper hoarding problem but there's a second part. This weekend, in the midst of trying to sort and get rid of some paper in my office, I . . . um,
I . . . bought some paper?

I know! I know! It's terrible! But it was rainy and I was alone in the craft store (if my daughters are with me they will stop me, they're aware of my issue) and they had two entire aisles of the most fantastic new papers. I just couldn't stop myself.

I promise I'm going to try to be better and not buy any more paper for the rest of June. 

For now, please enjoy viewing my new papers. See, I told you they were beautiful.

Flower Power

I took a trip to the nursery to pick up some annuals and more veggie starts for the garden. I was so glad to have my camera along because I knew all of you would love to see these pretty blossoms. Aren't the pink dahlias amazing?! And those little pink things in the top pic too – I can't remember what they're called, but they are such a bright pink. I've never seen the yellow flower before. Anyone know what it's called?

This is now the safe time to plant outdoors here, so I was hoping to get lots of stuff in the ground this weekend. Sadly, the weather was a bit damp for my style. I'm a fair-weather gardener. So my new plants are still awaiting their transplantings. Tomorrow sounds like a perfect day though so I'm hoping to some planting done in between edits on a design project I'm working on.

I did manage to bring a little color indoors when I found this broom at Pier One. Isn't it cheerful! I'm hoping it will make my kitchen sweeping chore a little more pleasant. I'll let you know.