Messy desk tableau

A glimpse of my messy studio desk. I haven 't really worked in the art studio for a long, long time; it's become storage space for whatever doesn't fit elsewhere, and it will be the last room to be decluttered once the rest of the house is put back together (which begins today. Yay!). Since my writing room is standing empty, though, floors newly refinished, etc, my computer has been parked here amid the mess, and this forgotten angel painting I did a few years ago has come to my attention. I love her. If I recall, the title was "Angels Choose Italy" -- because really. Wouldn't you? Thinking of getting her framed. Maybe, I don't know. Putting all the rooms back together, of course we want all new art up on the walls. What we really want is to do some big paintings together, and perhaps we will find the time. Perhaps we will, perhaps we won't.

The angel's color scheme goes with the new bedroom colors, which I can sort of show you here, though of course they're not quite right in the photo:
Almost done painting in that room; a little touch-up remains, plus hanging the new curtains and finding a quilt or coverlet to match. (This quilt is a beauty made long ago by my grandmother.) We got the new bedside tables at our favorite furniture store, Cargo, in the Pearl District. It's this big funky Asian antique and import warehouse filled with awesomeness -- old Indonesian porch columns and Tibetan altars that look like puppet theaters, those great Chinese emperor beds, you know, that are like an entire room? Velvet buddhas, strings of beads, fabric and lanterns and fabulous furniture, etc etc. These tables were quarantined in the upstairs back corner, roped off with the damaged or defective stuff, all because of a few cracks which you can barely notice. Jim bargained the price down to less than half, and they were ours. So, orange and this funky gorgeous blue that's kind of teal, kind of robin's egg, hard to describe. It's Embellish Blue by Behr, at any rate, and I LOVE it. With the bed reassembled, we're through camping out in the living room and actually slept in our bed last night. Yay! More photos once the nest is feathered. It's all sparse right now.

Today: to finally finish the nursery painting, which has taken about five coats more paint than it should on account of somebody at the paint store convincing me to use GREY PRIMER under a transparent tangerine paint!!! ARG! I could throttle me a paint store dude right now. The carpet is in, though, and the new sconces, and it's going to be so cute!!! God, am I ever ready to be DONE.

A few weeks ago, in a rare moment with *nothing* to do (ha!), I made some felt birds while Jim and I watched the last few episodes of The Shield on DVD (a show I thought I had no interest in, that turned out to be awesome). Anyway, you might have seen these garlands I made as gifts for my mom and Alexandra back at the holidays; well, I always meant to make myself one, and now I want one for the nursery, so it's underway.
So far I've only made three birds, though. I need to procure some felt and some more colorful buttons. I used up most of my button supply on the new shower curtains, but that's another story!

At dinner last night down on Mississippi Ave, Jim clowning with my niece and her friend, who are in town for Rock 'n Roll Camp for Girls. Check out their cool hair.




Oh, and I had to wear a long skirt to dinner last night because apparently, some time yesterday when I wasn't looking, I misplaced my ankles! After an afternoon up and down the step ladder, I happened to look down and see -- gasp! horror! -- that my legs continued all the way to my feet, with no discernable ankle in between! It wasn't pretty, I can tell you. The swelling has mostly abated now, and I'm happy to say the wrist braces seem to be doing the trick for my hands. I wonder what other fun surprises are in store over the next couple of weeks?

Cheers!