slow it down

This week has been a super slow work week. I keep trying to schedule things, and nothing happens. By Wednesday I was bored and stir crazy and I accepted that the universe is giving me a slow week and I should embrace it.

So last night I spent the night with FG on his couch catching a wine buzz and watching Friends. Then today I went to the park with my mom, sister, and nephew, and had a wonderful, chill day. I am floored by how much Andrew is talking now. I sat for a while and watched him narrate while he played. What a remarkable, cute kid. He's growing so fast, makes you want to soak him up while he's still little.

Since I have ample time at home, I finished fixing up the guest bathroom. I have to say, that tile and grout sealer is great. The water beads right off and everything is so shiny and clean. I have started on the master bath. The caulk was a lot easier in here, but the tiles are a lot grungier. I'm going to have some serious arm muscles from all this scrubbing.

I took a break from giving Pumpkin steroids to see how she would do. For a few days she did great, but the last few days have been rough. No eating, and when she did eat, I eventually had to clean it up off the floor... and the chair, and the rug, and the bed, etc. Yuck.

Poor kitty is not feeling well. I'll start another round of steroids tomorrow.

It's supposed to cool back down tomorrow and I'm so ready for it.

plants and plants

I don't know what I was thinking.

Vicky asked me if I would take care of the party favors for Missy's bridal shower and I said, "Sure!"

...and suggested that we give everyone a small plant with a tag that says,"Let love grow."

Damn you, pinterest. And wine.

I'm not going to buy 30 plants, so now I'm trying to propagate/ keep small aloe vera and pothos plants alive until the shower a month from now.

Good thing she's going with a rustic theme, because I'll be able to avoid buying 30 small pots and am going to use cat food cans with a ribbon tied around them.
Ha, crafty!

Then I have to figure out how to transport them to San Antonio.

If it works, I will have outdone myself.
If it fails, I'm going to be spending a lot of money at a garden center in a few weeks.

I asked my neighbor if I could have some cuttings of some plants in her front yard. I know she has a bunch of pothos and I'm pretty savvy with those particular plants. I actually have 4 that I've kept alive for many years.

She came over with 2 huge bags.

I definitely only needed like, 40 leaves but now I have a giant amount.

Anyone want some?

removing hard water spots

Let's talk about my guest bathroom. It's not updated (although I actually kind of dig those old-school seashell sinks), and it's in need of some repairs.

I never use it, but I'm motivated to fix it up so that I can use it while updating the master bathroom.

I figured it would be a quick project; just replace the gross caulk, clean it, and seal it.

I did not know that it would be a huge pain in the ass. When I started, I discovered that whoever put down the new caulk did a horrible job. Not only did they use the wrong kind of caulk, they caulked right over the old caulk. So I pulled up the newest layer of caulk, then had to pull up the older layer, which was practically mummified and black from mildew. Gross. It took a lot of elbow grease but I finally got it clean and applied the new caulk, properly.

Then I cleaned the tiles. Except... they weren't clean. They looked fine if you looked at them straight-on.

However, if you looked at them from an angle, for example if you were sitting in the tub, you saw all the hard water spots and old soap scum residue.

Now, it's not a huge deal. If I was just cleaning it for routine use, I would have moved on.

Except, I plan to seal the tiles and grout, and anything left on the tiles gets sealed in. I don't want to seal this grungyness on the tiles, I want to seal CLEAN tiles so that they don't get dirty like that. That's the point.

So began my crusade.

I'll make a long story short and tell you what didn't work at all:

Kaboom (did not touch the spots and smelled terrible)
Comet (My faithful standby couldn't get the job done)
Bleach (I wasn't optimistic, but it did get the grout clean)
Vinegar (I think this would have to soak on the tiles to make a difference)
Dryer sheets (I've used them before but this is way too labor-intensive to be practical)
Soft Scrub (again, good for the grout, bad for the hard water spots)
Full strength CLR (how disappointing)
Magic eraser (what a joke)
Borax (nope.)

Scouring stick got an honorable mention. It did a decent job but still could not clean some of the grimier tiles, and it required SO MUCH SCRUBBING.

What finally worked?

Good Old Bar Keeper's Friend. I use it all the time on the sinks, but I've never used it in the bathroom. I saw it in the cupboard, thought, "Well that might work," and tried it.

Well, it worked like a dream. I thoroughly rubbed some on with one of those green scrubby pads, rinsed it off, and now the tiles are all shiny and clean and I am SO SATISFIED.

You could eat off these things, they're so clean.

good weekend

Oh, I'm so happy right now. I've got a pocket full of organic blue corn chips (literally there is a pocket in my oversized knit cardigan and I put chips in it and I can't think of a better use for the pocket).

This weekend was so good.

Saturday Mah and I went garage sale and thrift store shopping. I found a 20 dollar bill in the pocket of some pants I haven't worn in months. Don't you love when that happens?? While we were out shopping I picked up this sweet little stained glass for $3.75, plus a $2 dress and a $3 necklace.

Then we wandered around Enchanted Gardens. I love that place. There's always something neat to look at and it's just plain pretty.

We each took home some notoriously hard-to-kill plants and are very confident that we can keep them alive.

The Air plant and ZZ plant might just be able to make it here. Cross your fingers.

I spent Saturday evening at FG's and it's finally cold enough to really enjoy his hot tub, but before that we went grocery shopping because nobody parties like we do.

Today I climbed up on the roof and I think we got all the major leaks fixed in the gutters and porch. If that's the case, then I can go back and fix some of the rotted wood. Cross your fingers again.

I made a killer chili and then we took a glorious nap and damn, that's a good day.

a little break

Oh, what a glorious day. It's FIFTY TWO degrees. Finally, we get a break in the heat!

I had an office day today, so as soon as the temperature started to drop I opened up every door and window, turned on every fan, and let the fresh air sweep into every corner of the house. I left it that way all day long and I don't even care that there are leaves on the floor because the energy in here feels so good.

Yes, by the way, I wrote that correctly... I had an office day. Not only was I in town, I didn't have to go anywhere. This was a slow week and I'm freaking grateful for the break. Taking every second to breathe because it's only a matter of time before it revs up again. I knew this summer would be busy but I did not anticipate just how busy it would be. It's all good, though, because I did hit Diamond status and I'm okay with a little hotel street cred.

I finally got to the grocery store and re-stocked the pantry and fridge. The shelves were so bare for so long; it's been months since I've had proper food in the house. You know it's dire when there are no beans or even a jar of spaghetti sauce in the pantry. I've been coming home to half-shriveled grapes and a few stale crackers for months. It feels good to revive the kitchen.

I've gotten a lot done to make life feel calmer this week. Getting to sleep in my bed and wake up with a purring cat in my face does wonders for my soul. I even got to wash my bras! It's the little things.

I felt so dang happy and centered today that I took a minute to sage the house, infusing it with positivity, then did some extra-stretchy yoga while Punk took a nap.

It's not possible to do yoga at home unless there is a designated cat perch.

I blocked off tomorrow to hang out with Mah, then on Sunday FG is helping me fix a few more rotted eaves on the house. The previous owners did some half-ass "improvements" that had lead to more damage that I've had to go back and fix. I don't need any kind of bad karma in my life so I'm fixing them properly and it's good to learn but I'd rather not have rotted eaves in the first place, ya know?

Oh, I also had time this week to start working on the guest bathroom. The plan is to fix that (re-caulk, deep clean and seal the tiles) so that I can use it while I'm doing the same thing + painting the master bathroom. The paint swatches have been up so long that I don't even notice them anymore.

Also. I have never lived in a house with a ceiling fan in the kitchen, but it seems like such a fantastic idea. It's always the warmest room in any house, with a need for air circulation... why is this not more common? I think I want to put one in there. But that's further down the list.

I think it's time for a hot bath.

New Orleans

Another month, another trip!

New Orleans made it on the list because of some super cheap airfare. It's about an hour-long flight. Seriously, as soon as you hit cruising altitude, the plane starts to descend. My kind of flight.

I booked a room at the Hampton Inn in the French Quarter, about a 5 -10 minute walk from Bourbon St, Jackson Square, Harrahs, and a grocery store. That's pretty much all we needed.

Y'all, this hotel was so clean, so nice, so friendly, and in a great location. Plus it was free because I used points. Hampton Inns always have a fridge and a microwave in every room, and they have a really good breakfast. I was very pleased and would absolutely stay there again.

I didn't plan much for this trip. We have both been there before and have done some of the touristy stuff, so we kept it pretty mellow. It was a quick trip, and everything was within walking distance, so we didn't rent a car and lyfted to/from the airport. I packed outfits that looked cute with tennis shoes, traded my roller bag for my cool collapsible backpack (it fits under the airplane seat and came in handy when we had to carry groceries ie: bottles of booze for several blocks).

It all worked out beautifully. Here's what we did:

Saturday:
Fly in, check in to hotel, go to grocery store, walk down Bourbon St.
The great thing is you can walk around with booze, so we bought our own at the grocery store, had a couple pregame drinks at the hotel, then poured them into a coffee cup and made our way to the party scene. Hand grenades may be a Bourbon St. tradition, but they are disgusting and sugary and you couldn't pay me to drink one. Coffee cup wine is my jam.
The people watching is A+ and if you don't like the music blasting from one of the bars, walk/dance a few feet and you'll get another option. We didn't even go into any of the bars, we had enough fun walking around, stopping to boogie with the crowd every so often. FG even caught someone flashing their boobs at the balconies for beads, but I missed it.

Sunday: We slept late and then headed toward Jackson Square. I ate a sandwich before we left, FG stopped to get some gumbo, and then we wandered around town.

No itinerary, there is plenty to see. Musicians on every corner, art displayed everywhere you look. I wish I was rich enough to fall in love with a cool piece of random art on vacation and ship it home to display on my living room wall and casually tell people who compliment it, "Oh, I bought that in *insert location here*."
...one day.

We walked up on a bunch of random, fun things... like skeletons throwing beads, which I thought was pretty creative.

Some of the balconies are decorated so beautifully. Tons of flowers, plants, people chillen on the patio smoking doobies and waving sleepily. I don't even know which route we took, but at one point we ended up by the river, which was a great spot to stop and sit for a while.

(it was windy)

Fortunately the weather was gorgeous, plus the Saints won so everyone was in a great mood, so it was very pleasant to wander around outside for hours and stop into a few of the shops. I try to get a Christmas tree ornament from new places I travel, and I found a super cute santa riding a gator.

(I also saw this cheeky figurine of an alligator receiving fellatio from a drunk gal on bourbon street that I thought would be hilarious tucked into the garden, but I didn't have room for it in my backpack. Shucks.)

At some point FG stopped to try beignets while I drank coffee, and we listened to this cute musician for a while, then kept on walking.

We stopped at the hotel so I could eat a frozen Amy's dinner, then we headed to the casino and gambled until we (FG) ran out of money. As we were heading back to the hotel, we decided to go to Bourbon street again, and it was just as crazy as the night before, just a little more ratchet since it was later in the night.

Monday we requested a late checkout, and had planned to go bowling but they weren't open yet, so we went back to the casino and overall I won $16 on roulette (lucky #3). FG tried another gumbo place, (which he said was better than the first), and we headed to the airport.

Overall, it was a good trip. Very relaxing and lots of fun.
Also now I have a craving for gumbo so I guess I have to make it.

Other neat things to do:
-There are a few ionic restaurants but since I can't eat at any of them and FG just wanted gumbo, visiting them wasn't a priority. Do your own search if you're interested.

-I will say that on Bourbon Street, there was a bar, Napoleon's Itch, that made mojitos and hurricanes using fresh herbs and juices instead of that nasty premixed stuff. Cash only, cute gay dudes bartending, worth every penny.

-Hiking
-Frenchmen Street
-Cemetery, plantation, swamp, etc. tours
-Ride the streetcar (we mostly dodged it crossing Canal St.)
-Riverboat

-I've done the cemetery tour and would recommend it. It's so cool and unique. If we had time we would have wandered around the mausoleums for a while.
-I've also done the plantation tours (Oak Alley is a drive but it's really neat.)

This is the last official trip of the year. We're looking at a weekend in December for one more trip, but right now nothing's planned. It's been good, y'all. From Atlanta to Denver to NOLA, lots of fun places pinned on the map.