Keeping Busy ...

I woke up this morning ... and I got myself a beer.

Not really.

I got up early to beat the heat, and took everything off the deck and swept it all down and got ready to stain it.  Dean came over and helped me.  I did all of the cutting in, and he rolled quite a bit of the deck itself.  I took over when I was done cutting.  The color I chose ... while it evened out all of the ickies ... is too light.  It reminds me of what somebody's face looks like right before they puke.  Two gallons got me one coat.  It needs another.





At the hottest part of the day, I took a trip over to Home Depot and got a gallon of some "chocolate" colored stain.  I'll start that process in the morning.  Hopefully, it will look better a little darker.  We'll see.  Live and learn.

While I was at Home Depot, I picked up a special hunk of junk ... in the form of a medicine cabinet.  The lack of a medicine cabinet in the bathroom was driving me nuts.  I had a big piece of mirror that I found when I moved in here ... and just set that on the sink.  Well ... it was blocking the light switch to the vanity lights.  When my sister was here, she'd go to the effort to move the mirror out of the way to turn those lights on, and I love the way those lights look.  So ... I decided to finally do something about it.

They called this thing "oak."  Oak, my foot.  It's pressboard.



The lightswitch cover has more wood on it than the medicine cabinet does!  But what a stupid place for a light switch!



And I haven't cleaned the lights yet, but these are the ones I'm talking about.



The bathroom is almost starting to look like a real bathroom ... instead of this!



Switching gears ...

While Mark was on vacation with his kids, he picked me up a beautiful piece of horsehair pottery made by a Navajo family in Tuba City.  It's been a while since I've looked at the map of the reservations in Northern Arizona ... and Mark, Jill ... I misspoke.  Tuba City is not down south (that's Tubac that I was thinking of...).  And I had it completely backwards ... the Hopi Reservation is a blip on the map of the much larger Navajo reservation -- not the other way around.  So Jill ... print this ... "you were right!"



Oh, here's the piece of pottery!



Isn't it gorgeous?  I haven't found a place for it yet, but for now, it's safe in my kitchen, where it just might stay.

J