im·pa·tient

–adjective 1. not patient; not accepting delay, opposition, pain, etc., with calm or patience.

2. indicating lack of patience: an impatient answer.

3. restless in desire or expectation; eagerly desirous.

Yup. That sums it up pretty well. After my rant about my house-commitment-a-fobia, we are waiting to hear back on our counteroffer. Its been 22 hours, don't they know we want to know NOW!?! I've naturally started planning what projects I want to do.

What I find surprising is that the house we choose to put an offer on actually NEEDs no work.   I wanted a project, but I'm certainly not going to complain when it's move-in-ready.   I'll create my own projects.   For example.  The house is over 100 years old but has been totally updated... a little too updated for my ideal taste.   I would love to find vintage spindles to refinish to add character back into the stairs.

One project I'm excited to get started (whether or not our offer gets accepted): coordinating but mismatching dining chairs.  I've been wanting to do this for years:  scavenge antique chairs that have similar back and seat heights but different backs and refinish them to match.   I have a table that I rescued from my aunt's basement and refinished a little over a year ago that I think would work perfectly with my envisioned chairs.   If I can pull this off properly, I think it will look so chic. My eyes are open for chairs- let the hunt begin!

Don't fret, I'll keep you posted on the status of houses (if i don't burst from anticipation first).  Keep your fingers crossed for us!!

*image from dwell.com

Halloween: an excuse to dress rediculous, eat junk, and mutilate pumpkins

I'll spare you the verbosities today and just show you some pictures my sister took at our Halloween party.  Enjoy!

Halloween meal, complete with murdered gingerbread men sugar cookies (made by my sister), meringue ghosts and "rotten" eggs made by yours truly.

My first try at meringues ever!  Although some looked 'scarier' than others they all tasted fantastic.

Devilled eggs seem to be a staple at any picnic or holiday.  Black food coloring just makes them look rotten.  eewww

My plans for pumpkin carving was surprisingly well-received.... by all except the pumpkins ;o)

And what would Halloween be without cheesy pictures of home-made costumes!

*Photos courtesy of Lisa martin

DIY Fix

It's been so long since I had a relationship with a DIY project.  Lately its been all one-night-stands and quickies.  I'm looking to bond with a project.  I'm starting to twitch here...I need a fix!! All this talk about wanting something more is getting me motivated to do projects I should wait on.  It's so hard to resist the urge to start bringing home antique pieces to refinish for our future house that we have yet to find.  The only thing stopping me, to Hubby's relief, is the fact that we have no room in our apartment for such projects and its getting too cold to do them outside.  This forces me to find other ways to get my fixes. Fix #1  IIDA New England's annual Fashion Show Galla this Thursday.  A team at my office paired up with a carpet vendor and a furniture dealer to create 4 'fashions' to compete in a runway show.  The catch is that these fashions need to include the vendor's products.  This is the 4th year I've been a part of it, so I've gotten a good deal of experience with carpet, carpet backing, and all of carpet's raw forms.  Its a great experience, but a lot of work.  Although I've kept myself from getting in over my head as I have in previous years (previous years included volunteering to be a model 2 years in a row and stayed up late the next year to sew an evening gown complete with feathers of carpet backing) I'm still looking forward to Thursday's festivities, after which I will no longer be staying late to construct carpet fashions.

Fix #2: Halloween of course!  I always wait until the last minute to figure out costumes.  I am not a fan of purchasing a prefab costume- I like to come up with something relatively clever or at least a costume that won't be a duplicate at a party.  This is the first year that I actually took it upon myself to come up with Hubby's costume too.  He just wanted to wear last years costume.  Although it was undeniably awesome, if you are partying with the same people, its not appropriate in my mind.  When I say last-minute, I do mean it...  I had a party to go to Saturday night.  Although the costumes only took about an hour to assemble, they were completed less than an hour before the party.  All the pieces fell into place and I was extremely pleased with the outcome.  I came up with the idea of Hubby as Pacman and I would be Pinky.  Pacman was created with yellow chipboard and made into a Pacman shaped sandwich board.  I was able to find a pink tank-dress at the thrift shop for only 4 dollars- all it needed was a zig-zagged bottom and ghost eyes.  Success!  I forgot to take pictures Saturday, so I apologize but you'll have to wait until Halloween when we will be dressing up again.

Fix #3 Houses.  My guilty pleasure right now.  I may be one of the only people on the planet, but my dream house is not "move-in-ready."  I want a livable house that needs some love to reveal its true character.  Ugly wallpaper, blue kitchen cabinet, and pink bathrooms don't scare me!!  Although I can't actually do anything to a house yet, I can dream of what I could do to houses.