Frosting
If you ever spend the morning out at the barn and, upon getting home, realize you are fully frozen through, do NOT immediately jump into a hot bath in an attempt to warm yourself up. I’m speaking from recent experience here.
A couple of weeks ago I did this exact thing - and ended up with chilblains on my feet. Basically, it’s caused by re-warming the skin too quickly and, to put it simply, results in red, itchy blisters. Not fun at all. I tried ignoring the problem, doing my best to get on with life as usual, but it got to the point where I was hobbling around on my heels because any pressure on the front on my feet was like being stabbed with many, many needles.
After finally deciding I needed to get to the bottom of my ouchie toes and doing a little research (which ultimately concluded with this self-diagnosis), I spent all of last Monday and Tuesday on the couch with my feet perched on an old pillowcase full of oven-warmed black beans that we keep around for blind baking pie crusts. Ponderosa kept me company and, after two days of keeping my feet warm at all times, I was finally able to move around like a normal human being again.
The only up-side to this whole ordeal was discovering the magic of foot-warming-beans. No more cold feet when I’m working…that’s definitely a plus.
As of Thursday, Eric, the cats and I have been in our house for a whole year. A WHOLE YEAR. I love this state, this city, this house. It’s home.
We’ve been investing in lots of lovely home-y things lately - and unintentionally we ended up adding a whole lot of new things to the house this week. I think it was fate - what better way to celebrate this first year than with making this space even more special?
Part of it was definitely that we got our tax returns back (I actually got our taxes together the first week of January because I’m a little crazy like that!). Because I was good about my record keeping and because we got married in October, we ended up with a little money to play with on top of the savings we’ve been putting away for a few big projects this year. But it was also just time for us to add a little more of US to this house. Time to add a little frosting to the cake, so to speak.
New and old artworks have gone up on the walls and once again we have plants reaching to catch the light streaming in through our windows. I find myself building tiny vignettes of precious things, a habit learned from my mom who is a master curator of all things interesting, and smiling as I walk through the house. I’ve wondered for years what it is that makes a space feel sacred, sure that there was something Serious and Profound I must do - but here’s the secret (that’s never really been a secret at all) : fill a space with colors, textures, and objects that make YOU feel happy and nowhere in the world will feel more right.
Perhaps the thing I was most excited for, though, was a new piece of furniture - a bed frame! When we moved, we decided to leave our old, ancient mattress behind and treat ourselves to a new one once we made it here. We did just that - but we didn’t have the money to buy a frame so we left the new mattress on the floor. And before long, the frame was sitting pretty low on the priorities list. But back to that tax refund - it gave us a little extra boost and we just thought, why not?
It’s so much cozier now at night, sleeping above the drafty floor. I have a spot to sit when I put on my shoes. And the BEST part is that Storm can no longer dive-bomb us in the morning, jumping down from the night stand and onto our stomachs in an effort to wake us up. It’s just a bed frame. But it’s also my favorite thing.
Between my feet and the fact that Eric was away on a work trip, not a LOT of jewelry work got finished this week. I did some drawing, some weaving, spent a lot of time taking care of the animals…but didn’t spend a lot of time in the studio, torch in hand. That being said, I finished some delicate turquoise studs and will be setting stones in a trio of horsehair earrings this morning.
It’s almost, ALMOST time for the March restock, too. I’ve got one more work week to prepare pieces and then I’m cutting myself off - everything else will just have to roll over to May. So with that, I’m off to turn on the pickle pot and get to work - there is so much to do!