feel good factor – finishing infinity projects before year-end

Here’s a recipe for some instant feel-good factor: finish one (or more) of those infinity project before the year-end in order to start from clean slate, rather than with a long to-do list. I certainly have quite a few of those to-dos, and have been working hard today to close some of them.

My first one was to get some self-locking shelf pins to replace the broken ones in the kitchen pantry. I’ve been missing a couple of shelves for a month now, meaning that all other shelves were stuffed and messy. The challenge here was that store clerks seemed to think that they did not have this sort of little pieces and I happened to be lucky to find them when going through every shelf and locker in the local Lowe’s. No 1 item ticked off. Feeling already better!

The second one I am a bit embarrassed about – I should have just returned things when I realised they weren’t right. Instead I bought a new staple gun, a saw, drill heads, wood and will complete at some point…So we have these lovely canvas prints of miss A. as a toddler on the beach – and nothing on the twins. So I did a lot of snapping last spring, turned my pictures black and white, spotted a great deal (or so did I think at the time) and ordered several prints.

They did not arrive within three weeks as they were supposed to, meaning that when we were out in Europe for several weeks my prints arrived and I could not check them. On arrival I immediately realised that they were not stretched but I would have to build the frame from the wood sent and stretch the canvas myself (I was very scared I would mess it up). When I finally had time to look closer, I also realised that my black and white prints had a weird green tint – all of them! The 3D-frame was not as thick as I had expected and the frame pieces only matched with the two largest pictures (of a total of 8 – grandparent might need to wait for their pictures a little bit longer still)! A true quelle horreur – moment.

So today I finally out together the first two canvases with my new tools, and I think that they look at least decent ( I had a bit of an issue with the corners, just like I sometimes have when wrapping presents), especially if I don’t keep the near the real B&W prints. Here I proudly present the amateur snapper with a little Canon and iPhoto skills finishes her canvas prints. And if you note from the pictures I also changes rooms on Saturday for the dinner party – dining area is now actually a dining area and the kids got a corner in the living room!

Magically the dining room moved into the dining space next to the kitchen over the weekend. I am still evaluating whether it should be a permanent move or not…

Finally – the self-streched, not-quite-the-right-colour large 3D black&white canvases of the twins