Shop At Moxie

How'd I live Without It?

 I am a creature of habit when it comes to my eating and drinking habits.  Most mornings I have a toasted Thomas English Muffin with Skippy extra crunchy peanut butter on it.  It's easy, quick and oh so peanutty good.  I love me some peanut butter!

For years I have been making this and doing the one thing "they" always say not to do.  I would stick a fork or knife down into the toaster with it plugged in to try to stab my short muffin out of the big oversized toaster.  It never really phased me but would send Bob into a pure panic every time he saw me do it.  "Megan DO NOT DO THAT.....YOU'RE GOING TO GET ELECTROCUTED"....he'd say in a frenzy.   "OK, ok ok I'd say,  as I finished fishing my muffin out of the toaster with my knife."   Next day, same thing.  This went on for years.  Stubborn and slightly disfunctional...yes that's me.

So when I was looking thru a catalog of kitchen gadgets to order for Moxie one day and I came across a bamboo toast tong I knew it was a match made in heaven.  I could safely retrieve toasted items out of the toaster and make my dear husband Bob's life a little bit calmer.  No longer would he have to waste precious energy worry about my possible electrocution.  He could now focus more energy on worrying about the possible side-effects of eating peanut butter every day.  

I use the bamboo toast tongs almost every day.  I love this little helpful gadget.  So cheap, so simple, yet so darned practical.  You almost can't live without it.  Really.

Find them at moxie.

P.S.   Did anyone else laugh when they read the statement "stab my short muffin" or is it just me?  Yea I know.....it's probably just me.

This breakfast is so delicious I forgot to not take a bite of it before snapping my photo of it.  Oh well.

It Hurt....It hurt Real bad.

No I didn't fall and break my elbow again.  And I didn't lose out on something great at an estate sale.  The hurt I recently experienced was emotional.  

It all happened so quickly.  We got the call in August that my childhood home, where my dad and stepmom still lived, had sold after a long time on the market and the closing was in September.   I specifically remember saying to Bob that day "It's no big deal.  I'm not sentimental about things like this."  I think I really believed this or maybe I just wanted to believe it.  I'm not really sure.

I spent a great deal of time over the next 3 weeks helping my family get ready for the big estate sale they were planning.  Only a pods worth of stuff was being transported down south with them.  The rest was given to us 7 kids or to charity or set aside for the estate sale.  I being the "family expert on stuff" was put in charge of the sale.  

I was so happy to get to spend long days with my dad and stepmom because that was something I really hadn't done in twenty years.  The flip side is that it was a happy and sad three week long walk down memory lane.  

All of a sudden I was remembering all sorts of stuff that had been shuffled to the back of my memory bank.  The time when my brother and I hosted a "small get together for friends" that turned into the craziest pool party of all times complete with an injury and my dad's prized lawn getting all torn up by dozens of cars.  Or the time when my dad had to sleep on a hospital bed on the first floor of our house for months as he recovered from a near fatal car accident.  I walked into my old bedroom and suddenly remembered the time when I was 17 and laying in bed listening to the radio at 10:30 at night when the radio station announced that the 10th caller would win a hundred dollars.  I was the tenth caller.  The song playing at the time was "Into The Groove" by Madonna.  I got all choked up when I walked into our small damp basement and was flooded with the memories of moving back home to save money when I was 22 yrs old. My dad was not yet remarried and 3 or 4 or my siblings were still living at home with him.  There really wasn't a room for me to have but he said "Well you can move into the basement."  So I did.  Basically it was a semi finished damp basement with the laundry room attached to it.  I moved my twin bed in and called it home for awhile.  I was dating Bob at the time and since he lived an hour away my Dad used to let him sleep upstairs on the couch so he wouldn't have to drive home late at night.  One day Bob dropped over and found me sitting on my bed in the basement and the next thing I knew he was down on one knee with shaky hand outstretched asking me to marry him.  When the spirit moves you the spirit moves you and I love the fact that my marriage proposal was in the basement.  I think he just couldn't wait to do it at any other time.  

I was very successful at putting on a happy face as I helped my dad and stepmom get ready for the big sale.  I knew how stressful of a time it was for them.  It's not easy handling a lifetime's worth of stuff in three weeks.  And my dad was sad to be moving away from the midwest where he had lived all of his life.  He was looking forward to golf and warm weather, new adventures and a simpler life but that all comes at a cost.  The costs are obvious.  Whenever you move you leave some things or some ones behind.  

The sale went off without a hitch.  The closing happened.  The farewell party was Saturday.  I was not looking forward to it.  Bob said to me "Would you rather they skulked off in the middle of the night without saying goodbye?"  I said "Yes."  I hate goodbyes.  I honestly wish I never had to say it.  I have a problem with it.  I'm not good at it and I try to avoid it when possible.  

We went to the afternoon outdoor goodbye party and I did very well.  I chatted.  I laughed.  I socialized even though I'm an introvert to the nth degree.  I played nice in the sandbox and tried to avoid looking in my Dads direction in the fear that it would trigger some primal need for me to become a crying baby in public.  

Then it happened.  People started to say their goodbyes and leave the party.  So I did what any normal 42 yr old woman would do.   I snuck off and hid in our car.  I was in a complete state of panic.  I couldn't deal.  About 20 minutes later Bob found me and took one look at me and knew exactly how bad this was for me.  He sat in the car with me for a good half  an hour talking me down off the mental cliff I was on.  He told me that I could not leave the party without saying goodbye.  He said I would regret it forever.  He was right but I was seriously paralyzed with grief and pain.  I didn't want to say goodbye.  My dad is not a young pup anymore.  He has health issues and I was afraid I might never see him again.  All the stress and anxiety I had been holding back for the last month came bubbling up to the surface and it was making me physically ill.  I did want to say goodbye but I knew I couldn't keep it together while I did it.  I desperately wanted to keep it together but every time I imagined saying goodbye I'd start the "ugly cry" again and nothing I did was making it better.  I didn't want to cause a scene for pete's sake.  What's wrong with me I kept asking Bob.  He said....that's just you.  You feel things deeply and that's why I love  you.  That just made me cry harder.  "I don't want to feel things deeply.  I want to be normal." I said.  

Somehow I found the strength to get my pathetic messed up self out of the car and walking towards my Dad who was sitting peacefully in a lawn chair talking to my sister and her husband.  Bob was right by my side.  He said he would do all the talking.  Well he never got a chance because it's really hard to talk over a blubbering idiot.   I did manage to say my goodbyes and let me tell you it was not easy.  I admire people who can keep their emotions under wraps or at least down to a socially acceptable level.  I am missing something in my make up that lets me do that.  I am what I am and I try to accept it, but some days it's really hard to be me.  

So it hurt and it hurt bad but I am able to see all the good side too.  My dad and stepmom are off on a new adventure and I love adventures.  I see roadtrips to sunnier locals in my future. They are off to live near the sea and don't know exactly where they will settle.  Wherever they land will be a fun place to visit I'm sure.  They've already promised to find all the good estate sales for me to go to when I visit.  You've got to love a family who knows how to entice you with promises of vintage shopping.  

This little emotional journey I've been on has kept me from blogging and from other things as well.  Turns out that I just couldn't get in touch with my creative side while I was hurting.  This little post is hopefully a sign that I can move forward now.  I'm feeling better already.

Simple Pleasures

Take a crisp Granny Smith apple and dunk it into thick real caramel and then sprinkle it liberally with chopped peanuts......it's a winning formula!  

Homemade caramel apples from the Confectionery in DeKalb is one of the many things that Bob and I look forward to each Fall.  They make the best caramel apples I've ever had for sure.  The apples are always crisp and fresh.  The caramel thick but not too thick and the peanuts are just right.  I love these apples so much they are something I like to give as part of gifts.  I love to spread the caramel apple love around town.  

There is only one way I can eat a caramel apple.  I must cut it into little pieces and put them in a bowl.  Then I eat the pieces slowly savoring every bite.  It lasts longer and you don't end up with caramel stuck to your nose.  

For me, the first caramel apple day of the year is a happy happy day.  Means Fall is almost officially here and as I have mentioned numerous times before, I love Fall.   Do you have something in your life like this that makes you happy?  If so, please share it with me in the comments section.  

Happy Sunday,

Megan

Describing myself in ten words or less

Quirky, random, mischievious, fiercely loyal and often misunderstood.

How about you?  Please share your 10 word or less description in the comments box.  If I get at least 10 wonderful descriptions in the comments I will reward you all with a really fun blog giveaway in the upcoming days!

Farm Girl at Heart

Here in DeKalb we are surrounded by beautiful farm country.  I love the fields and the farmers and the bounty of good things that come from them.  I am a country girl at heart.  Give me a small town diner and a good meatloaf plate and I'm happy as can be.  

I didn't always feel that way.  I did spend the first 12 years of my life in the Wheaton and Naperville area.  I was accustomed to having lots of stuff and friends near by.  Your friends were always a house or two away.  The library, the ice cream shop, the school....all within easy traveling distance.  

I remember the summer before 6th grade.  My parents loaded all of us into the station wagon for a country drive.  They told us we were going to visit the new town we were moving to.  I was not happy about moving to begin with.  I might have only been eleven or twelve but I had a life.  A life I was happy with.  Of course none of the sulking or protestations I brought forth were even listened to or tolerated.  That's not how we rolled back then.  Get in, sit down and keep your mouth closed was more like it.  But when you have seven little kids you need to keep order and let the mob know who's in charge.  My parents were in charge and we knew it.

So there I sat in my assigned seat with my sister Ashley on my lap.  I was her designated car seat.  To amuse myself I used to pull my arms away from around her waist and she'd always immediately snatch them back around her.  This could go on for hours.  What can I say....it gets kind of boring being a human car seat if you don't have anyone to play with.

We either did not have air conditioning in our car or we never used it.  Because I remember always riding around with the windows rolled down.  The wind so loud you couldn't hear anyone say anything.  That was probably the goal my parents had now that I think about it.  

We were moving to Elburn and this was our first drive out to visit the town.  The memory that has never left me is this....

Just as my mom said we'd be there at any moment a smell like nothing I'd ever smelled smacked me right upside my senses.  I was assaulted with the smell of poo.  What kind of poo I had no idea.  I actually think I teared up as I said (mostly likely to myself cuz who else would listen)  This place stinks.  I don't want to live here.  What I didn't know is that we were driving right alongside a field that was freshly fertilized with manure and that my entire existence in Elburn would not smell like doo doo.  

At the time I felt despair.  Prone to dramatic fits extreme in nature, I'm pretty sure I sulked about for a month or two before I came around to liking our new home.  We lived on an old gravel road with only four other houses on it.  We were miles from town (and the town didn't have much in it).  We were many miles away from our school and a life of tortured bus riding would be my fate for years to come.  I felt isolated and depressed.  So many feelings for a twelve year old I know.  But I was a twelve year old who had already read Gone With The Wind and other epic novels.  I was addicted to sagas.  My isolation and hatred of the smelly town we lived in fed my imagination and kept me going that summer before sixth grade.  I'm sure I dreamt of riding my bike down that gravel road to places more desirable.  But since my days were filled with baby-sitting and being a human car seat I never got that chance.

Instead, the fields, the openness, the country people, the small grocery in town, the only pizza place for miles, the butcher shop, the small middle school and the few new friends I made began to change my opinion for the better.  Life in Elburn wasn't so bad.  After awhile I began to think it was pretty good and now 30 years later I find myself mumbling about how I dread going into the city because it is so congested etc.  I admit to myself that I could never live in a city after having lived in the country.  

One of my favorite new prints from Zutano is their Farm scene.  It is adorable and oh so appropriate for all of us country folk out here in farm land.  

It was while I was straightening out the Zutano area in moxie that I flashbacked to my memory of first having moved to Elburn.  I'm glad I gave life in the country a chance.  It's pretty swell.

The Beast is Hungry

The beast isn't just hungry, it has an insatiable appetite.  It doesn't rumble when it wants to be fed, instead it beats it's big furry hands on it's chest until it is satiated.  The beast wakes up early and stays up until it passes out from the exhaustion of being the beast.  The beast hates to be ignored and will pester you until you listen to it.  (no the beast isn't Bob)

The beast will go anywhere and do almost anything within it's quite noble moral and ethical code to be satisfied.  I've tried ignoring the beast but it just doesn't work.  The beast must be heard.  When caged it rebels.  A rebelling beast is not a good thing.  The beast's favorite song is "Don't Fence Me In" as sung by Willie Nelson.

The beast is......................

  

The name I've given to the feelings I have inside that drive me.  To know me is to know that I'm not prone to plain speak or ordinary actions.  If I'm sick I'm probably dying.  If I'm hungry then I'm starving....possibly starving to death.  If I'm sad I'm most likely crying and if I love something then I have a hard time not lovin it, talking about it, eating it, or doing it.  I'm just not good at moderation.  It's not my thing.  

This burning fire in my belly to go out and do the things I love until I'm so exhausted I drop has been named the beast by me for years.  Some mornings my husband calls me from his work and asks what are you doing today.  I often answer with the succinct words.....the beast is hungry.  Crazy as it sounds Bob knows that that means I feel the need to get out and go treasure hunting.  

The beast is addicted to looking for vintage finds.  It loves the thrill of the hunt.  Finding something really wonderful in a dingy or unexpected place gives the beast the adrenaline rush it so craves.  Some people's beasts might make them do extreme sports or possibly naughty or illegal things.  Mine just is a natural born hunter and gatherer.  I used to sneak change out of my dad's penny poker change jar to go to neighborhood garage sales.  The thrill I got from finding odd and interesting bits at these sales was the stuff childhood dreams are made of.  I'm not proud that I snuck change out of dear dad's jar.....but I can tell you this.....the beast made me do it.  

If you are reading this and thinking that I should probably seek counseling, please know that it is like my addiction to diet coke.  When I manage to go without it for awhile all of my loved ones beg me to start drinking it again.  Sometimes going without the things we love just makes us cranky and not fun to be around.  

So the beast is a tiny bit unmanageable and creates big piles of stuff in my house that Bob makes me deal with or else he hides the keys to the van so the beast has to find new transportation.  The beast is fun and the beast believes in the good karma that comes from sharing the vintage finds with family, friends and anyone else who is interested. The beast doesn't even want to keep more than a tiny bit of what it finds.  It just needs to be the beast.

Bob is hoping the beast will arrange for someone to clean up these piles it just created real soon.

Darn that Groundhog....he's ruining my birthday!

Yep, today is my birthday.  The 42nd to be exact.  It's always been fun to share the date with the ever-popular Punxsutawney Phil.  Will he or won't he cast a shadow?  Will we have 6 more weeks of winter? 

Well today he did cast a shadow predicting 6 more weeks of winter.  Blahhh.  Doesn't he know that for MY birthday I wanted Spring to come  6 weeks early?  Oh well, that's ok Phil I really can't let you ruin my birthday because I have a lot to be super happy about.  Like the fact that my sister already dropped off a gallon of Samoas icecream for me (I didn't even know there was an ice cream in my favorite girl scout cookie flavor....yum!)

And how about the fact that my husband spent the entire last two weekends helping me redo my office which I've been wanting to do for years!  We made two power trips to Ikea and spent 4 long days getting rid of 10 years worth of misc. stuff I didn't really need but felt compelled to keep....like a white shoelace, two padlocks, a paper mache skeleton, 55 pens that no longer work, and enough random notes and ramblings written  on little pieces of torn of notebook paper to fill a dumpster. 

I have come to realize that I love writing down my ideas on the first thing I see, which is usually a scrap of paper with other random jots on it.  Then I add the note to a big pile of other notes and piles turn into boxes full of paper and so on and so on.  The problem is I have these ideas that I write down "for future use" but would never be able to locate them again ever.  As I read thru my years of notes I found that I've definitely been drawn to write down lyrics and quotes that inspire me along with ideas about things I'd like to accomplish in the future.  If only one of those notes said, "get some organization going you messy dreamer."

Better late than never, isn't that what they say.  This office re-do is all about giving me the tools I need to help myself.  I think the reason it took me so long to dive into a project like this is the realization that I would have to deal with a big huge mess first before the fun could begin.  I had to go all "Clean Sweep" on my butt to get this project going.

My most recent organization system was what I fondly refer to as the "tub system."  You know those giant Rubbermaid tubs that have lids?  Well I personally own about 80 of them.  I kid you not.  Now I do use some of them at work...but a whole lot of them are at my house too.  I just fill a tub with "like" items and voila....I'm organized.  Then I stack tubs on top of each other without any kind of labeling system...because "I can remember" what is inside of them.  Ya right.  Pretty soon tubs start reproducing in the night and the pathways in rooms become smaller and smaller.  Even I had to finally admit that something had to change. 

One of the major problems was my piles and piles of magazines and work catalogs.  I did the hardest thing ever and went cold turkey and recycled 10 years worth of decorating and lifestyle magazines.  Goodbye my old friends.  Now in the future I am going to rip things out of them as I go and say goodbye immediately.  As for the catalogs...well I have to keep those for my work.  I've got lots of ordering to do to keep 10,000 sq ft filled and it was impossible to find the catalog I needed when I needed it.  I'd have to get down on my knees and start digging thru huge tubs just filled with trade catalogs.  Not alphabetized...just all random.  So my office re-do started with this project.  How do I get the catalogs off the ground and organized?

Here is what I came up with.

 

Super ugly right?  The shelf is new and from Ikea as are the 5 for 2.99 cardboard magazine files.  Hey, 5 for 2.99 was in my budget!  Bob was all...."you're going to buy those ugly white holders and I was all....yea, I'm going to make them better."  I think he might have shaken his head in disbelief because I don't always make my ideas happen.  Well when I told Courtney the same day about my idea to transform the cheap files she completely shut me down with "you're never gonna get those done."  The challenge was on.  Not only did I get them done.  I got them done that night.  Sure I stayed up till the butt crack of dawn to do it...but hey I did it.

 

I have been collecting vintage wrapping paper for the last 3 or 4 years.  I just throw it into a suitcase and refuse to actually use it to wrap anything in it because I love it so much.  Well, I decided that if I could look at pieces of it in my office it would make me all happy so it was worth chopping some small pieces off of it.

Like this.

 

I didn't want to use up too much of my beloved paper so I decided to cover just the front and an inch around the sides of the files. That's pretty much all you see when they are in the shelf anyway.  I'm not fussy and things definitely don't have to be perfect when it comes to my projects.  I know the tall side of the file is supposed to face outward but I like the short side forward.  That way I can see which catalogs are in the files and access them quickly.  I loaded my catalogs into the files alphabetically from left to right on the shelves.  Much better than a jumbo tub!

 

I used a Tupperware rolling sheet as my craft area and simply used Mod Podge on the backs only of the paper which I then pressed carefully onto the fronts of the files.  I guaranteed a good fit by creating a template first and then used it to cut out all of the different papers. 

So you've now seen one corner of my office remodel.  None of what is shown used to be there.  I love having some surfaces on top of my shelves to put out some of my favorite items. Don't you love the painting of the retro lady with flower?  It was painted by none other than the fabulous Pat Kirk.  She is so talented and yet so very humble.  I love working with her!!

In the next day or two I will share  more photos of my office transformation. 

Happy Groundhogs Day!

Two boxes of kleenex and a tv marathon have kept me going this past week.

I'm back.  You might not have realized I've been gone.  Here's what's been going down in my world.

A couple days before Christmas I started to feel terrible.  This is nothing new for me.  I catch colds from hearing about someone elses cold.  Thought this was my fourth cold of the season.  I was wrong.  This beast that invaded my head and lungs was relentless.  By sheer will I made it thru Christmas Eve and even most of Christmas Day when I was hosting my whole family for Christmas dinner.  It's probably crazy to work for 60 days straight in the busy field of retail and then without a day off host a party for 20....but this is what we've done for the last 18 years and so be it.  I think I'd cry if I had to actually leave my house after working the holiday marathon.  So anyway, it was about an hour from us eating when I realized I was dizzy and disoriented.  When does the potato casserole go in?   When does the prime rib come out?  Is the ham warm enough?  Will the rolls fit in the oven? Who am I and why is everyone getting blurry?  Ok so that is a little melodramtic but I was seriously unable to figure out what needed to get done and how to time it all.  I think at one point I mumbled something out loud about being a wee bit dizzy and all of a sudden team sisters and mom burst into action.  They took over where I left off and they along with Mr Bob got everything cooked to perfection and out to the table.

We had a lovely dinner and I made it thru presents and desserts.  Things were looking up.  Dessert always helps. 

This is the dessert my family has had since I was young.  In cookbooks it's called Black Bottom Pie but for reasons unknown to me...my family calls it Ambassador Pie.  If you are planning on hosting any Ambassadors at your house in the future, I think they'd love this pie.  It has a layer of creamy chocolate followed by a homemade fluffy custard and is topped with freshly whipped cream.  Yummy!

 

My beautiful and sweet niece Brooke has been baking up a storm this year and she made a delicious peppermint cheesecake for the family.  She's the best!

 

Here her brothers enjoy some of the desserts

 

I enjoyed watching my youngest nephew Nathan open the presents from "Aunt Megan and Uncle Bob".   What a cutie-pie.

 

I am a no fuss hostess and so we tend to ramble around the house after dinner at the formal table with our plates of dessert and sometimes accidents happen.   I won't reveal who the culprit was.  Whoops!

 

The next day I crashed and burned.  Christmas was over and my body just collapsed on me.  I've been home for a week and just to make my life worse....the cable internet at our house has been out for the last 10 days.  They (comcast) swears they will be by "sometime" today to fix it.   I did not even have the internet to keep me company during my week at home.  I truly had know idea how horribly addicted to google I was until I couldn't google for 10 days.  I'm one of those people who sees something on tv or in an article and then wants to know more.  For instance, one of the saving graces for me this past week was that a bunch of the cable tv stations were playing marathons of shows I'd never seen before.  On Christmas day my mom and sister asked if I watched House and I hadn't.  They recommended it to me and voila.....marathon of 3 seasons of House on USA network.  That 20 hours of House episodes became my new best friend.  I never watched it because in general I don't do "medical dramas"  I have the queasiest most delicate sensibilities.  I can't hack blood.  I once cut my stomach accidentally and then went into real live shock from seeing the blood.  Actually I've been in real medical shock 3 times in my life (sometime I'll tell the story of waking up face down in an elevator having gone into shock)

So even though I thought that Hugh Laurie looked like a very interesting actor I passed on watching house  What a mistake.   Dr House is the crustiest, most unlikable/fascinating/can't wait to see what he says next/character on tv.  He is a horribly flawed, quirky genius.  I love him.  Can you not like but still love someone??  Absolutely!

When I get sick I get insomnia.  So every night between 1 am and 4 am I would watch one episode after the other of House.  Three seasons worth.  I was desperate to google the show.  I needed to know what happened in season one and two.  Why was Dr House the miserable crank that he is.  Why do I care so much?  How did his leg get injured?  I even thought of calling friends and making them google it for me but I resisted the urge.  I waited until today when I was well enough to sneak into work to do it.  Plus it gave me the chance to do a blog post....because I'm not sure I trust that comcast really will be out today to give me back the internet. 

I think I'm over the hump of being sick.  I still have a head full and lots of coughing going on but I now have the energy to get dressed in real clothes.  I hope all of you out there don't catch this bug.  Stay healthy and Happy New Year!

Self Expression

  Whoever wants to know something about me ought to look carefully at my pictures and try and see in them what I am and what I want to do....  Gustav Klimt