Book Review # 2- Lilith's Brood

I returned to my science fiction genre.   Lilith's Brood is a trilogy, Dawn, Adulthood Rites, and Imago.  All three were great.  The fact that they were bound together just made it easier to read all three. 

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Octavia E. Butler creates a new civilization based on an alien spececies.  After the earth ends in World War Three (typical sci-fie beginning) an alien species regrows the earth and populates it with rescued humans.  But the book gets really good when the aliens present thier plan, to "trade" with humans.  The aliens want to create a new race with mixed genes of the aliens species and humans. 

Each of the three books follows a different step in the process. 

Let me just say that her new interpretation of family and love is fascinating to watch.  She manages to create a world that is completely alien while being on earth with humans.  She captures what it means to be human through the eyes of an alien.  She also shows that humans have a great gift for compassion and change.  This is what I love about science fiction, it shows humans in a way that other genres cannot do because the subject is too close.   

Butler is an amazing author.  She has won countless awards.  Her writing is engaging and kept me up many a night.  Her last book I read, Kindred Heart, touches on the subject of race with the same insight. 

I would recommend this book to anyone who likes a good story.  If you have never read sci-fie you are missing something great.

A Corner of Spring

Although its getting warmer here, there are very few signs of spring yet, but I have a little spring in one corner of my house.  I made a spring mantle and have been waiting for the apple blossoms to flower for it to be complete.

Memories of my father are important to me and one memory I have is of him showing me how to force spring trees to bloom early indoors.  He used to go out and pick cherry blossoms, or forsythia and bring these huge branches home.  I was never sure where he got the branches but I do know he had a tendency to sneak onto other people's land and "free" them of a few lower branches or flowers (He did this with lilacs too, and was once held at gun point by a little old lady.  My dad was a rule breaker.).  But after a few weeks we had flowers in the house when it was still bare outside.

This year I decided to do the same in his honor.  I picked some apple blossoms from an abandoned house next door (only slight rule breaking for me) and just this week they have bloomed. 

To go with my apple blossoms I made a little spring centerpiece.  

I decoupaged the eggs with tissue paper and fabric and made the nests a couple of weeks back.  The rest were from the house.  Besides the fact that my cat has been eating one of the nests (I'm really not that upset) I think it turned out quite well.

I love the birdcage.  I have a thing for birdcages but my husband thinks I'm crazy for wanting them all over my house.  I had a friend who collected birdcages and I just think they are the most beautiful decorations.  Birdcages can be so beautiful, delicate, and eerie all at the same time.  This one is fake of course, but one day I will have some hanging in corners or whatnot. 

So there you have it, a corner of spring to foreshadow the coming weeks.  Forcing branches to bloom early may become a yearly ritual for me.  Next year I'll try cherry (that is if I can find some abandoned cherry branches).

P.S.  Here is Rhea eating my nest and then posing like a good kitty.

Link Parties I joined!

MIA

I'm sorry I have been MIA this week.  This is actually my first week I have not posted all five work week days.  Life has just gotten the better of me.

Yesterday was my father's birthday.  He passed away last August and it was a really rough day. 

Other than that my only excuse is that I have been working hard on my thesis, but the truth is that until about five hours ago I have been working hard on procrastinating instead of my thesis.  I just can't justify writing my blog if I'm not writing my thesis (I'm paying a lot of many to write the thing).

I'm happy to report that today I got some work done on my giant paper and now feel I can write my blog again (yippeee).  Tomorrow I will take a bunch of pictures and get back on the blog wagon.  I miss all my blog friends so much. 

New Sink (For Real)!

I never liked my pedestal sink.  My contractor (and family friend) told me it was not good, but I was a stuborn 22 year old.  So I bought the pedestal and he bought the mirror, in the end it did not work.

When my husband and I moved in (ten years later) we wanted a new sink for the bathroom.  I wanted one of the PB ones (suprised right? jk) but that was not in our budget, so we waited.

I don't even like this one as much, go figure. {source}

One day I was in my local town killing time when I stumbled upon MY VANITY, it was just want I wanted.  It looked more like a peice of furniture, it had a marble top and a below counter sink.  I loved it.  The best part was the price, $150, including the sink and marble top.  Jeff went in the next day and bought it.  We could not believe that our local, middle-of-nowhere discount store had this great vanity.   Bringing it home is another long story (follow the link to read it) but we got it home and it was great...

...EXCEPT...it was black.

But I was not worried because, as you know if you read my blog regularly, I paint everything.  Well I finally painted it, and I LOVE it (sorry about the all caps, I try to use them sparingly, but I'm SO excited!!!).

Here is the final reveal:

I love how the vanity curves slightly.  It is the perfect size and now that it is white it looks amazing.  

We kept our old faucets because they fit and they worked (gotta keep it cheap around here).

We even kept the nobs.

I painted inside the drawers gray, to match the walls. 

Here is one last before and after:

Before

Sorry about the toilet seat, gross.

After

Amazing right?  I just love it.  

We are working on the bathroom as a whole, so when we get a new mirror and all that I will do a full reveal. 

New Sink (Almost)

It took comments for all my wonderful readers to see that I have a theme going on in some of my blogs.  I use what I've got.  First there was Making Do, then I reused an old window for Better Than Pottery Barn, and most recently there was my big Project Brighten Desk.  There were a bunch of little things I did in between as well, like making my own valentines paper, and painting various objects to fit my new style.  The point is that I have been taking what I have and finding ways to make it work for what I want.

This next project fits right into my theme.  I made my own soft scrub and cleaned my kitchen sink.  OK so this may not seem like rocket science to some of you, but I was truly amazed by the power of my homemade cleaner.

This is what my sink looked like before I washed it (the other side was worse but I had already cleaned it).

The photo is not great, but this is pretty bad.  You can see all the scratch marks and tea/espresso stains.

I thought the sink was ruined.  I had renters in my house before I moved in in August and the sink was even worse.  I thought they had ruined it and I would need a new one (OK I wanted a new sink, and while we were at it we could get one with a bib?). 

Today I mixed up some white vinegar with a bunch of baking soda* (the baking soda I was about to throw away from the fridge).  It reacted and created a sort of paste.  With my little scrubby sponge and some elbow grease (love that elbow grease), I got the sink to this:

Looks new right?  Now compare:

I put all my little sink stuff away and I quite like how it looks.

Like my little scrubby lady?  I got her for Christmas because she looks like me.  :)

It's like a whole new sink and I didn't have to buy a thing.  It will be a while before I can justify getting a new sink.  That's OK, I like my sink now.   

* correction- I used baking soda not powder. 

Going Vegan

One day while I was confiding to my professor she suggested I try eating vegan.  She told me she had been vegan for a year and "never felt better" in her life.  Now my professor is in her sixties so this is saying a lot. 

Now, months later jeff and I decided that we should try it.  We wanted to find a way to eat helathier and feel better.  My professor's suggestion and her enthusiasm for the idea had me hooked. 

Jeff and I have been vegan for about three hours.  We made a meal plan and Jeff almost threw away all our dairy, but I'm hoping to give it to a friend (we have a whole dozen eggs I don't want to just throw away).  Of course as soon as we made this decision Jeff started to get silly; while reading the ingredients list on a package he said we should not eat it because it had yeast!  I think he went too far, and I'm glad he was just joking.  We are keeping yeast, and honey.  The honey is because I like my honey and peanut sandwiches too much.  My favorite bread has honey too.  You can't take everything away. Also, I'm not becoming vegan for the sake of the animals (I believe that the food chain exists and is good) but so that I eat better.  Not to mention, honey does not harm the bees (as far as I know, feel free to correct me, but don't expect me to give up my honey and PB sandwiches!).

We booked a reservation at the local vegan restaurant to celebrate if we make it to Saturday.  I have high hopes, I can't wait to give up my cheese addiction and get healthy.  I'll let you know how it goes. 

Project Brighten Desk

Did I mention I wanta Pottery Barn desk?  Well that is not going to happen until I find a job or win the lottery so I did what I could with the desk I have. 

Painting my desk was out of the question right now.  I have school work to finish and don't have the time to sand, prime, and paint all the little nooks and crannies on my desk.  So I decided that with some accessories, some new lighting and a little love I could make my desk a better place to be. 

This is what my desk looked like last week:

See how dark and messy my desk became?  This is even after I tried to organize.  It was not good.

For Project Brighten Desk I had a bunch of crafts: there was the bulletin board (which I love), the desk accessories, and some store bought additions I got for (what else?), my birthday.  I even included my failed bottle project to fill up a corner.

Are you dieing to see the big reveal? 

Better right? 

I took out the old monitor, and added the bulletin board and new space for little desk things.  I even added a ribbon holder (now I want more ribbon).

See my little bottles?  I even changed the background in my post-it dispencer.

Here is a closeup of the ribbons, I don't know why I only have pink and brown ribbons, but it works for the color schemem of the desk.

I made each of the little buckets hold a different tool.  These are holding pencils.  How do you like my pig?  I like porcelain pigs for some reason (one day I will show you my pig that lives in the kitchen too).

On the other side of the desk I have a bin for scissors and another for rulters and paintbrushes.  The little apple was a gift from my hubby when we were dating. 

The notebook here holds craft ideas and blog post concepts, held in my last desk accessory.

How do you like my light?  I brought this back from India years ago and it is amazing every place I put it.  I just love it over my desk, as I have great light in the right spot without taking up more space on my desk.  I should really start importing these lights, they are better than anything I have seen here because it has so many shells (yup those are slivers of shells all hanging together). 


OK one last before and after:

Before

After

Project Brighten Desk was a sucess.  I may never get the PB desk I dream of, but like so much of life, I can enjoy what I have.  I love my desk now, and it is good timing because I will be sitting at this desk all day for the next five weeks writing my Graduate Thesis.

(I may be around blog-land less during this time as I have to write my thesis and it requires much work.  Please understand and be patient with me.  I will miss you all!)