January 23, 2014 by gn0mel0ver

It’s The Little Things: A Funny Spider Story

I had a post about a product half-written for my Littlest Things weekly post. I kept trying to sit down and finish it, but after yesterday’s post, my heart just felt sad. And whenever that happens, all I want to do is laugh. And the best way I can think of laughing is to poke fun at myself. So I am going to toss all logic out the window and just share a funny thing that happened to me a couple of weeks ago.

First, you might need the backstory if you are new here. The short version is, I don’t kill Daddy Long Leg Spiders in my house. It is a ~~craziness~~ tradition passed down from my grandmother to my mother to me (although she recently told me she has begun to clear them out. Traitor). My husband goes along with it. In fact, he is the wrangler of the spiders. He moves them from spot to spot. With his barehands. Yep, he is a regular old ~~enabler~~ ~~Cow~~Spiderboy.

Second, my husband and I take baths together. This is the part where my children run through the house screaming and crying over too much sharing. But we do. In a completely platonic way. It is the best time to unwind and talk over our day. And we are guaranteed that we will not be interrupted.

Okay. Now that both of those disturbing and freaky facts are out of the way, we can finally begin:

My husband and I were taking a bath. We were conversing. And everything seemed to be going smoothly.

But halfway through the bath, my husband looked at me and a horrified expression broke out across his face. He was staring at the top of my head. There obviously was something on it.

I knew.

I knew that I was going to die.

“WHAT IS IT?!” I immediately screamed. Because panicking is what I do best.

Instead of answering my question, my husband gave me these instructions, “Don’t. Move.”

So, what would you do?

Would you sit there calmly not knowing what was on your head? Would you wait for an explanation?

Or would you do what I did and lose your mind?

I shrieked, “IS IT A BLACK WIDOW?!”

You are probably wondering why I would immediately jump to Black Widow. And I am going to have to answer, I have no flipping idea. No, we do not have an infestation of Black Widows… At our house. Yes, we do have an infestation of crazy… In our minds.

No reply.

“IS. IT. A. BLACK. WIDOW???!!!

Still no reply.

So, at this point I know. I know I have a black widow on my head and it is going to bite me. And I am going to die. My head all bloated and disfigured in the bathtub. My naked body wrinkled and cold waiting for the coroner to come.

I began to thrash and scream. I was trying to drown the black widow in the bathtub. If I was going to be humiliated, I was taking the little sucker down with me.

My husband quickly jumped out of the bathtub. He calmly told me to stop moving around.

“AM I DEAD?! DID IT BITE ME?!” I managed to scream in between dunking my head over and over into the water. Water was sloshing everywhere. My head was getting banged against the faucet. I am a treat. A downright gift to marriage.

All of a sudden my husband grabbed my legs from outside the bathtub. Then he dragged me feet first and yanked me onto the cold tile floor.

First, can I tell you how much that hurt? My back will never be the same.

I was sobbing.

And let’s pause for a moment and reflect on the fact that this scenario is happening in the buff.

You’re welcome.

I couldn’t feel where I had been injected, but I knew my head must be the size of a watermelon. “WHAT DOES IT LOOK LIKE? CALL 9-1-1! MAYBE THEY CAN GIVE ME AN ANTIDOTE!”

My husband was stoically quiet.

“WHY AREN’T YOU HELPING ME? I’M DEAD! CALL 9-1-1!”

Still ignoring me. Still quiet. He was staring into the churning water that had just moments before been a peaceful sanctuary.

“Is it dead?” I managed to mutter in-between rocking myself on the hard floor.

I wiped my eyes and peered into the bathtub. I couldn’t find the Black Widow.

I didn’t see anything.

“Where is it?”

Then another horrifying thought occurred to me and I lurched to my wobbly feet. “IS IT STILL ON ME? OH MY GOD! GET IT!”

My husband was in a quiet ponder. He just pointed to a tiny shape in the bathtub. It looked like a small wadded up ball of string.

“It’s right there.”

“That’s the Black Widow?!”

It sure didn’t look like one.

My husband sighed. “There was no Black Widow. It was just a Daddy Long Legs.”

If one month ago, you felt the Earth tilt on its orbit, shudder, and then keep on spinning, please know that that was just my emotions catching up with my brain. Or maybe the following syllable being screeched. “WHAT?!”

“WHY DIDN’T YOU SAY THAT? You know I’m not scared of Daddy Long Legs!” I paused. “And why didn’t you tell me it wasn’t a black widow?”

My husband looked resigned as he scooped the tragic fellow of my tale from the tub. “You didn’t give me a chance. You just started freaking out.”

“Well, you made me freak out when you wouldn’t answer me.”

It was at this point my back that had been dragged across the side of the bathtub began to throb. “And my back! Why did you drag me out of the bathtub?”

“I thought you were going to drown yourself. You should have seen it. You were flailing. You were going to get hurt.”

I rubbed my back, “Yea. Well. Next time, just say it’s a Daddy Long Legs. Then none of this would have happened.”

I said, “next time,” because it’s us. There will always be a next time.

I mean with as many Daddy Long Legs I keep in my house, it was only a matter of time before one made it into a fashion post. Poor fellow. All he wanted to be was a hat. I prefer them much better when they are just pretending to be art on the wall.

I’m quite terrified some of them are going to gather together and make me a necklace.

Hey! I’m just like Cinderella.

Only without a fairy godmother.

Or a glass slipper.

Although, I do have plenty of chores to do. And creatures at my beck-in-call.

Let’s just hope I never get invited to a ball.

I shudder to think what those spiders will come up with as a dress.

Besides, I don’t think my poor ~~prince~~ husband or my back can take any more fashion assistance from our eight-legged guests.

It’s the little things: a funny story coming from terror. Or learning something new about yourself.

Have you had a similar thing happen to you? Do you kill the spiders in your home? Did you learn any life lessons this week?

My husband has. He has definitely learned some valuable lessons from all of this.

1. He married a crazy person.

2. That crazy person wants to keep spiders all over the house.

3. When one of those spiders crawls onto her she will immediately freak out and attempt a drowning suicide.

4. Relaxing baths should just be called baths around here.

5. He should have been a cowboy.

September 13, 2013 by gn0mel0ver

We’re Painting The Blanket Pink!

Oh! We’re painting the blanket pink!

Not black.

Not blue.

Yikes! What shall we do?

We’re painting the blanket pink!

My fun Mother-In-Law came in June to visit us. I had this project I wanted to do (dye a duvet cover pink), but I had been putting it off. She is a go-getter, my Mother-In-Law. She insisted we dye the comforter together the next day (what kind of mother-in-law is so gung-ho about making sure her son gets a pink coverlet on his bed?…The SUPER awesome kind!). Thank goodness we did. Because she was such a help. Amazing. And who knows when this lazy girl would have done it. It kind of terrified me.

I had originally seen a comforter like this on Apartment Therapy. It was in the home of S. Rohde Hill. He is a designer. So, of course, I tracked him down. I had to know where he had gotten his awesome blanket. I wanted the pop of pink in our bedroom. I had all ready made a pink pillow, and had a pink Otomi blanket, this would complete my need of three.

It turns out it was a Target white duvet that he ingeniously dyed hot pink. He very kindly gave me some useful tips and information about how he did his, on his blog, The Aedis. I love his blog. He recently moved and I cannot wait to see what he does in his new space. I have also added his blog to my blog roll on the right. ‘Cause he is cool and you might want to check it out on other days, too.

My Mother-In-Law so sweetly went out and purchased me a garbage can, some gloves, and an oar. An oar? I can hear your thoughts, “Jenni, you get weirder and weirder.” Well, while that is true, hear me out. In searching for the best way to dye this massive white duvet and the two pillow cases (which I purchased from Target.), I found a great tutorial on the blog The Hip Soiree. She used an oar. It was so smart! She dyed a couch slipcover orange. But it was the same process. I just followed her example.

Now, S. Rohde Hill informed me he put his duvet in his washing machine and simply “washed” it with one polyester dye tablet and one cotton dye tablet. Here is the problem: I have a front loader. He has a top loader. I do not have an agitator. Hence the garbage can and the oar.

The dye packets were purchased from The Dharma Trading Company. The brand is iDye. They are one each of the polyester pink dye. And the cotton pink dye. I also purchased the fixative.

Here are the steps we went through:

I put the garbage can in the shower. I filled the garbage can up with super hot water (just deep enough to submerge everything) from the shower head above. I added the dye packets. Stirred. I added the cover and pillow cases, stirred. And then I stirred and mixed the whole mess every five minutes for one hour, making sure everything stayed submerged in the process. I then drained the garbage can and rinsed the duvet and cases out in the shower before putting them in the washing machine for a good rinse. (And when I say, “I,” I mean my Mother-in Law and myself.)

What you will not see, is me in the shower, in my pink bathing suit, wringing the comforter over and over in the shower to get the dye out. My hands were pink.

I rinsed and drained this three times in the washing machine.

Then we went to a different bathtub and added the fixative. Even after three rinses in the washing machine, dye was still seeping out. I am glad I bought the fixative. After letting this rest for twenty minutes, I washed it in a real cycle. Then I dried it.

We put it on the bed. And my son went to the pool and rowed himself around in a raft with the oar (supervised, of course). It was a great day! Who knew an oar was such an important item to have in the house?

Our duvet is a different shade of pink than Rohde’s was (I recently read he no longer has it). I think I got too anal with my rinsing and repeating. But I was terrified of it leaving a mark on the white duvet we use everyday. This was just going to be an extra accent blanket. And it is. Rohde’s was still much cooler. I used an old blanket I had laying around as the insert.

But, I love the way it turned out (so does Murphy) and now I cannot wait to dye more things.

Have you dyed before? What was it? And was there a white light? (Groan.)

* Just a note: This post also could have been titled, “I have a rad husband.” Because even though he was not thrilled with the prospect of having pops of pink in his bedroom….he went along with it. He always encourages my creativity. And now he likes it. And I like him… Well, I’ve always liked him. : )

I shared this on Savvy Southern Style

And My Romantic Home

May 17, 2013 by gn0mel0ver

The Spider Freak

The screams were coming from our bathroom.

They were loud. They were shrill. They were coming from me. My husband burst into the bathroom. “Are you okay?” he asked.

“Yes,” I replied, but I pointed into our bathtub.

“I just want to take a bath, but it is so big. I cannot move it.” I continued to point into the bathtub. I continued to point at the giant spider inside of it.

Before you become too alarmed, please know I loved the spider inside of the bathtub. It was a daddy long legs. It is a variety of spider that will kill other pests in your home. They do not have sharp enough fangs to penetrate human skin (this theory has never been proven, but I choose to believe it).

Growing up, our family kept them all over the house. Now, we keep them all over the house. I assume my husband thinks I am crazy, but he humors me with the daddy long legs’ special treatment. We never kill them. But this one was intimidating. And it stood between me and the relaxing bath I had been looking forward to all night.

I had tried to get it to crawl onto a piece of paper, but quickly realized that that would not work. The spider was the size of half of the paper. One quick move and it would be on my hand. I loved it, but there is no way I could handle that situation. I had begun screaming and mewling when that debacle had almost occurred.

My daughter looked matter-of-factly into the tub. “Well, mom…you let it get too big, ” she deadpanned. I was looking alarmingly at the spider contemplating my next move. When my husband took the situation in hand. I mean, he took the situation in hand…

My husband quickly scooped the spider into his hands and began the transportation to the nearest safe zone. This being the top of our entertainment center. But it began to dangle. The children began squealing. My husband asked me to get the camera. I stood frozen in the doorway. And just like that, the spider vanished. We searched everywhere. We could not find it.

The children ran away screaming.

My husband began to complain that he felt itchy. It continued into the night.

Maybe it went to join the other spiders we have transferred. Maybe there is a club of sorts in the walls discussing our antics. Maybe my children will have many stories to tell…

If you come to our house, do not be alarmed. They can not hurt you. They might tickle. They might crawl. There might be some undignified screaming coming from your hostess…

Welcome to our crazy, fun house.

Do you feel itchy yet?

Gnome Lover

Stumbling through life while still having fun

bathtub

It’s The Little Things: A Funny Spider Story

We’re Painting The Blanket Pink!

The Spider Freak