Lovelihood

The poor cat. Before the kids came along she was my go-to photographic muse. Now, if the kids are safely squared away in their tower, she might sit long enough to tolerate a single blurry, unleveled shot snapped in low light before slinking down to the basement where she might be left alone.

With that curtain finally (well, mostly) done, and before I get to the business of making a complementary shade for the other window in the room, it's time to tackle all the smaller projects on the ol' Teux Deux. "Make new strap" has been on there since we got the camera. I'd put it off in the usual, labor-over-the-logistics sort of way, before deciding to just make a glorified sleeve and permanently affix it to the default strap by way of a staff of parallel stitching. Method chosen, the only thing left (besides, y'know, actually making the thing) was fabric selection. Wool tweed, picked from the remnant bin for another as-of-yet unfulfilled purpose and that same curtain panel fabric seem to achieve that elusive feminine/masculine hybrid. Hermaphroditic, you might say.

The thing affixed on walls next to draperies to wind the curtain strings around is called a cleat. I've done a fairly exhaustive search, and they come in brass (not a huge fan of yellow metals in this household) and clear plastic (someone out there still believes that clear plastic makes for an innocuous, invisible, even, decor element — that person is wrong). A quick trip down the hardware store drawer pull aisle yielded this funky twig-shaped thing. But, caught up in the kitchy fervor of my find, I didn't stop to think that drawer pulls are usually screwed in from the reverse side, and I'm told that might not be the best way to attach something to an exterior door. So that's why, along the wall of eleven drawers, there is now a single one whose handle doesn't match. It's also why we're still on the prowl for a cleat that doesn't make us weep.

The temperature may never have risen much above freezing today. But from the living room, where I did my pre-run stretches with the sun warming my face, it very much felt like spring.

Last night's wintry mix left a satisfying cover of snow this morning. Enough to motivate The Boy to finish his breakfast without the usual nagging and cajolery, and as soon as I showered we took ourselves out back to stomp around and complain about the cold. Most exciting, to me at least, are the bits of green poking out, like these blades, likely the first emissaries from bulbs planted not by us in the planter boxes left behind for us on the deck. I'm not usually excited for Spring, but there's something very promising, this year, about watching all those buds develop at the tips of tree branches.

Noone's tendered an explanation for why, screwed into the half-wall at the top of the stairs, there is an old-timey schoolhouse pencil sharpener. A more nervous sort of parent might fear a toddler's pencil-thin finger finding it's way into one of those holes while her brother mischeviously rotors the handle on the other end. I'm just grateful for the two minutes of entertainment it gives a preschooler, upon bringing home a Valentine-themed pencil, an honest-to-goodness wood and no. #2 graphite. And I try not to worry about how damned sharp the tip of that pencil gets.

This little revelation makes me a bad Seattleite: the only coffee we keep in the house is of the instant variety. Sure, I indulge in the occasional coffee-house micro-roasted, fairly-traded cup. But twice a day, once in the morning and then again after the kids are down and I'm ready to sit down with my camera cable, or a crossword puzzle, I stir up my reconstituted brew and settle in to a warm cup of homey comfort.