Girl, You Don't Need Makeup

Just wake up an hour earlier, you could look so much girlier!

#15, Check!*

I did something I'm kind of proud of.

I got a tattoo!**

See?

Yep, flowers. I'm so unoriginal. I just really like them. Some people seem to have a lot favorite things, but I don't really have too many of those things. So I went with flowers.

Also, you might notice that it is rather large. I REALLY like that. I knew if I wanted a tattoo, I wanted a tattoo, not some tiny little thing that could be mistaken for a mole.

Seriously, I feel so awesome all the time. The flowers turned out gorgeous, and even though I didn't pay very much attention to the placement while it was happening (first-timer), I got incredibly lucky, because it's perfect. All my short sleeve shirts cover it, so I can wear all my same clothes to work. Obviously, it shows with sleeveless tops, but I don't usually wear those to work anyway, because I'm so forgetful about shaving my armpits. And I teach fifth grade. So no.

The flowers sit right on my shoulder, and the color is incredible. When it first healed, I was a little disappointed that the colors seem to fade slightly. Then I started being more aware of people around me with tattoos. Now I've noticed that the colors in mine are pretty amazing.  I went to Sarah Blinkhorn at Hearts of Fire Tattoo in Springfield, MO, if you're interested.

This was such an exciting thing to do. I felt brave. And of course, I'm so predictable. I want more!

* This item was #15 on my 101 in 1001 list. Please take a look at my list, and let me know if my list inspires you to start your own!

** Please remember, this tattoo is on my body permanently. Negative comments will only hurt my feelings. If tattoos are not your thing, then just politely ignore this post.

You've Got to Be Kitten Me

Our family is growing! Rand, Max, Mitzi and I have welcomed a little redhead to our family. Meet Simon Garfunkel Eckhardt.

Isn't he perfect?

He was born in our garage to one of the regular stray cats that hangs around our neighborhood. We had seen him, his mother, and his sibling hanging out in our yard a lot, and Rand instantly fell in love with him. He began trying to catch him before he got too old, and failed several times, but one night about two weeks ago, we managed to scoop him up and bring him inside. He was MAD.

He screamed and cried at first, and for a moment I worried we had made a big mistake bringing in an almost feral kitten, but within 24 hours he was already warming up to us. Now, after two weeks, he is a total love-cat. He's also the tootiest cat I've ever met.  I mean he toots a lot.

His purr is even louder than Max's. And all he ever wants to do is play. He's kind of wearing me out, but I love him. The big cats are being very good babies by tolerating him politely. They're not ready to be best friends yet, though.

This is the first time we've added a family member in eight years, and it's been a big adjustment. But now I'm convinced I need a house full of cats.

Cheers to many years with this little furball!

A Dramatic Scooter Story

I spent all last weekend stewing and moping about how awful the world can be. Rand and I had just experienced our first theft, and it stung, man.

We've never had anything stolen before. That's something I've always been very proud to say about our neighborhood. People would say things like, "You live on the north side? Eww, bet you can't wait to move." (No joke, people really say that.) And I could reply with, "Actually, it's a nice place to live. People are friendly, and I feel safe, and we've never had anything stolen or bothered!"

Not anymore. Now the jerks are right.

Early Friday morning, I left for work, and as always, I mentally noted where the scooter was so I wouldn't hit it with my car door. By the time Rand needed to go to work, it was gone. Someone had come into our backyard in the early morning, broken the lock position on the scooter's handles, and rolled it away.

Having something stolen really sucks. Having someone trespass into my own yard and steal something while one of us is home makes my skin crawl.

So we moped, cried, whined, and consoled each other all weekend. We filed a police report, and wandered around the neighborhood with the clicker hoping we could set off the alarm and hear it. No luck. In fact, we became convinced we would never see it again, so we decided to just make the best of things. Thanks to Dave Ramsey, we always have a little money stashed away for emergencies, so we decided to use it.

WE BOUGHT A NEW ONE!

Isn't it beautiful?! We bought it on Monday, and it felt so good to be able to recover from that whole thing and take a scooter ride Monday night. Plus, I think this one is prettier than the old one, anyway. We even splurged and bought us both new helmets. No more wearing a bicycle helmet on the scooter for me!

THEN....

On Tuesday afternoon Rand got a call at work that the Springfield Police had found his stolen scooter!! Georgie, this is drama! (Line from Ed Wood...anybody?)

Some guy had been trying to hot wire it in an alley when an old man walked up and the guy took off. The police were able to identify it from the police report and Rand's MSU parking sticker. As you can see, they were able to do some damage, but we think we're looking at less than $100 in repairs.

AND WE HAVE TWO SCOOTERS!!! We can go for rides together!

Obviously, I get the new one.

And you can bet those things are secured like Fort Knox now.

Just Say NO to Embarrassment

Have I told you about our scooter? Yes, Harpo (named for the pitch of the horn) joined our family not long ago, and it's a blast! Rand takes it to and from work, and we've been taking it all over town lately.

Now, let me tell you a little story. A couple weeks ago, Rand had to take the car out of town and so, for the first time, it was just me and Harpo with errands to run.

On Saturday, I finally started feeling confident on it, even brave enough to take it on busier streets. Of course I got a few extra glances, but it was fine. I scooted over to check on my flea market booth, then to stock up on yarn, then to the bank. All day, I felt just like this:

That was Saturday.

Sunday, I awoke to the sounds of birds chirping and a gentle breeze blowing throughout the open windows. It was a beautiful day to spend with Harpo. I took off down the driveway, looked both ways, and stepped on the gas as I turned to head south.


I must have turned too sharply, because I tipped the entire scooter over on its side. Right in the street. Right in front of my house, for all my neighbors to see.

My hands went straight into the street, but the scooter fell on my legs. I had to lift it off of myself and get it upright again, which was not a smooth, graceful move. Then I couldn't get it started again. I had to just walk the scooter over to my sidewalk, where I was too flustered for a few minutes to just realize the key needed to be turned. When I finally got the thing to start, I quickly took off down the road to escape anyone who had seen me fall. It was only a few blocks later, sitting at an intersection, that a guy pointed and yelled "Ha ha!"

So on Sunday, I was more aware that I looked like this:

Yes, that is a bicycle helmet.

An embarrassing fall and then being mocked in public? I had plenty of time just to drive around and think about it. At first, I wanted to go hide somewhere.

Finally, though,  I decided to just not care.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized that I've spent way too much time worrying about what other people think of me. I want to be free to wear what I want, look how I want, and do what I want, but obviously anyone who steps outside their comfort zone accepts the possibility of making a mistake, being mocked by others, or just getting stared at. By the time I got home, I was feeling fine, despite my rough start that day.

So here's my point. Seriously, try going about your business not caring what others think of you. Just pretend they're not there. Do what you want, be a nice person, and don't worry about it. That sounds so obvious, yet it has taken me a very long time to figure that out.

The moment I start to notice that self-conscious feeling creeping in, I remind myself that I don't care.  And suddenly I'm fine again.

Now that I don't care, I'm free to do all kinds of fun stuff.

"To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong." -Joseph Chilton Pearce

Happy Fourth of July!

Photo by Matthew Wieve via Unsplash

I hope you have a wonderful Fourth of July, wherever you are.

I Love This Moose

Good morning! School is out, and I feel like a new woman! I woke up bright and early today, went out for coffee, and now I'm writing up some blog posts that have been bouncing around in my head for a while. It feels so good.

Isn't this print by Amy Hamilton amazing? I can't stop staring at it. Not only is the moose so beautiful and sweet, but the watercolor effect is perfection. I've had this moose on my mind a lot lately. Check out all of Amy's beautiful creations in her Society 6 shop.

Cheers to summer and lots of time to do the things I love! What are you up to today?

My Mom's Garden Tour

For Father's Day weekend Rand and I drove down to see my parents. They live about an hour away from us, in a little cabin in the big woods. While I was there, I snapped a few photos of my mom's garden.

My mom has an amazing garden full of a huge variety of interesting plants. I love looking through her garden and greenhouse each time I visit and noticing the new blooms. Plants can be so beautiful and weird.

Aren't these little heart-shaped leaves sweet? My parents broke up an old sidewalk to create the little path below.

This garden has taken years to get to this point. She has some of the most massive Aloe plants and Hastas I've ever seen. She also some plants that only bloom occasionally, so you have to catch them at just the perfect time.

Little by little, I'm learning what I can and can't grow and how to make it all work. This summer has been insanely rainy, so even my plants are looking pretty good this year. I still have a long way to go to catch up with the variety and size of my mom's garden, though.

Do you have a garden? Flowers, herbs, or vegetables? 

How long have you been gardening?

Has it been rainy where you live? Are the bugs eating you alive, like they are me??

Lately

Oh, hey. Remember me?

I've got excuses, like work 'n stuff. But mostly, it was just writer's block that's to blame for my almost-month-long break from blogging. I wasn't in the mood.

But now I am. Let's blog it up.

Tell me how much you love our new scooter. I look like a huge dork riding it, and I don't care. I was born to RIDE.

My post on how to grow huge ferns is my most popular post ever, but no matter how lush your ferns get, they will still die if you stop watering them. This one was dead from neglect, but when I went to throw it out, I discovered baby birds inside. I couldn't argue with those three glaring faces, so I let the dead fern hang on our porch until they left. 

Then there's Max. He still doesn't care what you think.

I discovered this Bambi Airstream the other day, and now I'm obsessed. I want to move in and be a nomad. Only in a camper that is this retro and stylish, though. Now I'm on the lookout for a vintage starter camper, like a Shasta or a Scamp. 

Ok, we're caught up on me. So how are you? What's new? What have you been up to? Does anyone still read this thing?

I've got a few DIY/decorating/creative stuff posts lined up, so soon we'll see if I'm still any good at this.

Woodland Heights // Why I Love My Hood

It's no secret I dream of moving somewhere new someday. Although I love NYC, there are lots of beautiful places where I would be happy to live. Moving across the country and adjusting to a new way of life is something I want to experience at least once in my life, even if I end up moving back.

But we own a house here. And it's not selling. So we're here for a while. 

I'm not too upset. Every winter I get deeply depressed about feeling trapped in a location that forces me to drive in bad weather, and every spring, my Seasonal Affective Disorder calms down and I realize that this is a lovely place to live and I could do a lot worse. So here's a list of the things that make Woodland Heights a beautiful district and a fun place to live. Because it really is.

10. // Beautiful Buildings

Do you have a giant minty green wall in your neighborhood? It has its perks, like lots of photo ops.

9. // Historic Homes

Most of the homes in my neighborhood range from the late 1800s to the 1930s. Lots of homes have been restored and look amazing, but there are many more that just need some love, like the one below. 

8. // Mature Trees

Giant trees are the best. I'm happiest when I'm surrounded by trees that are at least one hundred years old.

7. // Friendly Cats

There are a ton of cats in my neighborhood. For me, that's an advantage to living here. Some are even really friendly, like this guy, who was wearing a collar that said his name was Louie.

6. // Brick Sidewalks

Some are in desperate need of repair, but some are in incredible shape. I happen to find neglected old brick to be irresistible.

5. // Commercial Street

I'm a little biased, but I really think C-Street is on the rise. We have Decades Boutique and other vintage stores, plus several art and design studios, The Savoy Ballroom, White River Brewery, Lindberg's, and a weekly farmer's market. There's a historic firehouse where we see bridal parties posing for photos nearly every weekend in the spring and summer. There are also lots of art walks and live music on C-Street, and our home is less than a minute's walking distance from all of it.  I took it for granted for years before I finally decided to go for a flippin' walk one day.

4. // History

If you don't love old stuff, you might not love living here. I like old stuff, so I would call this a plus.

3. // Lofts

I spotted the sign for the C-Street Loft Walk the day after it was over, but I'm on the lookout for another. Lofts on Commercial are cheaper than lofts downtown, and from what I can see from the street, they look gorgeous. Those windows alone are reason enough to move in.


2. // Coffee Close By

Rand and I have started a Sunday morning tradition of walking to this little place and drinking lattes outside while we ponder life. I love getting lattes that have the fancy heart-shaped foam pattern on the top. Oo-la-la!

1. // Nice People

Recently I had some friends comment that my neighborhood was scary or unsafe. Crimes happen here, just like they happen all over Springfield, but I never feel less safe in my neighborhood. In fact, I always feel pretty safe because there are always people around. It's true that most of the residents here are poorer than in other areas in Springfield, though not as bad off as some. But I kind of like that. There are fewer snobs here. No one ever complains if we don't keep our lawn perfect all the time.

Or if we go weeks without mowing. Not that we've ever done that (eye dart).

When it's warm, people here love to be outside. Maybe they just don't have air conditioning or cars, but there are always families on porches and children walking to and from the public pool and people on bikes and scooters. And did I mention we have a really talented garage band in our neighborhood?  I love going for walks around Woodland Heights with Rand, or just staying home, opening all the windows, and enjoying the live music. It's heavenly.


So you see what a nice place it is? You should buy my house. Just kidding. Well, not really. It is for sale. But it's for sale because we want to go far away and have adventures, not because there is a more perfect place for us somewhere else in southwest Missouri. I don't think there is.

The Flea Market Booth

{Photo by Jessica Lafferty, Via More or Less Jess}

“I like too many things and get all confused and hung-up running from one falling star to another till I drop. This is the night, what it does to you. I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion.”

-Jack Kerouac, On The Road

I thought Kerouac's On The Road was so awful I couldn't even finish it, but it does contain one of my favorite quotes ever.  This statement describes me perfectly: I like too many things. I've got a million ideas running through my head at all times, and there are so many, many things I want to try and learn to do and experience that I'm constantly jumping from one thing to the next. My goal is to get better about sticking to the things I start, since this habit has resulted in lots of unfinished projects and ventures that I don't follow through on very well *coughthisblogcough.*

So even though I probably have too many rods in the fire as it is, today I'm here to tell you about my latest scheme: My mom and I have opened a flea market booth.

Mom and I have been tossing around the idea for awhile. I inherited my love of thrifting from my mother. The problem for dedicated thrifters is that eventually your thrifted treasures start to pile up and you run out of space. Secretly, we both probably belong on an episode of Hoarders, so we've been feeling guilty about buying more junk when we both have too much already. And if something is standing between me and thrifting, I get antsy.

We looked at our options. Garage sales are great to visit, but having a garage sale of your own is the worst. We could just donate it all, but we really wanted to see if we could make a little something to put towards future thrifting. My mom suggested a flea market booth months ago, but neither of us knew anything about it or how to get started. I consulted my blog friend Danavee, who recently celebrated her three year flea market boothiversary and seems to really know her stuff, for some advice. She shared her knowledge of rent, rules, taxes, and so on, and she made it sound a little less scary.

So we went for it. We've opened up a booth at Vendor's Mart on Glenstone. Our booth is in the basement, where the rent is cheaper and we still seem to be getting plenty of traffic. So far, we've had no trouble paying our rent plus making some bread for ourselves.

The lighting's not great for photography. I plan to talk to Vendor's Mart about that.

If you're in the SGF area, stop by! It's not the kind of booth that's strictly vintage or anything like that. It's just mountains of all the stuff my mom and I have collected over the years, mostly home decor items, plus some random things you'll be surprised to see that I ever owned.

So here's hoping that we can stick with this little pursuit for awhile and learn all about it. I'm already feeling much more free to thrift as often as I please, since now if I change my mind about it later, I can just put it in the booth. Hot dog!

If I Ever Get a Tattoo...

...it will look like this:

By Nation of Amanda, available here

Even though I would like a tattoo, I will probably never get one, since I have a serious phobia about needles. But I stumbled across this print via Making It Lovely, and I had to share.

Happy Birthday, Max!

It's my cat's birthday!

Sort of. It was some time in February 2005 that Maxi-Cat joined our family. They told us he was two when we got him, but it was a shelter, so of course that's just a guess. We'll go with that, though, because he was a young adult cat at the time, so that means he's turning eleven! He's almost a teenager!

We are so in love with this boy. He is one of the sweetest, most loyal, most loving creatures I've ever met. I love almost all cats, but Maximus is very unique and charming. Instead of being timid and guarded like most cats, he is trusting and loving, even with strangers. He loves to be the center of attention, to be held, and to be talked to. We can hold him like a baby, or like a teddy bear at night, or even up in the air and he never even flinches. Sometimes I worry he's a little too trusting- he doesn't even move out of the way when something's coming at him. One of his favorite things is to be sung to. He'll just gaze into my eyes the whole time until he eventually falls asleep.

It was love at first sight nine years ago. Rand and I finally decided to get a cat, so we went to the Humane Society to look. From the moment we walked in, Maxy started showing off to get our attention. The other cats didn't seem too interested in us, but Maximillion circled in his cage and stared at us. He immediately caught my attention, so I held him and I instantly wanted him.  For some reason, I got this weird, don't-get-the-first-one-you-hold feeling, so I felt like I should hold another cat just to be sure. The whole time I held the other baby, Maxwell was staring at me. In fact, Rand recalls me saying, "Brandon, that cat is staring at me!" Instant connection.

Since then, we have become the best of friends. We sleep in each other's arms at night, and his endless griping for treats and attention is music to my ears. Here's to many more wonderful years together, Mr. Whiskerson!

The Room Journal on Apartment Therapy

This morning as I was scrolling through my Bloglovin' list, my heart skipped a beat when I saw pictures of my own living room on Apartment Therapy! I should have mentioned my blog on there...rookie mistake. Anyway, the comments were overall pretty positive. How exciting! Please click on over and take a peek.