Guilt-Free Shout-Out to Mom

Happy Mothers Day!

My mother writes books and articles on motherhood. In honor of Mothers Day, I'm giving her a bit of a publicity bump.
Debra Gilbert Rosenberg

The Story of the Mengel Cabinet Knobs

The electricity and water were shut off ages ago and they'd been draining the hot water heater for a good 30 minutes, so everyone was a little surprised when the overhead pipes poured down the last of the house's reserves.
"Hey, you wanna take a shower?"
I was the only female and glad I hadn't ditched my sweatshirt around the third time they made the joke.
The knobs came off the Mengel cabinet quite quickly, but for whatever reason I decided I wanted the hinges, too. Five screws per hinge, four hinges, and no real hurry unless the water never stopped, in which case the puddle might make it to my part of the floor.

Park Ridge Demolition Shower

Park Ridge Demolition Sale4
Originally uploaded by JillHannah

One demolition sale, two estate sales, two garage sales, an antiques show, and a stop at one of my favorite antiques/salvage places in Chicago. Not bad for a 2-day weekend.

Inspect a Gadget

As you probably haven't noticed, I added a "Follow me on Twitter" button to the right column of my blog. It's a Blogger gadget by GetRank with 135 little graphics to choose from.
One hundred and thirty-five.
You can't see them all sitting out on a nice clean webpage, but rather have to scroll and update individually, so I probably only saw half of them. But they're cute. I could change it every day and not get through them all until the leaves that are finally greening the trees start falling off again. I have a lot of higher priorities vying for daily slots, but in theory.
To get the gadget, go to the "Page Elements" tab of your blog (look for "Layout" and/or "Customize" depending on where you are in Blogger-land)
Click "Add a Gadget"In the bar that says (search for gadgets) type "twitter" or "follow" (either way it's the top result).
Click "Twitter Follow Me Button"
(I'm not showing this screen. It should be pretty obvious and this post is already so image-heavy your computer will think it's downloading porn.)

Finally!

"Title" is what is says above the icon on your blog, so change, delete, or ignore that as you so choose.
"Height" shouldn't be messed with unless you know what you're doing.
"Twitter Username" is, fascinatingly enough, your Twitter Username.
"Style" lists the 135 icon choices. By number. Every time you change numbers, youhave to click "Update" to see the icon in the preview box. I chose style 120, so that's one less you have to preview to see.
When you're done, hit save and voila! It's on your blog!

If you use this gadget, please comment with a link to your blog and the style number you chose. It'll be fun to see what other people do!

The Socio-Political Implications of Dogma in Commerce -or- I Only Buy Seventh Day Adventist Shoes

One of the local brands of eggs includes bible verses in their cartons. I know this and can choose to make sure I do or don't get this particular brand of eggs if that is important to me.

Etsy's handmade/vintage doctrine and independent spirit make it particularly attractive to people with causes and ideals. The opinions' volume can get a bit deafening, and it's easy to feel overwhelmed when you run into the same flavor of crap you thought Etsy could escape.

But!

In the handmade/vintage/indie marketplacedom, we have choice. As DIY self-owned Etsyland grows, it gets easier and easier to find the items we want supporting the social dogma to which we aspire. It's like each individual grocery store egg comes with a message from the chicken who laid it, giving the luxury of one more differentiating attribute as I we together our dozen.

In your business life, choosing to include a prayer or a call to veganism or a warning about the impending cockroach apocalypse is one more way to differentiate yourself from the next person selling felted soap or wire-wrap jewelry. Some people will be more inclined towards your cause and your goods, others will veer away, but that's also true if you paint it black or add more lavender.

It's your choice to share your opinions in your personal and business lives. You can change your opinions, change what you share, change how you share it. There's no need to be angry or surprised when you come across a person with different ideas. Ignore the idea, oppose the idea, but life's a lot easier when you stop getting outraged at the ideas very existence.

Now if you'll excuse me, I need to find an organic facial cleanser that supports the student movement in Pakistan.

Art credits: Madonna and Christ Child by iconsart, Hand Scratched Duck Egg by teener1416, Dome of the Rock Photograph by rebeccaplotnick, Karl Marx Book from HubcapHalo,

Dog-dawn-it

The early morning-ness of that last post was brought to you today by my dog, who decided he HAD to go out at 7 AM (though his campaign of whining started much earlier), and is now back asleep on a pillow by my desk.

It's a good thing he's cute.

The Story of the Blue Big Ben

My friend who is Cambodian was born on Cambodian New Year, also known as April 13. Saturday, I went with him to Chicago's Khmer New Year's celebration.
Buddhist call and response monotone chanting, hundreds of Styrofoam bowls filled with incredibly delicious curries and noodles and foods without translations, monks in orange and women in traditional Cambodian dress and children in their parents' arms--it was wonderful.

Then it was estate sale-ing time. I was creeping dangerously close to full-blown migraine and I knew I should have said, "Sorry, we'll go tomorrow or some time when I'm feeling better," but we were going treasure hunting to find him his birthday present from me and I didn't want to let him down. I found the three estate sales closest to my house, printed out a very explicit map, and we climbed into the car.

The first two sales yielded nothing noteworthy. As we drove to the third, I had big flashy blind spots in my vision freaking me out and making driving dangerous and terrifying. Meanwhile I learned my friend can't read a map and has absolutely no sense of direction, so I can't hand off navigation duties. By the time we arrived at the last sale, I was ready to vomit, explode, and curl up into a little ball on the lawn for at least an hour.

But I went in.

It was a moving sale, and different members of the family sold their things in separate areas on the first floor. Almost immediately my friend found a gorgeous quilt from the 1920s. He talked them down from $35 to $25. Wow. He took it home with him so I didn't get to inspect it or research it or anything, but happy happy birthday!
In the nephew's corner, I dug through a box of silk designer ties. A lot of them were beautiful-to-gaudy and apparently from the early 1990s. Fabulous as they were, I knew I couldn't sell them on Etsy for at least another year unless undid the seams and used the painted silk for something else...but this is why I have too many projects going, so I restrained myself and left the ties.

I didn't leave the bag drawer pulls or the blue Big Ben alarm clock.

The white haired matriarchal-type had a whole collection of tabletop clocks: electric and wind-ups and alarms, many in working condition and all predating my existence. She had an emotional attachment, I had a budget, so I had to pick a single favorite. In Migraineland, logic and analysis go out the window, so "Blue. Pretty." became my instant deciding factor and we raced home so I could crawl into a nice dark quiet bed and think happy garage sale-related thoughts until sleep ushered me through a few more hours of migraine.