Now I Can See The Moon!!

How's THAT for a cryptic blog post title?!?! :0) It comes from a very famous Japanese haiku poem written by a Samurai warrior called Masahide that I remember learning at school and it goes:

My barn burnt down,

Now ...

I can see the moon.

Personally, I've always thought it was a bit of a drastic way to have a lunar viewing and a much less permanent way to do that would have been to just go outside!! But that's just me! Tee! Hee! Hee! I guess it's really taking the ol 'silver lining in every cloud' outlook to the extreme! :0)

Why have I gone all 'Zen' on you? Well, I had a bit of a "Masahide" moment myself the other day. When we bought our Federation cottage, our assessment was ... it had good bone structure, but needed a LOT of cosmetic work. And one of those cosmetic jobs was to fix a number of cracked window panes. Since we're in the middle of our epic sewing room makeover and renovation, it was time to tackle the cracked pane of glass in one of its windows. This is what it has looked like for quite some time ...

It looks a little bit like the window is winking at you, doesn't it! Tee! Hee! Hee! Now, where that little square is, there is a piece of glass actually missing, so in winter, the wind was whistling in there, so I did a quick patch up job ...

OK ... so with cardboard and sticky tape being my repair materials of choice, I will never be a glazier! But ... it DID do the job and kept the wind and rain out of my sewing room, however, with the makeover, it was time for the patch to come off and the pane to be replaced. Did I say "PANE" ... er ... let me amend that to ... "PANES"!! Apparently, there was a little 'OOPS!' when my Beloved Geek Boy and his Dad were getting the damaged glass out.  I was pretty pleased to hear about it AFTER the fact! Tee! Hee! Hee!

So, I thought that was that ... new glass, new look window ... all's good. And THEN ... on the weekend, I walked in to see ...

EEK!! Someone stole my window ... now I can see the garden! Tee! Hee! Hee! See ... there's my 'Zen' moment! :0) Apparently, it was easier to paint the window when it wasn't actually IN the window. Since I had no idea how to put said window back into its hole in the wall ... I had to take GB's word for it!! However ... at the end of the day, I was rather pleased to see ...

The window back where it belongs and looking rather stunning with it's new glass and new paint job. All of the blue painting has been finished now (and BOY is my arm still telling me about how long it was wielding a paintbrush!!) and all of the trim has received it's undercoat, just needs its final coat of semi-gloss and then it's up to me to finish the de-clutter and putting back of the sewing room 'stuff'. SIGH!! Still sorting, tossing, re-housing and reassigning the 'stuff'. And STILL ironing and folding stash fabric whenever I'm watching TV. I'm REALLY hoping to get myself sorted in the next week or so, but promise to share some more update photos as we go.

On another subject ... thanks to all the OPAM gals who emailed their March finishes through to me or Peg ... much appreciated and always lovely to 'chat' to you ... although I DID seem to spend quite a lot of time writing emails on the weekend! Tee! Hee! Hee! Stay tuned gals, Peg will be announcing the prize winners tomorrow!! A big congratulations to you all for the biggest month of finishes we've ever had for OPAM ...

830 Finishes!!

WOW!! Mind you, there were a couple of gals stitching madly for upcoming craft stalls and over 200 of those finishes were from Sabine ... who obviously hasn't eaten or slept for the whole month of March to  finish so many projects! Tee! Hee! Hee! But whether you finished 200, 20, 2 or no projects last month (I'm in that boat!!), if you made time to do SOMETHING creative, if you made a little bit of progress on a long-term project, if you got all of your requirements together ready to start a new project ... well, don't beat yourself up ... you've still taken a step forward and exercised your creative muscles, so that's what really matters! :0)

And now ... I think it's time I went and did a little bit more de-cluttering before dinner ... or perhaps I'll sit down and have a cup of tea til the urge passes! Tee! Hee! Hee! Hope you're all having a fabulous start to your week ... will be back soon to tell you about a guest blog post that I've written on another blog ... stay tuned! :0) Til next time ...

BEAR HUGS!
CHEERS!
KRIS