More Progress...

A friend of mine and I were chatting briefly tonight, and came to the conclusion that life was never going to slow down. I expressed frustration that I always felt like "a break" was just around the next bend, or that I would somehow catch up soon, and things would slow down. I drew the comparison to greyhounds, running around the track after that stupid fake rabbit. I feel like achieving my goals, and life falling into some sort of structure or schedule is right in front of me. I can see it, and can almost catch it. I'm doing everything I can to try to catch it...pressing onward, pushing harder, fully exerting myself to try to get it...and somehow the distance between us remains the same. Lame-o! I don't know...maybe I should move to Jamaica or somewhere else they aren't as concerned with busyness as we seem to be here. Hahahaha. Something tells me this isn't a geographical problem.

On to tasks/projects that I've been working on...and even though I'm finishing stuff, more things seem to be added to the list constantly. :sigh:

One thing that has been driving me crazy are these sconces I bought a while back.
They're supposed to look like this:


However, someone (who shall remain nameless) :cough cough: My Love :cough cough: decided to throw his jeans down over the opening from our gameroom down into our living room...with his belt still attached. The belt buckle hit one of the sconces on the way down, shattering it...leaving us with one sconce that looked normal, and one that looked like this:



It was quite sad...and, try as I may, I couldn't find a replacement glass part (no idea what that's called) for the sconces. As far as I could tell, I was going to have to buy an entire new sconce in order to just replace the part that broke...or donate the one good sconce to Goodwill or something.
Only, today, it dawned on me. Why not try to get (yet another thing I don't know the real name of) one of the glass parts of a chandelier, turn it upside down, and see if that will work? So, I took my empty sconce to Home Depot (sorry, Lowe's! I still love you), and managed to find these pretty little things:



Aren't they lovely? So, they're meant to go between the hardware of a chandelier and the lightbulb. Instead, I flipped them upside down, and stuck a candle in them. Voila!



New and improved, no? I love them! I'm going to have to figure out some way to seal the bottom if I want to light the candles, though. Can't have wax leaking out all over everywhere.

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Moving along to my next awesome find. Have I mentioned that I really like craigslist? It's almost like a dream come true...except for the fact that you can't trust your fellow man not to kill you or kidnap you, or worse, and you have to find someone to go with you any time you want to pick something up. When you have a husband who is totally not into crafty things like mine, it makes justifying craigslist purchases and runs very difficult.

Enter the dillema: we had two lamps that I purchased from Target not terribly long ago, for a very cheap price. Can't remember how much, though I think they were around $9. Recently, and not very far apart, they both pretty much crapped out. One completely stopped turning on (and no, it wasn't because the bulb was burned out), and the other one had some sort of terrible problem with the switch, where you almost needed one of those rubber jar opener things to get it to twist to turn on. Those went in the trash. Which left me with a room with no lamps, and two beautiful lampshades with nowhere to go.

Enter online shopping: all of my most trusted resources for this sort of thing were failing me. Bed Bath & Beyond's prices for lamp bases was so mortifying that I had to avert my eyes. Lowe's was considerably more palatable, but still not really what I was looking for. Why pay more than you want for something that isn't exactly what you want? Right. That would be stupid.

Enter craigslist: I hunted around for a while, and found a posting advertising two lamps for the cheapest price I had been able to find for one new lamp: $15. TWO lamps, for under the price of ONE. I was ecstatic. After several days, and several failed attempts to go retrieve said lamps, I finally was able to go! Here they are:



They...are brass...you might be thinking. Yes. Yes they are. But I happen to have left over Rustoleum hammered black! I've been able to use it for so many things - I'm so incredibly pleased with it!

So, I removed the lampshades that I will not be keeping, along with those bendy wire things that keep them in place, and just took the lamp bases. I cleaned them off with all purpose cleaner, and made sure I got all the dust out of various crevices. I coiled the cords so that they tucked underneath the bases of the lamps. I then cut out two "corners" of a WalMart shopping bag, and taped them around the electrical bits of the lamps, a-like-so:
(As you can see, they're ready for their makeover on our patio, which has turned into my furniture/project headquarters)



I sprayed them each with a coat of Rustoleum hammered black. They looked awesome.




I just added one final coat, and am going to let them dry overnight. Tomorrow, I'll put them in their rightful place, with their amazing lampshades, and they will have a party to celebrate how amazing they are, and the new life they've been given.

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Alrighty, last "project" of the night. We have one of those awkward inset walls upstairs, and have never really known what to do with it. It doesn't help that there's a phone jack in the middle of it, and an outlet. No idea who thought that one up, but whatever.

So, as I was sorting through things in the garage, I came across these:



They're supposed to be hot plates or hot coasters, or whatever you call the things you put pots on when they're warm and you don't want them to mark up the counter or table. I bought them at Linens 'N Things at their going out of business sale...I think they were $6.

I got a sample of Glidden's Olivewood, and painted the interior of the inset, as well as added an LED light to the top middle, so it could illuminate whatever I chose to put in there. I am strongly leaning toward these babies.

I have, yet again, employed the use of Rustoleum hammered black (I'm afraid I'm going to end up in a situation like those Stride gum commercials, and have the Rustoleum folks tackle me and steal my can away so that I'm forced to buy a new one), and have painted them. I'm going to hang them up in the inset, and probably put a hurricane-ish vase on the shelf part. I'll post a picture once it's actually done. I might need some feedback on whether it looks cool or lame.

That's all for tonight. Long, emotional day, and I've got A TON to get done tomorrow before the realtor gets here. Wish me luck! Goodnight all!