A friend called me last week to ask if I were okay. “You haven’t blog in weeks!” she exclaimed. “Is everything all right??”
I assured her I’d simply been busy with spring cleaning. And also just hadn’t really had anything to say.
My internet mentor (my husband) advised me early on some of the do’s and don’ts of blogging. “If you don’t have anything to say, just don’t blog,” he said. “Don’t blog and say, ‘Well, it’s been slow around here so I haven’t blogged recently.” So I didn’t. But maybe I should have.
I’ve been remarkably unenthusiastic about housecleaning and decorating for the last year or so, as shocked visitors to my home will be quick to confirm. Except for frantic cleaning when a party was scheduled, we just sort of let things slide recently. In fact, our den floor is so covered with food crumbs, a mouse has taken up residence under the sofa. We blame it on our kids, of course. But we COULD have simply moved the sofa once in awhile and vacuumed....
Last week, Jon went out of town, Kmart had a sale on curtains and I went on a cleaning binge upstairs. I washed, folded and put away ALL the laundry, including those sweaters that should never be washed but also never seem to make it to the cleaners. I found a home for the odds and ends that have been hanging around the laundry room for a year or two now. (I have to admit, there is still an entire laundry basket filled with unmatched socks. Perhaps a miracle will happen here.)
I put up more pictures, finished rearranging the guest room, and hung seven sets of curtains. Lovely red-and-beige checked curtains from Kmart, marked down to a pittance per set. And they’re not even Martha’s! The whole look of the upstairs is transformed. It looks warm and cozy and homey. I feel...a little more like a homemaker.
We hadn’t done anything to our huge yard for the past few years except mow it and take down really objectionable branches that were poking people’s eyes out. This weekend, all four of us raked, trimmed, potted and planted, in the rain yet. We now have a collection of containers filled with flowers (potential flowers, anyway), a new shrubbery (shades of Monty Python & the Holy Grail!) and a newly planted section next to our front walk. I feel...a little more connected to the spring.
Now I’m attacking my studio. I realized one day that half the lights in my studio were burned out. They were color-balanced fluorescents, a little hard to track down, but I finally found a source and ordered them. They all went up today. It’s brighter in here. I feel....more cheerful.
In the throes of growing my biz and marketing my work, I simply let all this other stuff drop to the side. I had more important stuff to take care of.
But this spring, it just feels good to plant a few flowers, hang some curtains, and have our friends over for Bad Movie Night. It’s all a dance, and dancing is all about balance. Losing it and regaining it, trying to maintain a rhythm, and above all,
having a good time.
