House anniversary: 20 years!

Today marks 20 years since I've owned the house. Gosh, time flies. Seems like yesterday that I had reacted a car and took off from work early to head out East to make the closing at my lawyer's office in the village. As I drove into town the leaves were falling and kids were out trick or treating in their holiday costumes. It was so enchanting. I remember I bought a pumpkin to put on the front steps, my first stab at decorating!
And now here I am 20 years later, the house (and the village) have changed so much but it's still an utter joy to live here.
I took a snap this morning of all my holiday pumpkins on the steps to mark the occasion.
Here's the next 20 years and more house adventures to come :)

Bugs in the bee

One of my favorite paper mache sculptures is a big bumble bee. I made it a few years ago and I'm quite fond of it. It took forever because there are so many external parts to the anatomy. But it was worth the effort. Because it is fairly large, I keep it in my home office/craft room on a little end table by the window.
A few weeks ago I noticed that there were a few piles of gray 'dust' underneath the bee on the table. On closer inspection there were tiny holes on the body of the bee where the dust was dropping from. An even closer inspection, I saw very tiny little bugs--"no-see-um" sized, around the holes. They looked like teeny termites. Were they EATING my bee? How did they get there? Since I would keep the windows open upstairs for ventilation, I think they were so small they got thru the window screens and alighted on the sculpture.
This, of course, freaked me out. I sprayed some RAID insect spray on a paper towel and wiped down the sculpture around the little holes. I then applied some Elmer's glue over the holes, repainted those sections, and painted a new coat of Modpodge over the whole thing. I thought would solve the problem. It didn't.
I put the bee in my bedroom to keep an eye on it. Well, some more dust started to appear beneath it again. Not as much dust as before, but enough to be annoying. On top of that I saw another little bug.
So I decided to take no prisoners.
I brought the bee down to the basement work table over a several sheets of newspaper. I sprayed the body underneath where most of the holes were with a good amount of RAID directly. I let it dry over night. So far I've seen no more dust. I hope this does the trick, I really don't want to get rid of this piece. I put too much work into it to let be destroyed by insects. Stay tuned.

The basement ceiling

Yesterday I started a long overdue project I've needed to get to for years: painting the basement ceiling.
I've been wanting to whitewash it to match the walls, an arduous project I tackled about 10 years ago. When I did the walls back then it made all the difference in lightening up the gray oppressiveness down there. I never got to the ceiling because I knew it was going to be a bear.
So I decided that this needed to be my big Winter Project for the season...I mean, what ELSE have I got to do? LOL
When you're looking at a huge task I find it's always best to think of it in small steps so as not to get overwhelmed. Just start nibbling and after a while you'll be further along than you realize.
I'm going to do one "room" of the basement at a time; I started with the handyman corner. I'll prime each section's ceiling and then go back and paint, probably with a nice Decorator's White. Because the ceiling is broken up into smaller sections because of the cross beams, it helps to keep track of the job. I did the first section. It's slow going. Since it's overhead you can only keep your arm elevated for short bursts of time. You feel like Michaelangelo painting the Sistine Chapel!
So stick in a pin in this date, the official first day of the project, and let's see how long it take me to complete. My dream would be to have it finished by Spring. Stay tuned...

23 lbs (and counting)

I'm proud of myself.
Since late last Spring I've lost 23 pounds. Pretty impressive, huh?


And the dirty little secret was that it wasn't that hard.
I woke up one day and realized I had dropped a lot of weight.
How did I do it? Well, it started with a visit to my new doctor.
He did a complete physical, along with all the standard blood work.
I was basically fine, but he did say my blood sugar levels were way too high.



I told him that it was no surprise given what a bad sweet tooth I have.
Since I was laid off I had made it a practice to always have some sort of luscious dessert on hand...pies, cakes, cookies, breads, sweet rolls, etc...you name it, I baked it. And I ate it ALL. Not good. Not good for my sugar level and especially not good for my weight.
I had ballooned to 217 pounds. All my clothes fit me pretty tight too.
So I simply decided to cut way, WAY down on the sugar. I went cold turkey on no desserts. The last quick bread I made was at the end of May.



I also cut down on the amount of coffee I have in the mornings. Since I put sugar in my coffee, cutting down from 5 cups a morning to 3 has helped with the sugar intake.
I also cut out potatoes for breakfast.
All I have now are 3 scrambled eggs for protein on a bagel for a load of carbs to get me thru the day.



In the afternoon I have a piece of fruit, usually an apple. I used to have a chunk of the day's dessert--no more. I love apples because it's a good amount of food and they're easy to transport around if I'm out and about. I just throw one in my little backpack with a paper towel. Easy cleanup.



I cut out soda water a long time ago too. I only drink water, most often with a wedge of lemon.
I have a sensible dinner, usually a one pot meal that contains a protein, vegetables, and a little carbs.
Later at night I'd have another go at the sweet stuff; again, that's in the past. Now I usually have a few spoonfuls of peanut butter (Peter Pan if I can find it, my favorite brand since I was a kid).



That's my eating scenario. I can't say it would work for you, but it's done wonders for me.
This is all coupled with more daily exercise.
Since I've gotten older my knees are not what they used to be. Running on a treadmill or outside is not almost impossible. My legs can't take the pounding. So I switched to walking.




When I'm in the city I do what I call "urban hiking". I just walk wherever I go. I've taken a lot of jaunts thru Central Park. I take a small pony of water, an apple and I'm good to go.
The other thing that's helped is supplementing the exercise with two invaluable pieces of technology. I got a new iPod shuffle that holds a lot of songs and the battery lasts forever, much longer than if I used my phone for the same purpose. Having the tunes makes the time go by so much faster.




The second thing is I got a FitBit wristband.




It really helps me keep track of how far I've walked, daily and by the week. It sends me reminders, updates, and encouraging messages.
So all this has helped me drop a lot of weight. It's really nice when people notice. My friend Dean was very complimentary. My sister Kelley noticed the difference in my Instagram profile picture. I even got a comment from one of my doormen who I hadn't seen in a while.
Now the challenge is that I still want to lose an additional 10 to 15 pounds. I really want to look good in a Speedo by next summer. I know I can do it. The funny thing is that I don't really miss all the desserts all that much...that saying keeps rolling around in my head, "Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels." And that's SO TRUE.




My other mantra is "Conceive, Believe, Achieve"...red Speedo here I come!!

Style goals

The car, the sunglasses, the shirt, the watch...what's not to love in this quintessential Hamptons lifestyle shot of that venerable East End haunt, "LUNCH"?

Doodling: raven

This doodle took less than 10 minutes, I'm very pleased with how it came out...it's very October, don't you think?