Tag Archives: home

Here to Stay

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Somehow, I have lived in Tennessee for a year.  How did that happen?

This past Saturday marked the anniversary of completely uncharacteristic move 1100 miles south.  In a way, it seems this year flew by, and yet living in Boston seems a long way back.  I didn’t know a soul when I moved here, but of course I received a warm welcome.  It is the south after all.

I’ve made many wonderful friends in the last 12 months.  I’ve gotten to see my grandparents and extended family more than ever.  I’ve discovered I like bluegrass.  I’ve put 17,000 miles on my car. I’ve experienced a tornado warning.  I’ve taken thousands of pictures of the sky.  I haven’t done yoga once.

Words like “you’re fine” and “y’all” have become fixtures in my vocabulary.  My style has become more eclectic and less preppy.   Though it would be a serious stretch to call me an extrovert, I’m more outgoing and chatty than I used to be.  I like to get out more.

I don’t have a TV in my room and I don’t miss it. I still haven’t bought bar stools so I don’t have a proper place to eat a meal.  I cook maybe once or twice a week.

I’ve decided I’m not over the city living as much as I thought. I’ve stopped drinking soda. I like dogs more than I used to.  I’ve been to the movie theater 3 times.  I’ve canned jam.

I’ve learned more about what’s important to me and what’s not.

It feels like home here.

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I think it’s time to take down this wreath.

Y’all come back,

Sugarlump

Tax Avoidance (Not Evasion)

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It’s funny how, when faced with doing your taxes, vacuuming the sofa and ironing your socks become wildly appealing activities.  Suddenly, tackling that oil painting for my living room that I’ve been putting off since I moved in 11 months ago seems very urgent.  Brushing the cats’ teeth and cleaning out that “catch-all” basket of receipts, screw-drivers, lotion samples, paperclips and nail polish is just too hard to resist.

Doing my taxes really isn’t all that bad.  Because I own a business, I have an accountant who sends me a really nice tax organizer that makes the experience as painless and straight-forward as possible.  Every year, after I complete the document to return to her, I remark on how surprisingly simple it was.  And every year, I put off doing my taxes because something about it makes me want to do just about anything else.  I can’t explain it.

Today, instead of doing my taxes, I’ve done 4 loads of laundry and 1 load of dishes.  I’ve vacuumed, changed the sheets on my bed, rearranged the furniture and cleaned out the refrigerator.  Then I happened to find myself at Homegoods where I purchased 2 mirrors that were not the size I needed, but I had to have them.  Consequently, I have spent the last hour re-hanging everything on the walls in my apartment to accommodate said purchases.

At least I will have a fresh environment in which to do my taxes…whenever that may be.

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Off to French-braid Scarlett’s fur.  Doesn’t she look excited.

Y’all be responsible,

Sugarlump

Christmas Traditions

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This year marked a big transition in tradition for the Dyer household.   Instead of having our family Christmas at my parents’ house as we have always done, I hosted here in my new hometown of Nashville.

In my one bedroom apartment.

I didn’t foresee an issue as I have a large sectional that can sleep two people so I knew all four of us would have a comfortable place to sleep.

What I didn’t foresee was the blanket shortage.  I wound up sleeping under my robe.

It’s ok though.  Santa still showed up and we had our family Christmas.

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I may need a bigger place if I plan on hosting regularly.

After our family Christmas on Christmas Eve morning with just me, Eugene and my mom and dad, we headed to Kentucky for Christmas on Christmas Day with the extended family.

Got that straight?

We always sleep at my dad’s parents’ house on Christmas Eve.  My aunt, uncle and cousins live just down the road so they do their family Christmas early in the morning and then head to my grandparents for the big family Christmas on Christmas Day.

Christmas morning, Granny made sausage gravy and biscuits.  Man that stuff is good.  I certainly couldn’t eat it every day but then again my great grandparents did and they lived into their 90’s so maybe there’s something to that.  I’ll have to ponder that at a later time when I’m feeling less full.

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Per tradition, we started with our stockings.  Among other lovely items, there was a Starbucks gift card, which it looks like I could have used that morning if the nearest Starbucks weren’t over 70 miles away.

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After the stockings, we moved into the living room and the youngins passed out the gifts.  Eugene found a tagless gift, which was cause for great concern.

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My mom and Aunt Vickie received some money in shot glasses from Santa (Papa).  I found this hilarious.  I’m glad Aunt Vickie thought so, too.

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Granny got her box of tide with a dollar bill from Papa.  He’s been doing this for decades and I’m still not really sure how it started.  Maybe someday I’ll get to the bottom of it.

After Christmas at my dad’s parents’ house, we headed down the road (literally) for Christmas with my mom’s parents.

I went straight for a bourbon ball….or two.   I have a wicked sweet tooth and there’s no telling when it will strike.

We settled into the living room and opened our gifts.  It wasn’t the same without my aunt, uncle and cousin on my mom’s side, but we were certainly thinking of them and wishing they could have been with us.

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After seeing the photo that my parents sent out unsupervised in the family Christmas card this year where I look possessed, Eugene and I insisted that we supply suitable photographs for next year’s card.  We had my dad take about 437 photos and this was one of the better ones.

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With cameras retired for the day, we ate the delicious Christmas dinner that Grandmother had prepared for us.

Then I had a few more bourbon balls and a piece of rum cake.

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We played a game of Scrabble, one of our favorites.  I wasn’t on top of my game.  There’s only so much you can do when dealt X, B, J, H, L, L, T.  That, and most of the blood in my body was likely trying to aid in the digestion of the forty pounds of food I had eaten in the past few hours instead of pumping through my brain for a stroke of vocabulary genius.

And then I might have had another bourbon ball.

And then some leftover dressing from Christmas Eve dinner back at Granny and Papa’s.

And a piece of the jam cake cousin Lauren and I made on Thanksgiving and let ripen for Christmas.  It was scrumptious.

I think I’ll be full until next year.

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These things are the devil.

Y’all be careful,

Sugarlump

Young and Fabulous

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I’ve been going through old family photo albums lately.  Now I know why people take so many pictures and put them in albums: it’s absolutely hilarious to look back in time.

While looking through these old albums, I discovered that when I was young I was pretty fabulous.

I wore hot pink jelly flats, floral tops and patterned band aids.   I must have been subscribing to the “more is more” philosophy of dress.

This shot was taken at the front row of fashion week…in Granny and Papa’s den.

I wore sunglasses in the house and Mary Jane’s on a regular basis.  In hindsight, I might have opted for some sheer black stockings instead of the white tights, but we all fall victim to toddler fashion trends at some point in our lives.

Hopefully, it’s while we’re toddlers.

I wore sunglasses at night.  My theory on this obviously practical choice is that posing in my sunglasses after my bath prolonged having to go to bed.  My mom was eating it up.  It was genius.

I rocked white faux fur.  The paparazzi (my dad) caught me leaving the house in it Easter morning of what looks to be 1991.

This was my parents’ first home, purchased in the era of the high-teen mortgage rates.  And, bless their hearts, they still managed to keep me stylin’.

I wish I were as fabulous now as I was then.   I’m not sure that I could pull off any of these things now.

More to come on the first decade on my life.  Brace yourselves.

Y’all come back,

Sugarlump

Handy (Wo)man

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This precious little furball is a real trouble maker.

She gets into EVERYTHING.

And almost always leaves evidence.

“Who, me?”

I mentioned before how quickly she took to my new drapes.  I thought she was just cuddling up on them, but I should have known better.  This is Scarlett we’re talking about after all.

She likes to cocoon herself in the drapes and then have a crazy spell, which invariably results in tangled drapes.  The other day, however, she took it too far.  Literally.  Scarlett got caught in the drapes and decided to take them with her, thus pulling the drapery rod bracket out of the wall.

As the only member of the household with opposable thumbs, I had the privilege of buying new wall anchors and installing them to fix the drapes.

I also bought a new vacuum cleaner yesterday while I was out buying wall anchors.  Talk about an annoying way to spend several hundred dollars.

After I played handyman again and put the vacuum together, I got Scarlett back for her destructive behavior by running my new airplane engine of a vacuum for about 10 minutes.

Scarlett does not like the new vacuum cleaner as well as the new drapes.

Y’all hurry back,

Sugarlump

Dynamic Duo

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When we were little, cousin Lauren and I were a seriously dynamic duo. Every time I would come to visit, we got into all sorts of things at Granny and Papa’s. We had miniature chairs (which I believe had been … Continue reading →

Mugged

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Yesterday, I was mugged at Homegoods.  Mugged by coffee mugs, that is. I have been mugless since I moved to Tennessee.  The set of dishes I inherited came with teacups, but no coffee mugs.  I knew I wanted something interesting … Continue reading →

No Rush

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Certain things can’t be rushed.  One of those things is creating a piece of art. I purchased a large canvas for my living room shortly after I moved to Tennessee with the intention of painting a scene from my family’s … Continue reading →

Things I Never Tire Of

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Things of which I never tire:

1)      Sunsets

2)      Laughter

3)      Shoes

4)      Floor plans

5)      Chocolate

6)      Family and close friends

7)      Mystery

8)      Sitting on a porch

9)      The unconditional love of my little furballs

10)   Mexican food

In an ideal moment, I would be sitting on a porch of a home I designed the floor plan of, with family and friends, furballs at my feet, eating Mexican food followed by something chocolate, while laughing in a fabulous pair of shoes, pondering the great mystery that is life, as the sun sets.

 

Y’all keep it real,

Sugarlump

New Drapes

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I had another one of those serendipitous shopping moments last week.   I think, after a while of coming up empty-handed and discouraged, you build up good shopping karma and exactly what you have been looking for everywhere appears right before your eyes.  I had this moment in Bed Bath and Beyond.  I had looked a couple months back and there was nothing that excited me as I searched for drapery panels for my main living area.  My ceilings are 9 feet tall so I needed 108” length panels because I wanted them to puddle slightly at the bottom.  You almost never see this length available in the store.  Normally they have the 84” and 95” stocked and then the “extended lengths” are available for order online. 

Having given up on finding something readymade in the textured woven oatmeal-ish genre, I looked into custom drapes, which would likely be 3-4 times as expensive and take 3-4 times as long to arrive.  I just wasn’t sure I wanted to spend that kind of money on drapes for an apartment that is likely temporary and full of abnormally large windows.  I also wasn’t sure I would have a use for 7 long panels of something very specific.  And I’m impatient. 

My solution to this whole dilemma was to ignore it for a while.

It was very effective.   Except when I was in my apartment and able to see my naked windows.

Then, one fateful day last week, I stepped foot in Bed Bath and Beyond for the first time in months with low expectations and a glimmer of hope.  I didn’t even grab a cart or a basket as I sped toward the drapery department.  I walked through the first isle and saw nothing but dreadful polyester in 84” length panels.  I headed down the second isle, sure that my drapeless fate was sealed.  I reached the end of the isle and saw some drapes that had a nice, chunky woven texture like I had been searching for.   And they even had a color that could work: a sandy, oatmeal-y, taupe-ish color.  I figured I would have to order them online, but as I pulled back the sample curtain, there lay at least a dozen of the panels in the color I wanted in 108” length!  I nearly fainted.  Then the adrenaline kicked in and I sprinted (almost) around to the front of the store to grab a cart.  I tore around the corner on two wheels in the direction of the drapery section.  Thankfully, no one had scooped up all of the panels in the 13.4 seconds I was gone.  I quickly pulled out 7 packages and violently threw them into my cart like I was on Supermarket Sweep and headed for the registers. 

I only had 1 coupon with me and it was for 20% off one full-priced item.   The nice lady at the register asked me if I had any more because I could “save a bundle.”  I had had other coupons, but they had expired and I was pretty sure I’d recycled them already.  One lady behind me in line had a handful of coupons and offered me a couple of hers.  It was so sweet of her but I told her I couldn’t take her coupons from her.  The cashier said if I found any more coupons that I should come back and get my receipt adjusted.  Wouldn’t you know that I dug around in my car for my coupon folder (I have to have this otherwise I always leave my coupons either a) in my house or b) in a different purse that I am not carrying that day) and found a coupon for 20% off my ENTIRE PURCHASE (read: $84 plus tax in savings). The only issue was that the coupon had expired at the end of July and it was now the first week of September.   I know some stores will still take coupons after they have “expired” so I went back into the store and played dumb like I couldn’t read the large print indicating that my coupon had expired on 7/31/12.

It surely was a fateful day because instead of the surly, gum-chewing 20-something woman at customer service, I was called over for service at the register of a nice young man.  I gave him the coupon and my receipt from earlier in the day, telling him that I had found my 20% off my ENTIRE PURCHASE coupon I had meant to bring in when I made my purchase.  No problem.  He was going to take care of that for me right away.  And he did.  

And I got exactly the drapes I had been looking for, for ¼ the price I had considered spending, in the correct length and color, AND I was able to drive straight home and put them up in 30 minutes.

To say I was/am pleased would hardly cover it.

To say Gus and Scarlet are pleased would hardly cover it.  Though it took them weeks to warm up to their new, plush cat beds, they took to the drapes immediately, even before I had them hung on the rods.

If you need me at any point in time for the next few years of my life, I will be lint-rolling and vacuuming these drapes.  

 But at least I have drapes.

I mean, Scarlett has drapes.

If you need Scarlett, she’ll be snuggling with/guarding the drapes.

Y’all come back,

Sugarlump