Before and After

I thought I'd share some before and after pictures of my weekly 2024 planner. It's Tomoe River Paper (TRP) and this was the first time I'd used it. As it turned out, I absolutely love this paper even though it's much thinner than the normal 80-pound paper my daily planner had.

Originally, I bought this planner for 2024 to help me keep track of my dad's appointments, but he passed away at the end of 2023 and I didn't really do much with the planner for most of the year.

Then August happened. I suddenly looked at the 365+ blank pages behind the weekly spreads and went GAH!

I began journaling to use up the blank pages.

And then I began decorating the planner with stickers and washi tape and vellum. I tipped in a whole lot of vellum paper because I liked how pretty it was, and I had a pack of vellum so I could print my own.

And the more I decorated the book, the more I used it, and I started carting it along with me everywhere. It's a B6 size, so much more portable than my official A5 spiral planner.

For 2025, I am using another Tomoe River Paper planner. This one will have a lot fewer decorations because it's my every day, official 2025 planner. I'll put in occasional stickers, but not much more than that. I did, however, buy another weekly planner and that one I plan to decorate like I did this one.

Are you ready for the before and after pictures and how I chunked up my 2024 planner?

Side view of my 2024 planner as received.

Side view of my 2024 planner around August. Before I started decorating it like mad.

And here are three views of my chunked up, finished 2024 planner:

Front view. You can see I put a bunch of Post-it flags/tabs in there to mark different things I wanted to find again.

Side view of my chunked-up planner. The gold coating is still on the edges of the pages, but you can't see it because of the chunk.

Top view. More tabs to flag out things I want to find again. Also, I'm using Oli Clips to mark out the different sections. The first one is for the monthly pages, the second it for the weekly pages, and I used the final one to keep track of where I was writing.

I think it's wild how much thicker this planner became in the year I used it. Actually, in the final five months that I used it because before August, it remained close to how it arrived. This was just so much fun to decorate, and while I don't feel like I want to do this to my official planner for 2025, I am looking forward to chunking up my weekly B6 planner. I wonder if I can get it chunkier than 2024's version?

Revisiting the Ugly Window

Back in October, I blogged about the ugly window in my master bathroom. I'd debated what to do with it for a while and finally decided on some kind of valance. Since a curtain valance is easier than one of those cornice-type valances, that's what I decided to do.

Finding the right one, though, proved to be difficult. I paged through Amazon, Overstock, Wayfair, JC Penney, and on and on and on. My problem is that I love bright colors, but I'm not 6 years old. All the adult valances I stumbled across were so conservative. I like my colors bright and wild, and if I have a choice, I want pink.

I finally ended up doing an image search on Google and paging through that. This is how I ended up on eBay.

I found several valances I thought would work for me, all from the same seller. Making a decision was hard. Did I go with the solid or a pattern? Which accent color if I did the solid? Did I go for the size that fit across my window with no gathers or did I go for a little poof?

Ultimately, I chose the pattern and a size wide enough for poof. I love the valance! But the window is still ugly with a pretty valance over the top of it.

Making a House a Home

One of my laments to my mom and dad is that my house in Georgia doesn't feel like a home. I like my house a lot, but my house in Minnesota, that was my home. I've decided, though, that it's not a matter of place so much as how I have the house put together--or not put together as the case might be.

When I moved in, the house had blinds on all the windows, but only two rooms have curtains--the dining room and the front room--and that's only because I asked for the drapes in the contract to buy the house. I remembered that my Minnesota house felt really sterile to me, too, until I put up curtains in my kitchen. I'm still debating whether or not to put curtains up in my breakfast area of the kitchen, but I decided to do the bedrooms for sure.

Because I had one big window in MN versus the three small ones I have here, it meant shopping. Here's a picture I took of the curtain rods I'm going to use.

That's glass at the end of the rod and it looks super cool in person. I'm going with sheer curtains with a pattern in them in fuchsia and yes, I did shop for my curtains in the teen girls section. :-) What can I say? I love bright colors and this bright pink happens to be my favorite.

I have curtains from my spare bedroom in MN that I'm going to use in my guest room here and another set of curtains that I'd had in my master bedroom that will work in the other spare room. I'm still debating whether or not to put curtains up in the office. I guess it will depend on what it looks like when I'm done organizing and cleaning it.

I also need to get some more artwork up on the walls. In my MN house, I had a lot of windows and that left me with little need for wall decorations.

Here, though, I have a lot more wall to deal with. This is something I'll be slow about doing, though, because I need time to consider what I want to live with. For example, I have a long, narrow foyer and I found some super cool prints that showed the planets in our solar system like they were travel destinations. I started to buy them and then I realized that I wasn't sure I wouldn't get bored with that before too long and is that really what I want in my entry? I don't know, so I'll wait.

I do have a few silk flower arrangements and I'm thinking about a runner for my dining room table. I need to brainstorm a little more because I want to feel like I'm home when I'm in my house.

A Whole New Light

Yesterday, the handyman came out to do a few jobs at my house. Some of those jobs included putting up new things. One of those was a new light for my eat-in kitchen area.

The light that was here before wasn't horrible, but it was dark and heavy feeling. I like the cleaner lines of this light better.

I also had him hang a picture over the fireplace. Normally, I can do this myself, but this picture was so big that I wasn't sure I could handle it with both feet on the ground. Because I was putting it over the fireplace, I would have had to maneuver it while on a ladder. A bigger challenge than I wanted to deal with. Here's my new picture:

Winter Rose Award

I found out yesterday that Eternal Nights won the 2007 Winter Rose Award for Best Paranormal Romance! Whoo hoo!!! This was fabulous news and the timing was perfect because I really needed a boost. The complete list of winners is up at the Yellow Rose website.

Both the runners I ordered arrived. The one in front of the computer room looks fabulous, but it needs a quick vacuum. It just came yesterday and I was in the middle of the fight scene from hell. The runner I ordered for the laundry room isn't quite what was pictured online and I'm not sure I like it. I don't think it looks hideous or anything, but it's just not quite what I was looking for. It's too big a hassle to return it and it wasn't much money, so I'm keeping it. Maybe once I get over the difference between the image and the actual product, I'll like it.

Um, sorry about the freak out yesterday for those who read it before I edited it out. I do have an overactive imagination and I'd gotten myself into a state. I usually love the imagination because it allows me to write and to entertain myself in situations where other people are bored, but it also has its drawbacks--like full-blown hypochondria at times.

I'm ba-ack!

I've spent the last 9 days writing 10-12 hours all day, every day, so I don't want to talk about writing at all. :-/ Instead, I'm going to hit some of the non-writing stuff that happened this week.

First of all, having a hiatus was weird. I've been blogging every day (with the exception of conferences when I don't take my laptop) for like 2 years or something. I can't even tell you how many times I thought about something being a good blog topic.

Let's see, I've been waiting and waiting for these rug runners to go on sale. One to match the area rugs and runner I already have, and an indoor/outdoor one for the laundry room. Right now, I have a carpet remnant where I want the one runner and cardboard and multiple carpet remnants where I want the indoor/outdoor one.

Last Monday, I received an email from Home Depot saying they had free shipping, and I almost caved in and ordered them even though they weren't on sale. I've just been waiting and waiting! Patience isn't my strongest personality trait. But on Friday, not only was the free shipping thing still going on, but my two rug runners were 20% off! I immediately ordered, so I made another stride forward in home decor.

I received an email to tell me that the three types of lilies I ordered are shipping. I've been waiting and waiting for these flowers, but of course, I don't have time to plant them or do anything with them. Sigh.

Wasp wars have resumed. The weather finally warmed up, and both the grass-carrying wasps who like to build nests in my windows and the regular wasps have returned. I'm shooting wasp spray through my screens again. Largely missing since the 20 feet distance is less than you'd think.

My dad installed my screen door on my sliding patio door. Um, it's not great since I really can't open and close it. He's going to ask someone to help him get it so I can actually go in and out, but it was nice to sit here this weekend with all the windows open and the patio door open as well and let summer inside.

I have a $100 gift card from Circuit City I need to use soon. I'm debating buying an iPod. I have an MP3 player that I like, but now the battery is starting to not hold the charge, and plus none of the accessories work since they're all for the iPod and not for mine. I like the idea of popping it into a cradle and having music in the house. The other thing that would be cool is that the Apple iPod can carry TV shows and movies, all downloadable for a fee from iTunes. I don't know, though. I read the reviews and some people love their iPods and some people don't. Then I wonder will a new, cooler iPod be coming soon? After all, the current version has been out for a while now. Does anyone have thoughts on the iPod thing? Maybe I'd be better off buying a new ergonomic keyboard with my gift card.

I had bookmarks designed for In the Midnight Hour and ordered them from the printer. I got a proof on Friday and it turned out really nicely. I hope the finished product looks as good. I have no clue when I'm going to receive them, but luckily my mom will work on bundling them up for me while she watches her soaps.

I think that's it. At least it's all I can remember. Today, it's back to the EDJ (Evil Day Job), and since I've used pretty much every day of vacation I had, I won't be getting any time off for a while. Real time off, like to relax and do fun stuff. 10-12 hour days are not fun. :-/

Color My World

There was just a commercial on The Weather Channel (Yes, I watch TWC) where it showed a couple looking at their white walls, then they go to Home Depot to pick out paint. It made me remember all the episodes of Designed to Sell and House Hunters that I've watched on HGTV and how many of the homes shown have these white or nearly white walls--and usually throughout the entire house! And nine times out of ten, if their walls are blank, their furniture is every bit as neutral, so it looks as if they're living in a bowl of oatmeal.

I always shake my head when I see this and think, "why are people so afraid of color?" Of course, if y'all have seen the pictures of the house I built (link is on the right to go to the house galleries), you know that I love color. Take my great room for example. The walls are largely a neutral creamy off-white color, but then I have the focal wall. That's a brilliant blue. There's a bright pink, tall vase on the floor with big orange flowers and my area rugs are very colorful and fun.

But I digress. As usual. Anyway, I don't understand why people are so afraid of color. You paint, you don't like it, you repaint. No, it's not a huge amount of fun, but it's not difficult either. Or if they really hate painting with a passion, get some color in the room through accessories, like my brilliant pink vase with the orange silk flowers or accent pillows. Something. I just can't imagine living in a house without color.

Last year sometime, I found a quiz online that told you what your decorating style is. I blogged about it at the time and included the link, but I don't have time to try to search it out. Anyway, I took it and my style was determined to be Contemporary, Modern and Asian, and after reading the definitions of those styles on the website, I have to agree, those are totally my styles.

I was able to turn the heat off yesterday, for the second time this spring, and open up the windows. It was windy and it'll be windy again today, but also 80 degrees. Yea!