A Favorite Game: Restaurant City

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I’ll admit it. I’m addicted to this game on Facebook. It only makes sense. I like food, building and design, enjoy the multi-tasking and managing. All the fun and none of the risk. You pick the menu, get food as awards, decorate your restaurant and if you manage it well, it grows. At first, my kids were really into it, so naturally, I named our little cafe “Ollie’s”, then “Abby’s” and “Julie’s Cafe”.

It looked like this many, many months ago. And now, the place is “SereniTEA” and has grown by leaps and bounds. I gave it an Asian feel for obvious reasons. The graphics are just so darn cute, from the furnishings to the food. These designers are doing such a nice job with it.

This might make you wonder if all I do is sit around and play video games all day. I can assure you the answer is NO. After a long hiatus from Sim City (another virtual world game that I played years ago.), I found this to be just a fun way to decompress from everything else I do. Anyone else out there play this game?

Unrelated and random thoughts

  • The Chicago Craft Social last Friday was another hit! Lots of first-timers, lots of familiar faces, too. Check out my review on Craft Critique soon!
  • The T-shirt quilt top is so close to being done! I probably have a few more hours on it. Now if I could just stop blogging, playing, doing chores, etc. and finish the darn thing. *grin*
  • I can’t believe Christmas is less than three months away, which means, our cookie exchange is about 2-1/2 months away! Planning will begin soon!
  • There’s a new writing opportunity at my door… more on this soon! *** UPDATE! The online newspaper has launched. My articles (like you need more of me?), mostly on food and cooking, will run every two weeks. Thanks for all the support! ***

To Do Around Town this Weekend

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There’s so much I could do IN my house… so much I’d like to do OUT of my house. How do you choose?! Fortunately, some of these “things-to-do” are in town for a while.

Tonight, have fun with make-and-takes at Chicago Craft Social.

I SO want to see Jim Henson’s Fantastic World at the Museum of Science and Industry! I don’t mind admitting I’m a big Muppets fan, and love the Jim Henson empire. I remember when he passed away, and feeling like a part of my childhood went too. The exhibit runs from Sept. 24 (today!) through January 23, 2011.

If you’re around Millenium Park, this gastronomic event might be something to check out. Chicago Gourmet runs Sept. 25-26. Food. Wine. Tastings. Celebrity chef demos. Wheee!!! It would certainly be delicious and fun for me, and what I’d give to meet Rick Bayless. Don’t know what I’d say to him, but I’d love a chance.

There’s a jazz festival in Hyde Park this weekend, too, and closer to home, the Polish Art Festival in Park Ridge.

Wordless Wednesday: A Day in the Life

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Hanging Pictures – Part Two

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After a little deliberation, I started my installation of our framed pictures. Hooray.

Then I stopped after one. Boo.

(Inhale…) My husband came home, looked, made a comment that made me think he seemed unsure of the placement, (the hallway isn’t that wide, and the pictures are 8×10 or larger), therefore I became unsure of my logic and decision-making in decorating, so I stopped. Whew, run-on sentence… yes. Now we’re/I’m reconsidering and replanning.

Maybe the frames will go in the dining room now. Everyone can enjoy the pictures, there’s plenty of room… I don’t know that I like the layout so much here. The drawback about the dining room is that there isn’t a lot of light. This could be a good thing too, because we don’t want a lot of direct light on the pictures. (Don’t want them to fade.) Wintertime there’s a ton of light reflecting off the snow. But, the hallway has directional lighting (recessed can lights) for framed art.

I’m trying another layout. Now there’s an empty space for which I don’t have a matching frame. There’s another wall at our living/family room. Maybe I’ll try that spot tomorrow. Can I just hire someone to do this? My patience is being tested, I know.

Installing the Pencil Sharpener…Ugh

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Everyone likes a nice sharpened pencil, right? We used to have an electric pencil sharpener, but either that was a victim of moving four years ago or it’s at my in-laws home somewhere. Then we have all these little pencil sharpeners that come in art kits, school supply kits and the like. Some of them are decent, but most don’t cut it for me. They make for weird sharpening angles and lead (graphite) pieces falling out. Time for a good old-fashioned pencil sharpener. I bought this a while ago, and finally figured out a good location for it.

So here I go again with another DIY installation. Unlike the glass shelves in the kids’ bathroom (thought I wrote about that), this was a little challenging. You wouldn’t think a little ol’ sharpener would bring me a little grief… it looks like it was successful, but I’m lucky that 1) no one was here to witness my running up and down stairs to gather equipment, 2) no one was here to listen to my “potty-mouth” and 3) my 3 year old doesn’t understand when I swear when I get really frustrated.

This looks like it was properly installed, right? The sharpener is anchored into the oak door jamb where I predrilled holes, matching the position on the anchor. Solid oak is TOUGH, or maybe my drill bits are crappy. After checking the anchor position, I saw that one of the holes was drilled slightly off. Like enough that I had to drill again. So, that wasn’t too bad. Now for the actual attaching…

I took apart the sharpening mechanism, so I could get a better angle to put in the screws. At this point, I realized the predrilled holes were too small. It was so hard to manually drive in those screws, so I put down the anchor and screws, took out a larger drill bit and drilled holes again. Grr. I placed the anchor back, put the screws in place, then used the drill to start screwing them in… thinking I would use the manual screwdriver at the end. I didn’t want to break any plastic or crack the oak (which now I realize could be impossible for me). I nearly stripped the heads off two of the screws. Grrr, again. Took out the manual screwdriver, started turning that top screw… it seemed to turn so easily. Too easily. See that hole in the picture? The top part of the screw BROKE off.

And, here’s the other almost-mangled screwhead.

At least it works, and the sharpener doesn’t seem like it’s going anywhere – for now. The husband just shook his head after I told him…

Hanging Family Pictures Collage Style

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We’ve been trying to enjoy the fantastic weather here over the last couple of weeks, so as you might imagine, there hasn’t been much going on inside the house. This includes blogging, writing, house chores and the never-ending list of projects I want to start and those I want (or need) to get done… like fixing a few broken shelves in two closets and hanging up the family pictures.

Why do I find it so difficult to hang pictures? I guess if it’s one frame here, and one frame somewhere else, it’s a little easier, but here I’m trying to compose a nice grouping. Now it’s: how do I center the frames, which picture goes where, how much space do I leave in between the frames, how high do I mount them? I blame this on my type-A, perfectionist, engineering side. So, what to do?

I placed all the framed pictures on the floor and tried to figure out how it might look in different layouts. But, in the end, I broke out some sheets of paper and traced shapes.

I think I’ll be playing with the paper cut-outs for a little while.

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