Mellow Yellow

Today marks the second visit of the cleaning lady, and I'm pretty sure she's going to mutiny when she sees how dirty this place has gotten in two weeks. Little does she know that my cat attracts leaves like velcro and paint in the sink is a state of being over here. But she might also notice that since the last time she was here, new curtains were boughten and the bedroom has been painted and my shelves for the front room are back, sporting a fresh coat of glossy paint.

Good things. Things that will appear in pictures soon. I promise.

Some bad things might have happened, too. Things like our fancy marble dining table arrived cracked down the middle. And I didn't order enough wallpaper for the baby's room. And I'm 99% sure I didn't order enough wallpaper for the powder room, either... did someone say wallpaper calculator? Who? Wha?

I don't know -- maybe it's the fact that I'm dead tired and HUGE, but I just don't care anymore.

That's why they call me mellow yellow...

today.

Tomorrow I will assuredly have a nervous breakdown since I've been with Ike all day all summer with no school, plus his birthday party is this Saturday and I haven't prepped AT ALL.

Oh and the baby will be here in a month.

Mellow yellow, dudes.

Mellow.

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Lowdown on the Slowdown

Last night Ben sat me down and said something to the effect of, Honey -- I think you have a  problem. Except that's not exactly what he said, because husbands who call their wives Honey are kinda icky. Anyway, how dare he criticize my obsessive need to endlessly repaint swatches on the wall, my 800 trips to return failed curtains, my seeming inability to make a single decision on my own?

How dare he care about my happiness?

I must admit to getting a little caught up in timetables, in the hormonal rush of nesting on the clock. And like some commenters noted yesterday, rushing has definitely brought on mistakes -- nothing catastrophic or terribly expensive yet, but mistakes nonetheless.

I also admit to enjoying decorating as a spectator sport. I LOVE showing you guys what I'm working on, but it's pretty grueling to turn something out once a week. Or even once a month.

Add to this the fact that even the pros disagree on decorating "rules" (have you seen House Beautiful's 101 Decorator Secrets? SO MANY of them directly contradict each other. Awesome!), and I find myself rudderless, aswim at sea. Too few parameters and too many variables.

I like order, dammit. Tidiness. Mathematical certainty, objective truth. That may seem a little weird for someone schooled in the arts, but I will remind you that photography is filled with mathematical formulae and sciencey stuff. I love the unbroken line of cause and effect. I struggle against the nihilism of anything goes.

Order. Symmetry. Complementary. Happy.

So I will busy myself with finding a way to work, because I do enjoy solving problems (and trust me -- my patchwork paint swatched bedroom of horror IS a problem), but forgive me if my updates come a little fewer and further between.

Things will get done, but perhaps progress will happen on a more geologic scale.

Also I am tired and huge and the baby is punching my cervix 24/7.

That'll slow a girl down, too.

Hey Austinites, You Need to Just Dewit Already

You already know AB Chao, although you may have trouble placing her face. That's because she looks like this:

Yeah, she's kinda famous for her headless self portraits. But she's even more famous for this:

You can't even google the words "farrow" and "ball" without this room coming up. EVERYONE has seen it -- even Kelly Wearstler. And she liked it. A lot.

But AB Chao has made other things, too. Like this:

And this:

And even this glamazing garage redo:

Pretty awesome.

And sure -- you might hate her a little. She's tiny and even peppier than her teenage daughter, she used to write for fancy tv shows, and her clothes are always cute. Even her husband is cute.

I mean -- dammit, AB. You need to quit it with the cuteness.

But here's the thing:  I've known her for years and she's a really nice, really real person who knows how to make something out of nothing (those curtains in the top shot? first dropcloth curtain diy I know about). This is important because being an average middle class wage earner should not be an impediment to style.

And now you can join her Dewit Design Camp and be like AB.

Dudes, AB Chao is coming to Austin from June 30-July 1 to school you! Learn this stuff:

• Basic principles of design • Creating inspiration boards • Drawing layouts • Paint, wall coverings, lighting, window treatments, furniture, art • Using and repurposing existing items • Decorating on a budget • Common mistakes • Putting it all together • Styling • Shooting interiors • Q & A

Plus you will get to eat yummy food and hang out at Meredith Pardue's fancy new art studio. You know Mer:

She makes those paintings that are in all the glossy magazines.

She lives in Austin, too.

Austin is cool.

Cool people live here.

Be even cooler and meet Misses Chao and Pardue in person and soak up their coolness by osmosis.

Sign up for Dewit Design Camp right HERE.

I might even show up if I don't drop a baby first.

Curtain talk tomorrow.

Comment if you have any Dewit questions today.