My New Age Box

I ran to Target this morning to pick up a few things, and got one of those "You could win a $5,000 giftcard if you complete this online survey".  I've got nothing but time, so why not?  So I'm filling it out and it asks "Please click on the box below that best describes your age".  *Sigh.  As of last Wednesday, I have a new age box....30-34.  I am no longer a 'twenty-something', and now feel like I'm definitley not a semi-hot mom anymore.  But I'm really looking at this like 30 is the new 25 and I have had such a great first 30 years that I can't wait to see what happens in my next 10, 20, and 30 years. 

I tend to celebrate my birthDAY like it's a birthWEEK.  It started on Tuesday (my birthday eve) and I got my hair done, nails done, and had a jewelry party complete with cupcakes and ice cream.  Wednesday was the actual day - and since it's quarter end, Joe had to go to work.  But not before he brought me breakfast in bed and I received my much-asked-for-push-present/awesome wife gift of a right hand diamond eternity band.  My hubby is the greatest!  Then my parents arrived at 9:30 and I went and had what was the most amazing massage of my life for 90 minutes and then I was jello the rest of the day.  That night we had steaks and cake and it was wonderful. 

We wrapped up the week with my birthday party with friends on Saturday night, and it was a BLAST!! I haven't had so much fun socializing in quite awhile.  We left Lil E with her Granny and Grumpy and for the first time in a very long time Joe and I took a nap.  When we got up we cleaned and everyone came to the house for some pre-dinner drinks and then we taxi'd to La Huerta (best Mexican food ever) where we ate and drank and were quite merry.  Here some pics to prove it....

Myself and Baby Joe with a lime in my hand

From left (Brandy, Laura, Myself, and Joe) 

Fearing the third tequila shot

Greatest birthday ever.

It's been awhile since I posted and A LOT has happened and is also the reason I haven't posted much. 

I spent an INTENSE 5 days and got Evelyn potty trained!  It's so great - this is going to change my life.  We did the pants off and don't leave your house method and the first day was rough, but by about 5pm I could tell it was working and now she does panties all day and night no problem!  Yes, there has been an accident here and there, but it's totally worth it and wish I had done it months ago. 

I essentially decided when she was at school one day to research the heck out of potty training and really start implementing it the next day.  It's hard - I'll be first to admit it.  Potty training is by far the most frustrating thing I've ever been through, ever.  But to be free of diapers and wipes and pull ups (oh my!), it's heaven.  Although I now tote around a collapsable potty in my purse instead.  But we decorated it and it's great.  One tip that none of the things I read mentioned:  When using a public potty, be sure to cover up the sensors.  Evelyn was just about to go on the potty while at a restaurant and she leaned forward and set off the automatic flusher.....she levitated off the potty and a meltdown followed.  That probably set us back a day, but all is good now. 

A project around the house we did was paint the kitchen/den/eat-in kitchen area which is about 1/4th of the total downstairs square footage.  I'm always so optimistic and was all "Oh, I can totally do this in 2 days".  5 days later, and with Joe's help (I think he might have actual slowed me down) we finished and the room looks great.  I went through about 8 paint samples from Sherwin Williams and then gave up and went to Benjamin Moore where I had a direct hit with my first paint sample.  NEVER DOUBT BENJAMIN MOORE - I never will again.  That and they gave me my own set of paint samples :).  

Here is the color...

     Fresh Olive by Benjamin Moore 2149-30

It's a great neutral that is also a deep saturated color.  Joe and I both wanted something other than tan that would go good with everything and this looks great with yellow, orange, red, purple, turquoise, brown....it's exciting!  I also wanted something to go with the Collier Campbell Mercury peacock color fabric I got a few months ago (which I would use for window treatments). 

Now I'm on the search for a table for the eat-in kitchen area that seats 6.  I'm off to tend to Evelyn.  She has congestion and a cough and can't nap.  Poor baby!  I've got a fun post tomorrow about vintage brooches coming - see you then!

DIY: How To Deball Sweaters

No matter how good I am to them and how hard I try to prevent it, some sweaters get balls on them.  They always seem to show up by the dozens so it's impossible to pick them off by hand, so I set out to try to research and experiment the best way to get rid of them.

After googling for a bit.  I only came up with 2 methods to try:  1)  Buy an Oreck fabric shaver and 2) Use the same razor I do for my legs on my sweater.  Challenge accepted.

I went out and bought one of these bad boys for $20:

Then grabbed my Venus razor from the shower and put a brand new razor head on it.  Bing, Bam, Boom - we were in business.

Sweater #1 is an olive green number I got from J Crew.  I checked the tag and it is 80% Lamb's Wool and 20% Nylon.  This one is pretty clumpy, and the clumps are big.  It's a larger size knit and it has a woolly look to it so it shouldn't be too hard to get looking good again.  Here is a couple befores...

To be fair, I decided I would shave it with the Razor on one half, and use the Oreck on the other half.  I honestly didn't know what to expect, but here are the results...

The work of the razor astonished me.  It was very quick and had immediate results.  I just treated the sweater like a piece of wood and shaved "with the grain" so to speak in a downward motion.  I did overlapping 3 inch sections at a time and it worked amazingly. 

The one con I found is that the more I shaved, the more I shaved.  It was almost like my shaving created more shaving. But the end result made the sweater look as good as the day I bought it.  You can see in the pic below the section on the left of the sweater I shaved versus the untouched side to the right. 

Then it was time to try out the Oreck.  To be honest, I was expecting NOTHING out of this thing, but was pleasantly surprised.  It did a really good job at sucking up the balls once I got a good feel for how much pressure to use.  It didn't get as close a shave as the Venus, but if I hadn't used the razor on the other side, I think I would not have had to touch it up with the razor later

Comparison:  Left side=Venus; Right Side=Oreck. 

Because the Venus had shaved the left side so smoothly I shaved the right side of the sweater too.  This turned into the perfect combination so I used the Oreck on the remainder of the sweater and then did the Venus over it.  Here is the final result:

Here is what the canister for the Oreck looked like when I was done. 

It really did look as good as new.  I was so impressed, and it only took me about 10 minutes to do the whole thing which was a bonus.  So I decided to move on to the next sweater.

Sweater #2 is also from J Crew, but its made of:
36% Viscose
34% Nylon
25% Merino Wool
5% Alpaca

The ingredient list tipped me off that this one was going to be a pain in the ass.  And oh, was it ever.  Here is a pic of the sweater:

You can see it's a much smaller, tighter knit than sweater #1, and the balls were smaller too.  The Oreck almost had no affect on it whatsoever.  So out came the Venus.  After 30, yes 30 MINUTES I got this thing looking good.  I shaved it in a downward direction and then had to shave it in an upward direction to get it looking good again.  But in the end, I availed. 

There is no challenge too great for the likes of E3.  The harder I'm fought, the harder I fight back!  Let me know what I can help you with around the house - the accountant in me loves to figure things out!