If You Looked . . .

I follow Krista Smith and her Saturated Canary Blog not only because I love her images, but also because I love her heart, the way she sees life and the way she feels about family.

Krista recently blogged "If You Looked...", which I really enjoyed reading. Krista got her inspiration from a blog she follows, The Shine Project (where The Shine Scholarship Project to help at risk kids get to college started). I found it interesting reading both "If You Looked" (well, actually all four since Ashley, who writes The Shine Project blog, actually has written three "If You Looked" blog posts - I'll link all four below).

So, I decided to throw one of my own out here. I hope you enjoy mine and maybe you can link your own in the comments and I can enjoy some more "If You Looked . . . " posts. Anyway, here goes:

If you looked into my home, you would find a house that is obviously well lived in. We keep most mess contained to my den and the kid room. But there are still small spots that say "yes, people live here". You would certainly see carpet in my den and the kid room that have seen better days. Those rooms had new carpet installed at the same time as the master bedroom, but the master bedroom carpet still looks decent. My den and the kid room both make me cringe sometimes. And, honestly, if it weren't such a chore to have it done I'd have all the carpet pulled and the hardwood underneath refinished (I have wished dozens of times that we had done all rooms when we had the living room, dining room and hall done. Hind sight is 20/20). And, you would probably see dust bunnies in my hall because it seems as if they reproduce like the real bunnies are reported to do. I can pick them all up with my handy-dandy Swiffer SweeperVac every single day and by bedtime there are small bunnies already gathering. Oh, and they grow fast too! The next day those babies will be full grown. And if by chance I don't get to them then by the next day they are fat little rabbits that border on obese!

If you looked into my den, you would see a bedroom converted to den that is way too small for all the stuff it holds. In an 11X12 foot room I have managed to squeeze a full size entertainment center (stuffed to the gills and then some - with arts & craft supplies lined up in front of whatever belongs there (i.e. encyclopedias etc.), a three drawer chest, a computer armoire, my computer chair (the Manager size chair - not some small office worker size. No, had to be big because I needed it tall enough to lean my head back & rest my neck. My neck gets very tired very quickly - never fully recovered from two disk surgeries), three bookcases and a file cabinet. And we're not talking three bookcases the width of tower bookcases, no, these are significant (one is 3.5 foot wide and the other two are 3 foot wide each). And, as if that was not enough stuff to fill this room, I have added a 2X4 foot folding table that sits in front of the entertainment center and there is where I sit to do a lot of my artsy-crafty stuff. And, speaking of stuff - tons of stuff. It is hard to find free space in my den. I have put plenty of Art-Bin plastic storage to use holding art supplies that transport easily so that when I babysit my 3-year old great-grandson I can quickly clear the stuff out so his busy hands don't discover inks, paints and markers galore.

If you looked into my gmail, you would find, well, not as much as you would find in my ISP mail since the gmail is for forums and sites that I prefer to keep tabs on what come in. I initially set it up because I needed to be involved in a Yahoo group related to my former job but for some reason I was hesitant to use my ISP email address to set that up so I set up gmail. Once I retired I found other Yahoo groups to join and since I already had the account established it just made adding them easier.  And then I found it handy for other forums and such. So, since I'm not really involved in hundreds of forums, well, there really isn't all that much in my gmail.

If you looked into my cell phone, you would find 116 contacts - several are for the same people because I prefer to list peoples home, cell and work individually. I give the contacts names like: Barbara @ Home; Barbara @ Work and Barbara @ Cell. So Barbara takes up three of my 116. You would also find a couple dozen text messages - most between me and my oldest granddaughter with texts between me and my oldest grandson running in second place. I really don't text much with other people. What you won't find are pictures. I had to get a new cell phone a couple of months ago and I just have not put the SD mini card in to pull my pictures back in - and I haven’t taken any new ones since. 

If you looked into my head, you would find thousands of thoughts that all run together and step on each other. You would find the small compartments of some bad emotions that I try to keep locked for personal sanity and the compartments of good emotions that I try to keep open so they can spill out freely. You would certainly find the keys to what makes me who I am because a lot of what has formed me did not deserve a place in my heart.

If you looked into my bedroom, you would find the previously mentioned carpet that I wish I could get rid of. You would find a couple of old train lanterns that don't really go with the decor but made their way to the bedroom because hubbies den ran out of room and he loved them too much to put them in storage. You would find my stack of pillows because I simply cannot sleep with just one pillow. I have three. I need one under my head, one between my knees (best way I have found to fend off back pain in the mornings) and a third pillow for hugging - not because I don't have someone there to hug, well, maybe I don't have someone there to hug since he now sleeps with a C-Pap mask on and it's hard to hug around the hose and such, but that's neither here nor there. No, I need the third pillow for hugging to stave off shoulder pain in the mornings. Getting old sucks.

If you looked out my window this morning, you would see a beautiful summer day with nice green trees that have a slight breeze blowing through them. Of course, its midafternoon, but I will still call it a "beautiful" summer day because I'm inside with an air conditioner running - but it is scorching hot out here now.

Well, that's it for my first entry of "If You Looked . . . " I pulled several prompts from Krista and Ashley's blogs, but I will save the rest for subsequent posts. For one I need to get off the computer for a while and for another, well, nobody wants to read long drawn out blog post and this one has already run way too long. 

Cya later! :D