Jacquelyn's Space

Thursday I received a text from my buddy Brad that we have a bonus on our paycheck. What!? Totally unexpected. I was hoping for a good amount but wasn’t expecting much. Well it turned out to be $500! Yay. It is in celebration of our particular location turning 5. They had a celebration with a dj and free lunch. I couldn’t really party because, well, work. I did get my boxed lunch and some cookies. Loved the cookies, hated the boxed lunch. I shouldn’t have got the wrap with avocado. It tore my stomach up something awful. You win some, you lose some, I guess.

I am thankful for the bonus. This year I have been fortunate enough to have gotten many bonuses and it has all been wonderful. It has helped me along but not really helped me get ahead. All I have done is get things. All I want to do is shop…buy all kind of things I don’t need right now. Well some things have been to help get the house organized but it is still in major disarray because I haven’t had the energy to deal with it. I just get things then chill out.

So yeah, love the bonuses, appreciate the bonuses, but because of who I am right now, because of my depression, they aren’t really doing me much good. That sucks. I was thinking about that on Thursday…then for some reason, not just because of the bonus, I started feeling really horrible. I had the worst day. Oh yeah, a lot of it had to do with social media posts, racism, and trumphumpers. Yes! That is exactly what it is. So in addition to being in a bad place personally right now, I am battling all this bad stuff going on in our country right now. I have to make some changes…like I may have to avoid social media for a while, take news in small doses, and really concentrate on some of my personal issues. It’s difficult…but I need to realize that I won’t be able to help anyone until I address some of my problems with my health, my house, and my need to acquire things/spend money.

I am overwhelmed and my bonuses haven’t been big enough for me to hire a professional organizer and a small team of house cleaners, let alone the bigger house I wish for (lol). Well, you know, I might be able to hire some help for a short period of time. I should look into it. I wonder how difficult it would be with this pandemic. Oh well, I just need to struggle through and get this shit done myself… Because the minute I think of spending my money to hire someone, I think of all the lovely things I could buy with it. Yikes!

See, I am sick…I am a hoarder. I’ll tell you another thing, I didn’t want to spend my money on dinner last night. I had though about trying out an Italian restaurant in my town that I had never eaten at before though it gets good ratings. I was all set to order take out, gung ho, even. I just couldn’t decide what I wanted because they had some awesome specials…and their desserts are to die for (that’s what I hear). So I start going overboard, thinking I may get lots of food, fuck it. It’s a celebration of my bonus. But then I went the other way, and said fuck it! I don’t want to spend $17 on the lasagna my husband wanted and $18-19 on the dinner special I wanted, and then the money for dessert. Our bill would have been $50-60 by the time I was done. I did’t want to spend my bonus on that because I got my Amazon cart stuffed with all kinds of treasures I think I need. Yeah, so I made dinner at home. I may order from this restaurant today and make my husband pay for. Ha!

The last few days I have been obsessed with order some art prints for my house. What started it was I ordered some Jane Austen prints to inspire me in my writing. Then I really got to looking at all the art at allposters.com. There is so much good stuff there. I love all kind of art–classic(al), Renaissance, folk, Americana, beachy, impressionism….I love it all. I would love to fill my walls with art. I don’t have a lot of wall space when I think about it. Drat you open concept!! I want to fill the main living areas with art and my photographs but I really have to be choosy and cannot hang everything I would like. That kind of leaves out some the classic, Renaissance, and impressionist art I’d like to have….it leaves out a lot of stuff….because I want to utilize my own pictures too.

I have some prints in my living room that have reading as the subject. Anything with a book I love. Oh shit! That reminds me of Mary Cassatt print I’d love to have. I’ll have to look it up… Oh my God! At allposters.com, they have 451 items of Mary Cassatt items!!

Or I could get more book stands and leave some of my art books open to the art I love and want to display. That’s an idea! Then I don’t have to worry about framing stuff. So the living room, which is basically my library, will be decorated with book prints/art.

Well, I have a vision for the kitchen and dining room, and our family room. It will be Michigan themed. I have ordered some really lovely Michigan travel posters I’ve been wanting. Then I can add my own photographs into the mix. The kitchen will be Mackinac focused since my husband already bought be a framed picture of the Grand Hotel and that is hanging in there. There is not a lot of room to hang anything in our family room as it is a three seasons room and is mostly windows. I will have to come up with some creative ideas in there. My husband hung up a picture of the Mackinac Bridge with Labor Day walkers on it that he had in his office at work. I like it but it really isn’t to my taste…but I want to make it work somehow. I could put up some of the pics I took when we walked the bridge. IDK…I will mull that idea over.

The master bedroom will be a lot of flower pictures for now. I may supplement with other subjects later. I may be able to utilize classical and Renaissance art in there if I so choose. It can be eclectic. The master bath will be mainly my own floral photography and butterflies. I did buy one cute print of a little girl getting into the tub. Couldn’t resist.

The guest bath is already done up in a beachy theme. I can add more (and more of my own work) but that isn’t a priority right now.

I have some cute stuff for the laundry room. I found some cute wall decor at the Dollar General that looks nice in there. Then I found a really cute tin sign at allposters.com that I love, as well as a beachy print. Eventually I may put more of my photography in the laundry room too. Not sure, there isn’t a lot of wall space in there. It is more of a hallway and we have cabinets over the washer and dryer and the damn furnace closet on the other side, and lots of cleaning implements hanging along one wall. Not a lot of place for art but I want to have art every where. A feast for the eyes in every room! LOL

The guest rooms are a puzzle. I had planned on do the office with all my scenic photography. But now I have those Jane Austen prints to hang. It will be an eclectic mix. Not sure what I want to do in the other guest room. I plan on painting it coral in color. There are lots of prints I like that have a childhood them…I’d love to that in there. But then again I have so many beautiful photographs that I took. Once I get the rest of the house all done up everywhere else then I will focus on the guest rooms more. I’m sure both will be a mix of stuff. I want lots of art, and lots of my own stuff.

I’d like to dedicate the hallways on each end of the house to family photos. I just need to go through all my pictures and all the family and ancestor pictures I’ve accumulated over the years. I will really have to get choosy on what I want to display. That is going to be difficult. Shoot, I still have to hang some wedding pictures! Then getting frames for everything! Yikes!! I have to put my husband to work making frames.

This is a huge project… and I still have to get my house organized. This is why I am overwhelmed. So many things I want but it all takes work. All I really want to do is to chill in my lovely, organized home, will all kinds of books and art, and relax and read.

Oh well, this is me visualizing, conceptualizing, and formulating my plan.

I am so overwhelmed. I am trying to get my house organized…well, I don’t know if trying is really the correct word. I want to have an organized house, with everything in it’s place but I don’t have the energy to do it. I also don’t seem to have the attention span and tenacity to get it done. I have too much stuff. Too much!! But I don’t want to part with my stuff, I just want it organized so I can use it. I need more room but I know that’s not going to happen any time soon. Plus I keep getting more stuff; I always want more…books, games, things!! I have too many clothes too, as I have already mentioned. And then I buy stuff to store my stuff in so now I have too many storage containers and not enough closet space or room for it. I tried a storage space once, that ended in disaster (I’ll have to tell that story another time). I don’t know what to do with myself. I’ve been trying to do stuff little by little but more and more I’ve been putting it off til tomorrow because I have been so fucking tired… and overwhelmed. And once I started organizing one area or item set, I soon have to move on to something else or move other items to make room for what I am working on…it is a big mess. Then I get even more tired and cannot hold myself upright–my knees and legs hurt and get weak, as does my back. Ugh.

The house next-door to us, to the east, was for sale. It looks like it sold already, and it was only formally listed for a week or two. That was fast! It was listed for $229, 000.  It bodes well for the value of our home at this moment…barring no housing market crashes in the future.

So we will be getting new neighbors. Bye bye daycare! I hope anyway…I hope the new ones won’t want to open a daycare too.

We got new neighbors on the west side around Christmas. We’ve met the guy, but not his woman. Not sure if they are married or even “serious.” They seem to have a couple of young daughters that are there only part of the time. I was out with my cat one evening and the guy gave me beaucoup compliments on my pussy. LOL

Truly my husband and I suck at being neighbors. We didn’t introduce ourselves to the new neighbors…we didn’t really know the old neighbors. I get the feeling that they didn’t like us because the old neighbor complained of the noise (when we had the boys–he couldn’t stand the sound of the triggers on their play guns, or was it air-soft when my stepson played…regardless, it was a very silly complaint and I probably rolled my eyes at him), our back light shining in his window, and once our Ryder dog playfully attacked their little yapper (everything was okay). I know the daycare neighbors didn’t really like us, at least the guy didn’t (my husband says, “she’s nice enough…”). That went back to before I ever lived here and started because of the way our yard is higher than his yard and his yard floods in the spring –not much I can do about that bub. But since I didn’t feel the love from the neighbors, and I am an introvert, AND I am usually pretty busy and stressed, I never made the effort to get to know our neighbors or mend any fences.

I should try a little harder this time. It would be nice to have nice neighbors and a good neighborly relationship.