Flossys

Flossys., originally uploaded by sugar-cookie.

Hello all. Thank you so much for all the nice comments about my FLOSSY PONIES. I have seen it posted on some blogs and that is awesome! I recently found out about FEELING STITCHY, a blog devoted to stitching. I am totally going to be checking this one out regularly cos it is so inspiring. I also was featured on SUPER CUTE KAWAII! This blog is right up my alley! I will be looking at this one all the time now - when I need a little eye candy! I love it. Thank you so much and I might have some Flossys available very soon... Just keep an eye on SHOPPE SUGAR COOKIE.

V For Victory!

This past weekend was so nice that we decided to make a serious effort to get our backyard into shape. Since we bought the house a couple of years ago, we've been slowly but surely rehabilitating our yards. It's been an uphill battle because, quite frankly, the previous owners did not do much in the way of "upkeep". Which is a shame because the house has a great backyard with a lot of potential.

Before getting all dirty and sweaty, we stopped at TARGET and bought a strand of SOLAR-POWERED LIGHTS that we plan to test out in our patio. You can program the lights to come on automatically when it gets dark:



We pulled up all this ivy and found a bed buried underneath all the mess, along with a hollow tree stump. We're planning on filling in the stump with soil and then planting something interesting in it. By pulling up the ivy, weeds, and layers of dead leaves, we hope to eliminate some prime mosquito breeding ground:



DO WORK! Missy lugs a bundle of fallen branches and sticks up the side of our house to the front yard:



This is the fire pit in our backyard that we plan to dig up and replace with a VICTORY GARDEN. According to our neighbor Ben, the previous owners used to burn trash out here. The pit is filled with broken bottles, bits of plastic, and other debris. We've found busted glass pipes, spent lighters, pieces of scrap metal, and rusty nails sticking out of burnt planks of wood. It's a nasty mess and we can't wait to get it all cleaned up. Until this weekend, most of the fire pit was buried under a layer of rotting leaves and piles of sticks:





By the end of the weekend we had filled 15 large bags (11 in the back, 4 up front) with all manner of organic rubbish. The road to victory is certainly going to be a long one...

Weekend Wind-Down #48

Dang...I can't even remember the last time Missy and I cooked a meal for ourselves. Seems like for the past several days, we've been eating out every chance we get. Tonight, we got a large veggie pizza from TRANSMETROPOLITAN, which is this pizza shop down the street from us. They have these cool pizza boxes advertising this pie they make called THE HUNGRY SASQUATCH. The best part of the box is the freaky girl wearing a RAMONES t-shirt:



Earlier today, we had lunch at IKE & JANE. Missy took pictures of the cupcake she had as an appetizer, and I took pictures of her taking pictures:



I was impressed with the plastic cups they use at Ike & Jane, which are made out of corn and are totally 100% bio-degradable. Yet another good reason to patronize our local bakery-slash-cafe:



Late Saturday night we ended up at IHOP...Missy pondered pancakes with happy faces. In the end, we ordered the MONSTER MOZZA STICKS, as a tribute to MORRISSEY, who is affectionately referred to by his fans as MOZ:





FAVORITE MOMENT OF THE PAST WEEK?
MISSY - Cleaning up the backyard was OK.
RAOUL - Finding the record player stand at Everything Is Everything.

WORST MOMENT OF THE PAST WEEK?
MISSY - Cleaning up the backyard!
RAOUL - Buying hardly anything at the Super Target.

WORD OR PHRASE OF THE PAST WEEK?
MISSY - "Pencil? Pen? Stamps? T-Square? Protractor?"
RAOUL - "Super Target"

WORD OR PHRASE FOR NEXT WEEK?
MISSY - "Mommy and Daddy day"
RAOUL - "La Parilla"

FAVORITE MEAL OF THE PAST WEEK?
MISSY - Pizza and potatoes from Transmet and chocolate from White Tiger.
RAOUL - Pizza from Transmetropilitan.

WORST MEAL OF THE PAST WEEK?
MISSY - Having leftovers real quick.
RAOUL - St. Patrick's Day potluck at work.

PERSONAL SOUNDTRACK FOR THE PAST WEEK?
MISSY - Sleater-Kinney, Hawk And A Hacksaw, Alessi's Ark.
RAOUL - The Moves, Sarah Dougher, Sleater-Kinney, Kaia, Emily's Sassy Lime, Animal Collective, Printed Circuit, Hercules And Love Affair, Galaxie 500, The Smiths, Daniel Johnston, Wolf Parade, Fortuna POP!'s "Be True To Your School" comp.

House Bunny

Missy's been training our bunny OREO to eat while sitting on her lap...needless to say, the training is going well! Now if we can just train her to make us breakfast, we'll be set...












OREO 2879 from Raoul de la Cruz on Vimeo.

Everything Is Everything

Yesterday, Missy and I got out of work early and headed over to IKE & JANE (our favorite new local eatery) for a late lunch. Next door to the bakery used to be this cool little scooter shop called RE-CYCLE. They had since moved to another location and for the past couple of months, we saw a new boutique going into this space, teasing us with all this cool vintage furniture displayed in their front window. Well, before going into Ike & Jane, we decided to peek in the window of this new shop. We were surprised to find that the shop was actually open! On their mailbox was this piece of paper with the words EVERYTHING IS EVERYTHING on it - I'm assuming it's the name of the new shop. Turns out that they've just been open for the past three weeks, but the freak snowstorm put a damper on their grand opening. Anyways, to our hope and delight, me and Missy were able to find some really cool stuff in there. I ended up getting this vintage mid-century modern RECORD PLAYER STAND for only $30! I was so stoked too, because I've been searching everywhere for something exactly like this, and here it was in near-perfect condition, for a steal. The guy that sold it to me was happy to hear that I was going to use it in the way that it was intended for.

Missy ended up getting a pair of these vintage MUSHROOM-SHAPED glass containers, also at a bargain price. Turns out that she had been wanting something like these glass jars to build TERRARIUMS in. Who knew? Everything Is Everything was certainly living up to it's name. I also found this little plastic carrying case for cassettes. It's a fiery red and holds up to six tapes. If you know anything about me, then you know that I collect vintage cassette carrying cases...so this was another great find that I could add to my growing collection:





So yeah...if you're in town - NORMALTOWN that is - then head on over to Everything Is Everything and check 'em out. It's the shop with the huge MOD TARGET painted next to their door, can't miss it. Also, honorable mention goes to FRITZIE, the furry green dog COIN BANK that I found in Atlanta a couple of weeks back. We found him in the basement of this antique shop that had all these individual stalls full of junk, antiques, and collectibles. He had a slip of paper tucked into the top of his head that said "My name is FRITZIE. I am a coin bank". He totally looks like he stepped out of an old HANNA-BARBERA cartoon. I guess they were giveaways from some local Atlanta bank, back in the day, because the opening on the bottom has the logo for a Fulton National Bank. Anyways, he's already filled a quarter of the way with wayward coins and he currently sits on the stack of aforementioned cassette tape carrying cases in the SUPER DORM: