Summer Manifesto

The definition of the word manifesto from Dictionary.com:

man·i·fes·to

[man-uh-fes-toh] 

noun, plural man·i·fes·toes.

a public declaration of intentions, opinions, objectives, or motives, as one issued by a government, sovereign, or organization.

I know from experience that unless I am very intentional about doing something, it just doesn't happen. I know manifesto sounds like a big and serious word, but I like that it adds some gravitas to my summer goal making process. Besides, Summer Bucket List just doesn't sound as impressive.

Every year we make a list of things we'd like to accomplish and places we'd like to go over the summer. I've had a People I Need To See Live list for as long as I can remember.

Last year, one of my heroes, Ali Edwards turned the Summer Manifesto into a scrapbooking project (which I love). This bit about writing down intentions is totally how I work.

I didn't want to make my list too long. Also, there are things that don't need to be on there because we already do them. Much like not needing to remind myself to "brush my teeth," I don't need to write down "go to the beach." We automatically do this on a weekly basis all summer.

I wrote my Summer Manifesto down in my journal and decided to turn it into a piece of Subway Art. (Which, by the way, I plan on opening a Custom Subway Art Shop online very soon, so stay tuned...but that's not important right now.).

Here's my Summer Manifesto 2013:

1. Attend the Pageant of the Masters in Laguna Beach.
2. Shop at local Farmer's Markets as often as possible.
3. Make S'mores (Cuban style!) over an outdoor fire.
4. Take a Lake Cruise.
5. Visit the Orange County Fair (and eat decadent food, but that goes without saying).
6. Go to a Dodger Game. (Usually this would say Angel game because I love live baseball on summer nights and I think it's cool that we all get to wear RED, but hello! Yasiel Puig and Dodger Dogs!)
7. Build a Farmhouse Table and have lots of meals outdoors. (Check!)
8. Enjoy lots of Outdoor Movie Nights.
9. Build a Sandcastle. (Not just a flip-your-plastic-bucket-over Sandcastle, but a serious all-day one. This requires a trip to Del Mar. Yes, please. Oh, wait! Did I forget to add "Go to the Del Mar Horse Races?" Consider it added.)
10. Make ice cream. (I tend to forget that I have an ice-cream maker stashed away in my cupboard. And I'll be really mad at myself if I don't make my famous Homemade Dulce de Leche Ice Cream.)
11. Take the train to San Diego. (The train station is just blocks from Little Italy and our favorite Italian restaurant, Filippi's Pizza Grotto, so technically this should really read: Take the train to San Diego and go to Little Italy.)
12. Take the LA Bus Tour. (Lucy will be in Los Angeles taking an Improv class for 5 weeks and my friend, Jana and I decided we would visit her while she's staying up there and do the whole touristy-tour of movie star homes and point a lot and say things like, "there's the Hollywood sign!" and all that.)

These are all the big things. The little things that I don't have to remind myself to do are to go swimming as often as possible and as I mentioned before go to the beach every week. (On Wednesdays, if you must get technical.) Eat outdoors as much as possible on my new farmhouse table? That already goes without saying.

And I know I've forgotten things, but we'll continue to add over the summer as we come up with different ideas. And, trust me, I've always got ideas.

Maybe this fall I'll also do a "Best Cuban Places to Eat in Los Angeles" tour. *starts doing research and making notes*

That's my Summer Manifesto. It's in a prominent place in our home and we're already slowly working our way through the list. It's shaping up to be a fabulous summer. And of course, I'll definitely be Documenting the Magic.

So, what's on your Summer Bucket List Manifesto? Tell me.

"If you build it..."

I'm a sucker for lifestyle magazines. You know the ones where everyone is super well-dressed and chatting and dining in gorgeous surroundings? Sucker. Me.

I'm the one who tears pages out of said magazines and puts them into an idea file. That's right, Pinterest, I was way ahead of your time.

I'm not casting aspersions on Pinterest in any way. I love it almost too much, but I really, really love to have the glossy pictures to look at and dream over. (Note: You are welcome to track my obsession follow my boards on Pinterest. Thankyouverymuch.)

Back to my infatuation with lifestyle magazine layouts. I think my favorite photos always include a group of happy people sharing a meal together. There's something so inviting about a crisp, white tablecloth and an abundant table settting. If all this happiness happens outdoors, I'm practically delirious. *insert a longing sigh here*

So, I've been working on my Summer Manifesto (I promise to write about this really soon) and one of the items on it was that I wanted to serve a meal outdoors at least once a week. Ambitious, I know. But if there's one thing I also know for sure, it's that unless I'm proactive about doing some of the things I dream about, and formally write them down, they tend to stay right there in Marta's Perfect Life Fantasy File.

I've been dreaming for years now about a big, long farmhouse table that seats at least 10 or 12. Like this one:

NOTE: This in NOT a photo of my home. This is from the PB catalog. It's priced at $1,899. (Isn't it fabulous, though?)

Our house is, of course, freakishly small cottage-like and a table of this size wouldn't fit. But wouldn't it be a wonderful thing to have a table like this outdoors?

"We can make it ourselves!" I say this with as much enthusiasm as I can muster, because of course, we both know that when I say, "we," I really mean, "you." (This logic seems to work on my husband most days. Nod your head if you agree, please.)

The reason I know that this beauty can be made is that my good friend, Jana, has a couple of tables like this that her husband built. She was the one who turned me on to the genius of Ana White and Knock-off-Wood and her Free and Easy DIY furniture plans.

That's me, going all Fangirl on Ana White when I met her a few years ago at Blogalicious in Miami. Also, she is a beautiful, gracious and very down-to-earth lady.

So, The Farmhouse Table...

We're talking about my Dream Farmhouse Table over dinner a few weeks ago. Technically, I was just fantasizing out loud about it, (but that's not important right now) and my daughter, Lucy, who has been building sets and creating stage magic in college for the last couple of years, speaks up...

"If you have the plans, we* can build it, mom." (*we meaning her and The Beau.)

I have the plans. I know about Ana White and her DIY magic. (I am winning.)

Lucy and The Beau dutifully went off to the local Home Depot with the list of supplies and for $143.00 and change came back with everything needed to build the $1,899. farmhouse table. (I'm seriously winning here.)

And they started building.

The DIY Farmhouse Table

It seemed to come together almost effortlessly. Let me insert a caveat here: It seemed to come together effortlessly for people who know how to build stuff, which they do. They're quite the formidable team, in fact. But that's not important right now, either.

There was clamping and drilling and hammering and all sorts of happy building noises. They started the table around 2:00 pm and finished around 7:00 pm.

Here's Lucy tap-dancing on the table to show off it's sturdiness.

And there was much celebrating and over-sharing on Instagram and Facebook. (Shut up. I know.)

I waited until it got dark to feed them. 1) Because they still had to clean up and all that. 2) I wanted The Full Effect of the table and the candles and the lights and the flags.  3) It was quite a feast and it was totally magical. 4) I think the food actually tasted better outdoors.

There will be many, many more outdoor meals this summer. And I'm well on my way to fulfilling the items on my Summer Manifesto. 

I have to say right here that I am supremely blessed to live with such an amazing collection of talented people that I get to call my family. They are not only encouraging, but also enthusiastic about all my crazy projects.

Kudos to Lucy and The Beau (he's still a little new to this group and a bit shy about having his picture shared so publicly, so I'm going to respect that...for now) who both worked so remarkably hard to make my wish come true. Thanks, guys.

Did I mention I lead a charmed life?

“If you build it, he will come.” ~Kevin Costner, Field of Dreams

“If you build it, I will cook. A lot.” ~ Marta Darby

How to Make Ruby Slippers from the Wizard of Oz

I've been up to my eyeballs in costumes, props, and set painting for my son, Jonathan's high school production of The Wizard of Oz.

Unlike some of the other shows he's been in, this one has a lot of moving parts to it. (Which, I'd like to just say right here that the original creators of the old-school 1939 Wizard of Oz were genius. *bows down*)

And like every single other time my kids have been in stuff and especially when I vow I'm just going to sit it out, I've done nothing of the sort. In fact, I'm not only designing and gathering costumes, I'm building and painting sets and making (technically begging, borrowing, and stealing) props. (And chewing on Tylenol like it was candy, but that's not important right now...)

Jonathan plays the Cowardly Lion (one day he'll forgive me for putting him in that uber-furry suit under the hot lights. I don't think today's that day) and our sweet next-door-neighbor and good friend, Tessia is the beautiful Dorothy.

So again, I've been collecting/creating costumes and props and all that and the most famous prop of all was a little disappointing. The Ruby Slippers.

I looked. In costume and party stores and online and all the Ruby Slippers I found left me wanting. Besides the shoe itself, my Dorothy has tiny feet. 5 1/2.  So, I was a bit discouraged, but then I remembered that, "Hey! I can make stuff!" And so the quest began for the perfect Ruby Slippers to fit our very own Dorothy With the Tiny Feet.

As it turned out, Tessia had a pair of old character shoes (those are the Mary Janes with the slight heel used for stage people) that she was willing to let me mess with. Plus, they fit her uber-tiny feet perfectly.

Here's the instructions:

DIY - How to Make Dorothy's Ruby Slippers in the Wizard of Oz

You will need:

• A pair of shoes to be sparkled.
• Sandpaper.
• White fabric glue. (Very important that you choose fabric glue. It works 100% better than just regular white glue and adheres beautifully to the leather. Trust me.)
• Super fine glitter. In this case, Red. (Don't choose Kindergarten craft type glitter. You will not be happy with the result. Again, you really must trust me on this.)
• Clear Spray sealer.

1) Start with a pair of shoes you want glittered up. Once you commit, there's no going back.

2) Make sure the surfaces are all clean and sand the shoes very lightly, just to rough up the surface. This was kind of painful. They were really nice leather shoes.

3) Generously paint the white fabric glue on one side of the shoe.

4) And add glitter immediately. You're going to do a few coats so don't make yourself crazy worrying about getting perfect coverage on the first pass.

5) Take your time with the glue and glitter and do one side at a time. Be very patient with the spots you may have missed and just wait until the first pass is dry before you go filling in. (I found this out the hard way because I got so excited I tried to do more and ended up with bald spots in the shoe from where my fingers had accidentally touched some spots.

So, again. Just wait between coats until everything is dry.

6) Paint the other side and sprinkle with glitter. You will already be thrilled at this point with how beautiful it's turning out. Go ahead and celebrate. Just be patient and wait for the coat to be dry before applying the next one.

7) You're halfway there and they look fantastic. This is the point where you start looking around the house for other things to glitter. You're so good! You're a Glittering Goddess! Resist the temptation and just get the shoes finished, please.

8) In this case, the shoes had a strap which I waited patiently (!) to paint until the rest of the shoe was dry. It was at that point that I also addressed the bald spot issue. The glue goes on easily over the dry glitter and that second coat just makes it sing,

9) Spray the finished dried shoes with a Clear Sealant in a well ventilated area. And wait for it to dry.

10) You've spent about three good days on these shoes. It's best to wait until they're completely sealed and looking fabulous.

11) Dorothy was thrilled with her new shoes. The glitter held up beautifully under the lights and because we had sealed them she wasn't constantly leaving a trail of glitter. WIN!

12) I love the added special effect, too. Kudos to our photographer, Dan Shalaby for that.

I'm sure you're anxious to try this yourself.

However, if you're in the South Orange County area next weekend, I'd like to personally invite you to see the Ruby Slippers live and in person and the cast of  Pacific Coast High School Drama perform The Wizard of Oz. You can see my props, too. And of course, my son, the lion.

Performances are on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. May 30th, May 31st, and June 1st at 7:00 pm. The tickets are reasonably priced at $10 apiece and there are also 2 matinees on Friday, May 31st and Saturday, June 1st at 2:30 pm.

The shows will be performed at: the Attic Community Theater • 2834 S Fairview Street •  Santa Ana, CA •  92704

"Oh, Auntie Em! There's no place like home!"

Jesus and My Hair

I've been letting my hair go back to its natural curl.

That sounds like a really simple thing, right? It's not.

I've been going to a specialty hair salon in Laguna Beach. The hair gal, Vickie (who happens to be Puerto Rican, which makes us practically related) runs a cute little shop called Curls on Top. She specializes in curly hair. Sounds crazy, right?

So, I started going to this curly-girl-specialty-salon back in August. And let me tell you, it isn't as simple as "just let your hair go curly again."

I must interject here that I love going to the salon. Everyone there gets me. We're all curly girls who are embracing our natural curls. It's kind of like an elite club. (Or a recovery group, but that's not important right now.)

I've been straightening my über-curls for the past 9 years. I've Brazillianed them, Japanese systemed them, Keratined them to get my curls stick straight and manageable. That's some serious curl-taming.

Here's a story and video of me getting my blowout. (Get popcorn.)

The straightener people always tell you that the process will eventually just disappear with enough washing. Lies. I haven't straightened anything since last summer and there are still pieces of straight hair that must be coaxed into keeping at least a bit of a bend until the straightened bit grows out and can be trimmed off.

This requires tons of special conditioner and gel and special clips that keep the bend in place, and at least 30 minutes under a hooded dryer. So not the "just let it go curly again" easy-peasy thing. But I'm determined. Also, I have two really great friends who have been my Curly-girl Advocates, Jana from the Summer House and Carrie from Tiki Tiki Blog.

So I follow the Curly Girl Method. (<--Google it.) And eventually I will tell you the story with a video. But today's not that day.

Today I want to tell you that it's kind of hit or miss when it comes to how my hair will look. There are days when it cooperates beautifully and I get compliments.

"Why yes, it is naturally curly. Thank you." (I'm practicing being demure about it.)

But there are other days when all the straight pieces just really want to do their own thing screaming, "We'll never go curly again! Not ever! Never!" Those days I end up looking a little crazed. (Don't judge.)

Exhibit A:

I have been taking self-portraits every time I attempt to do my hair (I've been documenting since September) because I know that one day I'll want to document this for my posterity.

Anyway, I took the photo above with the I-can't-even-believe-I'm-still-trying-to-grow-out-my-curls face. And I was reminded of something from back in the seventies....

Remember Godspell? The musical from the 70's? And Jesus (played by Victor Garber. Seriously.) had a big mop of untamed curly hair? Yeah. That would be me last week.

Just to prove my point, I made this collage:

See what I mean? Me and Jesus have hair in common. I posted that pic on my Instagram feed (which you should totally be following, if you don't already. I'm Smrtqbn).

I'm thinking this transition back to my curly roots (Hey! That works on two levels!) is even making me more creative. Every day I am feeling more and more confident in my new-found Curly Girl Awesomeness. Almost like being myself again.

I guess I just have to take this one day at a time. Or Day by Day. (<--see what I did there?)

Giving Thanks

Thanksgiving is obviously a very uniquely American holiday. Which is the perfect time for us to celebrate because we're a uniquely American family. Cuban-American, that is.

I have the privilege of hosting my big, fat, Cuban family here in my home this year. It's going to be a smaller group than usual. Only about 20 of us, because not everyone will be here.

So, we're busy moving furniture (did I mention that our home is freakishly small?) and setting up tables. My sisters and I are texting, emailing, and calling each other to coordinate the menu and the details of the thing.

It's a wonderful excuse to get together and say thank you to God collectively for the many blessings we enjoy.

I'm grateful to all of you who regularly read my blog and let me (over)share the day-to-day happenings in my little world. I thank God for each and every one of you faithful readers. I'm grateful also for all of you who follow me over on my Facebook page. If you don't already, please click here and join the relajo over there.

I'll be taking the rest of this week off from blogging to feed my people and to enjoy some down-time with my family. If you're new here, feel free to look around and if you've been here for a while, check out some of the Linked Within posts at the bottom of each entry. You might just see something new.

I'll be back very soon with some fun giveaways and I'll regale you with stories of my oh-so-interesting-real-life adventures.

I sent out these invitations to my family who have already told me they were coming before they received them, but that's not important right now.

Wish you could make it! You're always welcome here. My blog-casa is your blog-casa.

Also, Japi Sanguibin! ;-)

Everyone Should Have a Giant Chalkboard

Back at the beginning of the summer I had the opportunity to host a big birthday bash. It was a joint birthday party for my sister, Helen who would be turning 70 and my daughter, Amy Kikita who was going to be 29.

Because we entertain so often, we have tons of dishes and silverware and vases and cups and tablecloths and all the sorts of things to be found when entertaining is a high priority. When we decide to host a party, I assess my inventory, pull out my sketchbook and let the ideas flow.

I start by making the folowing lists:

• Guests
• Colors
• Menu
• Invitations
• Decorations

And then I start gathering ideas. By the way, this is why God invented Pinterest. I'm on there and you are welcome to follow me, but that's not important right now.

So there I was scouring Pinterest and getting inspiration and I noticed certain things that happen to be trending right now: 1) flags and 2) chalkboards. I got to the point where pretty much all I could think of was how I might incorporate flags and a chalkboard into the decorating. (You're mocking me, aren't you?) My daughter, Amy Kikita suggested that she might like black and white for a color scheme. I deferred to her because, well, it was her party, after all. Plus she suggested black. And you know what's black?

I made the decision not to sew. Mostly from a lazy standpoint because I didn't feel like hauling out my sewing machine (don't judge me). So I designed some patterned flags in Photoshop and printed them out on a color printer and attached them to twine and when I say "I," I mean Eric.

My husband is a pretty smart guy and he did the math and figured out how many flags we would need to cover all the surfaces I pointed out. He did the tedious work of measuring and attaching hundreds of flags to the twine and also hung them all through the house. And because my home is pretty colorful, I decided to use red as the accent color.

Which then gave me the theme: Black and White and Red All Over. (I thought it was kind of genius, but that's not important right now, either.)

Now that I had a theme to work with, the decorating was pretty simple. Black and white tablecloths, flags hung everywhere, and red roses on the tables. Simple, fun, and a little elegant, too. Win!

What's also black, you may ask? A Giant Chalkboard, that's what.

Lucy is taking theater production classes in college and knows how to build stuff.

Me: "Can you create a giant chalkboard?"

Lucy: "Yes, ma'am."  *Mom does happy dance*

(No, I was not exploiting her. I just figured she could use the practice. Shut up.)

Here's Lucy building walls with her power tools and giving Jon commands while my mom presides over the entire business.

So Lucy (with Jonathan's help) built a giant wall which she then primed and painted with chalkboard paint.

Ta-da! GIANT CHALKBOARD!

It was a pretty impressive set up, if I do say so myself. And now we had a GIANT CHALKBOARD! It made me crazy-happy.

When the guests arrived we had them go out to the GIANT CHALKBOARD for photos, which looked something like this...

And this...

And this...

How much fun is this, people??

We were sad that Adam couldn't be here because he lives so far away, but we included him anyway. ;-)

We fed our guests Cuban style Fricasé de Pollo. You can find that recipe here. And yes, that's a giant tray of maduros. (For the win.)

There was a ton of food, festive decorations, everyone was happy, and a good time was had by all.

Did I mention that we now owned a GIANT CHALKBOARD? 8 feet by 8 feet of Awesome.

What else could we possibly use it for? For me, the question was really, "What can't we use it for?"

*the mind reels*

Yay! Improv night!

I am seriously in love with my GIANT CHALKBOARD.

And the flags? The beautiful black-and-white-and-red-all-over flags? Well, I left them up, too, for a few weeks because, well, I could. And they just made our everyday life pretty festive.

I love that my husband has just learned to roll with it. After 20 years he knows better than to argue about these things.

Because GIANT CHALKBOARD + decorative flags = a happy wife. Happy wife = Happy life.

I told you he was smart.

That's Entertainment!

I feel like I owe some kind of explanation about my lack of usual blogging over-sharing here in this space.

So here goes: I'm tired.

Just plain tired. Deep-to-my-very-bones tired. Or, to borrow a great Cuban phrase from my mom. Estoy agotada. (Which is awesomely descriptive. It means completely wrung out. Like a sponge. Not a drop left. Thanks, Spanish Language, for perfect descriptive words when I need them.)

There. I said it. In English and in Spanish.

Don't get me wrong. We've been having a blast for the past six weeks. We've been non-stop entertaining pretty much every week since school got out.

And I'm all funned out.

I think the crazy started back in May when we had the entire fam over for Mother's Day.

Then, once school was out, the kids started having their friends over for Outdoor Movie Nights.

Which really can't begin until after dark, which means that with these long summer days, they don't commence until 9-ish, which further means that Outdoor Movie Nights pretty much turn into Very Late Movie Nights.

Of course, there's always food. And on movie nights, we have our own "concession" stand. With the girls' favorite: Popcorn and M & M's. (It's kind of magical, really. The juxtaposition of the sweet and salty is pretty amazing. You're welcome.)

Did I mention we've hosted multiple birthday parties, too?

With most of the extended family present.

With lots of Cuban food, of course. (Of course!)

Oh! Did I mention that rehearsals for the last Improv show were held here? Of course they were.

And the first Outdoor Movie Nights were so much fun that they led to more Outdoor Movie Nights, which have now become Every-Sunday-Outdoor-Movie-Nights-at-the-Darbys (but that's not important right now).

Which means I've been feeding teenagers pretty much every week. Every. Week.

And sometimes on Monday nights, too.

All that to say this: I'm tired. Agotada. And I have been too tired to even write about my life because that whole living-my-real-life thing has been keeping me hopping. (Which, I admit, is a really good problem to have, but that's not important right now, either.)

I haven't had much energy to do much more than clean up from the last group that was here and prepare for the next party, which may or may not have included karaoke. (That's Miss Lucy in the orange dress.)

And celebrating my son's engagement to the lovely Stephanie. Which meant we also had house guests for about a week.

So, you see, I've been entertaining. With a capital E and an exclamation, like this: Entertaining! A lot.

And I'm just a little tired. Or, muy agotada. Demasiado agotada. Agotadisima! (<--Is that a word? Never mind....)

Hello, my name is Marta and I Entertain. ("Hi, Marta.")

I promise to write about all these wonderful things we've been doing and sharing how elaborately we decorated (There were flags! And colored lanterns!) and the food we served and all of that in great, gossipy detail. Very soon.

But right now, I need to go make a menu for next week's dinner party. I know. Shut up.

Writer's Block

I guess it happens to the best and most seasoned writers. You wake up and sit staring at the blank page on your computer screen and.....nothing.

I think it would be much more dramatic for this moment to happen in front of a typewriter with a blank piece of paper (maybe in sepia tones). But I know it happens either way. It's the equivalent of getting tongue-tied. I have lots of photos. I have lots of stories. I am in the process of editing some videos. I have sponsors who are anxious for me to post some of their content and bring you some fun giveaways.

But I don't seem to have any words.

So I look around my home for inspiration and this is what it has to offer:

My mom is at the table, reading her Bible. Poseidon and Nefret have commandeered the red armchair. And hey, at least the towels are clean and folded, right? ;-)

My guayabas are flourishing. I fantasize for a moment that they'll one day grow up to be fruit bearing trees and I'll be up to my eyeballs in ripe guavas, but sadly, today is not that day. Eric is working on a small wood project and there is less mess if he does the sanding by the back wall.

I'm still wandering around outside, hoping for inspiration to hit. Look! My coffee plants are beautiful and thriving. We got them as a gift from friends when they were about 4 inches tall. The now 4 foot plants feel like quite an accomplishment, but that's pretty much all I have to say about that. (Oh no! I'm starting to sound like Forrest Gump now.)

Jonathan has completed his school work for the week and is playing with his X-box.

My purple geraniums are blooming and they make me totally happy.

But none of this activity in and around my home has given me any words.

So I head over to Pinterest to see if I can find inspiration. I find this inspiring quote from Steve Martin:

Source: takemeforatwirl.blogspot.com via Marta on Pinterest

And I have to fight the urge to spend the next hour surfing for inspiration on Pinterest and now I have to fold some more laundry, but I remember that I should tell you to follow me on Pinterest, but that's not important right now.

So I remain uninspired and wordless, but the promise of guayabas someday makes me think of guava pastries, which makes me remember that I have some guava paste in the cupboard and pastry dough in the freezer.

So I think I'm going to just embrace the writer's block and drown my sorrows in a little café and some homemade guava pastries.

Tomorrow is another day. ;-)

Modern Day Thank You Notes

I have a love/hate relationship with the digital age we live in.

I kind of hate that unless your phone is turned completely off anyone can find you at any time. For the record, I never, ever turn my phone off. Not while I have kids out in the world, which is most all the time, but that's not important right now.

But I love when friends send me photos and we can share exactly what we're doing at any given time. It's the modern-day "thinking of you" greeting card.

In December, Lucy and I made vats and vats of Cuban eggnog, or Creme de Vie. I packaged it in the best, most beautiful bottles I could find and made custom tags to attach to them.

We delivered the local ones and I sent them out to friends that don't live in our immediate area code, too.

In this modern age, the "thank you" usually comes electronically (and I'm absolutely fine with that) and many times the gratitude comes with a photo.

Like this one, with the note that read:

"Thank you for the yummy treat and the beautiful bottle too! xoxo"

That's my dear friend, Desi Arnaz Jr. (be still my foolish heart!) sipping some of my famous Creme de Vie. *sigh*

He can keep the bottle. I'll keep the "xoxo."  ;-)

This is a fine mess I've gotten myself into...

We're still living in a bit of chaos.

Our kitchen cabinets are now in the process of being painted and it's taking a few days. So now that I've got my shiny and beautiful new appliances installed, I am still unable to cook and the mess is starting to get to me. I have lost my mojo and am feeling out of sorts creatively.

I haven't even had the energy to bust out my real camera, so the following photos are ones I've taken to with just my iPhone to document our lives this past week.

So here's our life according to my iPhone photos...

(I'm kind of enjoying the toaster, butter dish, and honey vignette, but that's not important right now.)

My dining area is full of everything that was in these cabinets. This is what I was greeted with as I came down the stairs this morning:

We managed to get a meal on the table in our cramped little kitchen the other night and that made me happy.

And we even managed a date night in our front yard.

The very big and bright one is the moon, the other object seen below it is Venus. We also located Jupiter and used the high power lens to see 4 of the moons. (I know. Nerdy McGoober.)

And because I'm Cuban and I feel guilty if I'm not giving you something...

My friend Pam turned me on to the coolest free camera app for the iPhone. It's called Orange Camera and has a bizzillion fun effects.

Get it. Use it. Love it.

I'll be taking a break for a few days to try and find my mojo again.

I mean my creative-flow-type "moe-joe." My other, Cuban "mo-ho" is somewhere in one of those boxes.