in which she discovers what is missing

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i finally hung my ampersand. oddly, it looks much more imposing in person than in this photo. it is making me think that perhaps i need to make an even larger ampersand for that wall. you do realize that in my head i am double-dog-daring myself to do just that. i mean it is not as though i have eleventy billion other things in need of getting done. right?

my reason for babbling on today is to tell you that a cardboard letter a  has joined my wee ampersand. i found it in the dollar spot section of target a few weeks back.

every time i see them together i think something is missing. something like...

... this!

~peace.

ampersand, the end

*

i could tell you that i have been meaning to show you the completed ampersand for ages. i could, but i would be lying. not about the meaning to bit, but about the completed bit. you see, i kept waiting for time to do the thing properly. it would seem that life with a teen & a toddler leaves one with no time for doing anything, proper or otherwise.

today i asked thehobbit to play with elfling, & set about just getting it done. i knew that rushing the completion would mean a wonky ampersand, but it was either that, or stare at the half-finished project for the rest of my life. i have enough of those, thank you very much.

so it doesn't look like it would have had i had the time, & i am having to force myself to be content with its many imperfections - but that is ok she keeps telling herself.

what do you think? pretend you do not see all the imperfections, please. lie to me if you need. & remember: all comments that do not contain words of praise could quite possibly be deleted.

eventually it will hang higher on the wall, but for now it sits on the mirror. oh, ignore the dusty mirror, please.

it feels good to have one less half-completed project cluttering my home & head.

&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

~peace.

ampersand, the update

*

still looking a bit wonky, but not terribly so. the next step - thickening & contouring with layers of paper. stay tuned!

~peace.

walls o' letters

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after seeing this freakygorgeous (real word) wall of letters on this blog a few months ago, i knew i had, had, had to make a set for thebelfry. by the way, how perfect is it that her letter k is covered in letters? did she somehow know that not only does kat begin with k, kat loves letters? most likely so.

research led me to other walls of letters:

this one is equally freakygorgeous. i want that button on my wall! 

a ready-made one on etsy.

& an alphabet poster of the most clever sort.

also, i have always had a fondness for edward gorey's alphabet, but i think, were i to have a giant version on my wall, people would stop coming to visit.

*

so, it has been a few months since i first discovered the original wall of letters. would you like to know how far into the alphabet i am? my sweet one & only, i would like to tell you that i am nearly done. heck i would like to tell you i am only a few letters in. alas, i have not even begun. a certain elfling has made all but the smallest of projects impossible. 

it occurred to me that i could manage one letter, were i to work on it a few minutes a day. but what letter? sadly, i thought about that for more time than i am willing to admit. then it hit me! how could i have not thought of it right away?! what symbol do i love more than all of the letters combined? the ampersand!!! & (see?) yesterday marked the start of the great ampersand project of 2011. behold the beginning (cue dramatic music):

excuse the dark photo, the skies are quite unspring-like today. i drew the ampersand onto that 3-d poster board. i don't know what it is actually called, but it's about a 1/4in thick, & large. when cut out, & covered in a few layers of paper, the ampersand won't look so wonky. trust me.

i plan to cover the entire thing in pages from my high school french/english dictionary. my plan had been to do so with a regular dictionary, so i could have definitions showing, but i was unable to find one with lovely yellowing pages.

i'm not sure why this book's pages are so yellowed - i am not that old. whatever.

as i complete each step in this project, i'll share the photos with you. it could take some time, as elfling is quite pesky these days, but i promise not to forget. until then - have a lovely day!

~peace.