This morning I woke up to the following things: one of our cats, rushing in the door with a mouse clutched in his little jaws. I could hear bone crunching. A mess the dog made, the origins of which were now unrecognizable. Garbage strewn across the driveway, thanks to another dog that had gotten in the can. Rain. Yes, I’ve had better days.

On a positive note, Elliott and I spent 2 hours with a kitchen designer this morning picking out cabinetry and countertops. It feels very strange to me that we’re actually re-doing our kitchen. I’ve hated our kitchen since I moved in with Elliott, and now I am picking out everything I want. Weird.

What I have noticed though, at the semi-frequent parties we host, is that invariably it’s THE room in the house everyone congregates in. Even now, when I consider it the least welcoming room in the house (it’s one of the only rooms I’ve not painted or added any personal touches to. I hate it that much.) The most exciting part about all of this is that we’ll finally be having parties in a room that I actually will want to be in. Yay!

I suppose it’s a good thing that I’ve lived in this home with it’s 4 cats and 2 dogs and 3 teenagers long enough now to know how to design around them. As in, no open shelving because pet hair is everywhere. I swear, even if we got one of those robotic little vacuums, it wouldn’t be able to keep up if it operated 24/7.

I picked out super-pretty cherry Shaker-style cabinets, and I think we might be going with concrete countertops – or at least concrete for the island countertop, and a stone/polymer mix for the others that sorta matches. The good thing is it’ll be beautiful and functional when it’s all done, the bad news is the cabinets will take almost 3 months to come in. Looks like we’ll be eating pizza all through the holidays, since I lose my kitchen in about 2 weeks. I’ll just have to think happy thoughts about what’s coming to keep myself sane…

Anyhow, just posted a review over in sextoys of The Cone – I’m glad AAG tried it out, I confess I’d wondered about it. After reading what she wrote, it’s definitely not on the top of my list, but it sure looks interesting anyhow. And I’m having some issues with the Quickies page (with the database Jack has been setting up) so it’s not being updated for a couple of days. Then it WILL be a section, promise.

~Jane