You know what I mean, don’t you?
When you can see the mantle top for the first time in months and the colony of dust bunnies that accumulated in the corners behind the Christmas tree?
I took the garland and all of the candles off of our long dining room table and couldn’t remember the last time the table looked so empty. Besides the crumbs and sweet little kid hand prints everywhere. 😉
My mind works in precarious ways though, even I do not understand them entirely; but suddenly, staring at all that empty table space, I remembered the big aqua-ish glass cookie jar I got at the Goodwill last year.
It was stuffed into one of the cupboards I hoped to organize in 2014.
At least, I thought it was.
Note to self, put on imaginary resolution list to stay organized this year.
I pictured miraculously finding it, putting it right there, smack dab in the middle of my table, and filling it to over flowing with grey toned sticks.
I pictured the sticks casting shadows on the walls at night when the living room and dining room grow dark in the winter evenings by 5:30pm.
Then, because there is no reason to my creativity, or crazy wandering mind, I remembered that while spending most of my time at Target pre-Christmas, lost amongst their racks of clearance clothing, that at one point, when I looked up from my cart full of clothing, past the three children buried up to their eyeballs in red sticker items, that down in “home decor” there was a plethora of glass vases.
Glass vases that MATCHED that vintage buried vase.
Ever since I saw this beautiful picture from Emily A Clark of her gorgeous gallery wall and painted hutch, I loved it all. Most of all, I couldn’t get those two blue-green glass jugs out of my memory.
In a split second it all became clear in my head.
First, hunt down jar from the thrift store.
Second, head to Target, NOW, and search relentlessly for the vases like Emily’s and return home with them in my clutches.
So, immediately, I went to Target, where I was momentarily over stimulated by all of the red “clearance” stickers everywhere, and by the constant unknown whining coming from within the pile of clothing piled high in my cart.
I snapped out of the haze of wielding elbows, thrown hangers and bright lights, for a split second, when I spotted two blue-green-recycled-glass-look-a-likes, just how I remembered them in my foggy pre-Christmas memory.
I couldn’t NOT, they were family with my $4 vintage blue-green jar, weren’t they?
I would make room for them in my home even if that meant throwing out a child… or three.
Lucky for me, our table was empty and was the perfect spot for the trio of blue green glass.
Which, from hence forward, I will now call “aqua glass”.
So, the bright side is, we didn’t have to get rid of any of our beloved babies, we simply wiped down the table, from said babies breakfast-sticky-finger-prints, and grouped the three glass beauties in the middle of our long table.
Along with their crazy mother, my three patient, strong babies, bundled up one snowy night, in their snow pants and mittens and helped me drag home a big ole tree branch that had fallen beneath the heavy ice of the big ice storm we endured over the holidays.
We waved to our googly-eyed neighbors.
And then, although we were pooped when we collapsed at home, I rewarded my little troopers for their minimal complaining, by showing them some fun stick tricks before daddy got home and saw the forest mess we created all over the living room floor.
We snapped, “wishbone sticks”, we held “reindeer horns” to our noggins and practiced our best Rudolph voice and we may or may not have played “light saber” with a few harmless stick pieces too, you know, for good measure.
By time daddy did come home, we had cleaned up the forest debris from the floors and our pony tails, and we even managed to hide the Target bags full of clearance “women’s wear”.
I would say the day, over all, was a success all around. My suspicions were confirmed by how fast our three blessings fell asleep after our adventure filled day.
In hind sight, I don’t think I could have traded any of those three little patient, wild things for all the aqua glass in the world.
Are you like me and take your kids shopping everywhere with you? Do you stalk Targets’ clearance section too? Are you a tree loving girl like me and would use tree branches instead of flowers on your dining room table? Do share, I love talking bargains and nature. 😉
