tales of housewares
I am now in possession of my first new kitchen gear: a potato peeler with the logo of some potato company on it, that I got for taking a survey at their booth at the Houston Home Show. LOL.
We ended up with complimentary passes to the Home Show, so my parents and I went over today to see what was there. It was woefully small this year, and there were not as many textile/decorating vendors as I recall from previous years. Tempur-Pedic had a booth there and I tried their awesome beds, but I doubt that I will want to drop so much money at this point for a mattress. We'll see.
I did spend some major money, though, on real kitchen gear. I bought two very expensive waterless cookware pans. So I suppose I should take the cookware sets off the wish list. They are made in a green-certified factory in the USA, and the demo was pretty impressive. Mom and Dad made me walk around the show once before sheer enthusiasm made me drop thousands of dollars on a whole kitchen set. That was way overkill for one person in a tiny apartment kitchen. I don't cook enough to merit so much. Yet.
I also got some super textile things called ShamWow! (apparently they have lots of TV commercials, but I had never heard of it before) that will help me keep my house free of paper towels (a noble and difficult goal).
I am composing a Household Gear Wish List at Amazon.com. This is NOT a registry-type list in which I actually expect to receive the actual item I have selected. I am choosing genres/categories of things, most of the time. In reality, with only a few exceptions, I would be happy to have items from second-hand stores or handcraft businesses or mom-and-pop shops, and certainly I would prefer things that are not made in China or are certified sweatshop-free.
I'm also not actually expecting people to suddenly start buying me things. But I've had enough people ask about a list that I went ahead and made one. It will help me get organized and recall things, as well, especially when I find something interesting that I may not otherwise have bookmarked.
I am thinking that when I get a better idea about the space (read: when I get my key and go in with a tape measure and some graph paper) I will start to think about textiles as well, curtains and wall hangings and decorations. I'm not making any decisions yet, but here are some colour palettes that I like:
Dark Compliments
Summer Wheat
Urzien's Compass
Ode to Vrijvogel
I haven't spent ten million hours on that color site, just scanned around doing searches on a few hues. I'm a fan of plaids and of big splashy/retro or geometric floral patterns.
I may also decide to create room palettes based on some of my paintings that I'll be hanging up or displaying on shelves. Who knows? The options are open!
I still haven't packed anything today. Oops.
We ended up with complimentary passes to the Home Show, so my parents and I went over today to see what was there. It was woefully small this year, and there were not as many textile/decorating vendors as I recall from previous years. Tempur-Pedic had a booth there and I tried their awesome beds, but I doubt that I will want to drop so much money at this point for a mattress. We'll see.
I did spend some major money, though, on real kitchen gear. I bought two very expensive waterless cookware pans. So I suppose I should take the cookware sets off the wish list. They are made in a green-certified factory in the USA, and the demo was pretty impressive. Mom and Dad made me walk around the show once before sheer enthusiasm made me drop thousands of dollars on a whole kitchen set. That was way overkill for one person in a tiny apartment kitchen. I don't cook enough to merit so much. Yet.
I also got some super textile things called ShamWow! (apparently they have lots of TV commercials, but I had never heard of it before) that will help me keep my house free of paper towels (a noble and difficult goal).
I am composing a Household Gear Wish List at Amazon.com. This is NOT a registry-type list in which I actually expect to receive the actual item I have selected. I am choosing genres/categories of things, most of the time. In reality, with only a few exceptions, I would be happy to have items from second-hand stores or handcraft businesses or mom-and-pop shops, and certainly I would prefer things that are not made in China or are certified sweatshop-free.
I'm also not actually expecting people to suddenly start buying me things. But I've had enough people ask about a list that I went ahead and made one. It will help me get organized and recall things, as well, especially when I find something interesting that I may not otherwise have bookmarked.
I am thinking that when I get a better idea about the space (read: when I get my key and go in with a tape measure and some graph paper) I will start to think about textiles as well, curtains and wall hangings and decorations. I'm not making any decisions yet, but here are some colour palettes that I like:
Dark Compliments
Summer Wheat
Urzien's Compass
Ode to Vrijvogel
I haven't spent ten million hours on that color site, just scanned around doing searches on a few hues. I'm a fan of plaids and of big splashy/retro or geometric floral patterns.
I may also decide to create room palettes based on some of my paintings that I'll be hanging up or displaying on shelves. Who knows? The options are open!
I still haven't packed anything today. Oops.