Map pillows

I imagine we each have things that we covet. We may not ever get around to buying or owning them, but the idea of them makes us a little bit giddy. Maybe they're in the SkyMall magazine, and you remember you've-always-wanted-one-but-will-never-buy-one. Or in an IKEA catalog.

I'm not talking huge items, just things that are not necessary but the heart craves anyway.

Maps play a big role for me in this issue. There used to be a great map pillow cover seller on Etsy. I had some 10 of her designs marked in my favorites folder. I dreamt of how to design a whole bed or couch space around them. I'd imagine waiting until I could find maps from the various places we'd lived. Or where family lived, to show A and teach her about different places.

I even brought a vintage US/Canada/Mexico map back with me from the US. One of those old classroom maps that used to pull down from a roller mounted on the wall.

Now that we are starting to plan moving to a new apartment, I seem to have found myself another way to obsess about map pillows. (Because who has too many pillows? Me, nah. Just because I have to store some in cupboards or 3 deep on my bed says nothing about my pillow purchasing issues.)

On the design-your-own-fabric site, Spoonflower. I found this in the project ideas page. Because if there is one thing a person moving needs, it is more fabric. Never mind, I'll get around my "no more purchases until after the move" by doing this project in March or April some time. Now, back to that page for the kids' clothing ideas I was originally looking through.

Big pillow talk from the woman who has yet to use her 1 year old IKEA sewing machine for the first time.

On failing, and then not.

Given that I work in science education, reading over and over articles and websites and books that stress the importance of trying things out yourself, it is surprising how often I still forget to apply that to everyday life. I have spent, my usual, 5 hours thinking about this bathroom light contact paper cover. I have found that there are no single hole punches of the office supply variety for sale in Switzerland (I refuse, so far, to buy a craft one with smaller holes, for $17). I have seen all sorts of images on my Google searches for Scandinavian designs, patterns, animals, and Mid Century Modern designs, patterns, animals. I've gone from the idea of abstract shapes to sheep silhouettes, to fish, to triangles arranged all over the place when I realized how poorly one pair of scissors cut contact paper.

I had two pieces cut out with the nasty scissors, that were rough on the edges, was just thinking how to get my hands on a friend's hole puncher since the cheap two hole one I bought really is for Swiss bills only, and this morning I finally got fed up. I found the better scissors, I told myself just to try something, anything, to get a feel for the light, the material, the results.

And there it is. I'm done, happy enough with it, it dims the light as I wanted, and since it is a nasty fluorescent lamp, the cover on it was plastic that doesn't get very warm. Perfect for white contact paper.

And I have a much better sense for working with the stuff now. There really is no substitute for learning something in context, instead of just trying to perfect the idea before even touching, playing, ripping, and messing up the material.

I'm thinking that any design tradition that embraces imperfect lines and organic shapes, is the one for me.

In other news, I realized last night that upgrading the desktop computer to iLife (iPhoto) '11 has deleted all my photos of A and anything else from before one year ago. Her whole first year pretty much, and M and my life together before that. I am extremely disappointed with Apple. I have all the photos also on my laptop which will never be getting that upgrade, so I am just pissed off instead of completely destroyed and emotionally broken. On some of the Mac forums, people are chiding those who did not back up their computers and actually lost their kids' first many years of life photos, comparing it to preparing for a natural disaster. Because, of course, we all decide to upgrade to earthquake '11 as soon as it hits the stores and we should treat a company like Apple as a force of nature, and not expect more from it. Uh huh.

Relaxing

I waste my time by looking through Etsy and trying to come up with things to do with the various rooms in our apartment. Right now, I have orangey wood floors, white walls, that bed (only a headboard height set of shelves, and none of the decor around the bed), and a 3X3 version of this shelf

What I would really like is to make the space bright enough to get me through winter, but also able to cool down for summer months without A/C.

Unfortunately, I really like these pillows from Esty that don't seem to match that there red shelf so well....