I twiddled and fiddled with my theme tonight, for, like, hours, days, years, and then ended up going back to the original look.  I am completely hopeless at that sort of thing. Thank goodness I am nice, I know how to cook, crochet, paint, sing, dance,weld, sew, knit, play, read, climb, slide, dig, wash, sort, love and pat kitties.

Ali was going to write a fake story about this mirror, but I reckon she’s too busy folding pillowcases at work. So the truth is that I got it at Value Village a couple years ago. And I haggled with a nice man over it, but because there were 2 different Elvis mirrors, he was guessing the other one would be “worth more”. Uh, ok.  To me, this was a great deal at $3.00. It’s worth at least twice that!

That’s the new one, spread wide open for all to inspect. Clockwise, sort of, from the top left: multicolour nylon bag mostly has assorted lip balms in it, and one lip stick, plus a battery, AAA for my mp3 player. Gum wrapper. Brown with pink hearts and pink strap is my wallet. It’s from Gap Kids and it was cheap. I prefer to keep all money-paper and change-plus all cards in one change purse. Sunday’s Toronto Star crossword. Ziploc bag with assorted stickers inside. Candy from ikea. Pink date book with an ineedmorelife sticker on it.  Black canvas HLDY bag for after work shopping.

What you can’t see: napkins, 10 pens in different colours, camera, address book, moleskine sketchbook, coupons for McDonald’s, Sudoku puzzles ripped out of various papers.

Shannon thought that this purse was huge when he saw it, but I think it’s just the right size. I love it.

Have you ever shopped at Joe Fresh? I love their clothes, so cheap. If there was a store near me, I’d never go to the Gap again. For real. I got a purse and a shirt there (and kid size socks and tights) on the weekend. If I’d had time I would have gotten bras and more…Solo shopping is usually a more rewarding experience for me.

I can’t really stress how much I love these swatch books. The one on the right side was my dad’s when he went to college when I was a little kid. Little=3 years old.  My sister and I played with this a lot, looking through the colours, mixing colours, all of it. Then when I grew up and I went through the same program in college as my dad, I got my very own swatch book. Gels have changed a lot over the years, now they are thinner and lighter and there are many more colours available. But I still like my dad’s better!

The more I make these themed posts, the more excited about my stuff I get. I mean, the more time I want to spend with it and show it to Shannon, who clearly isn’t interested at all and can barely even keep his eyes open while I am waxing poetic about how much this makes me happy.

Plastic pig, Tamagotchi key ring toy, Quagmire, Chris Griffin, 2 babies without pants, 2 French comic book guys.

Kindertoy Snoopy, Jawa, busted up lamb, pig lighter (click his fez and flames shoot out of his snout), crucifix that doubles as a whistle, baby and mama elephants, wind up pecking bird and small pig.

Then there’s 2 of my favourite belt buckles (which I should take a picture of all of them together) with 3 tiny Polly Pockets, a digital pig clock that needs to be stored with it’s instructions because it’s so hard to figure out, a miniature wooden mask and my small collection of Red Rose tea figurines. We always had these around the house when I was a kid, and I think they are awesome. I bought them at Value Village when I worked there.

What do you have in your bathroom? Soap? Tampons? Zit stuff? Me too. But I also have tons of other stuff, most of which are non-bathroom related. And completely unnecessary. You know, sometimes I look at these interior design magazines and I especially love the houses that are tidy and clean with no junk laying about. I love them but I could never live like that.

First are the cat that Ali gave me as a housewarming gift when I moved to Windsor. Second are my squeaky bath toys, a devil ducky, Mickey Mouse and Snoopy. Third, my toilet paper cover, which I didn’t make. I wish. I love it so much.

Ok, so I have these yellow plastic drawer things, each has three drawers and a lid with storage too, and they are crammed with stuff. 1, mostly makeup (from Forever 21) and hair bobs. 2, makeup and one iron on star. 3, toothpaste, 90210 button, my nametag from the grocery store, children’s plastic chopsticks (I put them in my hair) and a sewing kit with a YumPop sticker on it. 4, condoms, false eyelashes, keys and deck of UNO cards. Best card game ever. I think that might be my party drawer?

And the best:

I am sure there’s a Beavis somewhere in the world. If anyone who reads this ever finds him, I would be so happy if you sent it to me. I stole this from a certain job I had once. Well, it was given to me by a co-worker.

These used to be my sister’s tins, but I adopted them when she moved to London to go to university when I was 15. I adore them. I love the art, I love that they once upon a time held children’s cookies, I love everything about them. And they are the perfect size to hold tiny little things that might other wise get lost. Here they are in their closed glory:

Tin #1, with the little girl playing with her doll house contains:

That’s right, World’s Littlest Snoopy! I still have him after all these years (and I mean at least 28 years).  There’s also a small china duckling, Bad Badtz, a nurse doll, a baby clothes duckling patch and a Lego man ready for a margarita.

Tin #2, little boy playing with his castle contains:

This one’s great. It has a bunch of Polly Pocket dolls and their stuff that I got when they were brand new and cool. Now they don’t even fit in your pocket. There is also a pig eraser that would have been a prize for behaving myself at the dentist when I was young. Another china pig, a glass rooster and the metal car from Monopoly.

Tin #3, with the little girl swimming contains:

These were my mother’s toys when she was a little kid. They are in pristine condition because I have always treasured them. They are so cute and perfect. I just LOVE these two. I wish I knew where they came from, who made them. These might be in my top 10 most adored things I own.

It was suggested to me by the man I love the most that I take pictures of all the crap I own. While it’s true that I own an incredible archive of useless junk, I don’t know that this suggestion was because of the sheer awesomeness of it or as a way to embarrass me into getting rid of at least half of it. That won’t happen, but I did think it would be pretty fun to document all my stuff.

First, let me explain. I don’t throw my stuff out. Ever. I have pretty much every birthday card since day one, all personal mail, pay stubs, drawings, recipes and pictures cut out of magazines and newspapers, photographs, toys, knick knacks, toys, clothes, fabric, yarn, patches, stickers,  makeup, buttons, belts, books, tea towels, deodorant and toothpaste, shoes, and then some. And what’s strange is that my mother is the least sentimental person in the world. I will give her a gift for her birthday in June and she will re-gift it back to me by Christmas*. Some people say it’s because I am a Taurus and we lean towards hording, and if that’s true then I am a true Taurus. Although, strangely, I am not headstrong. No. I am NOT. I think I picked this habit up from my grandmas who both had lots of cute little things in their houses. Plus when I was a kid I had very few toys, and the ones I did have, I treasured deeply.

Also embarrassing, when I see other people’s collections of stuff I get nervous and jealous. I worry that they have better stuff or more stuff. Terrible!

Ok, first in the new series: Ticket stubs. This is by no means every ticket stub ever, but it’s a great cross section of shows I have seen. When I was younger I went to a lot of rock shows, but I never paid for any of them, so I never really had any ticket stubs to show. These I keep in my professional opera makeup kit (!) for no real reason, but if I do want to find them, I always know where they are.

They date from 1996, when I saw Electra at the COC. There’s my Mudhoney ticket when I met Flea for the first time, Cabaret, Blood for Blood and Otello. It’s certainly a great cross section. If you wonder where my 2 ticket stubs from the times I saw Prince, don’t worry, they are kept in special spots. And the Neil Young stub is somewhere.

*Not entirely true. But sort of.