Blizzard of 2013 In Pictures. 'Cause There Are No Words

You may have heard that it snowed last week.

It started like this:

And ended like this:

Photos by Andre M. Brown. There's no one I'd rather shovel for six hours with.

The Seven Stages of DIY. Or Recovery for the Non-Crafter

My name is Dawn. 

I am NOT crafty.

I didn't say I wasn't creative. I am a fantastic bow maker, after all. But whipping up something from scratch a la Martha Stewart? So not my forte. That's why I've honed my skills as a bargain huntress. So I can buy the stuff that I covet. Ready-made.

But sometimes my wants, the retail clearance calendar and my current cash flow are a bit out of sych. And I start living in a fantasy world. One where funky holiday wreaths can be constructed cheaply and perfectly. Using only my hands.

Fortunately, this experience, as most things in life, has become yet another lesson just waiting to be learned. Mmm-hmm. My take-away? Much like grief, there are seven stages of DIY (Do It Yourself? Nope. That's Don't Irritate Yourself), ready and waiting for the non-crafter. And, oddly enough, I've survived them all. Again.

Stage One:  Inspiration

Behold exhibit A

And exhibit B

Amazing right? And whipped up last weekend, in the basement, by my husband. Next time this happens, I need to say aloud: Dude has an art degree. Not: Oh yeah. Let the crafting competition begin. Because someone will lose. Handsomely.

Stage Two:  Excitement

Crafty bloggers. You suck. I'm not hating on your amazing abilities. I'm calling you out for managing to make your projects look completely effortless. For everyone. That dollar store Christmas ball wire wreath you were pimping out for $6 and boasting that it would only take half an hour to complete? I excitedly bought in. Sucka. 

Stage Three:  Smugness

Oh, I got this. Sure, the final cost may have risen to $20, thanks to the lingerie bags, bubble envelopes and other assorted impulsive crap I 'needed' for a buck apiece. But, not only do I have all the materials on hand, courtesy of my no shame act of cracking into a stock box or two, but I also showcased my mad improvisational skills. Indeed. Watch as I magically transform 15 feet of garland into one illusive wire hanger. 

Stage Four:  Pride

Granted it may be 4:30am (don't ask) and I'm keeping the goldfish awake, but I've managed to not only go all MacGyver on the plastic garland, ripping it down to its base wire, but successfully completed the tedious ornament stringing process. All before the sun came up. I rocked. All the way back to bed.

Stage Five:  WTF

One step left. Secure the sucker. And that's when things start to go drastically wrong. An easy five minute job, ha-HA, turns into an hour of intense irritation. I am ready to smash all of this shiny red goodness with one World Wresting two footed stomp. Go on. Try me. 

Stage Six:  Recovery

Art Degree husband saves the day (and wreath) by casually whipping out a glue gun. Fa-la-la-la-la. I hate him. 

Stage Seven:  Acceptance

AKA: The Non-Crafters Prayer. Dear Crafting: I accept that I am a perfectionist, as well as creatively impatient. I accept that these characteristics do not bode well for crafting. Also: I accept that I do not enjoy crafting. At all. Ever. In fact, I'd rather pull out my toenails one by one. But most of all, I accept that there is a distinct danger of relapse...

You're In The Army Now

High and tight.

Now really, how hard could that be?

Granted, I was sorta learning on the job. There was no clipping experience on my resume. No Barbie dolls. No little brother. No dog. But, even with this full disclosure, my husband Andre wanted me to cut his hair. In true Rhode Island fashion, he was tired of making the trip from our West Side home to his East Side barber.

Yup. Those ten minutes on the road were killing him.

Andre sports a skin fade. Translation: it's a haircut that's one step away from, well, bald. It's not an afro. Not dreads. Not a boxtop. I've been telling him for years that I could handle it. When his old barber drew blood, I told him. When he got a horrible cut in Charleston, SC, I told him.

When he got mistaken for guest of honor, ex-Patriot Troy Brown, by the organizers of a charity event two years ago, I didn't tell him. But for some reason, that night was THE night Andre looked deep inside himself and decided to give my mad skillz a shot.

Perhaps he thought a fresh cut would better help differentiate him from, say, a retired pro football player, next time 'round. Regardless, on the way home, we hit up the personal care aisle of Walgreens.

Duh. Where else would a barber go?
 
Back at the ranch, I set up shop in the middle of the kitchen, using a dining room chair, then set the overhead lights to blazing. After carefully draping Andre's shoulders with a tiny dishtowel, I got to work. Forty long minutes of work. This, as you'll see, was a precision cut.

I broke the process down into two parts, just in case you want to recreate this look at home. Step one: Eyeball an imaginary line near the top of the head, then straight up shave everything below. Step two: Attach a .5 guard to the clippers and bring the hair on top down to 1/16 of an inch.

Unfortunately, for Andre, on night number one, we had no speciality .5 guard in our possession. So I improvised with the next best thing: a 1 guard, which I can now say, with all certainty, is the same tool used by military barbers.

The next day, Andre got saluted.

Not once. But twice. By two different people. And just to be clear, he was not in uniform.

Apparently, on my first time out, I had perfectly recreated a standard issue cut.

God Bless America.

But more importantly, God Bless Andre's Chrome Dome.