BOOKISH DECOR? YES! PILLOWS!

AMBER LOVE 19-AUG-2015 Bear with me – I swear there are pillows in this post besides my boobs (Hey, I blurred them out!). A few months ago, when things inside this house seemed to be trying to kill me by way of bugs, dust, mold, and possible paranormal additions, I had to succumb to throwing out a lot of things, including my bed (see posts on my hives). My body and my mind were as far gone as they have ever been. This is third time in my life going through this.

We also continuously ran the washing machine (on super hot) and the dryer (on super hot). I ruined a lot of clothes that are now tween size and packed in crates. A lot of things are going to be slowly replaced or considered gone for good. Some were books too. My tweets have been a pathetic feed of #crying. I packed up a ton of possessions and sealed them in plastic bins or bags. Emptied drawers and packed that stuff up too. Removed every book and item from the bookcases to dust in every wooden joint. I donated even more comics to Superheroes for Hospice; I think it came to 250 of them.

Cleaned the damned bathroom with so much bleach that I was making myself sick. Got all new shower curtains too – it takes 3 to go around this stupid antique tub (see below). Dusted every individual wooden slat louver in six closet doors. Basically my full time job for the last several months has been trying to not die from this house. Although, it’s old and would make an excellent crime scene, especially the stupid antique tub.

By removing my bed, that meant I had to claim the one that was once in the guest room. It’s the bed Batman would use when visiting for Superhero Weekend. I had to steal Batman’s bed. I suck.

In the guest room, there’s now a couple of chairs and the space for a twin air mattress. I had been sleeping (or trying to) on that for months. Then I slowly tried spending time in my “new” bed. Some days I could last a couple hours; other days five minutes and panic took over and I’d be crying all over everything, frequently running into my awful shower and changing into the third set of pajamas for the day. That’s basically all I wear now are pajamas and I’m not complaining. Throwing out a lot and shrinking everything else meant I needed new clothes so I bought four sets of pajamas and they’re gloriously comfortable, even in petite so that I didn’t have to hem them!

But getting back to the bed situation – last week I worked my way up to staying in the bed overnight even though I was sleeping from 1-4 hours at most. The past several months had a lot of nights of a few minutes of sleep and that was the best I could do. Four hours was a big ass ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED in my opinion. The past two nights, I’ve managed to get 6-7 hours. That’s without Benadryl, sleeping pills, or Xanax. I’ve also managed to go from changing the sheets every single day to being a much more normal person and doing it once a week.

FINALLY – THE BOOKISH PILLOWS PROJECT:

Among things to replace were some throw pillows. The pillows are constructed forms from Joann’s Fabrics. They were $7 each and I got 4 of them. The fabric was expensive, but I love it. I love Spoonflower! I can spend as much time on there as Pinterest. People can make designs and upload them in order to turn it into fabric. You have to test the fabric out because what works on cotton might not work on silk. I’ve even tried this a couple times myself with Sandman themed designs. Needless to say, when I dove in there looking for crime/mystery/noir bookish things, I found the most perfect choices!

The first is called monsieur fancypantaloons’ instant library by peacoquettedesigns. It’s a graphic of a bookcase filled with antique leatherbound books. The second I’m so in love with. It’s an Agatha Christie design! It’s called murder on the orient express (agatha christie) by scrummy (designer Sharon Turner) who found me on Instagram when I posted my purchase. The fabric was the combed cotton offered through Spoonfower. For a mere two yards, I spent nearly $40 of someone else’s money. Ah, the pricetag of custom things.

I prewashed the fabric and left it to sit for a couple months while my house was being torn apart, fumigated, and my life was put into crates. Today, because I have spent two whole nights in my actual bed, I decided to return a couple more things to normalcy. This involved taking down the air mattress and trying to sew. Let me say this – I have no idea what kills my brain cells on a daily basis. Sure, it’s been months since I last sewed anything (my last superhero costume for Moonstone, a skirt, and Danielle’s Delirium blouse), but really… how much could I forget? Apparently some very basic things like how to make a bobbin. I had to Google it and read the instruction manual!

Once I figured out what the hell I was doing, I ironed and cut the fabric. I cut the fronts of the pillowcases 15 x 15 and the backs were 4 half rectangles that I honestly didn’t measure to anything that makes sense. They’re panels roughly 15 x 15 but a little wider that I hemmed for the center opening and then overlapped when attaching to the front pieces. This is so the covers can be easily removed in case of yet more washing. Ta da!

Founder and Editor-in-Chief of AmberUnmasked.com and Vodka O'Clock Podcast. Author of The Farrah Wethers Mysteries, comic book short stories, prose, and non-fiction. Cosplayer and figure model.