I no sooner finished vacuuming when my dear little Lucy made the mess you see in this first picture. By the way, that toy she is tearing apart is only a few hours old. I sewed her up a batch of them that morning. She's still in her destructive puppy phase, and I figured better a toy than my furniture. But she could have at least pretended to have some trouble demolishing my offerings!Moving on to my desk, I found a couple of things that were not where they belong. Okay, more than a few. Notice the close-ups. That's so you can't see the entire messy office space. Yeah, huh? Dumb like a fox.
The first item is a bag full of brooches--some vintage, some not. I have been running a special in my Etsy shop: For every ruana purchased, the customer receives a free brooch. (Pretty good deal, if I do say so--and I do.) However, I have not sold a ruana since Christmas, yet these remain nestled in their resting place below the computer monitor.
The second misplaced item on my desk, is my thesaurus. It should be standing with the other books along the back wall, but I use it so often that I tend to leave it out. In fact, I used it just now to find another word for misplaced. There aren't that many that fit in this context. I haven't "forgotten the whereabouts" of these things that are "scattered" about, I simply "placed them wrongly" because I am a "disorganized," creative soul whose things are often "put in the wrong place." 
Unfortunately, before I managed to complete the second one, our mischievous cat absconded with one of the half-finished headbands and it hasn't been seen since--the headband, not the cat. At the last minute, I whipped up another flower in red and sewed it to a shiny green ponytail holder, finishing just before we left for our trip to Lil Rhody. Whew!
The headbands now reside in a drawer in my sewing room until I decide what I'll do with them next--maybe something cute for Valentine's or St. Patrick's Day.
On the table where the mirror now rests while I write this, is a neat wooden box with old-time games inside. The words "Authentic American Pastimes Collection" sprawl across the clear acrylic cover and it's easy to see the games: Jacks, Pickup Sticks, and Marbles. The set belongs on a shelf on the porch, but it contains lots of little pieces and had to be rescued from visiting two-year-old hands. When she grows enough to reach the top of the sideboard, I figure she'll be old enough to play with--rather than eat--the game parts.
And that brings us back to the aforementioned mischievous cat. We adopted Betty 'Boom-Boom' Boop the day before her third birthday after falling in love with all of her gorgeous black beauty. Boom-Boom Betty is big-boned, for sure, but there aren't any bones in the stomach, right? Hers--stomach, not bones--waddles freely whenever she walks to her food dish. And she walks there often, checking to see whether we've come to our senses and decided to feed her more than twice daily. We haven't.
When the search for food and interfering with my belongings bores her, the Boopster loves to lounge. She has claimed the bed in the sewing/guest room as her own and though she'd deny it, the truth is she sheds. And yes, she's the queen and all that, but I still don't want to have to wash the embroidered linen duvet cover any more than necessary. So we've come to a compromise, I keep an old woolen blanket on the bed and she...well, she doesn't do anything. I guess the only give here was really on my part.
So there you have it, folks. The second creative exercise is finally completed and reported to you. Stay tuned for number three. Here's a hint: It has something to do with a Swiss Army knife!
