It’s a darn good thing that the men who collect my trash each Friday morning are stand-up guys, or the outcome of the following story might have been somewhat different. But let me start by saying that I’m not much of a project-y kind of girl. I admire those who are and I feel like I am very much surrounded by them. So, I get ideas and things, but the execution is rare. I cannot plan for a project. I have to wait for the inspiration to come and hit me on the side of my head between my cheek and ear for me to start one. However, when it starts, there is rarely any stopping ‘till it’s done! This is what happened to me last Friday morning right as the trash was being picked up. (Note: Our neighbors who moved shared the same trash service, so their last pick up was that morning as well). I was on my front steps playing with the children, when I spotted a long branch laying in my neighbor Jen’s, trash pile. Now, the trash men were already en route from my drive way to their drive way when the overwhelming sense of urgency set in. I looked at the trash truck moving, then I looked at the branch, then I looked back at the trash truck that by now had stopped and the man was already tossing discarded items into the truck. This branch that I had my eye on looked just like the branch Jen had in her dinning room that she used as a curtain rod. Clever, right? I hopped up and ran over to the branch, shouting at her son Caleb and asking him if that was in fact the same branch. When he told me it was, I literally took the branch out from under the trash man’s hand as he was reaching for it. “I have to have this,” I said through my rushed breath. “Sure thing,” he said and smiled at me.

Ha-HA! I saved the branch from sure destruction and gave it a new home in my dining room! I even had to take it from the garbage man and explain to Chris why there was a branch leaning against the living room wall later that day! See? It was so worth it, if I may say so myself.

Chris and I ran out the very next day to Lowe’s and found the least expensive curtains and brackets and I’ve never been happier sitting in this room. Yea, its not an original idea. I most certainly did take it from Jen.  But its such a great one and I’m glad I could keep the branch in use, which happened to have come from Craig’s parent’s yard in the downtown, wooded part of the city! It only took me 9 years and a discarded tree branch to get a curtain up in my dining room. Like I said, though, I have to wait for it and this just happened to take a little longer.