Bramble Patch: September 2012

Here are some of this month's happy distractions.

 Does anyone out there run a store or restaurant? Can I come over and hang this sign in your window?

They held a cat video film festival and I didn't get an invite. Color me peeved.

A two-minute scientific look at why people procrastinate and what they can do to stop. And by "they" I mean "me."

The new modern family: I think we are going to be seeing more and more of this.

Confetti System made the most amazing garland for West Elm. Are you thinking what I'm thinking?

Susan's Pinterest board is like a candy store of photography tips. Photo geeks, try not to crap your pants.

Artsy movie about a cult? I am so there.

This gal makes the most precious ornaments sculpted to look like your house. Talk about a great gift.

Man, I miss Designing Women.

Halloween Special***

This is the niftiest and easiest Halloween decoration I have seen in a long time. I'm going to line the front porch steps with these to scare the berjeezers out of Trick-or-Treaters.

I am expecting a new nephew any minute. I wonder if they will let me dress him up as Mr. T?

Speaking of Halloween costumes, I think I found mine.

Q: Who wants to commission their own personal zombie portrait? A: Everyone.

Three words: Monster Glitter Baby. 

 So, what was your most recent happy distraction?

Grow a Pair

I went to the farmer's market next to my office looking to pick up a couple of stargazer lilies for my desk. I came back with big hairy balls.

Yes. This is happening.

They are some sort of seed pod. Another flower shopper said she bought them three weeks ago and they dried standing up in the vase on her desk. "My boss hates them. He says the last thing he needs is another reason to remember the size of my balls."

I bought the whole bucket.

The conversation reminded me of a sign I made for my friend Jeanine a few years ago. At the time, I was really into vintage inspired graphic design. Jeanine was really into telling people to "Shut up and get some balls."

It was also right about that time when this SNL skit with Sarah Palin (Tina Fey) was popular. You might remember it as the "And I can see Russia from my house!" skit. There is a part at the end when Hillary Clinton (Amy Poehler) encourages the media to examine the credentials of female candidates. “In closing...I encourage you to grow a pair. And if you can’t I will lend you mine.”

For the record, Hillary has loaned me hers on several occasions.

If you are need of some, just let me know. I have plenty to spare!

50 Home Remedies: How Black Pepper Saved Me $700

Warning: this is a long post.

I have been meaning to write a comprehensive post on home remedies for some time but when I sat down to do it, I struggled with what to include or what not to include. I worry about people getting bad information. I trust we all know better than to lick a finger and stick it in an electrical socket, and yet, thousands of people go to the emergency room each year for that very reason. We is geniuses.

And speaking of emergency rooms...

Early Sunday morning I was washing dishes and I cut my thumb on a knife. Bad. Bad enough that I couldn’t get the bleeding to stop after 30 minutes of applying ice and restrictive pressure. It wasn't a big cut but there was enough blood to make me worry. Normally I would have gone to an urgent care center but the one by me didn't open for another three hours (remember this is early Sunday morning). Plan B was a hospital emergency room, but with my insurance, an ER visit costs $700 the second I cross the threshold. Don't even ask me what a band-aid costs. Now, $700 is a price I'd pay it for a broken bone, but a tiny thumb cut? I decided to give it another hour; if I couldn't get the bleeding to stop in an hour I would have to suck it up an go to the ER.

So what did I do? I googled “stop bleeding home remedy”.

Let me tell you, I read all kinds of crazy stuff. And I tried most of them. Vinegar, diluted bleach, sugar... Nothing helped. Then I read about fresh ground black pepper. I thought this was crazy but I tried it.

Keep in mind, the photos below would be far more effective if I had taken a BEFORE shot, but 1. I don't think y'all would want to see that and 2. I didn't want to get blood all over my camera. So you will just have to imagine and big bloody thumb. Go on now....

I cleaned the wound thoroughly, then packed a teaspoon of fresh-ground black pepper over the cut as best I could, then wrapped the whole thing it a clean paper towel and secured with a big piece of masking tape. After ten minutes I removed the paper towel and expected to see more bloody mess. To my shock and amazement, this is what I found...

What the?

Look, I'm not suggesting anyone tries to use this method to heal a gunshot wound, but if you are in a bind, give it a try. 

So while I am singing the praises of one home remedy, I thought I would take the opportunity to share some more. I emailed a bunch of friends and asked you guys on facebook for some tried-and-true home remedies. If you have one that is not listed below, take a second to chime in the comments below.

***50 Home Remedies ***

Colds / Nasal

Take a super hot bath. Mix in a couple of bottles of hydrogen peroxide, a hunk of fresh ginger (shredded), and five crushed IBprofen capsules. Soak for half an hour. This will detox your whole body by pulling the crud out through your skin (remember your skin is an organ too!). Drink tons of water to replace the stuff that comes out in the bath. Warning, you might grossed out an want a cold shower afterwards. If you have any cuts or hangnails cover them with vaseline before getting in the tub. Sandra

Remember that Ibuprofen is the only pain reliever made to work on mucus membrane (mouth, ear, sinuses). Christina

Eucalyptus oil. Eucalyptus oil. Eucalyptus oil. Sprinkle some in a hot bath. When you are dry, rub it on your feet, wrists, neck and scalp then over the ears with hats, scarves and put socks on top. I also mix it with a bit of chapstick and rub it on my temples and beneath my nose. The vapor helps loosen mucus, coughs, and opens up your lungs. It's also an anti-inflammatory and just sinks into your skin and takes the edge off of the achyness of being ill. Susan  (Note, I, Aunt Peaches, second this method wholeheartedly. I am rarely without Vicks Vapo rub for this very reason. Love my menthol/eucalyptus combo!)

My family swears by ouzo. If you think you are getting sick, drinking a shot and/or gargling with it before you go to bed to fight off the cold. Cynthia
Homemade chicken soup. I make sure to put fresh ginger in mine (calms upset stomachs and is very soothing). Kelly
 
For a nasal infection, a cup of warm water with a tablespoon of table salt shoot a cc or so up your nose, then wait until you've caught your breath and do it again a couple of times, it dries all the gunk. You can also gargle the salt water for a sore throat. Rhonda

If you have to sneeze pinch your nose and rub the roof of your mouth with your tongue. Cat  

Skin Ailments

(For sunburns) Make tea; pour it over the afflicted area (while standing or sitting in tub) and gently rub the teabags over the area. Dawn

If you have a pimple, wet a cotton ball, wring it out, add a few drops of Yonka serum and hold it to your face as long as you can, or use a band aid.  It has oil of thyme, lavender oil, oil of geranium, and one other. They are all anti-inflammatories. Ann

Apple cider vinegar is great on warts. Soak a cotton ball in it, place on wart and bandaid over. Refresh every day for a week. That should do it. Bev

Honey and salt paste for a facial scrub. The salt will disinfect and pull out impurities while the honey is a natural moisturizer. Cassandra

Poke a pin in an Advil Liquid Gel capsule and apply to the spot. It will knock that sucker out in no time. Caitlyn

Tea tree oil is the real deal, brilliant antiseptic and good for spot-treating acne. Katie

For bee stings, cut a green onion and apply the raw end to the sting. Same thing works with banana peels. Herby

A spoonful of honey a day makes your lips super soft. Randi

Lavender essential oil will help a burn (like from a stove) and it helps it heal faster and scars are less visible. It has to be a true note or pure form not mixed with any carrier oils. Elizabeth 

Use Listerine as bug spray. Spray all over your skin and clothes. Mosquitoes hate it. Janet

Bug bite? Rub it with a dry bar of soap. Will stop the itching. Susan

Crush up an asprin and mix it with baking soda and lemon juice. Make a paste and rub over your face for a couple of minutes. Rinse with cool water and ice cubes. Great for special occasions. Reem

Stomach

An almost surefire cure for nausea, even extreme nausea (where things have already started to happen, ahem)….try saltines and coke. Not ginger ale or sprite--there is something about the coke syrup that works. Eat a tiny corner nibble of the saltine (has to be the salted kind), take the tiniest sip of coke. Wait ten minutes, do it again. Repeat as often as needed. Works almost every single time. Myra

Chewing on fennel and caraway seeds is a great way to calm an upset stomach. My mother is Persian -- they have used for thousands of years. Salma

Hiccups

I learned this trick from a bar tender who said it works on everyone, even drunk people. Take a glass of water and drink 3 or 4 sips from the opposite rim. Meaning the rim that is not closest to you. This will mean bending over and probably spilling some water so do it outside or in the shower. Something in your diaphragm stretches in order to reach like that. It smooths the hiccups in two seconds. Amanda

A spoonful of peanut butter for hiccups. Works every time! Melissa

Especially for children: hold your kid's nostrils closed with your thumbs (one for each nostril) while using your fingers to close their ears. (Push in the flappy guys that partially cover the ear opening; don't try to plug the ear canal like a cork.) Have them take 10 sips of water. If they insist on breathing, let them do so only after the 5th and 10th sips. Voila! Works almost every time. John

Our sure fire hiccup trick: a glass of tap water, hold a paper towel over the top of the glass, sip the water *through* the towel. A few gulps ought to do it. Tracy

Ear problems

Mix equal parts vinegar and rubbing alcohol and put 4 drops in effected ear. Works great to prevent my kiddos' swimmer’s ear. Jayme

To help babies and toddlers with ear pressure problems on airplanes (especially small planes)...during take-off ask the flight attendant for two paper cups and two of those piping hot towels (or ask for hot water and soak some towels yourself). As the plane is taking off, put the towels in the cups and cup them over your child's ears -- no gaps. The steam will escape from the cups into their ears and alleviate the pressure. This works great on my son who has chronic sinus problems. Stopped him from screaming bloody murder and now he thinks it's a game. Learned this trick from a flight attendant and I never got a chance to thank her properly! Rebecca

Soar Throat / Coughing

Warmed lemonade with a teaspoon of honey swirled in cures a kid's nighttime coughing fits. Amy

Gargling with salt water - works wonders. Sore throats, cough, even earaches. Becky

Eat a couple of marshmallows for a sore throat. Dawn

A spoonful of honey makes a sore throat feel better and stops cough better than OTC stuff. Our crew team (rowing) goes through a lot of "honeybears" at regattas when the weather is cooler- the coach is a doctor and he originally recommended to rowers, etc. Dawn

Headache

My favorite is eating a big thick shake (like a Blizzard) when you have a headache. Numbs it away. Lisa

I have to travel for work and I'm always getting headaches from smells on buses, trains, planes and conference rooms (imagine -- perfumes, BO, cleaning products, etc). I keep a plastic bag with a tissue loaded with lemon oil. When I need it I waft the tissue under my nose to block or balance the offending smells. Justin

Splinters

Make a paste of baking soda and water. Pack it on the splinter and put a band-aid over it. 10 minutes later the splinter will pop out. Jennifer

Apply hydrogen peroxide. It draws the stuff out. Heather

Soak the area in olive oil before trying to pluck it out with tweezers or a hot needle. It makes it easier to grab onto the splinter. Natalie

Toothaches

Clove oil for toothaches. A couple drops from a Qtip helps immensely. Don't swallow it! It will make your mouth water and it tastes horrible, but it works. Christina

Hold an ice cube between your thumb and your forefinger (same side as the toothache). The nerves hook up in a weird way. It will calm the pain long enough to get to the dentist and have the real problem taken care of. Grant

For a canker sore, gargle with warm water and salt for 30 seconds every few hours. If it is a particularly bad sore, soak a black tea bag in very hot very salty water for a couple of minutes, then press the bag directly on the sore for 10 minutes. The salt will draw out the crud and the tannins in the tea will relieve pain. Dee

Hangover

MSG. Cat

My roommate taught me a after a night of heavy drinking to take a multivitamin before you go to bed and one when you wake up. Mary Elena

A hangover is just a symptom of dehydration. You can prevent the worst of it by drinking 2 liters of water before going to bed (hopefully you can remember). I also take a small dose of an anti-inflammatory like aspirin. Coleman

Urinary Tract Infections

Alka Seltzer has never been advertised for such, but it will treat UTI's. Cassandra

I get UTIs all the time since having mt second baby. I get no warning at all. Unsweetened cranberry juice will get rid of it in a day or two, but if you are worried about, ahem *making a mess* , and you can't spend all day sitting on the toilet, you can fold a couple of clean cotton socks and stick them in your underwear like a pantyliner. It's not glamorous but it gets the job done. You can tend to your kids and go to the store for medicine without worrying you will pee your pants. Anonymous

Baby Care

Pure cornstarch cures diaper rash better than any OTC remedy I've ever tried. Amy

Feet

Listerine is wonderful for a great foot soak. It's a very powerful disinfectant and will keep your feet smelling yummy. I like the vanilla mint. Cassandra

Fever

Soak socks in vinegar and put on clean feet (stick a towel underneath). Wear until they dry out. Maybe an hour or two. Take temperature, it should have come down a bit. June

Lice

Natural Remedy for Lice: 3 tblspoon baby shampoo 3 tblspoon olive oil 1 tsp tea tree oil 1 tsp eucalyptus oil. Leave on hair for 30 minutes. Rinse thoroughly.  Jen

Taking Pills

If your kid has to take yucky pills or medicine, have them suck on a popsicle first. It will numb their tongue and sense of taste long enough to make swallowing easier. Jennifer

OKay. That's it for today. Feel free to chime in the comments with your favorite home remedy. Also, this is the part when I am supposed to encourage you to seek professional medical help in cases of serious illness, but I am going to assume we all have enough common sense to know that much already. Right? Right. Stay safe and healthy everyone!

Tie-Dyeing for Formal Dining

There are so many reasons I love setting the table for an autumn feast: Thanksgiving, Rosh Hashanah, breaking the fast for Yom Kipur, Autumnal Solstice, International Talk Like a Pirate Day, Be Bald and Free Day… the list goes on.

Here, I decided to set up a formal dinner party for Halloween. A small, spooky gathering is a great way to feel festive without everyone feeling obligated to don a full costume or sit on the porch handing out candy in the cold. Then after dinner everyone can crash on the couch for apple cobbler and a scary movie. Now doesn’t that sound good?

OK, let’s start by setting the table. It all hinges on the table cloth and today I am making my own. Saddle up, this one is going to be fun!

When I initially signed on to do a sponsored post with Rit dye, I thought I would demonstrate  a new way to use the dye like a funky costume or some outdoor decoarations, but after thinking about it, instead I decided to show a new way to display everyone's favorite way to use fabric: tie dye.

Autumn is the perfect time of year to break out the tie dye. Tell me you don't see where I am going here...

Okay, let's get the elephant out of the room and talk about tie dye. Because tie dye gets a bad rap. People (some people) think is garish and weird. Or, as my father called it "beardy weirdy." Which was also slang for "hippie dippy."

Yes, tie dye is beloved by Phish loving hippies the world over, bless them, but it’s also beloved by people who know a good thing when they see it. 

Me? I love to use tie dye as an active neutral. Something that goes with everything. Other active neutrals include black and white stripes, moss green, navy blue, thick silver sequins, Scotch tartan, and my personal favorite: leopard. These are colors and patterns you can add to a composition to bring all the other elements together. A common thread. Tie dye is an excellent active neutral. Especially on a dining table set with jumbled components.

See, I have a lot of nice things in my house, but a big matching formal dining set just isn’t one of them. Do I care? No. Why? Because I know I can always pull things together with an active neutral. Like tie dye!

Yup. I use disposable paper products for formal dining. Mind blown.

For this set up, the only special purchases were the black “poison” paper plates ($2.50 at Target) and some white pumpkins (2 for $1.00 at the farmers market). Everything else is from my everyday cupboard. Plain white china, plain wine glasses, melamine polka-dot plates from Target (another active neutral), some red leaf glasses I bought at Goodwill, and oodles of candles. The good silver was a gift from my friend Ann, but beyond that, nothing on the table falls in the "special occasion" category.  I'm even using outdoor patio chairs. But, put them all together on a tie dye background and they sure do look gussied up! If I had done this set this all on a white table cloth it would have been totally Snoozeville. Tie dye is the trick.

Bonus: Sloppy dinner guests? Tie dye hides stains like nothing else. Score!

   

Before showing you how to make this, I want to say two things:

1. It is really hard to take pictures while wearing rubber gloves.
2. There are endless varieties of colors and patterns you can achieve with various tie-dye techniques. Rit has great information about this online. Consult with them and the directions on the package for specifics, but I can assure you it is easier than you think. Just don’t let yourself get hooked on a visual in your mind before you start the process. Embrace the unpredictable.

Materials

• One cotton flat sheet
• Half a bottle of Tangerine Rit Fabric Dye
• Half a bottle of Scarlet Rit Fabric Dye
• 20 rubber bands
• Salt
• One large pot of simmering hot water

Okay, let's get started...

More Liberace Pumpkins

Last year I made two snazztastic Liberace pumpkins. Now this year they made three friends. Okay, maybe I made them. Just the same, they are altogether now a happy gang of five. Next year I'll aim for nine. I figure if Liberace appreciated anything above all else, it would be abundance. 

My favorite is the one I am calling The Snooki Pumpkin (not to be confused with Alexa's amazing Snooki Pumpkin). Mine started out as a $1.99 foam pumkpin from Goodwill. It was a little rough around the edges so I decoupaged it with leopard print tissue paper, sealed it with Mod Podge mixed with a spoonful of gold glitter, then just to keep things classy, I topped it off with some randomly dispersed orange rhinestones ringed with concentric circles of puff paint. The painted dots are so simple but they add a sort of ethnic flair I think. I'm not sure what kind of ethnic flair that might be but I know it's there.

Happy Halloween!

The Rumspringa of Dessert

I may or may not have spent my birthday dinner at a Medieval Times ("Dinner and Tournament!") eating chicken legs with my fingers and wearing a paper crown that barely squeezed over my head. It was amazing. There were long-haired horses and sequined wizards and pina coladas served in glow-in-the-dark challices.

I may or may not have considered buying a commemorative place mat.

I may or may not have greedily reached directly into the path of a 10-year-old girl named Kaytlyn while attempting to grab a pink carnation mid-air shortly after it was thrown into the crowds by The Green Knight, who was, clearly, aiming that carnation in my direction. After all, it was my birthday. Okay it was her birthday too but I'm 23 years her senior which means I have 23 less years to catch pink carnations from guys on saddles. So don't act like I didn't have it coming, KAYTLYN.

Because it was my birthday (and if that isn't a good excuse to eat crap, I don't know what is) I decided to shelf any health-conscious food choices for a couple of days. Okay maybe it was four days. Ease up.

I had been looking forward to a scoop of fried ice cream from my favorite Mexican restaurant for months but it paled in comparison to the pastries and treats that paraded into my life this weekend. Using my new-found-carefree-33-year-old sense of abandonment, I happily drove a fork into each one of them.

It was Heaven. It was gluttonous. It was the rumspringa of dessert.

Sigh...

Now it's Monday. The glow has worn off and all I want is an Alkaseltzer and a bucket of raw vegetables.

Hello salad bar.

*** For anyone (like me) who gets annoyed by people posting a excessive instagram photos of food (like me), you should read this sometime.

The Jesus Year

Today marks 33 years of living. Welcome to my Jesus Year!

Are you familiar with The Jesus Year concept?

Let me take you on this fun ride....

So, supposedly, 33 is the age at which Jesus came into popularity, and thereby, we are all supposed to use this number as something to measure  our own life achievements. A benchmark. A barometer. This sounded like a good concept I was 8 and 33 seemed like a whisper away from a nursing home, but now, today, it's different. It's irritating. It's sort of sad when you start feeling all good and stuff about yourself for remembering to pay your electric bill on time, only to realize that when he was your age, Jesus was raising the dead. Jesus was walking on water. Jesus was making miracles. Jesus had better hair than you. 

Jesus, talk about butthurt.

Then again, when Jesus was my age, he died.

So there is that.

Then again, back then, everyone died by forty-something. I mean Cher didn't even begin to get interesting until she was like 47. So yeah, I think I'll let myself percolate a little more before breaking out the ye'olde Jesus yard stick.

Look, I don't want to take a single day for granted, but I also don't want to waste a minute worrying about living up to some external standard. Simply put: I have too much living to do.  No reason to get hung up on anything. At least not until I turn 42 and hit The Elvis Year. Then we'll have something to talk about.

All-in-all, 33 is looking pretty good right now. Happy birthday to me!

When do you know you are too old to curse?
When your friends put it on your birthday cake. Point taken, fuckers. 

 

 

A Blank Slate

Since moving in almost one year ago, I have been putting off decorating the dining room.

For one thing, I don't dine in there much. It seems silly to waste time and money on something used so little.

For another thing, it had this plate rail that I didn't know what to do about. Part of me thought about taking up a plate collection, but seeing as I need another thing to collect like I need a hole in the head, well, the plate rail stood empty.

Last winter the top band was painted a soft pink, then last month I put up some MDF strips to give the walls that board and batten look that is getting so popular these days. It looks OK. Meh. For $25 worth of materials, it looks fine, but I wish I had taken my time with measuring more carefully. The bottoms of the strips don't blend in the molding that well. Eventually I'd like a way to patch that, but for now, it's fine.

As of this week I have a blank slate.

But as you may know, nothing stays blank in my house very long....


Changes a foot...

Is it a foot or afoot?

Whatever.You get the point. I'm making crap.

So, the pivot point to a dining room is the dining table, right? Mine is a nice old thing with lovely regency style bamboo legs. Love the bottom. Hate the top. The top is a mess and appears to be laminate of some sort. I was thinking about painting the whole thing minty green but now I'm thinking I'll just gold leaf the top and call it a day. I like gold leaf and if I do it right, it will hide imperfections better than a solid coat of paint. Plus, it's gold. Enough said.

But then there is the issue of chairs. I like the idea of a contrasting wood with a different material. Metal? I see those acrylic ghost chairs all over but they don't look comfortable. I could do fabric but then I'd spend every Saturday vacuuming cat hair off of them. So metal is good. Red metal? Maybe. Hmmm....

The pajaki is a soon-to-be TBD DIY and the portrait gallery is already in swing. I have lots of art but I like the idea of hanging nothing but portraits in one room. We had a hallway like that as a kid. Of course, those were mostly relatives. I would like to open it up beyond relatives to include, oh, say, Neil Diamond?

Anyway, all of that is to say; stay tuned!

One of These Things Does Not Belong

An early birthday present arrived in the mail last week.

Based on the packaging, I thought it was a book. Maybe a cat toy. Or perhaps a funky bracelet....

Imagine my surprise when I opened it up to find a leopard print knife. Clearly, some people know me too well.

Better yet, it also came with a matching meat cleaver. Oh what fun it will be to cleave meat with safari flair. Oh happy day indeed.

I have a feeling print patterened knives are going to be a thing from here on in. Sur La Table is selling these fetching polka dot babies right now, and you can find all sorts of other options from Kuhn Rikon. Neato!

Let’s Get Leafy

It’s fall y’all. 

...or autumn y’all. 

...or pumpkin latte season at Starbucks y’all.  

Let's embrace it.

Let’s get leafy.




If you have followed this blog for a while you might recognize this project. It's a lot like the valentine garland I hung up last February. It was supposed to come down by March but I liked it so much I let it hang up year round. Which is really just a nice way of saying I was too lazy to take it down, so okay, you got me, my butt is a lazy one. Revelation I think not. 

I like this project because 1. It was 100% free, and 2. I can leave it hanging September to November, and even after that it can stay on display in my pantry window or some corner of the house that doesn't need to look all seasonally fancified. 

I know someone is going to have a  fit because I’m promoting the use of plastic bags, so let me get this out of the way: I double dog pinky-swear to you that I own a hundred reusable bags and use them on a regular basis. They just don’t always come with me when I need them. They sit at home all day watching Sister/Sister marathons on off-network cable. If they don’t show up when and where I need them, it cannot be helped. So sometimes, just sometimes, I resort to using plastic bags. I already feel guilty about the matter so please, oh please, EASE UP ALREADY.

OK.  

Now let's get back to the pretty parts :)

Why I will not be shopping at Hobby Lobby anymore

Dear Hobby Lobby,

As an avid crafter and long-time Hobby Lobby shopper, I am disappointed by your recent choice to sue the United States government. Your suit claims that you do not want to follow the law by providing your employees with health insurance that would cover emergency contraception, because, as you say, "These abortion-causing drugs go against our faith."

 

Hobby Lobby, here are a three things I want you to know.

1. The morning-after pill does not cause abortions. It prevents pregnancy from happening in the first place. It stops ovulation and inhibits the egg from implanting in the uterine lining. It does not tinker with an embryo that has already implanted. It does not abort a fetus. 

Yes, I realize a lot of men like to believe that life begins at the very moment of male climax, but as any woman can tell you, that is not the case. Sad face, right?

In emergency situations, the morning-after pill is a necessary measure. Thousands of women rely on it every day to control their family planning. It is possible that some of them are amongst your 13,000 plus full-time employees.

How do I know that the morning-after pill is not an abortion? Because I have had occasion to use it myself. I have also taken the time to do my homework, read the scientific research, and asked several of my friends in the medical profession to share their thoughts. Just now, I even asked my dear friend Maureen, who is a doctor—and a conservative-minded Christian one at that. Our conversation went like this:
 

Now, I can see why you might be confused. Yes, there are some pills that can cause abortions. As the Mayo Clinic points out "Keep in mind that the morning-after pill isn't the same as mifepristone (Mifeprex), also known as RU-486 or the abortion pill. Mifeprex terminates an established pregnancy — one in which the fertilized egg has attached to the uterine wall and has already begun to develop."

But Mifeprex is not covered in the mandate mentioned in your law suit. So, errrm....this is awkward.  

Sorry Hobby Lobby, those are the facts. I believe in facts. You may believe in something different, and that's okay too. Facts will be around longer than both of us.

2. By opposing the morning-after pill, you are opposing a simple form of contraception. Your lawsuit claims that this is a violation of your religion, which I don't buy (see item 1) but okay, fine, you stick to it. Hold your ground. Keep your magic beans. But the thing is Hobby Lobby, you, as a corporation, are not your employees. You do not make family planning decisions for your staff. You have every right to hire and fire employees as you see fit, but, you do not have the right to dictate what those employees do with their bodies when they are off the clock.

I know what you are thinking Hobby Lobby, "But why should we have to pay for these women and their choice of life-style? Can't they just pay for this stuff themselves?"

Good points, Hobby Lobby. My employer asks a similar question every time they have to pay out for one of my colleagues who receives Type II Diabetes medication, or treatment for lung cancer, or someone's Viagra, or vasectomy, or any other medical treatment caused by "life-style choices." That's the way insurance works. It's all-in. Nobody gets to pick and choose coverage based on what they see fit and moral. You don't get to punish your employees by holding back medication because you don't agree with their life-style choices. Your lawsuit aims to set legal precedent that would prevent other US employers from covering contraception in their benefits package, and that is not cool Hobby Lobby. Not cool.

3. As a craft blogger and creative professional, I spend a lot of time in craft stores. A lot. Probably ten times more than anyone else I know (except for my other craft blogging friends, who are all reading this). I have to cross three other craft stores to get to the nearest Hobby Lobby, and I used to do it on a regular basis because I liked the way you do business. Your stores are always clean, well-stocked, and your employees know their stuff better than most. Yes, the Glitter-Me-Jesus figurines are a little freaky, and sometimes your music is weird, but hey, we can't all be DJs. All in all, over the years, I have spent a good deal of money at Hobby Lobby. As of yesterday that is over. I will not support a company that would deny its employees the ability to control their reproductive organs. I will not be shopping at Hobby Lobby anymore.

Furthermore, I am going to tell all my family, friends and colleagues about what you are doing with this lawsuit. I'm going to tell all my blog friends too. There are a few thousand of them dropping by every day. I don't expect all of them to agree with me, but I do expect that they will think about it. And yes, I'm hoping they will think about it as they are driving right past your store to head over to Michael's, or Jo-Ann's, or AC Moore, or Ben Franklin, or any of the other wonderful craft retailers who are observing their religious beliefs in their hearts and not in my biscuit. 

Warmly,

~ Aunt Peaches

If you are a Hobby Lobby customer and have an opinion on this issue, why don't you take a moment to tell them about it.

*** The Morning-After Update

Before publishing this yesterday afternoon I asked a friend to read it to make sure it wasn’t totally off-base or offensive. She said "Do you realize that you could lose half your readers by posting this?"

Yes. And that was a risk I was willing to take. However, to my amazement, the opposite has taken place. It appears that I have lost a few readers and gained many, many more. The overwhelming tide of support is startling. That was not expected.

I want to take a second to say thank you to everyone who is taking the time to weigh in -- on both sides of the debate. Thank you for telling your friends and sharing on facebook and writing emails to the folks at HL. Consumer buying power is one of the only tools we can use to see change. Lucky for us, it is also one of the most effective.

I also want to note that a number of people have sent emails to me directly because they don't feel comfortable commenting on this subject in public. The fact that they felt compelled to email is wonderful, appreciated, 100% understandable...and precisely the reason I wrote this post. Some things need to be said…in public. No one should have to feel bad about speaking their mind. Progress will never happen if folks are too afraid to say what they know to be true.

With that in mind, for a while here, I will be turning on my comment moderation. All comments will be published whether I agree with them or not. However, any mean-spirited remarks, particularly those in response to other commenters, will not be published. Period. I’m not asking you to agree with me, I’m asking you to think about it before you write it down. Who knows, if we each can say what we think and be respectful about it, we might just find some common ground and find a way to move forward.

Hugs,

AP

**Update Feb 10, 2013, one month after the law was to go into effect.

Several people have asked me about the current status of the lawsuit, and while I am not an attorney, I'll tell you what I know in a nutshell: Last fall, the district court denied Hobby Lobby's claim as a religious institution, so then HL appealed to another court which is, currently, essentially, in limbo. You can read more about it here, although none of it really matters right now because HL hired lawyers to find a legal loophole that allows them to reset their insurance calendar back many months, thus proving time to wait out the court system and avoid $1.3 million dollar daily fine. So that sounds fun. If you would like to see a list of for-profit companies who have suddenly become religious institutions to avoid paying for their employees health insurance, take a gander over here.

Also, unfortunately, many comments below were lost when I switched commenting service providers in January 2013. I apologize if yours was deleted or became "unthreaded." Comments on this post are now closed.