Update

Ok, I know it's been a few days (9?!) since I finished the Istanbul report and said there was other stuff happening here that deserved some space. Sorry! It's mostly old news now, and not one of my most creative posts (I'm in a hurry!), but just pretend that you're as out of the loop as I am and it will seem new and fascinating.
1) I cut Matt's hair. It has apparently been too hot for regular hair, which I find hard to believe, since my hair is 15 times longer than his was, but he had more hair to cut off than I expected. Here are some of the styles we considered.
I think this would have helped Matt make lots of new friends here in St. Paul, but apparently he's too good for the local tattoo shop crowd.
This is about what he looks like now, even though this photo is at least a week old. After we finished with Matt's, Rob got jealous (he seems to suffer a lot in the heat), so we cut off all his hair too.
I'm embarrassed to admit this, but I'm a bit jealous of his hair - it's thick and dark and kind of curly, where mine is thin and stubbornly straight - so it was hard to see it all cut off. But it turns out that my family's hair is a lot easier on the clippers than his.
Don't worry, I still have my hair. But that may change if the weather continues.
After fixing up the guys, I decided it was time to tackle other, longer-standing projects, so I finally got some primer and paint and polyurethane (which is a lot more expensive than I thought)
and painted this previously hideous roll-top desk and our coffee table. The project took me three days of painting, two of which were pretty good painting days. I learned that white paint and black dogs do not mix, and neither do perfectionism and procrastinating (both of which are problems for me). I haven't put the hardware back on, because I want to find something better (but that isn't keeping us from using it). I haven't found something better because first I need to finish up the detail on the roll-top. I probably won't get around to either of these because I wasted so much time working on that stupid desk that I am behind schedule on my research project.
Etcetera.



In other big news, Rob and I might buy a house. This plan is only a few hours old, so don't get too excited (but do cross your fingers, and maybe free up some time this fall to come help us renovate/move). Here is a sneak peek of the kitchen.