Spontaneously Decorating with Turquoise, or "At Least it's a Pretty Color"

Last night before bedtime, I was looking at one of those decorating blog-hops where people showed their work and craft spaces.  I noticed how stark white seems to be the current trendy look, and I was marveling over how those people could keep white things white. I mean, for work and crafty activities?  I make a mess. Plus all of that white looks kind of stark and unfriendly, don't you think?  Well, that's my opinion, anyway.   

I shut down my Ipad and headed off to bed, making a detour into my non-white and rather cluttered office to put some mail on the desk. Sitting next to my keyboard were a few fountain pens that I'd cleaned earlier in the day to ready them for filling with ink.  I love fountain pens!  But if I drain one and then let it sit for a few days before I refill it (which I do, constantly) the ink dries in the nib and it needs a little flushing out with warm water before it can be refilled to flow smoothly again.

ANYway, I'd had a very productive day. (I promise you, this is going somewhere.) I'd worked in the garden. I'd checked a bunch of stuff of of my to-do list, including "clean pens."  But wait, I hadn't refilled them, and I wanted that task finished. I figured I'd quickly fill the three pens with ink, at best a 10 minute task.

I grabbed one of my favorite inks, Navajo Turquoise by Noodler's Ink. I love this color for writing in my journal -- it's actually a bit darker out of the pen than in the Goulet's sample up there, so it looks more like a turquoisey dark blue and it makes me happy.

Here's what my bottle looks like.

I use this ink pretty often, but it's this empty and this messy because I spilled it once. Big surprise.

So, I got my pens lined up, their converters ready to load.  I opened the bottle. I dipped the first pen, realizing that because the level of ink in the bottle was low, I had to dip the pen pretty deeply to immerse the nib in the ink. Hmm, I need a tissue to wipe the tip off, I thought.  And as I turned to grab a tissue -- you are seeing where this is going, aren't you? -- my elbow hit the bottle, and yes, the bottle tipped and spilled a lovely Navajo Turquoise onto my desk and under my keyboard.

You'll forgive me for not stopping to take photos, I assume?  Rest assured that I leapt up, grabbed the box full of tissues and started swabbing frantically.  I dashed to the laundry room to grab some rag towels.  You can imagine the frenzy of wiping that ensued. I left a lot of turquoise fingerprints in the process, but I eventually got it all cleaned off of my desk and keyboard. Luckily none spilled into the keys, it was just underneath.  I was greatly relieved that none had dripped into the carpet.

Now my mousepad -- a pretty floral with a turquoise background to begin with -- has an extra dark turquoise corner.

Good thing I have a manicure scheduled for tomorrow, as I don't really want to wear this turquoise nail look for long.  And this is after a whole lot of scrubbing.

It was only when I went to climb into bed that I discovered the rather large splodge of turquoise ink on the top of my right foot.  It must have dripped when I was carrying soggy towels to the laundry room. (Still, just my foot. Not the rug. Phew.) Back into the bathroom for more scrubbing.  I went to bed with just a delicate aqua stain.


So, things are back to normal sort of, plus a few turquoise additions to the decor. But I'm quite certain that I'd never be able to carry off a stark white office.