I may have mentioned before that I have a thing for chalkboards.

It’s more than just a ‘thing’, I guess.

It sort of shattered violently and noisily as a result of rapid combustion (that came up when I googled, “synonym for exploded”) past passion and onto obsession before I ever even realized it.

Not kidding.

My hair blew black one day a la that old Maxell audio cassette tape high fidelity ad, and KAPOW!

Chalkboards.

Hang on. I’ll get a few shots…

Okay, so the big one with the ‘Happy New Year’ on it is probably the biggest example of my obession because do you see the piece of roughtly cut granite that it is sitting on? When we built the disposable shack I actually bought that chalkboard it’s own shelf of roughly cut granite. And roughly cut granite turned out to be smoothly cut granite that a blowtorch and chisels and stuff are employed in order to make it ‘roughly cut granite’.

So basically, I bought my chalkboard a custom granite shelf.

Can’t get more wHiedly obsessed over your chalkboard than that, I think.

If you have been reading regularly (and I thank you from the bottom of my heart if this is so), you recognize the potty chalkboard. It is lovely and very useful, as I’ve said before, for allowing terrific multi-tasking while you are in my downstairs bathroom. Sometimes you come out super smart and philosophical depending on what is written on there when you visit.

Once, when my friend Kim Dahlberg visited with her family during a Patriots game, I put football-oriented sayings on there so she would sound football smart when she came out of the potty (seriously, the potty chalkboard started with “pssst, Kim, look over here…”

It was very funny when she came out and actually said things like, “What down is it?” and, “I heard you cheering, did someone get a pick six?!”. Because my friend Kim Dahlberg is wicked smaht about a lot of things and oh-my-Gawd is she one fantastic cook and enlightened yoga-y person, but she knows absolutely nothing about football and we usually have to tell her who we are rooting for based on the color of the uniforms.

She also looks to me to make sure she is cheering for the right team when the crowd on the tv erupts. Usually she is not. So one look at me and she goes from maniacal fan to awkward silence.

Then she gets us food so we all forgive her.

The potty chalkboard is my friend Kim’s best friend when she visits during a Patriots game.

The other little chalkboards have just appeared over time. I don’t even know how.

Like, when I went to photograph them, I almost missed the little one by the kitchen fireplace that says, “Maine on my mind” because it is always there and it’s little and Maine is always on my mind. It’s just part of the fabric of the house.

So, long story short there are a lot of chalkboards and they change their messages all the time, without warning.

So when I started the blog, my niece Courtney (who shares my chalkboard passion, and strives to reach my obsession one day (but she is still young)), asked me if I was going to include quotes, because I have always been keen on quotes in my house, especially on my chalkboards.

So why not a chalkboard on the blog?

That would be so me!

But I thought photographing my chalkboards would not look fantastic and plus I am only a budding chalkboard artist so I cannot compete with what is on the web for chalkboard art, because mainly I am focusing on becoming a better photographer for my images and I am working on my writing and why are you putting so much pressure on me to also be a fabulous chalkboard artist too?!

Geez!

But now I am so excited because, people, you are not going to believe what I found.

There’s an app for that!

Yes, there is! For a mere $7.99 I have in my possession an app so powerfully happifying for me that I am just Snoopy dancing with glee.

And it’s not just a chalkboard or just inspiration in app form…

It’s Chalkspiration!

Seriously. Chalkspiration. That’s the name of the app.

I know!

So now I am so excited because periodically I can put up a beautiful chalkboard featuring images from Dingleville and add very cool and inspirational quotes to them just like at home!

This is just so awesome because sometimes I can send special notes to you just like I do for my friend Kim Dahlberg during Patriots games and then you can be wicked smaht about lots of different subjects that maybe you weren’t so smaht about before (be-fo-ah).

So here is my first Dingleville Chalkboard, chalkspired by my brand new app:

How cool is that?!

Very cool. That is very cool.

Sometimes it’s the very little things that kick off a smile on a Saturday morning.

Chalkspiration did it for me.

Well, the chalkspiration app and coffee.

That probably went without saying.

Thanks for readin’.

* As always, you can come on over to Just Ponderin’s facebook page to comment or just hang out.