Stuff and Nonsense

How's That Facebox Thing Work Again?

2011-11-04T20:10:00.000-04:00

Really just a brief post so people won't be confronted with the "Sweet Baby Jesus!" title, and also I've (by which I mean Rob has) got my shop Facebook page set up. And here's a lovely rhino I embroidered. He's for sale, too.

Sweet Baby Jesus! Check Out The F***ing T-Shirt!

2011-10-30T23:17:00.000-04:00

See, this is the kind of thing I was talking about last night. That's the kind of copy I wish I could use on my Etsy stuff. Except, you know, I want to sell it. But it would be awesome.

OK, here's my very slightly sought after post on the process of one of my t-shirt designs, from the original photo that served as the inspiration to the finished product. Currently I'm working on a series of very minimalist portraits of early punk musicians, primarily the ones from the New York scene in the mid-70s, though obviously Joe Strummer was British. The original one of these was a drawing I did many years ago of Jules Shear, from an article or maybe even an ad in Spin magazine. Jules isn't particularly punk, I know, but it was a good drawing.

I don't have any photos of the actual embroidery in progress, because frankly I don't find that particularly interesting. If you dig that sort of thing you can look for some of the billions of embroidery tutorials that are on the internet.

So here's the photo of Joe Strummer that's the basis for my design. I found it on Pinterest, and I liked the effect of the contrast between the smoke and the curls in his hair, though I knew I wouldn't have the smoke in my final design.

I did some sketches and came up with this one that I didn't mind too much. Still liking the curls.

I wanted to refine the design even further, to make it as minimalist as possible while still keeping it representative and fairly recognizable. If I may be self-indulgently arty, (and I may, otherwise why have a damn blog?) currently I'm into making things as linear and gestural as possible. How little can I actually put down on paper and still retain the essence of whatever it is I'm drawing? (It's awful, isn't it? Soon I'll be going on about "mark-making". Someone please kill me if that happens.)

I decided to go with the design above, and then all I had to do was the embroidery, which is the fun and easy part. It's getting easier and faster all the time, which is good from a production standpoint, and makes it more relaxing and therapeutic from a mental health one. Lord knows I need all the help I can get.

Here's a closeup. I went with red and black, because the Clash, you know? Also I had a black t-shirt. All these designs are done in stem stitch, because it's nice and linear and lets me keep some of the sketch-like quality I want. I'm getting a lot better at it, too. I hardly ever have to rip anything out anymore, and if I do, it's usually because of a mistake in the design and not the quality of the stitches.

I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out. In fact, I won't mind if nobody buys this, because I'll happily wear it myself, though seriously, check out the fucking t-shirt!

Once, I Made a Good Choice

2011-10-29T21:41:00.000-04:00

It's always refreshing (and novel) to realize that something you did in the past turned out to be a good idea. God knows it doesn't happen very often. But I've been editing photos from a batch of embroidered t-shirts I've been working on, and I'm finding it profoundly fucking tedious. Now I'm having the chance to be very grateful that I never decided to go into graphic design, as I've considered at several points in the past, usually when I was feeling conflicted and unsure about my abilities and inspiration. I can see that I'd be driven absolutely ship rat nuts if I had to spend my life "staring every morning at a hundred nearly identical photographs of moodily lit tubes of toothpaste", to quote Douglas Adams.

I still have to spend a certain amount of time staring at nearly identical photographs of moodily lit t-shirts and pieces of jewelry, but since I'm the one taking them, there are usually only a dozen or so, and I don't have to do it every day. Then there's the copy writing, which is whole different kettle of suck, and always leaves me feeling stupid and slightly unclean, though I'm finding it's getting easier. I'm learning to set aside my dignity and self-respect and compunctions, and just write some nonsensical blather so I can post the shit. If I could get away with labeling everything "Oh just buy it already, you know it's awesome", believe me, I would. (And I'm thinking that should be my tagline when I go global. Actually, I have gone global; my first sale was to someone in France, and I also had a sale to Australia.)

The actual making of stuff is the fun part, naturally, not at all like work. Embroidering or putting together something while listening to music or audiobooks and drinking tea, and then later getting real live money for what I've made is still pretty miraculous to me. Not a lot of money, but I've sold several things this month. I really dig the series of minimalist punk portraits I've been working on lately. Who knows if anybody else will like them, but I'm enjoying doing them. Above are the Joe Strummer and Joey Ramone shirts I've got completed. I've also finished a Richard Hell one for myself, though I don't know if I'll make one of those for general consumption, I'm not sure how popular it'd be. Yeah, in comparison to the unbounded popularity of everything else I've been making. (Well, the Mark Twain bacon embroidery actually was pretty popular. Gotta get another one made soonest.) It would be nice if these really did take off, because I have several other ideas for the designs. I think they'd be awesome on onesies, for a start.

Like this guy was. He's the one who went to France. (If I think about that too much it's mind-boggling.) I'm really just putting him up here to show off the sheer technical perfection of the french knot that makes his eye. I realize no one but me cares, but that is a textbook fucking example of a french knot and I think it should be noted. So it is.

Forever Now

2011-09-27T15:08:00.000-04:00

Sunday night I went to see the Psychedelic Furs and the Tom Tom Club here in Lexington. It was a fantastic show, which made me wonder why I hadn't tried harder to see the Furs again since the first time I saw them all the way back in the Mesozoic Era, i.e. 1983. I will amend that in the future, if possible.

I was looking at my old concert shirt yesterday and realized that to me, it really is an incredibly complex symbol and not just a garment. For one thing, it may be the oldest piece of clothing I own that has belonged to me alone. It's been kicking around with me for 28 years, so it's a part of me and my "style", whatever that means. My friends and family are all familiar with it, so they know what I'm talking about when I reference it (which happens more than you might think). It's something I had in high school, and everything that entails and implies. Then too, it's a piece I've altered, so it showcases the kind of things I do, my art if you will.

For another thing, the Psychedelic Furs were only the second concert I'd ever been to, so that was a BIG DEAL. It was here in Lexington, and we had come to visit my grandparents for Easter weekend. There was an article in the paper about them, (which I kept for years afterwards) and the tickets were only $7, so Mom and I went. I was 16, and so excited.

Really I had to go. I had an obligation. I was living in a small town in southern Ohio, and everybody else (as far as I knew) except me and my best friend were into bands like Journey and REO Speedwagon. MTV had come to our county the previous August, so people had been exposed to New Wave, and talked about it, but if people were listening to it, they kept it to themselves.

Of course I didn't. Everybody thought I was smart and weird anyway, which was fair enough, so my being into New Wave was no surprise to anybody. Now I was actually in the same town as a real live New Wave band, British guys who'd been on MTV, who spiked their hair, who wore eyeliner. Eyeliner! I had to represent. How could I hold my head up if I didn't go see them? I can guarantee you nobody else from Wheelersburg, OH, was spending their Easter weekend seeing the Psychedelic Furs.

So we went and it was awesome. I was fairly nervous about the whole thing. I'd only ever been to see Cheap Trick before (with Saxon & Krokus opening, WTF?), and that was an arena show, which is a whole different ballgame. Would there be a lot of punks there? Would there be slamdancing? For sure everyone else would be a lot cooler than me.

But I had to go. I'd seen the videos for "Pretty In Pink" and "Love My Way", and even without the video, LMW would be enough reason to go see a band. Plus, eyeliner!

It was a great show. There were some people dressed in garbage bags. I saw a couple of Mohawks. There was a little slamdancing in the back. Richard Butler had a lot of product in his hair, and yes, he was wearing eyeliner. He was beautiful. I wanted to marry him, which not turns out not to have been such a pipe dream after all, since his brother Tim, the bass player, actually did marry a girl from Kentucky and now lives in Casey County. See, dreams can come true!

I had to have a shirt to commemorate the occasion. I couldn't wait to wear it to school, and show everybody how infinitely much cooler I was than they were. The reactions were all I could have hoped. "The What Furs?" " ' Psychedelic?' " "Whuut?" "Who're they?" "Whut?" Most gratifying.

Funnily enough, I still get that today whenever I take the shirt out for an airing, or even mention the Furs. "Christ, I know you people have heard of 'Pretty In Pink'. That's them". I used to date a horrible boy who would say "the Psychedelic Furs" which such a sneer in his voice. You know what, fuck you, because you're a jerk with a bowl haircut and you're so stupid you buy whole cassettes and will only listen to the one song you heard on the radio. Besides, your musical tastes certainly don't hold up to scrutiny. Asshole.

Therefore, my shirt represents not only the Psychedelic Furs, who I really do love (and Richard, I'm definitely still available), but also all the other bands I love and who people always gave me shit for listening to. It's old and has yellowed with time, and has permanent smoke stains from when the house burned. (It was pointed out to me that a concert t-shirt that's been through a house fire is in fact, punker than fuck.) I had to paint the neck and sleeve bands so it wouldn't look quite so bad, but I still love it.

It makes me think of high school, of my friends from then, of being 16, of concerts, of 27 year-old Richard Butler dancing around with big hair and eyeliner, of the Concrete Blonde show I wore it to when they broke up on stage right in front of us, of 55 year-old Richard Butler dancing around with smaller hair and no eyeliner. It's all good times.

So I wore my old shirt to the show, though since I'm not a young girl anymore, I wore it with pearls and Chanel #5. I was right up front and Tim Butler sang to me. It was awesome.

I Was Going To Call This "For The Birds" But That Would Be Stupid

2011-09-04T21:45:00.000-04:00

Another thing I've done for public consumption, and of course agonized excessively about, is this birdhouse I did for the Lexington Arboretum yearly birdhouse display and auction. I'd wanted to do it last year, but couldn't come up with an idea in time. That sort of worked out well because it gave me a whole extra year to think of something.

I don't remember when it hit me, but it suddenly occurred to me to do something with an embroidered or cross-stitch design (since I think about embroidery a lot anyway). Then all I had to do was think of how to implement it. I considered using or making a traditional house-shaped birdhouse and drilling holes in it, and good Lord am I glad I didn't, because the one(s) I finally did build out of polymer clay were quite enough of a pain. (Note to self: maybe do a small mock-up first next time. Also you probably won't go wrong scaling up your design.)

A seemingly good idea that turned out not to be was using colored wire for the stitching. I wanted to use it for durability's sake, but it got too kinked and bent and broken (o, the story of my life, especially the men in it), so I just used plain old DMC embroidery floss and a needle and coated it with matte acrylic varnish when I had the whole thing done and baked. One lucky idea that panned out was using a large ceramic flower pot for the base, which was exactly the size and shape I had in mind.

The whole thing turned out OK, though I wish I knew how to get my polymer clay smoother when I'm joining seams in it. I don't know if it's a matter of practice or if there's a magical trick to it. I hope the latter, but I doubt it. Naturally I had my usual bout of panicky self-doubt while I was driving over to the arboretum to drop the birdhouse off, thinking, "Oh my God this is crap, I should just set it on fire except the fumes would probably kill me, and anyway I paid $10 for the entry fee so maybe I'll just set it on the doorstep and ring the bell and run away like I'm dropping off an abandoned baby." Which would have looked really stupid since the visitor's center is primarily made of glass and the dozen or so people inside would see me doing that and maybe call the cops because they thought I was dropping off a bomb or a bag of anthrax or something.

So I didn't do that, I took it inside, nervously, and the lady there was very nice and said, "Ooh, that's so pretty!" and "Did you cross-stitch that by hand?". (In my head, "No.") And I saw the other birdhouses, though not closely, since they were all shoved together on tables prior to display. They were very nice, but they weren't all a million times better than mine as I had feared, and of course nobody's stuff ever looks like mine, (why am I still always surprised?) so I left feeling pretty cool. Now I can get on with worrying that the roof and base are going to come apart, or birds will hate it and peck out all the stitching, or the arboretum staff will hate it and set it on fire, or it will just spontaneously combust, which would be kind of awesome.

In other news, I've gotten a lot of "favorites" on Etsy for my Carolina wren wall hanging that I showed in my last post, which is of course nice, though I would gladly send it off to a new home in exchange for a little cash. But a very cool thing is that a couple of other Etsy sellers whose embroidery work I've admired for a while now favorited it also. That makes me happy.

That Was Relatively Painless

2011-08-19T19:56:00.000-04:00

Here's the latest thing I've made for my Etsy shop, and also for the Etsy NeedleArts Team July/August Challenge. I think this is the first thing I've made for a challenge or swap where I knew what I was going to do immediately and with no brain-wracking or agonizing. It even came together amazingly quickly, even the nest, which I totally made up as I went along. It was curiously refreshing!

The Very Slight Possibility That I Might Be Crazy, Plus Confirmation That I'm a Huge Dork

2011-08-03T01:52:00.000-04:00

I totally have this! I didn't know there was actually a term for it (Ordinal-linguistic personification ), though I figured I have some slight aspects of synesthesia in other ways, since I first read about it in Blue Cats and Chartreuse Kittens: How Synesthetes Color Their Worlds . But I've always known that 1 was the father and 2 was the mother and 3 was their daughter, who was in love with 4, who was young and handsome but poor, but 1 and 2 want 3 to marry 5, who is older and rich. 6 is male and kind of arty or bohemian, and a little weak, while 7 is his girlfriend but more ambitious and is also interested in 8, who's very charismatic but distant, though she may eventually marry 9, again older and richer, but without such a distinct personality as 5. I am NOT totally crazy, other people think like this too, and some even more than me.

Possibly the best persuasive sentence ever: "I promise I'm not some kind of modernist monster trying to make you read something with no pelisses or heaths in it. " Well, I'm sold.

It's from this review/recommendation of Villette by Charlotte Brontë, which I've been considering reading anyway. The fact that the review is totally hilarious AND shows the same edition that I have is just pushing me closer to the edge. It's going to happen.

Also, I just found out I can get the audio version from Librivox for free. How did I not know this existed? I vaguely feel that maybe I have heard of it, but that can't be true because if I had why would I not have checked it out? Not possible. I find that audiobooks are often very good for Victorian or other "classic" novels where sometimes you can get bogged down in all the verbiage, but too they are immensely soothing to listen to, and good for walking or needlework, plus the libraries only have a limited number of the ones I want to read/listen to and I've heard all the Jane Austens at least twice, so this is heaven sent. Yes, inordinate glee over free public-domain audiobooks=hopeless dorkiness. I don't care.

Ooh, and more Pinterest validation! I pinned a very cool necklace by Wendy Brandes, who is an actual legitmate jewelry designer with a very cool blog, and she's started following all of my boards. That makes me very happy.

And Another Thing

2011-07-30T13:40:00.000-04:00

Something else to complain about - super-restrictive diets undertaken not because of specific medical issues, but because you don't appear to have anything else to do with your life. And you don't have a sense of humor, and you like to proselytize. Or so it appears to me, anyway.

Now, you can eat whatever you want, I don't care. If you want to live exclusively on Doritos, or if you want to be a floratarian (I read this in a Connie Willis story, but they may actually exist) go ahead. If you have a medical condition such as food allergies or intolerances or celiac disease, then of course you have to restrict your diet. I can't eat bivalves, because I throw up for hours if I do, but that doesn't mean I don't think you should eat them. Eat what you like, just don't tell me about and for the love of God don't try to bring me around to your way of thinking.

What got me started on this was reading a recipe on a "paleo" diet website. These are the people who believe we should go back to a "hunter-gatherer" diet, because that's how we evolved to eat. So wait, we stopped evolving before we learned to grow crops? I don't know the precise number of thousands of years (or tens of thousands, who knows), since that happened, but my understanding of evolution is that it keeps happening all the time, without our knowing it. Sort of the point, n'est-ce pas? I'm wondering when this line of thinking will "evolve", if you will, to the point of thinking that even coming down from the trees was a bad idea, and we should never have left the oceans in the first place, (thank you, Douglas Adams) so we should just eat fish and plankton.

Also, the paleo people don't eat grains, but no one could have begun to raise grains if there weren't some wild ones around in the first place, right? I suppose if you can find some wild oats or wheat, that would be OK, wouldn't it? And what about wild rice? They eat fruits and vegetables, but those have presumably been farmed. The recipes I see call for things like broccoli and onions, but not wild ones.

Oh well. Here's the non-paleo, non-vegan, totally delicious cake I made for Mom's birthday back in June. It's the Devil's Food Cake Cockaigne recipe with the Chocolate Sour Cream Frosting from the Joy of Cooking, garnished with chocolate chip-stuffed wild black raspberries (I got the idea from Pinterest). Man is it good, and I'm not even a big chocolate cake fan.

Sweet! And Get Over Yourself

2011-07-30T11:58:00.001-04:00

So you know what's cool? Having someone whose blog you follow and admire start following all your Pinterest boards. I mean, it's cool anyway to have people you don't even know follow you, but that just makes it a little bit better, makes you think, "hey, maybe I'm not such a dork after all". Obviously, this is patently untrue, but it helps.

Fortunately, nobody much is reading this, so I won't piss anybody off, but I just have to point something out. In many of the blogs I encounter (not follow, for reasons which will soon be made clear), women go on and on about how the most important thing in their life is "being a mama", or "raising my beautiful children". Well and good, but I can't help but notice that all of these women have small children. I have yet to see the mother of, say, a 15-year-old express this sentiment. Just sayin'. (Also, I love Kate Beaton so much. She's so brilliant and hilarious.)

Today, Productivity!

2011-07-29T22:23:00.000-04:00

I've accomplished several things today! Mainly what I've done is work on an embroidered wall hanging, but since I may enter it in the Etsy NeedleArts Team challenge next month, I can't show it yet. It's turning out well, though, even the bit that I completely winged. In fact, so far that's the best part.

I also made this colored pencil drawing of the view from my window. The cows weren't part of the original plan, but they showed up around the time I was working on the foreground, so I had to add them. You'd think a cow is more or less a stationary object most of the time, but they move around a fair bit when you'd like them to stand still and be drawn.

I also added this coffee cozy to my Etsy shop today. I found it a couple of weeks ago with just the planets finished, and I had completely forgotten about even making it. I added the stars and put the fastener and backing on it last week, then forgot about it again until today when I finally photographed and posted it. Now I'm free to forget about it again for as long as I like.

Finally, here's a chalk drawing my niece did when she was here last weekend. Her artwork always fascinates me, and I really like her color choices here, especially in the top section. I'm thinking I may borrow them for something, though I'm not sure what.

When In Doubt, Cook Some Squash

2011-07-28T20:40:00.000-04:00

I've been feeling extremely lazy lately. I don't think I've actually been, I've read and studied a lot and last week we babysat my niece, which is a full time job, but it's mainly that I haven't made anything to speak of. If I haven't produced anything, I just don't feel, y'know, productive.

So today I added a few photos and updated some items in my Etsy shop, since I haven't made anything new to put up in a while. Every little bit helps, I suppose.

Also, I came up with a new recipe in my ongoing quest for Things To Do With Squash. This one turned out actually very good, though I had an inkling it might, and it's very easy, once you make the sauce. I guess you could call it Sesame Summer Squash "Noodles", though I'm always suspicious of recipes with words in quotation marks. (Plus, why are they called "sesame" noodles anyway, when they only have a small amount of sesame oil in the sauce? Presumably there was more at one time.) So maybe Summer Squash In Peanut Sauce is a better name.

Whatever, I used the sauce recipe from the The 1997 Joy of Cooking, more or less. Basically it's peanut butter, soy sauce, vinegar of some sort (I used red wine), hot sauce (crushed red pepper also works), and sweetening (honey in this case), and then I usually use garlic and ginger paste from the Indian grocery. Mix all these things to taste, adding a little more of this and that until you think it's balanced. The Joy calls for black tea to thin it out, so I tried it this time, and while I don't notice much of a tea flavor, it didn't hurt it either.

Then all you do is slice your squash, yellow or zucchini or both. I did 1 small squash in longish julienne since I wanted it to have a noodlish sort of form, but you could slice it any way you like. Then I sliced about half a carrot into thin coins, and around a quarter of an onion into thin slices. Steamed all that together in the microwave for about 2 1/2 minutes, just until it was tender. Of course you could always saute' it, but I wanted to limit the fat, what with the peanut butter and all. Then I tossed it with a couple of tbsps of the peanut sauce, and garnished it with a little chopped cucumber, and I must say, it was damned tasty. Also fairly healthy, and most importantly in the summer, it uses up some squash. It's colorful, too.

When the moon was full a couple of weeks ago I took some (I think) cool photos on my evening walk. Of course they don't quite have the glow of the real thing, but it was very lovely in the dusk with the Queen Anne's Lace blooming everywhere and the moon coming up over the hill.

Boredom as Inspiration

2011-06-03T15:53:00.001-04:00

Just a couple of drawings I made on the drawing pad function of my phone, which isn't even a smartphone. It's extremely useful for occupying bored children (and adults), and I don't care what kind of phone I get next, as long as I can draw on it.

I made these in a parking lot in Bardstown, KY, while I was waiting for my dad. This is a view across the parking lot of some old houses. I think it's not bad considering I drew it with my fingernail. It really is true, the more limitations you place on yourself, the more you discover. I wish I could remember where I read that.

Looking in the other direction. I drew this one with an unopened ball-point pen. My favorite part is the electrical pole and the twist of cable hanging from it.

Oh, and apparently the Rapture really did happen for this guy. Good for him. Unless somebody melted him with a bucket of water.

Feel Free to Hate Me

2011-05-10T16:25:00.000-04:00

All right, it did turn out to be spring after all. Today is sunny and hot, so I spent the morning in the little nook I've carved out under some big, twisted old honeysuckle bushes. I took my embroidery - a birthday present for my sister and a laundry bag I'm making for my Etsy shop - and sat in the shade and listened to the birds while I worked. Oh yeah.

The view from inside the nook. It really is lovely, cool and shady, and when the wind blows honeysuckle blossoms shower down on you. I'm still picking them out of my hair. Yes, you may hate me.

Some rings I just made, epoxying things onto ring forms. The bee is made from a brass stamping I've had for ages, and the heart locket was directly ~~stolen~~ inspired by one I saw on Pinterest. (Oh Pinterest, you are my very favorite time-suck.)

The cameo one is made from a button I didn't even know I had. Last week I spent a day rummaging around in our old barn, going through a lot of boxes I had stored for years, and it was well worth my time. I found so much stuff I'd forgotten about, like my high school class ring, which I thought I'd lost ages ago. There were two fruitcake tins full of buttons, with a twin sewing machine needle in one. Very nice, since I'd been planning to buy a new one.

I'd also been planning to buy some batiste to make summer slips with, and I found several pieces just the right length, and in peach, cream, and mint green, just the colors I'd wanted. Then a whole box of linen blends and linen weaves and 2 or 3 yards of what I believe is 100% percent linen in black. Such a score! And that's not even counting all the other things I needed/wanted and found, like pillow forms, that rubber-dotted stuff you use on the bottoms of slippers and feety pajamas, still more fabric.... And I didn't even get spider bit.

Rumors of Spring Have Been Greatly Exaggerated

2011-05-04T13:05:00.000-04:00

It's almost 1:00PM on May 4th and it's still only 48 degrees. It's been raining since forever and there are pools of standing water in the yard. All the shrubs around are green but the trees are only grudgingly putting out leaves. Can't say I blame them. To brighten things up, here are some pictures I took last month on a rare sunny day.

Violets and lilacs, my favorite flowers.

California poppies in my grandmother's wildflower garden.

Some lovely pink tulips. Amazing how much better they do when they don't get mowed down.

Tulips at the corner of the yard. I'm very pleased at how well these have done, considering they were potted bulbs from Kroger that I saved and replanted. I'm actually going to have to divide them this fall. (Assuming that's when you divide them. I think it is.)

A closeup of the pink ones. I love the triangular shapes they make when they're opening. I did some drawings of them last night. I want to work them up into a design for embroidery or painting.

Easiest Chalkboard Tutorial Ever

2011-04-03T22:54:00.005-04:00

I've wanted a nice big blackboard for years now, ever since I saw some forever ago in the Ballard Designs catalog. I even have a frame somewhere I was going to use for it, but it's literally just a frame, no backing or anything. Plus I'm not sure where it is .

I've been seeing tons of cool blackboards and blackboard-painted objects on Pinterest lately, so I thought I'd make a Goodwill excursion and try to find a good-sized frame for cheap. But the other night as I was drifting off to sleep, it occured to me that there's a big stack of old windows in the tobacco barn that I could use for free. Done and done!

Most of the tutorials on the web tell you to to mix something into your paint if you're going to use it for a chalkboard, but I remembered seeing a fabulous, enormous yellow chalkboard in an old issue of Mary Engelbreit's Home Companion. The article said you could use any color of regular matte or satin (I think) latex paint, just not gloss, which seemed like a wonderful idea.

To experiment, I used a small wooden box I'd been meaning to paint anyway, and some navy blue craft acrylic I'd bought on clearance for 50 cents. It worked perfectly once the paint dried and I tried writing on it with chalk. More importantly, it erased, too. OK then.

I went out to the barn, selected a window, knocked off the spiders, cleaned off the dirt, and brought it inside to paint. I just used regular black acrylic craft paint, mixed with a little brown and navy blue so the black wouldn't be so stark, and thinned it slightly with some water. The water wasn't strictly necessary, since a couple of spots needed two coats, but really the paint covered the glass very well. I didn't prime the glass in any way beforehand, so it may flake off at some point, but that's no big deal since it'll be easy enough to touch up.

I think for this the cheaper the paint the better, since you want it to be flat and chalky. The MEHC article suggested rubbing the painted surface lightly with chalk first, and mine did seem to work better after I'd drawn on it and erased it a few times. So, here are my instructions:

Find the space or object you want to turn into a chalkboard. (Window, wall, door, flowerpot, wooden object, piece of masonite or foamcore to fit in a frame, etc.) You could try something smooth like glass or ceramic (a jar or a mug), but I don't know how well it would hold up. You'd want to be careful washing it.

Clean and/or sand as necessary, making sure surface is grease- or residue-free.

Paint with acrylic craft paint, any color you like. Let dry. Add another coat if needed.

That's it!

The weather is finally pretending to be springlike, complete with thunderstorms and tornado watches, and the flowers seem to agree. The trees, however, are having no part of it. None of them have any leaves yet except the willow, and they don't look in any hurry to produce any. Oh well, at least there's daffodils. I bought these bulbs a few years ago, and the package claimed they had pink centers. The first year or two they were a little peach-tinted, if you used your imagination, but now, obviously, they're just yellow. Still pretty though, and they bloom late, so they make the daffodil season last longer.

And the peach trees are blooming now!

Postcards Are Mailed!

2011-04-02T23:05:00.006-04:00

I actually finished my postcards for iHannah's postcard swap a couple of days ago (when it was still March, amazingly), but didn't get them sent out until this morning. Still, I'm nearly a week early for the deadline, and they're off into the world, 2 to the Netherlands, 1 to Sweden, 1 to Norway, 1 to Canada, and the rest to various places in the US. I've posted pictures of the individual cards at the DIY Postcard Swap Pool on Flickr.

I hope the recipients like them, because I'm actually pretty pleased with the way they turned out. It was an unusually painless process for me, since I usually stress and obsess way more than necessary over anything I do that people are going to see.

Plus, I finally got to experiment with the rub-on film I bought lord knows how long ago. It can be run through a printer or stamped or drawn on, then used as a regular rub-on. The little flourish above was drawn with a metallic gold colored pencil, which didn't turn out as metallic once it was applied, but otherwise came out well.

The eggs on the card above were done with a stamp I carved, then stamped onto the film and applied. I carved the wren stamp, too, but just stamped it directly on the card. You can see how the film changed the color of the ink slightly, which is fine.

I could have stamped or drawn the eggs and the flourish directly on the cards, but it's good to see how the rub-on film worked, which was really very well. I think it would be better to use for computer images, or on non-flat surfaces where you couldn't conveniently draw or stamp. I don't know how well it would hold up on hard surfaces like glass or ceramics. Maybe if it were sealed with some sort of topcoat.... Fun stuff to play with, though.

Postcard Progress

2011-03-29T23:50:00.006-04:00

I've actually been making progress on my postcards for iHanna's Postcard Swap. I've done a little every day, not rushing things or waiting till the last minute, which is completely unlike me. If I'm not careful I may have these sent out this week, barring disaster. Above are some of my early sketches. Here are the final drawings I decided on. I wanted to do them in different styles, so some are pen and ink, some water-soluble graphite pencil (love that!), some very minimalist line drawings, and of course the colorful birds are in watercolor. Oh, there's also a wren card made with some hand-carved stamps, but I didn't take a picture of that one yet. My creative process in action, i.e. spread everything out and see what ends up next to each other.

Cutting out crows.

Starting to put things together. I know most people begin by painting backgrounds, and sometimes I do that too, but but for these I wasn't sure what the birds would end up looking like, so I wanted to do them first and then see what sorts of backgrounds would suit them. Some are simple watercolor washes, stamped or not, some have little paintings or drawings, and a couple will have decorative papers for backings. Then I'll add previously-painted watercolor scraps or stickers or rub-ons, whatever seems appropriate. I would have finished some of them today, but discovered that there was only about two inches left in my glue runner, and some of the thinner papers really need a dry adhesive. At least I'm still ahead of the game so far.

Postcards and Pink Embroidery

2011-03-26T23:30:00.008-04:00

I've signed up for the DIY Postcard Swap over at iHanna's blog, which should be interesting. I'm feeling very behind because apparently some people already have their postcards finished, while I'm still working through what mine are going to look like. "Something to do with birds" is about as far as I've gotten. Well, maybe slightly farther than that, since I've cut out the supports for the cards, and painted a couple of them, and drawn some birds, and I already have some previously-painted little scraps of watercolor paper to use, but how they'll end up is anyone's guess. But I'm still mainly at the pile of stuff above. See, there's not even any adhesive-type stuff in the picture yet. I'm very excited to see the postcards I'll be getting in return. I'm sure I'll be thinking, "Damn, why didn't I think of that?" Judging by what I've seen on other people's blogs so far, I'm sure they'll be fabulous and shame me. I finished my pink embroidered scarf last week. I'm pretty pleased with it, though that linen-blend wrinkles if you look at it funny. I had to iron it about 5 times before I finally got around to taking the pictures, because it got obvious and prominent wrinkles every time I touched it. I'd thought about adding some ribbon above and/or below the embroidery, but decided against it. I didn't have the right shade(s) of pink, and it really didn't add anything. Less is, in fact more, most of the time. Since it's supposed to SNOW! tonight, here's some pictures of the apricot tree when it was blooming last week. It was very lovely, but it always blooms too early and then it gets frostbitten. It's never actually had any apricots on it that I can recall. It was actually swarming with bees when I took the picture, but apparently the bees declined to be photographed.

Jimmy Choo By a Nose

2011-03-26T01:13:00.002-04:00

Now that the basketball games are over tonight, there's an Australian horse race on Sirius/XM. I can't understand a damn thing the announcer is saying except that a horse named "Jimmy Choo" is winning. I would totally have bet on him. Though I have to ask, who listens to horse races on the radio, except for the Derby if you're not near a tv? And who for the love of heaven listens to Australian horse races unless they're in Australia?

St. Patrick's Day, etc.

2011-03-17T12:40:00.008-04:00

Irish soda bread, natch, because you have to make something Irish on St. Patrick's Day and I don't like corned beef. I think it's a law or something. At least I remembered the soda this time. Once I didn't and the result was very...dense. It was a lot like Terry Pratchett's dwarf bread, though it wasn't too bad if you toasted it.

This batch turned out pretty well, I think. It doesn't look like much, but it's one of those things that's impossible to photograph well. I take comfort in the fact that I've never seen a picture of soda bread that looked much better.

Today's thing I've made, my upcycled suede skirt turned purse. 3 of your earth dollars for a brand-new, tags-still-on skirt in the softest chocolate-brown suede from Goodwill, plus another $3 for a pack of leather needles. Cut off the bottom, sew it up, sew up the lining (which was already there), make straps from the cut-off, and sew some pockets to the lining. It took maybe an hour, and that was mainly because there were a lot of layers to sew through when I attached the straps. I think I got the idea from ReadyMade , but I can't seem to find it on there now.

The inside, with the pockets I made from leftovers from my first quilt. I think I should have made them deeper, or something, because they have a tendency to come open and dump everything into the bottom of the purse. It could just be that it's a big ol' squashy bag without much shaping and it kind of collapses onto itself when I set it down. Anyway, it's about time to retire it and bring out or make something a little springier. I'm thinking linen, but then I usually am. It's occurred to me that a child's skirt would also make a good and less enormous bag. I need to get back to Goodwill and see what I can find there.

I realize none of those other photos are actually very photogenic, if you will, so here's something pretty. An empty glass bulb from the Bath & Bodyworks Wallflowers thingy I got for Christmas, washed out and with a ribbon tied around the neck, plus snowdrops from the yard.

Oh, why not?

2011-03-16T11:52:00.011-04:00

Right, going to try to start this thing up again. It's just about what I'm capable of after this bout of the Amazonian Death Flu, which seems to have decided to linger on forever. Plus I have a lot of pictures of crap I've made for myself or others & wanted to post somewhere besides Etsy. And then there's always things to complain about.

Like bloggers in California bemoaning their bumper crops of Meyer lemons. Oh really? What a pity, because to my knowledge I've never even been in the same building with a Meyer lemon. Make some damn marmalade or preserved lemons already. Or send a big box to lemon-starved little children in Kentucky, i.e. me. I'll send you a bushel of mint or some zucchini in a few months.

And there's this, which is useful, because I can never remember which of these symbols is bleach and which is dry clean. But I just noticed the next-to-last symbol in the "dry" column. "Do not dry"? What? Do I have to keep whatever it is wet at all times? I don't think any of my garments say "Store under water". I'm very confused.

The latest thing I've been working on. Inspired by this post at ihanna's blog, I decided to do the embroidered squares as a border on a white linen-blend scarf. I've been feeling the pink lately, as you can see from the new background, since it's been so chilly and dreary and grey. Now I just have to get up the gumption to actually finish the scarf, which should really only take about 15 minutes.

I actually like Hanna's better, her colors seem warmer somehow, though maybe it's the pale pink linen she used for her background. It might also be that most of her squares are done in similar stitching. Doing a lot of different stitches seemed like a good idea at the time, but I'm a little lukewarm about the finished product. Still, it'll probably look different once I have the whole thing assembled.

I do like a couple of the squares, though. These were just supposed to be sort of spirals, but they ended up looking like little abstract roses.

This one makes me think of a chrysanthemum or zinnia. Little zinnias in bright pinks and oranges would be very cute on something or other.

Blah.

2008-01-26T14:09:00.000-05:00

It certainly is January, isn't it? On the plus side, it's gone by fairly fast and there's only five days of it left, and even better, the water's unfrozen! This is very exciting.

I haven't accomplished much this month, partly because I was resting from Christmas and partly due to an inner ear thing that kept me dizzy and nauseated for two weeks. But I'm feeling better and I've been drawing a fair bit again. Here's some things I don't mind too much:

Pen and ink in Moleskine:

Pencil and Neocolor II crayons over acrylic in watercolor sketchbook:

2B pencil on sketch paper. I don't know why I bother ever using a harder lead. It never works out as well for me.

Noel, Noel

2007-12-24T13:30:00.000-05:00

It's amazing, but I've actually finished all my Christmas projects except for cutting out and baking one batch of cookies (but the dough is already made), and packing for a couple of weeks in West Kentucky (but I have everything laid out on my bed). In fact, I had all my presents bought and/or made and wrapped by 10:00 AM yesterday. This is completely unheard of, let me tell you. I don't know what I'm supposed to do at 1:00 AM tonight. Maybe get some sleep.

I've been a busy girl these last few weeks. I made all my Christmas cards, in several different styles (I'm not bragging, I'm just sayin'...), and as usual lots of my presents. I have a sore shoulder from embroidering my niece's monogram on a comforter for her, and I burned my arm in two places making miniature mince pies. Of course the oven rack burn on the wrist is understandable, but I managed to slightly blister my right upper arm with the corner of the cookie sheet (and I'm right-handed). That takes talent, folks. Not just anybody can pull that off.

I also made a batch of ornaments for the Cake and Pie and Freshly Blended ornament swap. I got some really cool stuff back, too. Thanks, everybody in my swap group. Here are the ones I made:

The bodies are painted wooden balls (doll heads, actually), and the heads and wings are polymer clay, molded off a porcelain angel head and a rose petal respectively. The legs are twigs from the yard wrapped with brass wire and held in place with hot glue. I just hope the wings survived shipping.

I decorated my little bedroom Christmas tree with my swap ornaments and these clothespin ornaments I made based on these Martha Stewart instructions. I made them 3 or 4 years ago so the photos aren't the greatest, but you get the idea. I especially like the Regency ones.

Now I can relax and enjoy the day. I'm very excited about seeing all my family and Bowling Green friends, and I can't wait for Bokkon Family Christmas. But those cookies aren't baking themselves, so Merry Hannukwanzmas to everyone and be safe and happy.

Procrastination is a Great Motivator

2007-12-01T22:51:00.000-05:00

I've been busy making things, but since they're mainly for Christmas I can't post anything yet, lest it be seen. And because I'm perverse like that, I've also been inspired to do some sketching and painting as well. I always feel like making "fine" art when I should be doing something else.

I won't post any of my paintings, since they may turn out to be presents for someone or other, but here are a few pen and ink sketches I made in my Moleskine (yes, I'm one of those dorks.) I kind of like the one of Sally.

Super-Sexy Sewing Machine

2007-11-16T23:05:00.000-05:00

Wow, I want this!

I've been toying with the idea of getting a smaller, portable, made-in-at-least-the-second-half-of-the 20th-century sewing machine (unlike my old one which is "probably one of the first electric ones" and seems to be made out of solid lead). Not so much that I've actually checked models or prices, just considering.

I think my search is over. I don't care what it costs, this just looks cool, which is not something you can usually say about sewing machines. (Ok, never.) The only problem? It's not actually in production yet. : (

Yikes.

2007-11-13T22:47:00.000-05:00

I'm freaking out a little right now. I signed up for the freshly blended and cake and pie Holiday Ornament Swap and I'm having serious self-doubts. I expected it, of course. It's what I do. I am actually excited about it at the same time.

My anxiety has two parts:

When the other people in my swap group open my ornaments, they'll say WTF is this? and throw it straight in the trash and

This doesn't matter because I can't figure out the last part of the ornament I'm designing.

I basically know what I'm making. I considered and discarded several ideas as being too ordinary, before settling on one of my polymer clay + other things creatures. At first I thought it would be too weird, but then I realized it was really the only thing I could do. It won't be too strange, but still me. I just haven't hit on just the right thing to finish it off. Well, I have a month before I have to send them out.

I also am absolutely forbidding myself from looking at any of the blogs or websites or Etsy shops of the other people in my group, because that would definitely precipitate a grand mal freakout. Plenty of time for that after I've sent out my ornaments and can't do anything about it.

Lovely and Amazing

2007-11-10T22:46:00.000-05:00

Via Polymerclaydaily.com, unbelievable polymer clay and stone jewelry by Kotomi Yamamura:

So gorgeous and inspirational. I need to go get to work on some stuff of my own. I wonder where she gets her stones? Her things can also been found at Syoko Mode. Most of the site is in Japanese, but there are lots of pretty pictures.

Ok, Just a Few More

2007-11-08T23:13:00.000-05:00

Really, I'll stop after this. (That's such a lie, I'm always liable to post good Halloween costumes or ideas for them at any time.) But I just ran across the Etsy Halloween Costume Contest Winners and some of them are really great.

I'm not sure animals care for dressing up, but this gnome costume made me laugh: That cat is furious. I don't blame it.

Some kid in this family is totally going as a Wild Thing next year. Austen, you know who you are. Actually, that's Max, isn't it? Ooh, Max and the Wild Things, that would be a great group costume.
The baby shrimp is cute too. I love the eyes and antennae.

Excellent Edward Scissorhands, but so was my friend Clay's several years ago. He had actual scissors on each finger and rigged them so they all really worked. He could even eat pretzels with them.

And finally, not a winner though I think it should have been. If I had a kid I would definitely make it dress up as Frida Kahlo:

Walking On Broken Glass

2007-11-06T04:09:00.000-05:00

Finally here are the glass pendants I've finished. I particularly like the large aqua-colored one at the top. The long narrow pendant with the text on the right is the first of these I made, about 2 years ago or so. I've gotten a lot of compliments on it, including one from the mad hot boy librarian at the branch library, which was nice.

This photo isn't as good, but you can see the colors and detail better on the brown pendant.

I've got several others in various states of completion, which I'm hoping to finish now that I'm back home.

Halloween Ain't Over Till It's Over

2007-11-06T03:39:00.000-05:00

I've been spending a few days in beautiful Bowling Green, famed in song and story. I attended a Nine Inch Nails cover band show on Halloween night dressed as a hooker, complete with black eye and split lip. (Just makeup, of course, which I learned from this and this video on YouTube, courtesy of the Costumer's Manifesto, as usual. It was a fabulous time, I must say.

Me and Frosty, the World's Whitest Pimp:

Lookin' good:

Then I made Day Of The Dead cookies the next day:

It's been a good trip.

Halloween Isn't A Holiday, It's A State Of Mind

2007-10-31T00:04:00.000-04:00

Keeping with the theme, here are some pictures of costumes and things I've made for Halloween, though first I want to state here and now my views on Halloween costumes. Sexy costumes are absolutely out. No sexy nurse or French maid will ever darken my door. In the first place there's nothing less original, and in the second, I've never seen a really good, clever costume that was sexy or even particularly attractive. Besides, it's very liberating to be something hideous, because you don't have to worry anymore about looking good, you can just relax and enjoy yourself. I wish I had some pictures of the year I was a West Virginia snake-handler, as a case in point. I still have all the pieces; I may have to dress up in them again and take a picture. Anyway, down off the soapbox.

Heat Miser and Cold Miser, I think this was in about '99 or 2000. It was totally last minute, held together with Stitch Witchery and safety pins:

From the next year, Willie Wonka and the Oompa Loompas. I had more time for this one, and made "Willie's" coat, vest, and bow tie. For the Oompas, all I had to do was paint stripes on the socks and safety-pin elastic on the pants and pom-poms on the shoes.

This is a doll/sculpture I made of "Cinderella Skeleton" from the book by Robert San Souci. Last year I made her consort Prince Charnel but I couldn't find a picture of him. They're polymer clay over a wire armature, with painted faces and acrylic fake fur hair. Cinderella's dress is made of vintage dress scraps, though Prince Charnel's clothes were new fabrics. I'm especially proud of her shoes, which I also made of polymer clay and which are removable. I really like the book and I loved making the characters. I'm thinking I may eventually have to do the stepmother and stepsisters, and especially the skeleton dog.

Here are this year's jack o'lanterns. Mine's on the left and Dad's is on the right. I like the nose on his. Maybe it's coincidence, but the cows across the road started making a huge ruckus when we set them out.

Halloween Things

2007-10-29T21:15:00.000-04:00

Everybody else is doing it, so why not me? Here are some cool things I've found lately.

I love these mummy cookies from Baking Bites and the skeleton ones are nice too:

Extreme Pumpkins is always a classic. His "Candy Traps" make me very, very happy.

The ever-popular Cylon jack o'lantern at Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories:

For anything you could possibly ever want to know about costumes and make-up, The Costumer's Manifesto. This site is just fantastic.

What better Halloween accessory for a child than a pimped-out Munsters-style Cozy Coupe (courtesy of Craftster):

Oh god, it's Frank:
If I saw anyone in this costume, I'd pee my pants. (Also from Craftster.)

I Like Movies For The Wrong Reasons

2007-10-26T23:40:00.000-04:00

I'm not really a big movie person, but I tend to like them for visual reasons. I saw Stranger Than Fiction the other day, and surprisingly liked it. For one thing it has Emma Thompson and Queen Latifah and Maggie Gyllenhall in it, all of whom I love, but even Will Farrell was unusually good in the straight role. I have much more respect for him now as an actor.

What I really liked about it though was the visual details. Unfortunately I couldn't find all the images I wanted, but there's a couple here.

First of all there's Maggie Gyllenhall's bakery. It has a fabulous 3-dimensional cupcake sign hanging outside (no picture, alas), and an assortment of glass plates attached to the front window:

I've been wondering how they were attached. Silicone, I guess, or possibly hot glue, though in real life I don't think it could cope with temperature changes.

I also like this little crushed velvet bolero. There's a better picture here .

I loved Emma Thompson's apartment too. No really good images, though you can get a small idea from this:

It's all blank white walls and terrazzo floors, with very little furniture and just a few giant architectural fragments here and there for decoration. There's a massive stone lintel surrounding one doorframe, which is a nice touch. All in all, very cool.

It's Oh So Quiet

2007-10-23T21:09:00.000-04:00

The circus has left town and it's very quiet around here now. My family's all gone home after Dad's 60th birthday festivities (which were awesome, if I do say so myself. Big props to Talon Winery ) so things are a little dull here. Not to mention it's been raining all day and I have a sinus infection, so all I've done today is finsh reading Un Lun Dun by China Mieville. It's very good, much better than the little I read of The Iron Council. I really am going to have to finish that one of these days. Maybe I'll read some of it tomorrow if it's still raining.

Amazingly I've also been working on some new pendants with the glass pieces I've been collecting. I found some good aquamarine-colored pieces that I think probably came from the old blue glass canning jars, and these look really good with freshwater pearls. I'll try to get up some pictures in the next day or two.

Then there's this from Monika Krol Jewelry, which I found at The Carrotbox:

It's absolutely ridiculous but I love it. I'd even wear it, though I'd catch it on things and break it or them.

Vodka and Teapots

2007-10-16T23:23:00.000-04:00

An interesting post here at Chow about adding vodka to your pie crust dough to make it easier to handle. Now, with Grandmama's Magic Pie Crust recipe I have no problems, but I like their idea for using Calvados for apple pie or bourbon in a pecan pie. I'm also thinking maybe amaretto in a peach or blackberry pie, or bourbon for pumpkin. You could do a lot with this.

Also found this fabulous teapot on Etsy.

On another site I actually saw there was one that said "Slut" , which I liked better, but apparently it's sold out. But you can get custom pieces. The Hunter S. Thompson plate is also good, but really everything in this shop is. And only $6 shipping from New Zealand! I'm telling you, Etsy rules!

More Covetousness

2007-10-13T23:34:00.000-04:00

I was watching the Graham Norton show tonight and fell in love. With his t-shirt, that is. It had Carel Fabritius's "The Goldfinch" on it, with an actual chain attached where the one in the painting is. I've been looking around on the web for the shirt, but I can't seem to find anything.

It's surprising, because normally I wouldn't wear anything Graham Norton wears to a dogfight, but that shirt was mad cool, and very clever on someone's part.

Even prettier than the t-shirt was Ioan Gruffudd. He's dreamy. I thought John Barrowman from Torchwood & Doctor Who was shockingly attractive, but Ioan Gruffudd is just beautiful. I was excited and then worried to find out from IMDB that he's currently filming The Secret Of Moonacre , which is based on The Little White Horse . I love that book, but it's always scary when your favorites are made into movies, especially since I can't think who Ioan Gruffudd would play. He's too young and pretty to be Sir Benjamin. Maybe the leader of the Black Men? Possible. IMDB doesn't say yet. Tim Curry's supposed to be in it too, and he is also fabulous. Maybe he's the leader of the Black Men. That I can see.

Thou Shalt Not Covet

2007-10-13T00:50:00.001-04:00

I got the new Dick Blick holiday catalog today and was consumed by an intense longing for everything in it, RIGHT NOW. Never mind that I don't need a whole $600 set of pastels, I only need a few select ones and anyway I don't use the ones I have, look at the colors. And they come in such a nice box. Never mind that I don't and have no intention of starting to practice sumi-e, the set is so pretty.

After I stopped hyperventilating I came to my senses and realized that what was really cool was the tree-topper on the cover, a 5-pointed star made of gold metallic Prismacolor pencils and tinsel.

I think this is very doable for Christmas this year. I'd use multicolored pencils since they'd be more festive and also much cheaper since I can find sets at the Dollar Tree or Big Lots. Then just cut them in half, sharpen both ends, use a dab of hot glue to hold them together and wrap the joins with tinsel or brass wire for strength. There you go!

Three Posts! Golly.

2007-10-13T00:11:00.000-04:00

I went for a walk today and came back with a pocket full of broken glass. And I was happy about it!

The previous occupants of our (former) farm had their garbage dump along a fence a quarter mile or so from the house. Most of it's long since gone, but if you poke around you can find some treasures. I think we've already found most of the unbroken bottles and jars, but I keep and eye out for pieces of colored or textured glass. Even some plain glass develops an interesting iridescence if it's been in the ground long enough. Today was a particularly good haul, with several bits of blue and green, and even a piece of Depression glass (the large triangle on the left, though you can't see the design in the photo.) I intend, though I've only completed one piece so far, to use these bits for jewelry-making.

It's the little things that make us happy. Hey, yesterday I came back with a pocket full of snail shells.

Doing This

2007-10-11T23:26:00.000-04:00

Finally posting for real this time. It's only been two years since I first staked out this spot, but I didn't want to start blogging without being able to make things look decent. I'm still not sure that's going to happen, but we'll see. (And for the record, I've finally been assimilated too. I've broken down and joined MySpace. Oy.)

So I accomplished some things yesterday. I did waste? some time organizing all my collage copies and clipart, but I tell myself it'll make things easier in the long run. And it did, because I finally got around to decoupaging the wooden blocks I bought ages ago. Here's one view:

And the other sides:

I also made some more paper-and-wood pendants:

The castle pendant in the bottom left corner of the bottom picture is a piece of an original sketch I made. I'm planning to do some more of these soon. I'm not sure about the purple and silver piece that backs (or fronts) the French textbook pendant. (Bottom picture, second from right, top row.) I actually think it looks better in the picture.

Starting out.

2005-12-20T10:04:00.000-05:00

Today: Cold Music:"Shonen Knife" by Shonen Knife

Oh god, now I've gone and done it, started a blog. I'm kind of embarrassed about it, but all the cool kids are doing it, so why not? It's not that I don't like the concept, it really is that half the free world is doing it. Still I have a better feeling about this site than Myspace, which makes me slightly queasy somehow.

I'm thinking to give this a craft focus, after being inspired by all the crafty-girl blogs that are out there. Sometimes I can almost convince myself that my stuff is just as good as theirs, and besides, it's different than most of what I've been seeing lately. Still, I'll have plenty of random thoughts and rants, I'm sure. And someday I may be able to figure out how to post pictures.