The Long Overdue Post: Bee Pattern and Botanical Pictures

Hullo! 

Here is a pattern that I have been putting off posting for ages, but finally have done! I wanted to make a cute round bumble bee, but didn't find anything to suit my fancy, so I decided to adapt another pattern, and I made so many little changes that I think it is quite my own now.  So here it is!

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Bumblebee Pattern

Body:

R1: Ch 2 in yellow.
R2: 6 sc in first ch.
R3: 2 sc in each sc – 12 sts.
R4: *2 sc in next st, sc in next st, rep from * around - 18 sts.
R5: *2 sc in next st, sc in each of next 2 sts, rep from * around – 24 sts.
R6: *2 sc in next st, sc in each of next 3 sts, rep from * around – 30 sts.
R7: *2 sc in next st, sc in each of next 4 sts, rep from * around – 36 sts.
R8: Switch to black or brown. Sc around, 36 sts. Repeat through R11
R12: Switch to yellow. Sc around, 36 sts, repeat through R15
R16: Switch to black or brown. Sc around, 36 sts. Repeat through R19
Rnd 20: Switch to yellow. *Sc2tog, sc in each of next 4 sts, rep from * around – 30 sts. (Somewhere around here is generally a good idea to sew on the wings, put in the eyes, and begin stuffing.)
Rnd 21: *Sc2tog, sc in each of next 3 sts, rep from * around – 24 sts.
Rnd 22: *Sc2tog, sc in each of next 2 sts, rep from * around – 18 sts.
Rnd 23: *Sc2tog, sc in next st, rep from * around – 12 sts.
Rnd 24: *Sc2tog, rep from * around – 6 sts. Fasten off.

Wings:
R1: Ch 2 in white or cream.
R2: 6 sc in first ch.
R3: 2 sc in each sc – 12 sts.
R4: *2 sc in next st, sc in next st, rep from * around - 18 sts.
R5: *2 sc in next st, sc in each of next 2 sts, rep from * around – 24 sts.
R6: *2 sc in next st, sc in each of next 3 sts, rep from * around – 30 sts. Finish off. Sew to body using white or cream.

Stinger:
R1: With black, ch 2.
R2: 4 sc in first ch.
R3: *2 sc in next st, sc in next st, rep from * around - 6 sts.
R4: *2 sc in next st, sc in each of next 2 sts, rep from * around – 8 sts. Finish off. Sew to bee with black yarn.

Finished! 

I made this dahling little bee as a present for my friend and dormie E, who actually kept bees in high school and missed them at college. Bees are amazing creatures, but recently they have been disappearing from hives all around the country, causing huge problems for farmers both commercial and home growers. Click here to learn more about this phenomenon known as Colony Collapse Disorder.

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 How is this for some color? These are the leftover pictures from Memorial day weekend when we went to my university's botanical garden. My cousin and I felt pretty cool when we got in for free by showing our student IDs. And then we were like, oh wait, our parents are paying thousands of dollars for our tickets, really. Haha. ha. err. Anyway!

This is my favorite one. ^

 

So that's all for now, at least until I finish my other owl sachet pattern. 

Ta!

Saturday in San Francisco

Greetings!

This past week has been a lot of studying as usual. But the weekend finally rolled around and I got to go to SF yesterday with some friends from my Japanese class, and some acquaintances of theirs from the International Dorm. They were all really cool, and we had a lot of fun. I forgot my camera, so all of these pictures were taken by my friend L! Thanks for letting me use them!

This is the Palace of Fine Arts! It really was gorgeous, and there were really cute ducks in the pond. And a bunch of not as cute super vicious seagulls and pigeons. But with some careful aiming of bagel pieces you could make sure you only fed the ducks.

This pigeon seemed to be very fond of me. Which was odd, because I kept trying to kick it. It was fascinated with my shoes, I think.

A female duck came over to where we were and was chasing and biting some of the male ducks. We wondered why until we started walking towards the Exploratorium (which was our original goal anyway except we all got very distracted by the ducks). Then we saw that there were a bunch of DUCKLINGS!!! But our cooing was interrupted when another mother duck who had slightly older ducklings started attacking the smaller one, and it all escalated to a big duck fight. Fortunately none of the ducklings were injured.

Inside of the Exploratorium there was an exhibit on what determined cuteness and they had some of these Mitrushka doll decals on the wall.

SF was really cold and windy so I resourcefully made my scarf into a head covering to protect my ears and hair from the howling and mussing up of the wind. Unfortunately it made me look kind of like Baba Yaga. I guess its just the nose... sigh. I was warm though, which was all I cared about.

Our last stop was Japan Town, where we ate dinner at this cute restaurant called "On the Bridge", stopped by Ichiban Kan, and the Nijiya Market. I was kind of practical at Ichiban Kan and only got a couple of baskets for steaming vegetables and some steel wool, but made up for it at the grocery store and got shoyu (soy sauce) dango and some mochi you can make in the microwave and some Kirin milk tea! Yummm

Anyway, my 24 hours of frolic are done and now I must hit the books once again.
Ta!

The Eagle Has Landed!

This was what I meant to title the post a few days ago when I once again felt the urge to blog about what was going on here in my delightful apartment. My bed has finally arrived! On Tuesday, my dear Da came and helped me take the horrible metal Ikea death trap back to the evil place from whence it came, set up my new AWESOME golden pine "Liberty Loft" as it is called by the company that makes it, and took me on a massive grocery shopping trip. Ikea isn't really evil, just the bed I guess, and now we have some store credit which is kind of fun! Finally finally finally I have managed to get settled in, and my first week of summer school is over. This afternoon, I reorganized the kitchen and did some final clean up, and took pictures of the finished product! Hurrah for Bag End!

 So this is the living room, and my beloved comfy couch! Above the couch I have a super gorgeous Monet print. The cushion and carpet mach the couch awesomely considering they were things my flat mate S's mom just happened to have! The lamp is from Target, I think, and the table and chairs were a consignment store purchase once again by S's mother. Thank you so much! The napkins on the couch are some super cute things I picked up at Ikea in the "As Is" department, which is where all of the real bargains are!

 SO CUTE! I think I want to make them into a bag of some sort, but I'm not quite sure yet. Anyhow, on with the tour!

I ended up totally reorganizing the kitchen yesterday, finally. The blue bins on top of the fridge are breakfast food and bread, and the brown one on top of the cabinet is baking supplies such as flour, sugar, baking powder, chocolate chips, etc. In the slow cooker on the stove, which I am learning to love love love is cranberry barbeque chicken breast that turned out ABSOLUTELY DELISH! I also made a simple beef stew earlier in the week, essentially tomato soup, carrots, potatoes, and stew beef. I am excited to experiement with it, maybe put in some celery and peas next time. The gorgeous little red and white china pot that holds spatulas, whisks, etc. is another thing picked up from my favorite thrift store, and then salvaged from mummy's garden (sorry mum!). I just installed the magnetic rack thingy above the stove and I must say I really like it already for convenience and storage of metal kitchen items that I want handy.

Now, these two bins may not be much to look at artistically, but I am so excited about them, because they have all of my new spices and necessary cooking supplies! I must say, I am really surprised at how much I adore cooking. I guess it falls in line with my crafty creative self, but I always just assumed I would be rubbish at it ( as did my parents, friends, and boyfriend). Having cooked yummy food three times in a row now, I am gaining confidence and really learning to love making good food. To paraphrase one of my fave web comics (Questionable Content) "Cooking is wonderful! It's like science for hungry people!"

This is the first thing I cooked and it was SO GOOD!! The recipe is from Church Suppers: 722 Favorite Recipes From Our Church Communities, a cookbook my mom gave me for Christmas last year. I reproduce the recipe here with the disclaimer that its not mine, I am not doing it for profit, and it was originally someone's home recipe so sharing it is hopefully not illegal or offensive. Anyway, its a christian recipe book so I figure sharing is par for the course!

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BBQ Roasted Salmon
Courtesy of Cathy Jobe, Northbrook United Methodist Church, Roswell, Georgia

Ingredients:
1/2 Cup pineapple juice
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
4 (6 ounce) salmon filets
2 tablespoons brown sugar
4 teaspoons chili powder
2 teaspoons grated lemon rind
3/4 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Cooking spray
Lemon wedges, for garnish

Combine the first three ingredients in a zip lock bag; seal and marinate in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour, turning occasionally. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Remove the fish from the bag and discard the marinade. Combine the sugar and the next five ingredients in a bowl. Rub the mixture over the fish. Place the fish in an 11x7-inch baking dish coated with cooking spray. Bake for 12 minutes, or until the fish flakes easily. Serve with lemon wedges. Makes 4 servings.

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When I made this, I actually forgot to put the cooking spray on the baking dish, and I only marinated the salmon for an hour, but it was honestly one of the most delicious salmon dishes I have ever eaten, high end restaurants and living in a coast side town notwithstanding. We ate it with broccoli and lemon, fried rice leftovers, and sourdough bread. Yum! My parents were absolutely ::shocked:: that I had cooked something for myself other than instant mac and cheese.

Anyway, moving on from the kitchen area and my newfound cooking obsession, here is the rest of the house!

Bookshelf in the living room, Ikea. Another Monet print!

My beloved walk in closet. The mirror was a steal from my ever favorite thrift store, $10!!! I finally have everything unpacked and hung up. Sorry about the picture quality, there is no natural light in here and the non flash pictures came out super fuzzy.

This is my darling roomie A's side of the room. She is not in residence, sadly, but for now my childhood bed, now her bed, is acting as a sofa/futon relaxing kindle-reading area. The picture above the bed is my mother's water color! Isn't it just b.e.a.u.t.i.f.u.l. ? I can't believe she let me have it!!

This is my desk/sewing area under my bunk! The hanging pictures are, from left to right, a print of my mom's favorite painting, a tulip painting from the thrift store, and an Alfonse Maria Mucha print on wood that I got from a local street vendor. The first picture is more in focus, but the second is much more true to life as far as the light in the room, so I decided to post them both and maybe you can kind of just merge them together in your mind?

Finally, here is my pride and joy! It is so sturdy and pretty. I really like the natural wood color and it never shakes or wobbles when I am climbing up and down. I have always wanted to have a loft bed, since my brother had bunk beds to himself. It could be a pirate ship or the swiss family robinson or a castle fort, all with a few blankets and some imagination! Now I finally have my own awesome loft. It is a lot different form being on the top bunk in a dorm too, now that I don't have to deal with a person under me who talks in their sleep... you know who you are <3 but I still love you E! I also really like the desk/bed setup. The ceilings are higher here than in the dorm, so I the space under the bed is comfortable enough that I don't have to watch my head every time that I stand up, but I also have enough room to sit up in bed with no worries! It is just a dream. I am so in love with my whole apartment that I can forgive it its shortcomings, which is does have. Where you may ask?

This is my bathroom, whose ceiling has been leaking on and off since we leased the place. It has been kind of a hassle, but I really actually like my repair guy, David. My landlord insisted on calling in a plumber as well, thus the hole in the ceiling, but I really agree with David that the whole thing could have been solved with some well placed caulking in just one visit if the idiots upstairs didn't insist on ignoring his instructions not to shower for 24 hours. As annoying as the experience has been, I am now on good terms with the repair guy for my building, which can only be a blessing as he is also coaching me about how to convert two prong outlets into three, tightening my locks, replacing my kitchen and bathroom light fixtures, and telling me where not to hang pictures because water pipes run through the walls. (Apparently S's room used to be a kitchen) Anyway, the whole thing is moving towards resolution. I was happy my mom didn't say I told you so after her warnings that no apartment was perfect and I insisted that this one was the exception to the rule.

So, that's essentially the place! I am so glad I finally had some time to sit down and write this post what with laundry, organizing, moving in, and 3 hours of Japanese class plus 5-6 hours of studying per day. Its really hard but I hope I will eventually gain some semblance of fluency. Anyway, I am off now maybe to collage, maybe do some altered booking, or maybe just nap and read Nero Wolfe mysteries on my trusty kindle. Have an awesome weekend!

Ta!

All in the Golden Afternoon

Hullo!

Well, after my three week vacation at home I am back at school again. I wonder why it is that I feel more like doing constructive creative things when I have other things to do rather than when I can watch three seasons of a new TV show in two days. Well.

I have spent the most wondrous memorial day weekend with my father's clan! First our traditional brunch at a ridiculous restaurant where they have a multitude of treasures on the wall, then our also traditional visit to a lovely garden. Despite my dear brother's disparaging remarks about "people who take pictures of flowers with their bad point and shoot cameras and think that they are photographers", I really loved the flowers there and this is the best way I can think of to share their beauty. Enjoi!

I have to say, this doorway really reminded me of Alice's trip into wonderland

And I fear that I am quite obsessed with these oversized poppies. They ranged from orange, to a light pink, to white, and orange yellow. Scrumptious!

Of course, the rose garden was even more lovely. I took a gazillion pictures, but most of them were blurry and out of focus because I was running around so ecstatically, snapping away heedlessly.

This might be my favorite picture of the day.

Isn't it such a fantastically charming wonderland?

The day was so sunny and hot, quite a change from the recent weather in my hometown (windy, foggy, and generally miserable.) I didn't quite dress for the weather and ended up being quite warm, but it was nice to be really truly warm for once, so overall the day was fantastic! Also had lots of fun with the relations, and this was only the beginning of our flowery art-y totally awesome weekend.

More pictures to come of botanical gardens and awesome impressionist and Japan town-y greatness. Also a few tutorials for some adorable crocheted animals are in the works... just as soon as I find where I wrote down my pattern. I really did write it down somewhere!!

Until next post...
Cheers

And Sew it Begins...

I forsee many bad puns in the future, for this weekend has heralded the beginning of my exploits into the world of sewing! I have a Singer Merritt 9618 that used to be my mother's and was very lightly used.

And my parents have even let me set up a little sewing corner in the living room! The sewing table upon which the sewing machine rests is the one that contains the Egyptian Goddess, mentioned in previous posts. Shwaaaaa! So, my first little messing about project was a little bag I made out of a dishcloth that my father had given me to play around with. It is nothing fancy at all, just four sides, a bottom, and a handle to hold all of my notions. My mother threaded it for me, and my father gave me many helpful tips on what exactly I was doing wrong (i.e. not putting down the presser foot. embarrassing!!).

Yesterday also held many fun shopping purchases! The morning started out absolutely terribly, as I abhor being woken up by texts. Fortunately some retail therapy was in order courtesy of my darling mama and my absolute favorite thrift store in the whole world. It was even having a 30% off sale!

There was also a collectible dishware sale going on outside that was not 30% off... but my mumsie was kind enough to indulge me in some luverly things! The little turquoise plate is GORGEOUS and I also really love the creamer, which is, if you can't tell, covered with Japanese ladies. (The picture really doesn't do it justice.) And then, to top it all off, the lady at the checkout counter threw in a lovely little cloth basket that would be perfection as a yarn project basket! Lovely.

Also inside is a darling little red ikea mug I got that looks like a tulip. Scrumptious. One does wonder what to do with such things, of course, once one has gotten lovely little tea set type things. They are too pretty to use everyday, too precious to risk in the world of bumbling brothers and well meaning boyfriends. I suppose I will have to save them for some sort of solo tea party, but there is also no room for them at Bag End, I fear. Bother!

More useful and still quite happy making is I also got a couple of skirts and dresses that I adore quite a lot. I think my favorite right now is this black jumper type dress that is very simple and plain, but cute. Kind of reminds me of the Uniform Project... Ah well. Some of the things need to be re hemmed or altered, which is probably my next project in the works. Also working on a little cupcake pincushion with the pattern from BitterSweet.

May the force be with you.

The Mechanics of Blogland

Hullo! Well finally the most awful week in the universe is over. Seriously, finals plus moving out of what has been my home for a year was emotionally as well as physically draining. However, now I am so happy to be back at my family home in our tiny little town. Bag End (our apartment) is coming together nicely, with many fabulous furniturey and kitcheny things all combining to be something very much like a home. Home is a very confusing word these days, considering that I had three not too long ago, dorm apartment and house, but now the dorm is empty and I am just a little sad. What is it about saying goodbye to places that you spent time in? My dearest H has no such qualms about leaving his room, but I will miss it too and remember fondly my time there. Anywho.

The avid reader of this blog may notice that in the past 24 hours, the backgroundyness of it has changed no less than 3 or 4 times. Why is this? Well, I finally figured out a few things about the land of blog that no one had really clued me in on before, and it is all thanks to The Cutest Blog on the Block. It is a magnificent and quite cute blog that has many free backgrounds, banners, and other various accoutrements to make a blog absolutely lovely, and my current background is courtesy of them. Thanks! They also have nice guides to editing the html of a blog to make it a three column blog etc. I was rather disappointed when I saw that Attic24's blog client, typepad, was only available with a fee. I resigned myself to blogspot's awful templates and boringness with a great sigh, only to realize after trolling various craft blogs that they were quite gorgeous and still on blogspot. It was confusing for a bit, but I hope that now I too will join their ranks!

Hopefully in these upcoming several weeks of freedom I will be able to post much crafty goodness on the newly revamped blog.

Ta!

The Secret Post: Revealed!

Now, the alliance of magicians would frown on revealing any magic trick, but this is long overdue. The hints, the coquetting, all of it is at an end now. So, would you like to know?

There he is in all of his smoldering glory! May I present, Mister Fitzwilliam Darcy <3!!! Some more glamour shots of the fellow... "Ready for my close up"

"Take me! Take me!"

So, for this fine fellow I used various colors of Lily Sugar&Cream cotton yarn, and a bit of embroidery thread for the nose. The pattern I used was from Geek Central Station, although it needed just a bit of tweaking for the head. It would have turned out looking like an outright bobble head otherwise, so around row 22 or 23 I just stopped increasing, and did them all just in sc, then proceeded to dec at an appropriate juncture. The jacket was of my own design,  and the pattern goes a little like so:

R1: sc 20
R2: sc 20
R3: sc 20
R4: *sc 4 inc* repeat all around (24 sts)
R5: sc 24
R6: *dc 2, dc 2 in 1 st* (32 sts)
R7: *dc3, dc2 in 1 st* (40 sts)
R8-R10: dc 40 sts, finish off

Yay! Obviously very carefully thought out and not haphazardly thrown together at all! I sewed the arms onto the jacket, then sewed the jacket onto the torso. The hair was my brainchild as well, just a simple round bit of crochet that starts with 6 sts, then inc in each sc to 12 sts, then sc 1 inc 1 to 18 sts and so on until the toupee covers as much of the head as you want it to. (Not really much of a brain child, eh?) I did a bit of embroidering around the hairline and the sideburns so that his mane would look more tousled and less Mr. Collins, but I am not sure it turned out quite how I wanted.

Anyway, best of luck to anyone attempting to craft a twin, because who doesn't want a Darcy to warm their bed at night? Heh.

{ Mr. Darcy Amigurumi, Darcy Ami, Mr. Darcy Ami, Pride and Prejudice Amigurumi }

A post! A post! My kingdom for a post!

A post you shall have, then, screeching inner muses who comment on every random event in my life and remind me that documenting such moments is what this blog is for. Well then! It is the midst of dead week, a week of no class for me, since I am skipping my one review session to pop home for a quick visit. Home you ask? I know, it is all a bit convoluted with my family home, dorm room and now APARTMENT! However, while my family home will likely stay the same for a while, dorm home is soon to be home no longer. Myself and my intrepid room mates signed the lease for our beloved Bag End just on Friday, and Saturday brought lots of cleaning and then Sunday moving. I missed the moving on Sunday thanks to Mr. Sandman, but have quite a bit of my own moving to do on the morrow. Therefore, the day today was spent lugging around huge pieces of furniture, disassembling my bed, etc.

I am so. very. excited. about my furniture. First of all, we are going to have the most fantastic couch in all of the land! It is sage green and feels like it is made of lucsious clouds. I cannot believe that my parents are willing to part with it, but apparently it is too "unstructured" for their tastes, cos they are old and can't get up from it. While I pity their loss, I celebrate my lovely couch even though it is awful to move around without the help of strong young men like my darling dearest whose muscles are just withering as he sits in his chair slaving at essays. But I digress. The rest of my furniture came from a barn on our property, which my father has apparently been filling up with old furniture and oscilloscopes. While at first the jumble is absolutely overwhelming, with some careful treasure hunting I was lucky enough to find a desk, a comfy office chair, a sewing table, a dresser, a lamp, a cool jar, an end table, AND an adorable green metal chef's shelf with adorable wicker baskets and drawers. All of these things are fantastic for several reasons...

The lamp is the cool metal kind whose stem is all bendy so that you can twist it around every which way and it will just stay however you bend it, and is also apparently halogen and thus a fire hazard; live dangerously! The jar is large, glass, and closes with a cork, so it has actual storage potential for sugar or something like that. The comfy office chair is infinitely better than the one I got at Staples, which slants forward in such a way that forces me to maintain perfect posture at all times or else slide onto the floor. The end table looks like it will match our table and chairs, which my roomie S was so kind as to provide, and may even work as a TV stand since it is nice and sturdy. The chef's shelf is perfect, providing room for appliances such as microwave, blender, panini maker, and coffee maker. Incidentally, my parents have also been kind enough to gift me with a new coffeemaker! The dresser is particularly close to my heart as it has a fold up top that can be used for changing babies, and it is where I and my brother were both changed as babies.

The sewing table and desk get their own paragraph for sure. They are beautiful dark wood, and both of them at first appear to be simple tables. HOWEVER! Both of them have fold up sewng machines!!!1!1!1!!!!111 Ahh it is too cool. The sewing machine that was in the sewing table was beautiful as well, black with gold detail, reminiscent of an Egyptian idol. Even more impressively, the sewing table had, in secret little containers on the underside, a place to hold the pedal, sewing machine oil, AND! The original manual and sewing machine oil were in the drawer! It was so unbelievably awesome. While the desk didnt have such nifty little containers, it had a space for the sewing machine, herein known as the Egyptian Beauty, which would probably fit in either the table or the desk, and a little bobbin rack in the drawer! I was oohing and ahhing over this stuff for at least an hour, and still am if you can't tell. The only thing missing is the power cord, which my father assures me he will be able to locate no problem.

But do you even know how to sew? Not yet, is my reply. I have been, however, inspired to at least attempt to learn! This inspiration is partly thanks to Project Runway which I have recently become horribly addicted to, and also the fact that stumble upon keeps directing me to adorable sewing blogs and projects and the like.

Anyway, pip pip and cheerio, pictures to come of the new homey home once we have it all set up.

The Big Sunday Post!!!

Hello lovelies! What a beautiful Sunday, finally true to its name. So many exciting things to tell you all about!

First of all, this last Wednesday was a Very Inky Wednesday. Why? So, those who know me personally may know about my longstanding affection for pens. Pens are glorious! They are wondrous instruments for writing and drawing and each one has its very own personality. As such, I have a rather extensive collection of these fantastic implements at home, which has garnered me no small share of mockery. Well! Everyone else is missing out. I reorganized said collection recently, and brought back to college all of my out-of-use fountain pens. As I am now a poor college student, it has become incumbent upon me to provide the tools of creative fun more from my stashes of supplies than from art stores. Thus, a grand cleaning out and revitalizing took place! It was fascinating, to watch dried carcasses of pens revive under the faucet, rainbows of ink spewing from their nibs. Perhaps the funniest thing was when the pen would produce one hue, and the cap another upon rinsing. Some of them are still on the road to recovery, having developed some issues of neglect obviously, but overall the operation was quite successful and happy-fying.

Perhaps the most thrilling aspect of this particular adventure was created by the dilemma of lots of clean pens and not enough ink. Being a notorious hoarder as I am I have a box full of old ink cartridges, mostly Sheaffer, that I have been using to fuel my pen addiction as well as one bottle of India Black. The problem with these cartridges, however, is that first of all, almost none of them fit directly into my favorite pens. This means that I have to go through them all and poke a hole in the top, syringe the ink out, and syringe it back into an appropriately sized cartridge. Messy, wasteful, and time consuming. The other, more pressing concern is that they are all very old cartridges. Sheaffer cartridges are made out of porous plastic, letting the water evaporate over time. While some online sources advocate rehydrating the solution to fill the cartridge, this has not, in my experience, gotten rid of the troublesome clogging bits of ink, and it generally produces very watery writing.

SO! Being very satisfied with my bottle of black ink, I decided that the best solution would be to try to find some cool ink store that sold other colors of bottle ink. I just googled 'ink store' in my area, and LO AND BEHOLD! A very cool ink store showed up, quite close to campus. I was intrigued, having assumed that any cool ink store would require at least a 15 minute walk to the downtown area. So, the very next day after class, I noted down the address and made my way to the cool looking and mysterious ink store. Zounds! It was nestled behind a clothing store, and next to a parking garage, with nothing but a very narrow stairway marking its presence. The store itself is quite fantastic, mostly focused on printing large things for presentations and supplies for architecture students, but they had INK! And moleskines, and a large selection of other artsy type stuff of a most pleasing nature. I bought a bottle of Pelikan Royal Blue, and I love it.

On to even more adventures in the world of craftiness? Indeed. A bunch of my pals were going out to frats, as per the usual, but this time something was different. There was an Anything But Clothes party, which is exactly what it sounds like. Rather than allow my darling room mate to go out clothed in garbage bags (paugh!) we set to work on making something a little more awesome: a skirt made of cereal and waffle boxes! (Emphasis on the waffles!!) The construction of this recycled garment is simple.
1. Cut cereal boxes into 1.5-2 inch strips
2. Overlap two strips slightly and staple, giving a pleated effect
3. Repeat until skirt is approximately waist circumference
4. Duct tape over the staples on the inside, the square tops, and staples on the outside for a more comfortable wearer experience.
5. Tres A La Mode!

Fantastic fun! Could there be more? Yes, indeed, but it must wait for another day. The next post will be a fascinating exposé on my most recently completed secret project.

...Sweet Dreams

Monday, Again.

Oh Monday, why are you so horrid!?

Well today was not quite quite so bad. I have been spending my time doing work, lots of it, for the past week. I had a midterm and a Japanese test. Unfortunately, my Japanese test did not go as well as it, perhaps, could have. Fortunately, it is the last one until the final, my lowest grade, and I can drop one test. I am redeemed! We will soon see if it paid off insofar as my other midterm goes...

So this Monday is not bad at all considering the view of the week from here. I can see finals looming in the distance, but there is time yet to sit and play. Well, not quite so much time, perhaps. My super secret project is still underway, and LATE seeing as its recipient's birthday was just the other day. I am sorry lovely! You know who you are. Soon, I promise, all will be revealed.

As far as other projects, I have too many ideas and not enough time. In my spare moments I steal glances at craft blogs of housewives who some how have time to make beautiful and adorable things. How I envy them! I feel so frustrated. I don't know how I have time to hang out with friends, errr make that Boyfriend, for hours doing nothing really, or mucking about on facebook, but not enough time to fulfill my creative urges!? I think the answer has a lot to do with the guilt factor, that if I have time to work on projects of my own then I ought to be doing something more Useful and Productive with my time. This guilt rule does not apply to occasions upon which I am frittering away my time doing useless things on the internet becos as everybody knows when you are on the internet you are rarely being CONSCIOUS about what you are doing. So, rule for living from today on is: be conscious about how one is spending one's time and make time for crafty things. Or Else.

Ta!

An Organizey Tuesday Eve

Well, it has been a while.

Spring Break was rather lovely and very little got done...except I have started a new secret project! Details of which will be posted at a later date when the secret-ness of it is no longer necessary. And actually, the idea for another secret project is bubbling away in my brain. That one shall have to wait as well for a secret revealing post!

The long awaited yarn arrived, early in fact. It got here just before my dreaded PS3 midterm, and it took a great deal of self restraint not to rip open the box and go yarn crazy. I didn't manage to get much done on baby things, except find out the due date of my friend's mom's child is June, so there is a due date on that.

But today has held many momentous moments! I reorganized my desk and area in general. It has been a hectic couple of days.

First of all, my beloved other half underwent a rather unfortunate experience, which I was unfortunate enough to be a participant in. It all began while we were cuddled up watching 300, a belated birthday type activity. Partway through the movie, a smelly smell was smelled. We triangulated the source to be his closet. After much moving and searching and sniffing, the ceiling was revealed as the culprit. A small hole next to a fire sprinkler was whooshing out great quantities of rancid, rotten, distinctly deathly smelling (or perhaps cabbage smelling?) air. After spending the rest of the movie in comfort, the scent increased over the next day until it became unbearable. This resulted in him moving into my room for about two days, computer, bed roll and all. While I am very fond of my lovey, it has been a bit much as there were already 3 girls in this very small space and adding in one boy did not help matters.

Anyhoozles, he is back in his place, and I am back in mine, and all of the shifting and shuffling has led to a great re-organizational effort on my part to reincorporate all of my things into the space which is allotted to me. I have realized that I have either too many clothes, or rather, not enough closet space. The distinction may seem infinitesimal to the untrained eye, but having too many clothes is when one owns many garments one does not ever wear, whereas too little closet space is exemplified by my own lovely closet with many wearable outfits that just don't quite fit. So. My desk has been shifted 90 degrees, from the wall to facing the end of the bunk bed in the room, while the bookshelf that once resided in my boyfriend's room has moved to be against the wall horizontally. Zoinks! Everything seems much better and spacier and happier, and I am led to wonder whether the process of moving things around is one that prompts throwing useless old things away.

So clean! So new! Until next time.