my boring, crafty life

2009-08-27T23:50:00.002-05:00

Whoa! An entire year to.the.day. since I last posted?!

Weird.

It's a sign.

Anyway.

Gotta get this thing going again. I've been able to get tons done with scrapbooking, all of my other crafts have been painfully neglected due to this scrapbooking hobby (cough:obsession:cough). I did paint a bunch of ornaments last year for Christmas gifts though. That was fun, and a big hit. I'll have to find some pictures of them.

Anyway. I'm still alive. Just buried in enough scrapbooking paper to last five lifetimes. But that's okay. (And yes, I still want more...always want more...it's the paper companies' fault..they keep MAKING more!)

I'll be back with a fun project next time.

2008-08-27T21:31:00.002-05:00

Aww, poor neglected craft blog.

Just a teensy bit busy. Had a baby, bought a house, new wonderful job, stopped crafting (mostly) but now that my little baby girl's almost 2, I figure I can maybe do some stuff again. Now that I don't have to stay up half the night making bottles and changing diapers, or studying a 900 page book to get certified for my new job in the pharmacy. :)

Yay for me.

Finished a scarf I have been working on since I learned how to knit in 2005 or 2006. But I'm dumb and didn't look at the length I was so excited to be getting it done. I still had one skein left. :/ Oh well. Maybe I'll make some fringe to make it seem longer. ? It's ugly anyway. Teal, purple and green, pretty colors, except for the silvery threads in it that makes it look like I knitted using dog hair. Maybe I'll try to pull all that out, it's pretty easy to do, but still would take some time. Then it would at least be wearable.

Maybe. There's a lot of things on "oh I should do..." list and more is added all the time, so I probably won't ever get to it.

2006-04-19T15:53:00.000-05:00

Books read in 2006

1. Modern Girl's Guide to Life - Jane Buckingham
2. Super Crafty - Susan Beal, Torie Nguyen, Rachel O'Rourke, Cathy Pitters
3. Seven Types of Ambiguity - Elliot Perlman
4. Stitch 'N Bitch Crochet: The Happy Hooker - Debbie Stoller
5. Dollar Store Decor - Mark Montano
6. Night - Elie Wiesel
7. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
8. Cell - Stephen King (still in progress)
9. Mother Night - Kurt Vonnegut (stopped halfway through, not picked it back up yet)

The Da Vinci Code: Average as far as the book and writing go. Perfect for a movie. I did figure out the ending, 1/4 of the way through, so it was a little predictable. The historical religious stuff was interesting though.

Cell: I'm only about 1/4 of the way through, but it's a really easy read. It's pretty interesting, and a crazy idea. The story starts off on like the second page, not something I expected from a Stephen King book, because he usually takes up so much time and space describing things. I feel like I'm handed too much information, stuff I could figure out on my own, but it's still a nice easy read. :) Just heard yesterday that Eli Roth is making the movie. Something funny I noticed at work the other day. I read on my breaks, and as I was buying my food I noticed I was carrying this book with my cell phone ;) hehe.

2006-02-25T21:02:00.000-06:00

Books Read in 2006:
1. Modern Girl's Guide to Life - Jane Buckingham
2. Super Crafty - Susan Beal, Torie Nguyen, Rachel O'Rourke, Cathy Pitters
3. Seven Types of Ambiguity - Elliot Perlman (yes...still in progress...it's a LONG book!)
4. Stitch 'N Bitch Crochet: The Happy Hooker - Debbie Stoller
5. Dollar Store Decor - Mark Montano

Stitch 'N Bitch Crochet: I love this book. The instructions are easy. Crocheting into the chain stitch has been the hardest step for me so far, and it was comforting to know that it can be annoying, if not hard, for people who crochet all the time. Her instructions reminded me of something I read while learning how to knit. Sometimes you just have to let yourself be new to something for a while...eventually you'll pick it up. There are so many projects in the book that I can't wait to get started on, I also love how many non-clothing items there are, I really don't want to make a halter top for myself, or even a sweater.

Dollar Store Decor: Blech. Really not worth the money in my opinion, luckily my library had a copy. It's a wonderful idea, I love the idea. But out of 101 projects I only might want to try four or five?! Some of the stuff looked plain cheap. Others were repeated so many times it was ridiculous. An example of that is where he shows you how you can cut designs out of gift bags and decoupage them to a lamp shade. Good idea! Then, a few pages later, he'll show you how you can cut designs out of gift bags to decorate a tray...well, okay. Then how to decorate a box, then a something else, and on and on. It should've all be included in one, not to mention the fact that crafters can figure out that if you decorate THIS item with this dollar store item, you can also decorate THAT item with the same $1 store item without being told. It just bothered me, kinda like I was cheated out of a few ideas because the spread the same one out. But the book isn't exactly horrible...other people might find more projects they like...maybe less.

2006-02-25T20:32:00.000-06:00

So, I learned how to sew last week...kinda. All I did was finally figure out how to thread and run my sewing machine. It's a Singer from the 50's (the 301A, not the Featherweight one) so it only does straight stitches I think, so it's no big deal. I may have to get an inexpensive one that I won't use often for zigzag and other "fancy" stuff. My goal is to be able to make doll clothes and kid clothes like my mom did when I was little. I loved my handmade Cabbage Patch clothes better than the ones she bought at the store. I also had a beautiful Christmas dress that I only wore ONCE with a black velvet bodice, ruffly skirt and poofy sleves made out of red, black and white plaid. My favorite was that she sewed bells into the skirt. I absolutely loved that dress, and it's what pops in my head whenever I think of my clothes when I was a kid. I didn't appreciate the months of hard work when I was that little though considering I played Dukes of Hazzard with my cousins, jumping around and diving under tables in a dress that took so long to make. ;)

It's been a pretty productive week. Thanks to my new book, Stitch 'N Bitch Crochet: The Happy Hooker I also learned how to crochet finally. It's still a bit icky because I was using hooks I bought at Target's $1 Spot that were made out of wood and VERY rough. I couldn't really see the stitches because the hook was separating each ply of the cotton yarn when it wasn't shredding it to bits. But today, with a nice little 50% off coupon for JoAnn's grand opening sale, I bought a set of aluminum hooks. I'm still in a little practicing mode, I've done a few rows of single crochet so far. I want to get a little more done so I can see what it's supposed to look like, and then I'll hopefully be able to learn the other stitches as fast. I accidentally started doing the stitch you use to make flowers, or a round hole. I kept stitching into the same spot thinking it was the next stitch. Oh well. :)

It's also not been a very productive week though, considering I spent most of it learning NEW things instead of finishing projects I've already started. I've already convinced myself that I DON'T need to buy any more supplies. I need to finish what I have...or at least half of it...before starting on something where I have to buy new stuff.

2006-02-17T16:23:00.000-06:00

Valentine's Candy Box

I made this for my husband for Valentine's Day. I was going to get him a promotional Saw II poster from work, but they had already put it up in the display (which ruins the poster). I also learned later that my husband already got a Saw II poster from where he works.

I covered a box with regular red paper and then used a Valentine's Cardmaking Kit from Target's $1 Spot. I was lucky enough to be there when they first put out their new season stuff a couple months ago, because all the really good stuff was gone really fast. I grabbed a bunch of gel pens and a star shaped scrapbooking hole punch thingy, whatever they're called. Then I just used a glitter pen to write on the box after I was done.

I filled it with Valentine's Day M&M's and cherry flavored Blow Pops.

2006-02-12T16:28:00.000-06:00

This is an embroidery of a Virgo design. I think they were vintage patterns, I got them from someone else. I have one other one, my husband's sign, Aquarius. After stitching that on another color of flannel, I'm going to turn them into both sides of a small pillow. The embroidery's about 4 inches across, so it will probably be 1/2 the size of a regular throw pillow. I may add a fabric or ribbon border, I don't know yet.

This one is done on purple flannel (that's what I had) and I love stitching on flannel, it's great, plus it's soft and the ends don't fray. I printed the pattern out and had to use transfer paper to trace it onto the fabric, you can see a little of where my traced line was off in a couple places (like the bottom of her sleeve...)

In other news... :)

I went to our new Jo-Ann's Supercenter. It's freakin HUGE! I only made it through half the store before I had to leave. It just opened two days ago, and there were a million people in there. I love it though. It's bigger than our new Michael's and has a much bigger selection. The best thing is I can even walk there. Michael's used to be w/in walking distance, but they moved over to the "cool part of town" where all these businesses keep popping up, it's still like a minute and a half driving distance, but still. So Best Buy, Target, all kinds of big stores moved out there, so Jo-Anns moves into the old Best Buy building. Yay for me. :)

2006-02-10T15:43:00.000-06:00

I used Sublime Stitching - Craftopia patterns for this. It's all in shades of brown and mostly light blue (a couple darker shades of blue here and there). I am not completely done, and it may be years before I am. I still need to sew a ribbon border along the top in light blue. And as I collect buttons in the future, I will sew on my favorite blue and brown ones. Maybe a couple craft-themed charms if I see anything like that.

It's just a plain canvas tote bag in oatmeal from Michaels.

2006-02-07T19:56:00.000-06:00

Books read in 2006:
1. Modern Girl's Guide to Life - Jane Buckingham
2. Super Crafty - Susan Beal, Torie Nguyen, Rachel O'Rourke, Cathy Pitters
3. Seven Types of Ambiguity - Elliot Perlman (in progress)

Quick reviews in case you were interested.
Super Crafty: Amazing. Best money I ever spent. Gives all kinds of different project ideas, while leaving room to adjust and inspire crafty minds to think of their own versions. I love the little extras like "Crafty Disasters" and "Crafts from the Past" My favorite projects and ones that inspired me the most to get crafting: Sock Monkeys (I've always wanted one), Super Cool Appliques (felt! I need felt! why is it taking me so long to buy some stinking felt!), Bejeweled Baubled Purse, the entire "Reduce, Re-use, Resparkle" section.

Modern Girl's Guide to Life: It's okay. Some tips are helpful, some aren't. Like dinner parties. I've never known anyone who has ever had one or has been to one. I will likely never have one that doesn't consist of everyone grabbing a plate of food and sitting around the living room and dining room. Plus her section on flowers annoyed me, because it was wrong. I spent a couple years working as a florist in the store I still work at. She said something about skipping roses and buying a more durable bloom since the rose will die in a day. What the heck? Roses can last a week (if you know when to buy them). There are more durable flowers, but roses are fine. I just haven't been able to get past that comment.

Seven Types of Ambiguity: I discovered this through his new book at Barnes and Noble (The Reasons I Won't Be Coming). It looked like it might be pretentious, but I tried it out anyway. He has the most beautiful writing. It's like a river of chocolate syrup. The new book was checked out at the library, so I got this one instead. It's a pretty thick book, but it's really holding my attention, so it shouldn't be too long before I'm done. I'm just about through with the second part, there are seven. All told from different points of view centered around the innocent kidnapping (a weird way to put it) of a little boy.

2006-02-04T17:17:00.000-06:00

It's winter again. The past few weeks have been perfect. Not warm, but not cold either. Now all of a sudden it has to snow again (just a little, but it's still there) and be freezing damn cold. I think we've had our heater off for two months. I love cold weather, but this is actually cold enough to turn on the heater. It's 27 (feels like 15) degrees. I think 32-35 must be my breaking point for turning on the heater. My most favorite place to be is in bed, in winter w/ the heater off (maybe even the window cracked) in bed with puffy blankets, cozy piles of pillows all snuggled up with my husband and two kitties.

Right now I get the second best thing. Watching some Scrubs on DVD cuddled up on the couch with some furry blankets and furry kitties and knitting something warm. I might even add some hot chocolate to my little fuzzy warm day. Best thing about it, I get some crafting done so I can post some more pictures!

2006-01-18T20:45:00.000-06:00

I made some ornaments last weekend. The way pictures come up on this blog is really annoying and I never have time to figure out how and if I can change it. Oh well. Sorry it looks like crap. Anyway.

The Fuzzy One:

I made this with a clear frosted ornament and glued scraps of fabric to it. I had two samples, I didn't have enough fur to cover the entire thing, so I put a hot pink metallic meshy fabric underneath.

The Poinsettia:

Same clear frosted ornament. The light pink petals are from a silk flower I had laying around. Then I cut up petals from a pinkish-gold silk poinsettia and glued some of them on, I also used the green stemmy things from the poinsettia too. Then I glued leaves to the back. Even with E6000, the leaves wouldn't stick exactly where I wanted them to because of the plastic in them kept them too rigid. But it's not too bad.

2006-01-08T11:48:00.000-06:00

It's been a long time since I've updated. I've been crafting, just not finishing a whole lot of things. But I'll post a couple later, this isn't a crafty post.

When I graduated college, after a semester of not being able to read anything but articles and textbooks, I was going to read all the books I could manage and keep a list of them. The first book was Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk. I wanted to read this the day it came out, but I had to wait. After my last class ended I went to my car and called my then-boyfriend, now-husband and squealed to him, "I finally get to read that book!" But, like everything else, the motivation to keep track of the books I read faded after a couple months.

Now, inspired by a post in www.getcrafty.com, I'm going to try this again. But I'm going to keep the list going in this blog. In the same kinda way that the 12 Days of Christmas song goes. Every time I add to the list in a new update, I'll post the entire list again.

Books read in 2006:
1. Modern Girl's Guide to Life - Jane Buckingham

2005-12-10T18:01:00.000-06:00

Snow!!!!!

2005-12-06T18:04:00.000-06:00

I finished a scarf in time to wear for the cold weather! It's just a k2p2 rib and is pretty long. I wish I could've made it a little bit wider, but I wasn't sure if I would have enough yarn, and I don't think I would have.

The yarn I used was from Target's Dollar Spot. I used the lilac-ish pink acrylic and purple furry yarn. I had only bought a couple of them for $1, then went back when they were 75% off (yay!) and got more. I didn't know what to do with the furry yarn at all, it never occurred to me to knit it along with another type of yarn. I got the idea from someone on Craftster.org who had used the orange-red furry yarn from target to make a similar scarf. It is SO soft, and really warm too. Warmer than my jacket.

2005-12-06T18:00:00.000-06:00

I was just clicking through some old bookmarks to clean out my folders on the computer and all of a sudden I'm being overrun by fuzzy caterpillars.

Okay, there was just one.....and...yeah, I made it myself.

I made it while bored at work Sunday out of pipe cleaners and I had to draw a face on a piece of paper and tape it to the front. :)

2005-11-30T20:10:00.000-06:00

Christmas list. Doesn't seem like a very crafty entry, but first impressions aren't always what they seem.

- simple, but pretty desk for crafty area in bedroom
- shelves/storage baskets/organization stuff for same area
- chair (you guessed it...same area)
- Sublime Stitching patterns - Winterland and Krazy Kitchen (maybe Pirates too)
- Knitting Journal from Barnes and Noble (or just a really pretty blank notebook)
- Giftcard for Hobby Lobby, JoAnns or Michael's
- blank light green pillowcases (to embroider on for our bed)
- spice rack from Target
- fresh ground pepper and salt things
- headboard for bed (right.)
- puzzles (i love puzzles and will never have enough - if I were to stack all the puzzles I own now, they would probably be twice my height, if it were to actually stay standing)

2005-11-20T14:40:00.000-06:00

New embroidery. I got the image from a retro-themed clipart site (can't think of the name). It's done on a flour sack/tea towel in satin stitch. I hate satin stitch. H-A-T-E it. I hated it before I did this. Thought maybe some practice would help. Nope.

I planned on turning this into a decorative towel for Halloween. Well, it's now almost Thanksgiving. Since I'm burnt out on Halloween right now, this will have to wait to be finished next year. I plan on cutting the towel in half (it's pretty big) and hemming it - then it can be two towels. Then adding some other Halloween items, a pumpkin, a witch, I dunno. "Happy Halloween" banner maybe. Then edging it with some orange or purple rickrack and an embroidery border.

Even though the hard part is over (and I'm never attempting satin stitch for the rest of my life) I just want to put it away for a while before I associate the hatred for the stitch into hatred towards the piece. Which I love. I love the black cat I painfully created. It's not his fault. :)

2005-11-18T16:11:00.000-06:00

I'm sick. I took some Nyquil three hours ago, and I finally feel tired. Before they changed the ingredients, I couldn't ever take Nyquil before. After a day or two of taking it, I wouldn't be able to go to sleep because of the pseudoephedrine. Now that they keep any product containing that behind the counter in pharmacies, they changed the ingredient in Nyquil. Now it won't keep me up =)

The Nyquil isn't helping the cough though. I called the Dr. earlier and hopefully they'll prescibe something. I had this exact same thing last winter and I got some really great cough syrup. Made it go away and I could sleep.

I got a lot of knitting done yesterday. I had to go to my parent's house while my husband copied some recorded TV stuff onto DVD and we did laundry. It's so nice to not have to pay to do laundry. Plus my mom has an awesome washer and dryer so I could wash everything in two loads instead of four or five in the crappy washer and dryer we have at our apartment.

I still need to work on Mr. Craftyknit's scarf though. I still haven't learned how to do stripes, and I need to find out on a website. Rather than doing that, of course, I'm updating this. And then I'll probably forget in the next couple of minutes, shut down the computer and start on something else. It's already cold....so I need to get it finished!

2005-11-16T19:15:00.000-06:00

Our First Anniversary!!

Our first wedding anniversary was on Sunday, Nov. 13. We didn't do anything, really. We went to my parent's house to get some recorded shows onto a DVD. We also went to a friend's house to watch a TNA Wrestling pay-per-view. Yay. Oh well though, we were both off work and together. Everything was pretty fun that we did that day too.

Instead of freezing the top layer of our wedding cake, we just had the place re-make one for us. It was pound cake with white buttercream icing. No decoration because I did that myself. The decoration was just the petals from three roses scattered. It was a little harder than I expected becuase the petals kept rolling around. It came out pretty good though. Better than our wedding cake because they didn't put enough petals on each layer. Not a big deal though.

2005-11-16T19:03:00.000-06:00

My mom's birthday was on Monday. I finished a cross-stitch kit for her last summer, and then finally framed it on Sunday (since I had to work on her birthday and wouldn't see her). I put everything off. It did turn out okay, even though I didn't stretch the fabric inside the frame. You're supposed to stretch it over a board or that foam core stuff, but I couldn't get it to look right w/out unravelling the edges. Plus it's in there pretty tight, so it shouldn't move around. And then, if it does I'll just re-frame it :) Wouldn't be hard.

Even though it's one of those "home sweet home" type of kits, the bird was so puffy and cute, it wasn't that bad. It also isn't for me, and my mom loves it. Maybe someday someone will put out cross-stitch kits that aren't icky looking...

2005-11-16T16:26:00.000-06:00

You are interchangeable.Fun, free, and into everything, you've got every
eventuality covered and every opportunity just
has to be taken. Every fiber is wonderful, and
every day is a new beginning. You are good at
so many things, it's amazing, but you can
easily lose your place and forget to show up.
They have row counters for people like you!

What kind of knitting needles are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

2005-11-08T20:26:00.000-06:00

There's a chance of bad weather again tonight. It's too warm for November. I just heard a story form my mom (I think she said this was on national news) about a woman and her husband who lived in a 2-story house. The roof was blown off and her husband caught her by the ankles and had to HOLD ON TO HER as she flew through the air. The tornado was trying to suck her out of the house. WTF? Why is it so mean? I can't IMAGINE that...I can't even imagine being the husband having to keep someone from blowing away!

This time I think I might drive out of it's way...but then you never know if another one is going to pop up. It's so frustrating. I just don't know what I should do. Stay on the second floor. Go out into the hallway...?! ugh.

I may have to update this later. This is going really slow right now. It keeps pausing in the middle of typing. Annoying. I'm sure there's tons of typos.

2005-11-06T19:05:00.000-06:00

Holy Crap.

Last night was probably the scariest and worst nights of my life. My husband and I were awake at 1:30am watching the UFC finale. We didn't get to see the end of the last fight, and it was a good fight.

Switching around the channels during a commercial we land on a local channel. Tornado Warning. Vanderburgh County. We see the projected path of their "tornado rings" on the weather screen. The red shaded area that looks like a < includes where we live. Where we are right NOW. Holy crap.

I pull my pants up over my nightgown, shove my shoes on w/out untying them. Throw a warm shirt on over the top of my nightgown. My husband grabs shoes, a cell phone, some candles and a lighter. I throw soft stuff into our bathroom to cover up with (warm too...if it comes to that). Throw the cats in there too....hard to do with two cats. We try to figure out what to do. I'm so scared that I shake the cell phone out of my hand trying to talk to my mom. We still have some time. My husband wants to get out of there, "If we stay here we die!" he tells me. We live on the second floor. The top floor, where the roof is, and roofs blow off. I refuse to leave. We try a downstairs neighbor, the maintenance man. He's not home. We open the door, contemplating on driving away.

One lightning strike gives us a peek at the clouds forming an abstract verion of "Don't even try it." So we go back inside.

I grab my phone and shut myself in the bathroom, in the bathtub. With a pillow on my head. Lot of good THAT will do, but hey, I might avoid getting a splinter on my forehead. My husband never comes in there, like he should. He's watching the weather on the local station. It's turned up so I can hear. I keep hearing "Ohio River" "Newburgh" everywhere south and east of where we are. That's good, in case you were wondering.

The weatherman says to, "Make sure you put as many people between you and the storm as possible." People? That's a little rude isn't it? Meaning walls, of course.

Gradually I'm assured that it has passed us. Barely. A 1/4 mile wide tornado, an F3 (or worse, they think), passed us by 3 miles.

My mom says that it's so scary when stuff like this happens, but isn't it a great feeling when it's over and you're okay (this is before we know the damage it caused). But no. It didn't feel good. I haven't felt better because I want to buy a house, or at the very least rent an apartment on the ground level.

Usually stuff like this happens and you're disconnected. This time:

my brother in law is close to us so was in the path of the storm as well.
I thought my cousin lived in the trailerpark that was demolished (17 people dead so far) but he had moved a month earlier.
My 18 yr old sister in law is nowhere to be found. Not answering her phone, suspected to be staying at a guy's house in the city that was hit.
Two friends live in the path of the storm. - one had a board go through the wall of his mom's bedroom.
The other has a girlfriend who lives in the next town the tornado decides to visit.
A co-worker's father's girlfriend was in the trailer park. Intensive care, losing a lot of blood.
An old co-worker used to live in the trailer park. Not sure if she still does.
My boss lives in the third city the tornado hit.
My mother in law lives a few counties over where the line of storms is heading - although the tornados seemed to be dying off.

But I am so lucky.

2005-11-05T22:18:00.000-06:00

I've always been afraid to buy a car. A few months ago I got really tired of my 94 Corolla...it was a great car, I just was afraid to put any money into it...so I started looking around at new and used cars. We didn't have a ton of money to spend, but we had enough to buy something pretty nice. I'm 26 and made my parents go with me to buy it. Which is good I guess since they have the experience. But that wasn't the only reason. I HATE bargaining. I am a flea marketer and a garage saler's BEST friend. So I took my parents so they could deal with all that crap.

Turns out we get a great salesman. Yes, they do exist. He was nice and very friendly, not creepy or sexist...we'll get to one of those in a minute. So now I have a used (only 2 years old though) Matrix. I love it.

Any car salespeople reading this. BE NICE TO YOUR CUSTOMERS. They will come back and refer all their friends to you if you're nice, along with giving you thousands of dollars for a car.

Today I went with my mom because she's looking for a new car. She's looking for new, looking at a G6, which is boring and a Matrix (hmm...who do you think suggested that one...) We go to the Pontiac dealer and he's a little vague with things, isn't all that friendly, but not awful. Then my mom was leaning toward the G6P (bigger engine, etc). She hadn't wanted one before because my parents were told by the other car dealer (a woman) that it was turbo charged. My dad doesn't want that. So my mom says, "I'm not sure who told us it was turbo charged, my husband thinks it might've been the other salesgirl we talked to first." Crappy salemsan, "Aaahhh...salesGIRL."

First of all. How stupid can you be. It's the interest in knowing about cars that makes more men know about them, not that the male brain has more aptitude for knowing about them. AND if you're trying to get $20-something thousand dollars from two WOMEN you make a stupid comment like that? Not to mention that HIS knowledge came straight from a booklet he read sitting in front of us. I don't expect every salesman to know everything about a car (although they should know quite a bit), but don't insult someone for making a mistake when you really don't know anything.

Any car salespeople out there reading this, do NOT act like this to your customers. I don't want to give this guy a penny I find on the ground. I'm talking my mom more and more into getting the Matrix from the guy I bought mine from. Not even because I love my car, really like the salesman, but I just can't stand this other guy. Ugh. Okay. I'm done.

2005-11-04T14:19:00.000-06:00

(Three updates in one day...that won't last long. I just wanted to get a few of my projects up.). This is the I Luv Veggies pattern from Sublime Stitching. I lined them up on the bottom edge of a boring black apron that I'm going to hang on the kitchen wall since I don't wear aprons. I might enlarge a couple of them (the carrot and the garlic maybe?) and put them on the center of the apron.

2005-11-04T14:10:00.000-06:00

What would Jason do? This is something I made for my husband. He already had a t-shirt with this on it, so I can't take credit for coming up with it. But I printed the design out on paper. Put some transfer paper (essentially carbon paper) between the "pattern" and the fabric and traced it. You can trace it with a pen or if you don't want marks on the original you can trace it with something pointy, I used a knitting needle. Then it's all just simple split stitch. It was a little hard stitching though since this is on my husband's jacket, it's not really thick, but the fabric is hard to get a needle through without a few pokes in your fingers.

I did sew through a thin layer of skin on my index finger while stitching this though. Even felt the thread go through my skin. Ick.

2005-11-04T12:57:00.000-06:00

Hi. I'm boring and you don't want to read this, and you probably aren't.

I'm 26. Married. Work a crappy job and don't make enough money to justify having spent 5 1/2 years in college. My free time is spent watching movies, sometimes TV, or crafting.

I knit, embroider, have the desire to sew (just haven't learned how), make collages, what I like to call "photography", cross-stitch. And then some other random craft things like painting or making ornaments, mosaics, nothing that's really a "category" or anything.

I don't like to knit clothing, I know after spending that much time on it, it won't fit. Right now I'm stuck with scarves as I'm making some Christmas gifts. It's really easy to find embroidery patterns since you can basically use any basic outline drawing, but my favorite are the designs from http://www.sublimestitching.com It's really hard to find cross stitch patterns that I like, but I've been able to find some funny ones here. Other than that I satisfy my cravings for cross stitch by making gifts for other people. I stitched a boring bird pattern for my mom, a really boring Precious Moments pattern for my Grandma because she collects them. The only time I could stand something slightly "countrycrafty" looking is with Christmas.

I love the x-stitch designs in that link because I have two black cats. (Many of the scenes on that site have occurred in my house - like Isis eating out of the trashcan.) Loki (the boy) is four. Isis (the girl) is 1 1/2. They are insane, like to attack each other to the ground to bite? no. To lick each other's heads. They must not know there's a simpler way about it. I mean, you want to kiss someone, you don't go tackling them right. Or maybe you do. Whatever works.