It's Geek to Me

Helena Hem

2012-02-01T07:04:00.000-05:00

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I finally put on my big girl pants and sewed up Helena's hem! It's allllmost done.

It just needs the ties done on the front.

I referenced this article on TECHknitting about how to sew hems shut. And by "referenced," I mean CLUNG TO FOR DEAR LIFE, keeping the page open on the computer, on my lap, while I sewed, like some great virtual security blanket. The last illustration (not picture) in the post was invaluable for an overly literal person like me!

I'm still not 100% sure how the hem was supposed to be picked up for the button band. (Wait...is it still a button band if there are no buttons?) But I'm pretty happy with it!

To celebrate, I cast on Rose Red, just in time to wrap up Jardin January. It's very impressive, no? ;)

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

JiffNotes
Is it bad that when I read the title of this post I hear Professor Umbridge in my head? hem, hem

Snap Happy (The Geekend That Was, 1/29)

2012-01-31T07:03:00.000-05:00

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The weekend was BEAUTIFUL. Saturday after morning chores (Michael had to run sound), we went to the Atlanta Botanical Gardens armed with my spiffy new camera to give it a real test run.

Of course, we had to start with lunch. I love the cafe they now have at the Gardens. It's a bit on the expensive side, but I expect overpriced food at any event arena. And this stuff is not only REALLY GOOD, it's also healthy.

Chicken and barley soup; chick pea, yellow squash, and orange salad with citrus dijon dressing and coconut-pecan cookie

If you're a Garden member or go often, they actually have a "frequent buyer" card that they don't really advertise. Grab one next time you're there! It's also cool that since we're in a garden, they use compostable plates, cups and utensils. The plate is actually made from banana leaves. And yes, that clear plastic cup is also compostable!

The sky was a brilliant shade of blue.

I'm a little worried that many of our flowering trees are going to bloom too early an then get frozen next week when we're supposed to get down into the 20s (F)! But I guess I'll just enjoy them while I can!

I've always loved the trunk of this tree. The camera lets me do fun things like shoot everything black and white except the blue sky. =)

Winter is a great time to really capture the shape of this awesome cedar tree. (I should know its genus and species by now, but I've sadly forgotten!) When the leaves are green, you can see its cone sticking up above the other trees, but it's difficult to see the whole thing.

We enjoyed seeing all the yummy-looking Winter greens.

This recipe fascinates me...

...what do you think, would you try it??

It was fun to wander around outside, but I was really excited to hit the Fuqua Orchid Center. Next weekend it's going to be really spectacular, since Orchid Daze begins, but it's awesome at any time.

Here I was playing with the "pop color" filter on the camera.

It makes these just a little "purplier" than normal. Purplier. Yes, I'm quite sure that's an actual word. ;)

And now on to Real Photography. The kind where you play with ever-mysterious concepts like Aperture (not to be confused with Aperture Laboratories), Shutter Speed, Metering Mode, Depth of Field...!!!

Let's just start with Aperture, okey dokey? That's how much light the camera is letting in (how wide the lens is open during shooting). Also related to f-stop. I used to have a coworker that, when asked what an acronym containing an "F" stood for would tell you what all the other letters stood for and then say, "And, of course, the 'F' is implied." I'll let you figure that one out on your own. But! In this case, the "f" stands for "factorial". Oh, OK, that's all perfectly clear now. =P

Wikipedia tells me the f-stop is the focal length divided by the aperture. What I understand is that a smaller f-stop (larger aperture) makes the background defocused while keeping the foreground in focus (because, though I don't understand it...yet...a smaller aperture means a greater depth of field). For instance, this picture...

...was taken at a smaller f-stop (smaller aperture) than this one...

I tend to like my backgrounds a little defocused.

Here's a more dramatic example. F-stop cranked all the way down, i.e., I REALLY WANT YOU TO JUST LOOK AT THIS ONE FLOWER.

And the same flower in more of "hey, look at this pretty flower in the context of its background foliage" mode.

Of course, this camera is pretty smart and does very well if you just let it pick its own settings. =)

In all the times we're been in the Orchid Center, I'm pretty sure we've never seen this particular bloom. That's one of the things I love about it; there is always something blooming, and it's different every time you go. We've been before when a volunteer has pointed out a bloom and said, "This one only blooms for two days!"

I love the shapes of this one!

Here's a shot showing the roof of the Orchid Center.

I took around 120 pictures. I discovered a lot of things about my camera in the process! It has several methods of focusing; one of which allows you to move the focus spot wherever in the frame you want it. (I used to try to cheat this with my automatic by centering what I wanted to focus, then holding the shutter button halfway down and recomposing the shot.) It's got a panoramic mode (which we played with but I wasn't thrilled enough with any particular result to share). It's even got a timer! So now, you can see both of us at once!

I haven't even begun to play with the flash yet! I also have a wide-angle lens (which is what I'll use the most when we're sight-seeing, as it's nice and small and then the camera fits in its spiffy case). It lets you get the entire Fuqua Conservatory in one shot. =)

JiffNotes
New camera = lots to shoot and lots to learn. Imagine how many pictures I will have after Orchid Daze starts!!

Theme-a-licious Jardin January Wrap-Up

2012-01-30T15:50:00.000-05:00

Wrap-up day for Theme-a-licious is the 31st, but again, I'm posting this a little early so everyone can check in while it's still the 31st for them. And also to give those of you who may have forgotten a chance to whip a post together. =) By the way, should we be doing these posts on the first instead of the last day of the month? What do you think? Leave me a comment if you have a strong opinion. Or even a weak one. ;)

So let's recap my plan for Jardin January:

Shakespeare's Garden
Convents Herbal Garden
Sanctuary
Rose Red Hat

I worked on Shakespeare's Garden and Convents Herbal Garden the first part of the month (see recap here). I stopped on Shakespeare's Garden because I was missing one fiber. Fortunately, the wonderful Kris saw my plea and sent me several yards! It arrived Saturday, but I was busy trying to finish Helena so I could cast on Rose Red! I managed to finish all of Helena except the front ties!!! Michael looked at the wee sweater and said he was amazed at what I could do. =) I'm pretty happy with it even though I can see some imperfections. But when it's on a sweet little baby, no one will see those. ;) I did JUST cast on Rose Red, and I'd show you a picture, but since I only did four rounds, it doesn't look like much. =)

Sanctuary fared much better thanks to IHSW! (Really, mainly due to Burn Notice and its vice-like grip over my spouse. =)

And for good measure, I worked on Les Rubans. Because it totally has flower-like things on it. See how this works? It's all up to you how strictly (or loosely) you apply the theme. ;)

Now it's time to talk about...
Fangirl February

Send a Valentine to your favorite designer...or at least work on his or her designs for the month!

I'm having a little bit of a hard time making up my mind here. I have so many favorites! But I think I'm going to concentrate on three: Teresa Wentzler, Moss Creek Designs (Rae Iverson) and Mirabilia. Here's what I'm going to do:

Teresa Wentzler: Peacock Tapestry. It's in progress, but just barely, and is a great candidate for the upcoming Amazon April
Moss Creek Designs: Blackwork Band Sampler...or maybe Ye Shall Prosper. They're both on my WIPocalypse list!
Mirabilia: I should be good and work on Autumn Queen (in progress AND on the WIPocalypse list). But what I really want to do is start Dancer, since Dasher needs company. And since it's my birthday this month, that's probably what I'm going to do. =)

It's hard for me to pick a favorite knitting designer since I have so little experience. But since I love every sock pattern Cookie A has cranked out of her genius brain, I'm going to add Bex (WOW that sock has been in progress for a while) to the list. Besides, how am I going to get the opportunity to work on one of the socks from my self-made sock club if I don't get some free needles up in here?

So how did your Jardin January go? What are your plans for Fangirl February? Please add your link below (to your wrap-up post). And despite what Mister Linky says, you don't need to comment after linking, though of course I'll always appreciate it. =) Our next check-in post will be on the 15th, when we'll share how Fangirl February is going! And don't worry if you haven't posted before...just jump in whenever.

Les Rubans Update

2012-01-28T19:36:00.001-05:00

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I was waffling on what to work on after IHSW, since I managed to wrap up one of the four gardens in Sanctuary (you'll see pictures in a couple days with the Jardin January wrap-up =). So I decided to pull out Les Rubans, since that post got so many comments! In fact, I'd had a vague idea for a while that the first time one of my posts got 20 comments, I'd do an unannounced giveaway. So there's going to be a little something coming to one of the commenters on that post (picked by my randomizer...aka my hubby). I'll keep it a secret until it gets there. 'Cause I'm sneaky that way. ;)

Anyhoo, you wanna see some pictures, doncha? Well, here you go!

This is an in-progress picture of the first ribbon that we worked on in class (also first in the instructions). It's also the smallest, which just made it seem like a fabulous place to start. By the way, this piece TOTALLY fits in with Jardin January, for those keeping score at home. It absolutely has many flowers, and flower-like things on it, though I may or may not be working on them at the moment. This picture is the laid base of the background filling stitch plus the first (horizontal) path about halfway done (the pink).

Here's what the motifs looked like before the filling stitch was started:

SEE! Completely and utterly flower-like.

And another shot to show how dimensional all this is!

I think it's hard to tell now that the filling stitch is in there.

Aaaand, this is the horizontal pass done and the vertical pass halfway done. Most of that blue metallic grid is covered up now, but it's still under there lending structure and dimension.

JiffNotes
Totally flower-like.

Eat Your Vegetables

2012-01-24T08:37:00.000-05:00

A couple months ago Michael and I took my sister, brother-in-law and niece to YEAH! Burger, and the side of the month was roasted Brussels sprouts with goat cheese. YUM! Well, anything with goat cheese is fantastic. But what amazed me was that my sister went completely gaga over the Brussels sprouts themselves. She'd never had them prepared by roasting! That got me thinking...there must be a lot of people who've never had them that way. Well, if that's you, and especially if you hate slimy, mushy, boiled Brussels sprouts, you owe it to yourself to try it. They're not mushy, they're not slimy, and you can make them as crispy as you like by stripping off more leaves (more loose leaves = more crunchy bits).

This recipe is from Cooking Light. I've changed it just a little bit (doubled so it's for four and changed some things around).

Roasted Brussels Sprouts and Apples

modified from a recipe in Cooking Light

1 cup diced apple (about 1 apple)
1 pound Brussels sprouts, trimmed and quartered (with as many leaves pulled off as you'd like)
1 1/2 T apple cider vinegar
1 1/2 T olive oil
1/4 - 1/2 t dried tarragon
salt and pepper to taste

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Toss all ingredients and place in one layer on a cookie sheet or baking stone.

Bake for 25 minutes. Serves 4.

Easy peasy!

The Geekend That Was, 1/22 (Winter Blues)

2012-01-23T20:12:00.000-05:00

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After Friday, when it was yucky and rainy outside and I didn't leave the house, I belatedly signed up for International Stitch and Hermit Weekend. I had hoped to go for some outdoor photography, but the weather was supposed to be disgusting all weekend, so I thought I'd have lots of stitching time instead. The hubby went to judge a pinewood derby Saturday morning, which I should have gone to with him, but he had to leave soooo early that I couldn't make myself conscious in time. We may have also stayed up too late watching Burn Notice (THIS SHOW IS SO ADDICTING!)

So there I am, stuck at home, with thunderstorms raging outside, and what am I doing? Am I curling up with a cup of tea and stitching? Noooo, I'm still trying to beat stupid Dance Central (with intermittent power outages), I'm doing laundry, I'm getting myself ready in case we go for a movie later, I'm doing chores...what the heck?? When the hubby got home, I continued to do more of the same. I did do some stitching, but most of it wasn't very showy...I figured out how to sew Helena's hem, I did a test stitch on Shakespeare's Garden to determine if two yards of begged and borrowed flower thread would do (result: TWO GIANT QUEEN STITCHES, and that's all). Late Sunday night I stitched some satin stitches on Les Rubans. So most of what I have to show is from Friday night's Burn Notice marathon:

I'm not showing you the whole thing because I'll save it for my Jardin January wrap-up (SUCH A TEASE).

The mail man did deliver some mini-skeins I bought from Tami at Candy Skein. Omigosh, these colors are AWESOME!!

I played with the camera a while, but it was impossible to capture all the ranges of blue and teal. Some of these are too bright; the one second from the right in particular is actually a deep turquoise. And because I am a total weirdo, I used my new swift to turn one of them into a wee yarn cake. Yeah, it's pretty much not very useful in that form! =)

Sunday we did go on a shopping trip and got lots of good bargains. My best one is this down jacket (550 fill!!!)...it was 70% off, so only 30 dollars! It's so warm, and I don't look like the Stay Puft marshmallow man in it. I love it!

JiffNotes
Winter blues are OK as long as they are yummy yarn colors or keeping me warm!

Meta post: Comments

2012-01-23T10:08:00.001-05:00

Just a quick note...I enabled threaded comments (which means you can "Reply" to a comment), and to do it I had to change my comment form from being pop-up (in a new window) to embedded (in the same window as the post). If you have any problems commenting, PLEASE email me at heather at lottloft dot com and let me know. If this causes a lot of trouble (I know the embedded comment form has had problems before), I will switch it back. TA!

Al the Orts that are Fit to Report (January TUSAL)

2012-01-23T00:28:00.000-05:00

(What's a TUSAL?)

Here's a month of orts (scraps). My yearly jar is getting washed out, since it was emptied from last year's orts. This jar (i.e., votive candle holder, but let's just pretend it's an actual jar) is fairly full this month mostly due to winding all the yarn for my own sock club.

Speaking of winding, I finally spent some of my Christmas money on a swift! Now I no longer have to tie hangers together with elastic and put them in my giant, weirdly square fat separator to wind yarn! (No idea what I'm talking about? Check out the cheapest DIY yarn swift ever. I'd been doing pretty much the same thing.)

What the...? Hey, how did that book get in that box from Knit Picks?? Well, guess I'll have to keep it. ;)

Dancing Queen?

2012-01-21T17:14:00.000-05:00

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For Christmas, I got Michael a 5-pack of tickets to Georgia Tech basketball games. Since our coliseum is being remodeled, some of the games are being held in Philips Arena. Thursday night we went to the Georgia Tech - UVA basketball game, and we found out our seats are pretty close to the court, which is awesome. Close enough, in fact, that I had great hopes of actually catching one of the T-shirt bombs they hurl into the audience. But we all know how that is ultimately going to end up for the short girl: No T-shirt for me.

BUT WAIT!! What's the guy who's normally throwing the T-shirts doing up in the crowd? (And by "up in," I mean at row 10 where we were sitting.) He's recruiting people for some crazy half-time stunt! HOW CAN I SAY NO TO THAT??

BEHOLD, MY BRIGHT YELLOW FLOOR PASS OF SUPERIORITY! (Only good at half-time.)

I think they mean, "UN-LIMITED"!

As I made my way out on the court, trying to avoid being kicked in the head by the dance team, I wondered what I'd have to do to get my T-shirt. Probably something vaguely athletic, trying to throw a ball through some small hole from very far away, causing the crowd to chortle with mirth and raise a rousing chorus of "AIR-BALL, AIR-BALL!" Or perhaps something involving a blindfold, where I crawl around on the floor towards targets to win FABULOUS VALUABLE PRIZES while the audience helpfully yells, "TO YOUR RIGHT!" "STRAIGHT AHEAD!" "FASTER!!!" simultaneously?? (I've seen it done. NOT pretty.)

What? Musical chairs? Oh, well, that's OK then. Wait, why is the guy holding four of us back? What are WE going to do?

Hmmm...*sniff sniff*...smells like a dance contest. I'm afraid I didn't win (the old guy got the sympathy vote), but I'm not afraid to admit that I busted out some Dance Central moves during the competition. =) At least the crowd cheered for me! But most importantly, I GOT MY T-SHIRT. And it was even a medium (a rarity in the sea of XXLs they were showering into the crowd).

(I am hoping that 11-12 is for 2011-2012, and not the record we're shooting for, although things honestly aren't looking so good right now.)

I love the back!

Speaking of Dance Central, I am in a total grudge match with it right now. I'm trying to get my very last achievement, "Something to Prove," which involves getting 100% on all the teaching recaps. If anyone knows how to conquer "Dip It," hit me in the comments. =(

JiffNotes
Apparently, I will do almost anything for a T-shirt.

The Geekend That Was, 1/15

2012-01-17T20:32:00.000-05:00

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Soooo, my eyes are dilated right now, so this is going to be a short post! I'm still way behind on blog reading (even the Theme-a-licious posts! =o) but I will get around to it!

Friday night we had friends over to play Settlers of Catan. There was good food, good wine and probably the closest game I've played. Also the strangest distribution of resources, ever. I spent a couple minutes playing with my camera before the evening started, because I saw this out the window:

The night went extremely late, so not a lot happened the next day. ;) We did watch a lot of Burn Notice on Netflix. Have you seen this series?? It's about a CIA contractor who gets "burned"...that is, he's fired, stranded in Miami, and all his accounts are frozen, and he has no idea why. He narrates over some of the scenes, and it's hilarious. He's like the MacGyver of spies because he has to make his equipment with very little cash. And it costars Bruce Campbell!

Sunday we saw Beauty and the Beast in 3D. It was so great to see that movie on the big screen again, although I will admit that for most of the scenes, I could have done without the 3D. There was one scene where Gaston's leg looked like it had been deflated! I managed to avoid singing along to all of Belle's parts. ;)

Monday we had planned to go to the Botanical Gardens so I could play with the new camera, but Michael wanted to go shopping first. We got a bit of a late start and never made it to the Gardens. Oh well, there is always next week. But we did enjoy our pre-shopping brunch, and since I had the camera you can see my Pumpkin Pie Chai...

YUM. And also, the Red Velvet Pancakes...

...with some random semi-healthy sandwich in the background. ;)

JiffNotes
I find my lack of stitching pictures disturbing. Also, it seems this is the closest I can come to "short".

Theme-a-licious Jardin January Check-in

2012-01-14T20:44:00.000-05:00

Check-in day for Theme-a-licious is the 15th, but I'm posting this a little early so participants 'round the globe (omigosh, how cool is it that we're themeing 'round the globe??) can check in while it's still the 15th for them!

A quick graphic note...for those of you that put the original graphic on your blog sidebars (which I do appreciate!) remember that there's now a much prettier version available! (i.e., made by a real graphic designer instead of me ;) To change from this:

to this:

just change the last part of the "src" in your "img" tag to "themeButton.gif" (note capital "B") instead of "themeblink.png". Unless, of course, you just like my unprofessional one better. ;)

Now on to the update! So far I've been able to work on two of the four pieces I wanted to work on for Jardin January. First up: Shakespeare's Garden.

I kind of stalled out when I remembered that I was missing one color of Flower Thread. Measi was kind enough to check at her LNS, but they didn't have it. I'm now going to stitch it with another color to measure exactly how much I need and hope someone can give up a partial skein. You guys are loving this piece in the comments and making me really want to finish it!!

Awaiting a response on the Flower Thread, I moved on to Convents Herbal Garden. I worked on the upper right corner.

This piece goes really slowly for me for whatever reason! I was thinking I'd finish this corner, but now I'm not sure...

My third planned piece for this month is Sanctuary by Drawn Thread. And the fourth is a knitting project I won't start 'til I'm done with a certain sweater. But you guys also really loved Les Rubans. And it, you know...kinda has flowers on it. =)

So what do you say? What should I work on for the rest of the month?

How has your Jardin January been shaping up? Please add your link below (to your check-in post). And despite what Mister Linky says, you don't need to comment after linking, though of course I'll always appreciate it. =) Our next check-in post will be on the 31st, when we'll sum up Jardin January and make plans for Fangirl February!

WIP Wednesday

2012-01-11T07:17:00.000-05:00

I am plodding along on Helena...

I've finished one sleeve (well, except for seaming it up). I'm somewhat terrified of seaming up the picot hem. But I think with a couple visits to TECHknitting, I can do it. With my nifty new camera, I was able to "warm up" the color so this is more true to the real yarn color than previous posts have been. <3 the new camera! Now I just need to conquer all its features....

I need to hurry up before the little girl is too big for the sweater!! I also want to be done so I can start Rose Red (or Silver Rose, in my case ;) for Jardin January!!

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

Another Giveaway Link...

2012-01-10T18:51:00.000-05:00

Southpaw Stitcher is having a great giveaway for her blogiversary!

Go visit to enter!

The Geekend That Was, 1/8

2012-01-09T08:02:00.000-05:00

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Thank you so much for all your kind comments on Les Rubans. =) I must admit that you all make me want to pull it out and work on it!! Gabi asked what I meant by "chichi" women...I meant women with a lot of money who are always "dressed to impress". Now, this is not to say that everyone at that shop has been anything but perfectly nice any time I've been there. It's just me being intimidated! Thank you also for the well wishes on my sinus infection. This week was wretched, but I am feeling like a human again!!

The big project for the weekend was taking down all the Christmas decorations.

The corner always looks so empty just after the tree comes down.

I did manage to do one thing that I wanted to do at the end of last year. I'd been so tempted to join different sock clubs (especially Cookie A's...I LOVE her stuff!) but I have so many sock patterns and so much sock yarn already. So I took a page from The Yarn Harlot's book and made my own.

There are only five bags here because I was going for six, but I already have two socks in progress. You can see one bag is different...after I made up the bags, I had Michael switch out the contents of that bag with another one so I wouldn't know which "kit" was in it. I'll probably pick that one first! =) Gee whiz, I wound a lot of yarn!

JiffNotes
I think I win for owning the most Christmas ornaments...or at least for having the most pine needles on my floor!

WIPocalypse Check-in #1

2012-01-08T22:16:00.000-05:00

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So far, I've had great success! Dasher was finished (click here to see his beauty shot). I took another shot to try to capture HOW MANY BEADS (and other various assorted sparklies) he's encrusted with.

I've started working on Shakespeare's Garden (which is also my first piece for Jardin January).

But sadly, I remembered that I am missing one of the DMC Flower Threads...2358. Anyone have one they can trade or sell me??

JiffNotes
Don't expect a finish every month...that's not really my style. ;)

Les Rubans Anciennes

2012-01-06T08:56:00.000-05:00

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What with all the holiday hubbub, I never got around to posting about the second class I took in November (after Chocolat). I didn't have to even travel for this one, as it was at a local shop. Now, this is a shop I don't go to very much (well, since being a one-car family, I don't go to any shops very much), for a few reasons:

It's mainly a needlepoint shop.
Canvases can run over $400!
It's frequented by extremely chichi women, of which I am not one.
CANVASES CAN RUN OVER $400!!!1!!one!!!

Ahem.

Anyway, I usually only set foot in this store when I'm shielded by the bright and shining combined buying power of Jean and Teresa...no one notices my purchases are pitiful because they're too blinded by the glare of their melting credit cards. (I jest...but seriously.) On one of those occasions, they were tantalized by a sign proclaiming that Tony Minieri would be teaching. Now even *I*, with my limited needlepoint knowledge, have heard of Tony Minieri, and I even have some of his ornament kits in my stash. They put themselves on the list on the spot, and I succumbed to the peer pressure and I didn't even ask how much the class was. Because, see above about chichi. One doesn't ask such questions, donchaknow.

After I left and stopped hyperventilating at my extreme carelessness, I started to get really excited. I did my prework, but all the time I was thinking, "What the HECK are we going to DO for FOUR DAYS??"

BWAHAHAHAHA!! (That's the sound of "day two Heather" listening to "prework Heather" asking that question.)

I mean, I've been in some pretty complex needlework classes, and none of them have been more than like, A DAY. THIS, however, was an entirely different ball of wax. Ew. Ball of yarn. That's better. The pace was very fast, especially for a night owl like me who was being forced to parse a lot of verbal instructions at 9am! There was even HOMEWORK! I would say that if you have trouble processing verbal instructions, you're probably going to have a tough time in one of Tony's classes. His written instructions are great, and you'll be able to get everything later, but you'll be a little adrift during class. It was kinda like being in a fiber boot camp run by Harvey Feinstein. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

ANY-hoo! What you really want are PICTURES! Well, here they are...somehow my camnesia during class extended to not getting a good picture of the model, which was GORGEOUS. BEYOND GORGEOUS. But I wasn't sure it was Allowed, so I didn't. We did get a super-nice full-size color copy of the model for reference later. Priceless.

Here's what I had at the end of the four days:

By the way, these are NOT the original ("antique") colors if you happen to find an image online. These are "jewel tones". Shhhh...don't tell Tony, but I'm going to change a couple shades. I actually think I would have liked the antique colors better, but there was ORANGE, so I couldn't do it. Many thanks to Jean for the Oli clips...I literally would have died without them, since I had about 8 needles threaded at any one time!!

Here are some closeups: (old camera, but it did pretty well =)

The tie-down stitch for all that gold was put in first, but left open and hanging until all the gold was in, then it was stitched down. Brilliant!

This crazy modified crescent stitch is the bomb!

Oh, day one, how naive I was then....

Can you see how dimensional this piece is going to be?

More crescents and such!

This tie-down was actually relaxing to do...probably why I finished it. The scrolls...notsomuch. But gorgeous!

Another tie-down...hmmm...also relaxing! My laying is getting better, but when I would walk up and look at the model, I would realize that it still looks like the surface of the moon in comparison!!

JiffNotes
Just scroll back up and look at the pretty pictures; there are way too many words at the beginning of this post. I stitched that stuff!

White Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup Cookies

2012-01-05T21:37:00.000-05:00

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Even though these were "technically" Christmas cookies and "technically" should have been posted, you know, during December, I wanted to go ahead and post them as a "public service". You see, I vaguely remembered my sister showing up with them, and even though I'm not a huge fan of their more common variant, in which mini Reese's peanut butter cups are mashed into peanut butter cookie dough, I LOVED these. However, when I googled, I couldn't find them anywhere! I wasn't sure if she'd just used brownie mix, or some kind of chocolate cookie dough. Well...

The "recipe" is this: Get a bag of white chocolate mini Reese's peanut butter cups. Get a box of brownie mix.

Mix up the brownies, and scoop about a tablespoon into mini muffin tins. NOTE: I HIGHLY recommend using paper liners...even if you grease the heck out of them, you'll have trouble prying the little devils out.

Bake. I did about 20 minutes at 350. Unwrap your PB cups while they're baking.

As soon as they come out of the oven, smash the PB cups into the center of each one.

You can make them more "festive" by adding sprinkles as soon as the PB cups melt a little. They're great when they're still mellllllty. =)

JiffNotes
Way too many "quotes". And calories.

Drive-by Giveaway (not mine)

2012-01-04T18:28:00.002-05:00

Head over to CraftyMoo for a great New Year's giveaway!

Theme-a-licious graphic update!

2012-01-03T21:43:00.001-05:00

OK, how many of you noticed that "Theme-a-licious" was misspelled in the banner graphic?? (Don't go look now; it's already fixed!) Thanks to Sharon for emailing me and pointing it out! I felt kinda like you do when a friend tells you you have spinach in your teeth...really embarrassed but really glad she told you! I blame NyQuil for my lack of observance. Yeah, that's it....

Anyway, the graphic is updated, and as a bonus Michael gave me a nice sidebar graphic to replace my crappy button:

Note that this button has an animation, too, so if you want that, link to it rather than downloading and uploading to Blogger. Check out the Theme-a-licious page for updated graphic instructions!

The Geekend That Was, 1/1

2012-01-02T21:56:00.001-05:00

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This report is going to be kind of light...except for one thing! (FORESHADOWING: Your KEY to QUALITY blog posts.) Friday was a day off, and it was the first day we really had to relax the whole holiday season! There was a whole lotta relaxing, and that was good.

Saturday we went to Michael's parents' house for his mom's birthday. We went to see TinTin, which was EXCELLENT. You must go see it. Good, clean fun, and even if you've never read the famous comic, I promise you'll enjoy it. I'm a huge Snowy fan, so I found much to be happy about. The rest of the day we spent playing with our new Settlers of Catan expansion pack that Michael's parents gave us for Christmas, Traders and Barbarians! It was a ton of fun...we played two games and didn't even get to the traders or the barbarians. There are five new scenarios, and those are the last two.

Unfortunately, I started to feel sick on Saturday (didn't keep me from winning the second game, though ;) I barely made it to midnight. Sunday I spent half the day in bed and the other half on the couch (my typical sinus infection type thing). However, that did let me spend a good deal of time beading Dasher...yeah, yeah, I know, it's Jardin January, but as Michael said, "Dasher's got a garland! That's greenery!" Part of Theme-a-licious is the creative designation of favorite projects so fit them into the theme. ;) Anyway, I was too out of it to even consider foraging for a project that wasn't lying right by me. But the good news is that by doing that, I have my first happy dance of 2012!

"PLEASE! No more!!!"

After putting on all the Treasures, I'm pretty sure that Dasher is "dashing" so that no one tries to put any more sparklies on him! =) Now I just need to figure out how I want to finish him. I was thinking a cube, but maybe he deserves to be framed? Or maybe a flat fold? What do you think?

I did make some changes in Dasher's colors if anyone is interested. I thought the original deer colors were too "yellow". I can also tell you the Delica numbers for the Mill Hill beads. Several are used across the eight reindeer, and even if you're just doing one or two, it's a lot cheaper to buy a tube of Delicas.

Today has been another hibernation day, but tomorrow it's back to work. =(

JiffNotes
Being sick is not a great way to start the year, but a finish is.

Happy New Year!

2012-01-01T13:37:00.000-05:00

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WOW, I can't believe I haven't blogged since LAST YEAR!

Just kidding. I used to do that when I was a kid. Just after midnight I'd be saying, "MOM! I haven't BREATHED since LAST YEAR!!" =P

Here's where I'm starting out on my Theme-a-licious projects (also WIPocalypse projects) for the month...this post is really more for my reference. =)

Shakespeare's Garden

Convents Herbal Garden (Chatelaine Mystery II)

Sanctuary

Thanks to all of you who are joining in with Theme-a-licious 2012...remember that you don't have to commit to doing all the months...just drop in when you can. And enjoy visiting other participants' blogs each month!

JiffNotes
Gee whiz, I haven't written JiffNotes since LAST YEAR!!

Theme-a-licious 2012 BEGINS!

2011-12-31T00:01:00.000-05:00

Jardin January

The holidays were a little stressful...let's relax in a nice garden. Work on any piece with flowers or gardens.

Welcome to the first Theme-a-licious 2012 post!! I'm extremely excited, especially since we have this way shiny header graphic provided by Michael. I helped with the icons. =) If you visit the Theme-a-licious page, it will explain how to get this nifty banner on your posts. If you just grab it from here and upload it to Blogger, the animation will NOT work. There is also a non-Nathan version for those of you who are not fans. (WHAT?? =) That's OK, more Nathan for the rest of us. ;) I'd appreciate it if you link the banner either to the Theme-a-licious page or to this post (preferably this post, so it will be easy for people to use the Mr. Linky to visit others).

Anyway, next month this post will be filled with lots of pictures of all the stunning progress I'll make, as well as plans for Fangirl February. But I'm getting ahead of myself!

Here's what's on my list for Jardin January:

Shakespeare's Garden
Convents Herbal Garden
Sanctuary
Rose Red Hat

OK, so that last one doesn't technically have a flower on it, but it's named after one, so that's good enough for me. ;) Mine's going to be more of a silver rose, actually. I took the easy way out this month and just picked the projects on my WIPocalypse list that were gardens. =)

As for timing, I'll probably work on one of the stitchy gardens a week, then pick a favorite for the last week. I'll work on the hat throughout the month. I lost my favorite grey hat and it's getting cold! =( That is, as soon as I finish knitting a sweater for a certain tiny girl!

So join in the fun! Post about your plans...what are you working on? Do you have any goals you want to meet? Are you Themeing just on weekends, or the whole month? When you link your post below, please use the URL to your post rather than your blog, if you would. And please put a link back here in your post so people can easily find other Theme-a-licious participants! Thanks and let me know if you have any questions or problems. Did I mention I'm excited?? =)

And to All a Good Night

2011-12-30T19:00:00.000-05:00

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Look what I got for Christmas!

This crappy picture was taken with our point-and-shoot camera, and I did practically nothing to arrange it or frame it. I'm going to have to up my game for this baby! It's a Sony NEX-3C and it's like a DSLR, but it does not have a mirror (the "R" is for "reflex"...aaaand, now I have Duran Duran in my head). It's such a new concept there's not really a nifty acronym for it. Sony calls it a "compact interchangeable lens digital camera". I call it a DSLM.

So usually on Christmas Eve, Michael and I, my parents and my oldest sister and her family go to a church service together, then we go back to my parents' house for a Christmas Eve buffet. The church they wanted to go to this year was much closer to me, so I offered to host the buffet. I didn't know whether it would make things easier for my mom or if she would feel like I was trying to take something away from her, but she was happy to give the job to me! So we cleaned up a little.

Here's the full stitched ornament garland. I don't know what I'm going to do next year; they don't even all fit on here now. I have a few sprinkled around elsewhere.

We went to the service at Church of the Apostles, and while it was a nice service, the first 30 minutes gave me musical whiplash! We went from a Michael W. Smith jig to frenetic jazz to full-out gospel to country to O Holy Night sung by a high tenor! We only got to sing one hymn as a congregation until the very end of the service. They made up for it then. The message was excellent, though.

Aside from a little traffic snafu that caused our guests to wait for us while we tried to get home, everything else went great. My nephew the former sous chef cut the oh-so-yummy-but-oh-so-hard-to-cut peppermint bars and plated all the Christmas cookies:

Clockwise from the center top along the outside edge, White Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup Brownies, Blueberry Almond Bars, Pumpkin Spice Buttons, Peppermint Cream Bars, Chewy Chocolate Gingerbread (on edge), and Buried Cherries. I also made one more cookie which you'll see later. =)

I didn't get a shot of the spread, which included French Onion dip, cheese and crackers, hummus, hammie sammies, green beans with toasted almonds, and my mom's strawberry salad (congealed). But I had to get a picture of my sister's amazing rosemary Parmesan pull-apart bread. YUM!

Oh, yeah, my sister brought pumpkin eclair cake, too! NOM!

Ah, here's that other cookie atop some white chai tea. =)

This is a Dutch Stroopwafel, which is two pizzelles sandwiching some caramel. Setting it on your hot tea (or coffee) melts the caramel just enough so it's soft. It's also great for dipping...mmmmmm....

The next morning we all gathered at my parents' house for opening presents, eating and playing games. From this point on pictures were taken with the new camera! =) Here I am playing with its color filters during a game of cards.

Messing around with soft focus. This is a temari I made for my mom years ago!

The next day Michael's parents came over. I still need to read the whole manual on my camera, but I couldn't resist running around taking more shots. This is one of the stitched ornaments that moved to the tree because it was "in theme" (white and gold). =)

Closeups of ornaments on the garland. These were some of my oldest sister's favorites. I'm so excited because next year we are going to exchange ornaments!

She says she already knows what she's stitching me! I can't wait to see what it is.

One more color filter shot. Michael's parents brought this lovely poinsettia when they came over.

They took us to see Odysseo, the new Cavalia show. It was fantastic!

Random cool Christmas things:
1) I was totally behind Santa in traffic on GA400. I pulled up behind a pickup truck, and the license plate was "HOHOHO". "NO WAY!" I shouted, and eased around to his left. Sure enough, Santa was driving!!
2) A nice lady at Target gave me two quarters to go down 400 with...I was totally out of cash and trying to get the checkout lady to charge me fifty cents extra and give me some quarters. Thank you Christmas angel!
3) Alongside 400 there are small pine trees, and each year someone decorates one of them. Well, at least the bottom few branches are covered in tinsel, shiny garland and baubles which always look like they were thrown on hastily. This has led us to believe that the GDOT does not do this, but it's some guerrilla Christmas spirit going on. This year we were headed home late, and we spotted a guy doing it! Sure enough, he was just throwing decorations in the general direction of the tree. We're now sure it's on the down-low, because his car headlights were off. Believe me, you don't want to be on the side of 400 in the dark with your headlights off unless you're in stealth mode. Now that we're sure it's "just some guy," we love the tradition even more.

Hmmm...those were all related to 400, weren't they? That almost makes up for the TWO TIMES I have had to get out of the car at the toll plaza...once to go back and put ANOTHER quarter in because the machine said one was "invalid," and once because I could hear one quarter just spinning somewhere in the machine. A nice whack on the side made the quarter drop from wherever it was. Good thing, too...that was one of the angel's quarters and I literally had 8 pennies on me.

Hope your Christmas was great!

JiffNotes
Hopefully the picture quality around here will improve!!

Reports of Dasher's Demise...

2011-12-29T09:40:00.000-05:00

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...have been greatly exaggerated.

He just didn't get all his bling on before Christmas. I'm going to try really hard to finish him before the new year, but there are a lotttttttttt of beeeeeeeads.... I bet I only have 1/4 of them on in this shot. I'm probably up to 1/3 now!

Pre-Christmas was very busy, then we spent Christmas Day with my parents and Boxing Day with Michael's parents--not that they celebrate Boxing Day in any way, shape, or form...it just sounds fancier than "the day after Christmas". It was fun; pictures and such are coming. I kinda threw an impromptu Christmas Eve buffet, too.

Then, Tuesday the 27th...I had to go back to work. I say "had to"...it was more like "chose to". I took off the whole week before so I'd have time to bake cookies, deliver them, wrap, take our niece to the Aquarium, and generally make the festivity happen. But I must admit that I thought I'd have at least a day or two to totally hermit...play video games, stitch, knit, maybe even finish some ornaments! (I actually have a "pile" now. I always scoffed at people who had a "pile".) Anyway, I ended the year with 2.5 days of vacation and 3 days of work. It's always so quiet and I get so much done (with so little to do), and I thought I'd get to do a long lunch at the Mall shopping crazy sales. Not so much...I actually have a lot to do, and I didn't even see the Mall. I did have lunch with my parents, which was nice, since in all the hubbub at Christmas it's hard to find time to really talk.

But boy oh boy do I just want to stay in my pajamas all day!

Taking a whole week off before meant that I actually did get to make scarves for my sister and mom for Christmas. It was a super-crazy plan, trying to make them the week before, but once I saw how EASY and QUICK the crochet version of the Berroco Lacey scarf was...I thought, why not???

They are a bit "bright" in this picture. They're kinda like the "potato chip" scarves but WAY fluffier. =) Why are there three? Well, I had to make myself one, didn't I? You know, to make sure it was good? Like when you have to sample at least three cookies from a batch to make sure they're fit for public consumption. (Just me? OK.) Really, though, when my sister's pink came, it was a lot darker than I thought it would be and I wasn't sure she would like it. So I made mine as well (middle) and would have given her mine and taken hers (left). Lo and behold, she showed up on Christmas morning wearing a top that was THE EXACT COLOR of her scarf! A Christmas miracle! Mom was wearing her red one at lunch on Tuesday and said she'd already had lots of compliments on it. My mom and sister are very knitworthy. =)

Here's an in-progress picture of Mom's scarf so you can see how the yarn comes. And I don't really crochet, but the knitting directions are like, "lift the next four stitches, one by one, over the first stitch on the right needle," whereas the crochet are "pull the loop through the next four loops". Yeah, I'll do that!

The first one took me a while because I was trying to figure out what was going on and how to pull through those loops. But the 2nd and 3rd took less than two TV shows (1.5 hours?), and that was while paying attention to Nikita. =)

I hope to do a pre-Theme-a-licious post with graphics for you all, but if I don't get around to it, or the hubby is late with the shiny graphics ("shiny," get it? I'm still hoping for Nathan!) the first post will be on the 31st. Many of you have already blogged about what's on your list (some for the whole year!), so you can just link in that post. Otherwise, share what you're working on for Jardin January! Here's a small graphic that I made that you can put on your sidebar or use in forum signatures. Sorry it's not a "blinkie" but those make my eyes cross. ;) It's also on the Theme-a-licious page.

JiffNotes
I want to be in school again so I get the long Christmas vacation!!

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-25T00:30:00.000-05:00

Advent has arrived; the final square is turned!

Hope your day is truly blessed.

Not a TUSAL was stirring...

2011-12-24T08:42:00.001-05:00

(What's a TUSAL?)

Well, the Nativity scene is on the top of the china cabinet where I normally take the TUSAL picture! Hope you have a blessed Christmas Eve!

Almost Done

2011-12-23T23:14:00.000-05:00

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The cookies are baked!

Somehow, I achieved a world record of having all the gifts wrapped on the 22nd!! That's, like, TWO WHOLE DAYS EARLY.

Unfortunately, Dasher didn't make it again this year. Oh, well, I have other deer to keep me company.

And lots of ornaments...some I've done, but a bunch that I've received in exchanges.

Everyone who visits us comments on them and gets to hear where they all came from. =)

I finished scarves for my Mom and sister, but I won't post a picture...yet...on the TEENSY OFFHAND CHANCE one of them will read my blog in the next 48 hours.

Now there's just a little baking and cleaning left!

JiffNotes
I would be totally done...if it weren't for Swampy. Or taking my niece to the Aquarium today to see the dolphins. =)

The Geekend That Was, 12/18

2011-12-19T10:35:00.000-05:00

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So this post was going to be filled with awesome live-action images of the cool stuff I did this weekend, but I forgot my camera every time we left the house! So instead, here's a picture of part of my sister's decorations last Christmas for tea (since you will remember IMichael forgot to take any this year!)

Friday night we went to see Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (most awkwardly punctuated title, ever) in real IMAX (as opposed to the retro-fitted regular movie theater screens now calling themselves IMAX). WOW. It was fantastic...or should I say, "incredible," since it was directed by Brad Bird (who directed The Incredibles, as well as Ratatouille and The Iron Giant). You could absolutely tell what was going on in the action scenes (no close-cropped, hyperactive editing) and Tom Cruise failed to annoy me. =) I feel like the trailer was incredibly cheesy; the movie is not. Also, I completely missed the switches from IMAX to regular format during the film (only part of it was filmed in the large-format IMAX). Go see it in IMAX!

Saturday it was all about the cookies. I did not get as much done as I intended; my original plan (before Mission: Impossible intervened) was to have the cookie list and shopping list done on Friday. I did try to work on the list in the car as we drove to the IMAX theater (it's about 45 minutes away), but lack of protein tanked my efforts. So Saturday I made the list and sent Michael off to grocery shop while I attempted to clean up and wrap his presents. I got exactly two teeny stocking stuffers done before the dulcet tones of the garage door opening caused me to throw everything back into bags. Too much cleaning!! I managed to mix one dough and make one batch of Peppermint Cream Bars...

...the surprise break-out cookie from last year, to take to one of my favorite annual parties, Cookies & Carols, hosted by The Roses. It's just what it sounds like...tons of Christmas cookies and singing every Christmas carol from "Angels We Have Heard on High" to "I'm Getting Nuttin' for Christmas". (Geek alert: One of the attendees brought his ukulele to play the fastest ever versions I've heard of "Santa Baby" and "Frosty the Snowman". The ukulele was signed by Jonathan Coulton!!! Who played a bit of "Still Alive" on it!!!!!1!!one!!! I got to touch it. =)

Sunday after church and errands to buy remaining cookie ingredients, all I had time to do was put up my Advent calendar post before it was time to get ready to go to one of my favorite Christmas concerts/performances: Carol Sing! One of my coworkers invited me...two years ago? Three?? After the first year, I said, "Just try and stop me from showing up every year!" His church has not one but TWO hand bell choirs, and they do a concert...but the audience is the choir. Sit and listen to gorgeous bells and organ and sing Christmas carols as loud as I want for an hour?? YES, PLEASE!!! That's about as perfect as I can imagine. He plays the bass bells, and it's so fun to watch him and his co-bass-player manage their table of giant bells! Also, afterwards they have a vast table of Christmas cookies in the fellowship hall, and if you're quick, you can get a Buckeye (they go fast)!

So, yeah...cookies for dinner two nights in a row. I expect Eating Well to show up any day to interview me for tips on how they can emulate my healthy lifestyle.

JiffNotes
It's all about the cookies. And the carols.

Advent

2011-12-18T16:19:00.000-05:00

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Today I am participating in Jo's advent calendar. I'm actually assigned to the 19th, but I'm posting a little early so perhaps those in Australia can read it when it's still the 19th for them!

"Advent" means "arrival," so I am sharing Snowflake Nativity by Chatelaine (with modifications by me). I started stitching it when it was just "Christmas Mystery"! I have since done other mysteries, but this is the only one I kept up with until...the naked baby happened (yeah, I'll wait while you go look). I tried really hard to like it (well, maybe not that hard), but I just couldn't do it. So I waited to see what the rest of the piece was going to look like, let it hibernate for a few months, then finally decided to use some of the remaining motifs and a couple from a Just Nan pattern and make my own top for the piece. I am always tempted to sign up for mysteries, but this one kind of cured me and convinced me I needed to wait until I saw an entire pattern.

Jo asked us to share a Christmas tradition as well as a stitchy picture. One of my favorite Christmas traditions is going to a Christmas Eve service with my family, especially when I get to sit next to my oldest sister. She and I both have sung all our lives, and she has a beautiful, very high soprano, while I am a slightly lower soprano. She does the most beautiful harmonies (or descants) above the melody, and we blend very well since we're sisters. We like a service with a nice, loud organ so that we can sing as loud as we want! =) Afterwards, we go back to my parents' for a nice snacky buffet supper of hammy sammies (ham and some kind of magic sauce on rolls that my mom makes), chips and dip (gotta have French onion dip!), and Christmas cookies. I suppose there are some vegetables in there somewhere, but I couldn't tell you what. Let the healthy holiday eating begin!!!

My three sisters are all a lot older than me (12 - 17 years), so I was a little like an only child sometimes. But my mom always made every holiday so special for me. She was a great Santa, and was only disappointed when I "figured out" it was her doing the gifting. My next question after she told me that, yes, she was Santa, was, "Are you the Easter bunny?" "Yes," she said, "I'm the Easter bunny, too." Then I asked, "Are you also the Tooth Fairy?" My mom told me later that I had ruined all her fun at once. =)

I'll leave you with the Advent calendar my mom made me when I was little...you see, we have a fine tradition of handcrafts in my family! =) I can't remember how old I was, but I do know that the last few days, she was working just ahead of me on the squares, and the last few were not sewn to their backings, although the fronts were done!

Shhhh...don't tell my husband I turned the 19th over early to get this picture! I've been making him guess what each square is every day! ;)

JiffNotes
Merry and Blessed Christmas to all! Come back in a couple days to see more stitchy Christmas decorations!

The Geekend That Was, 12/11 (A Day Late, but Not a Dollar Short)

2011-12-13T08:15:00.000-05:00

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This week has already gotten away from me. Our big accomplishment for the weekend was getting the tree (we always have a fresh tree), putting it up, lighting it, garlanding it, and putting on approximately 9,236 ornaments, of which Michael did 3.

But he did hang the stockings.

And two wreaths.

And some garland.

And put up the Nativity scene.

And the Christmas card holder.

And a nutcracker.

(This was the list he was yelling in the background while I was talking to his mom on the phone. Like, "OMIGOSH I did all that AND I PUT OUT A NUTCRACKER." Note: The nutcracker is only 18" tall, not the 5-6 feet you might assume from the importance imparted to it.)

I'll have more Christmassy pictures later. By the way, have you been visiting Jo's for the online advent calendar? You really should, even if you're not into stitchy stuff, because everyone is sharing their favorite traditions. Some of the bloggers "across the pond" are sharing some really cool stuff. I'm due to contribute on the 19th!

We took a "break" Sunday morning to go see my niece's church Christmas play, entitled, "DUDE, You Hear What I Hear?" It was a heartwarming tale of a young girl trapped in a department store overnight who uses the opportunity to share the true story of Christmas with the mannequins that have come to life (obviously). I can't make this stuff up, folks!

There may have also been some Lego Star Wars III (The Clone Wars).

And last night we went to a party where our White Elephant was a case of cellulite treatment cream. Festive.

JiffNotes
Seriously, though, the bag the cream was in was really cute, and it came with chocolate. It was either that or the Captain America mask. JiffNotes FAIL: Most unhelpful JiffNotes, EVER.

Attic Stash and Other Eye Candy

2011-12-06T08:51:00.000-05:00

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My camnesia from the Chocolat weekend extended even to forgetting to take a good picture of the model, although I did get a couple of extreme closeups to help my poor brain try and figure out what people who can actually sew would make of the excellent directions. Like this one:

Sew a fine seam, indeed. I sure won't be taking that kind of photo of *my* Chocolat.

To make up for the lack of Chocolat pictures, I thought I'd share a few pictures of some of Jackie's other class pieces that she had on display. This is Ebony and Ivory, which is gorgeous but looks terrifying to sew together.

This next shot has more of the Ebony and Ivory accessories pictured, but you may not be able to tear your eyes away from THE PANSIES IN FRONT.

OMIGOSH, LOOK AT THE RIBBON PANSIES.

AND LOOK AT THE PANSY PINKEEP.

Do you see the needle keep peeking out on the left side corner?

LOOK WHAT IT DOES.

IT ROTATES!! SO. COOL.

Um...yeah.

So, I want to take that class, a little, maybe.

Anyway! I did purchase a good bit. The first day, it seemed like I was going to be so restrained.

Not so much. You can click on this picture to revel in my excess in higher def. Actually, a lot of this was either for things I already had or fits in the "general stitching tools" category, like the Bohin needles (have you TRIED these needles? So smooth), the mat boards, and the scissors (because of course I have NO scissors already). Well, OK, not the squirrel and Waterlilies I picked out for him. How could I resist? But the Crescent Colors are for Mirabilia's letter "H", and the fabric is for a Milady's Needle pattern I have and that Rovaris pattern there (SQUIRREL!) that Teresa gave me. I actually already had the Belle Soie for the Rovaris pattern, but I bought another skein at The Attic because the color was at least 186% more awesome than the skein I had.

Then I went totally crazy and picked out Dinky Dyes and Gloriana silk for Cirque des Cercles.

I love every one I've seen stitched on black, but in lieu of that amount of crazy, I decided I also liked the multicolored ones. So I picked these floss colors, helped by Annette, and then we started in on the fabric. I kept saying, "Darker. Darker!" And finally someone pulled out this beautiful fabric (I can't remember if it was Annette or Teresa!) So what do you think? How crazy am I?? I'm thinking there are enough floral motifs in here to qualify for Jardin January... =)

JiffNotes
Already looking for the next class...because, you know, I have no stash to work on...

A Real Treet

2011-12-05T19:56:00.000-05:00

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Earlier this Fall when gracie asked if anyone wanted to do an ornament exchange with her, I jumped at the chance! Her ornament to me arrived on Saturday. Just take a look at the cool tin that encased the ornament:

Love the card!

But the real goodies were inside.

Chocolate, lovely flosses, some cute holiday tissues, and the pièce de résistance, the lovely Christmas Tree ornament! It's finished so cute with the rick-rack, and I adore the angel tree topper.

What amused me was that this was what I sent to gracie...

Yup, a Christmas tree. Great minds...and great stitchers...clearly think alike. =)

JiffNotes
Hand-stitched ornaments are the best ornaments!!

The Geekend That Was, 12/4

2011-12-05T08:30:00.000-05:00

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Last Friday was...

TUBA CHRISTMAS!

No, I don't play the tuba. I stumbled upon this event one year (it's apparently always the first Friday in December) at CNN Center, and have tried to get back to it each year (with not very much success). This year, Michael picked me up for a quick lunch and Tuba Christmas at Underground.

The weather was absolutely beautiful, and nothing beats listening to Christmas carols played with booming bassy precision by about 100 tuba, sousaphone and euphonium players aging from 7 to 73. I highly recommend going to a concert (it's free, even!) if there's one in your area.

Saturday I helped my sister serve tea. Michael and I usually go as "paying customers," but my sister needed some help since my mom, who usually helps, was going to see my niece's dance recital. It was actually really fun, although a little hectic, since her previous tea booking (a single party of 26) left about 45 later than she had planned! We had less than an hour to reset; that included breaking down three large tables and setting up six smaller ones in their place...not to mention water glasses, tea cups, plates, flatware, tea pots with warmers, cream, sugar, clotted cream, lemon curd, spirited peach butter, menus, welcome signs...!!

Although I handed Michael the camera, he did not manage to take One. Single. Picture. Well, he was entertaining his parents, so I guess he has an excuse. Of course, I did not discover this until the last "course" was served, so *I* took this picture...

Caramel Chocolate Nut Tartlets (want to move in to one of these and take up residence), Cranberry Noels (cookies), Victorian Bakewell Tart, Cinnamon Pumpkin Bread with Cranberry Cheese (OMIGOSH YUM), and Mocha Cream Puffs.

I did get to taste everything afterwards. =) Serving went pretty well; I can't imagine taking care of more than three tables, though!! And two of mine were people I knew, so they were very forgiving. That's right...two! In addition to Michael and his parents, Rocky and Maria were at another table, much to my surprise and delight! I'd been wanting them to experience tea at my sister's for a while.

Sunday we made a start at unearthing Christmas decorations and went to see Hugo in 3D, which was EXCELLENT. If you have any interest whatsoever in early film, go see it. It's worth it even just for the opening tracking shot, which was so amazing and I still am not sure how ILM* did it.

JiffNotes
*Industrial Lights and Magic, of course!

WIP Wednesday (Pretty Dasher)

2011-11-30T08:53:00.000-05:00

I should have taken a picture of Helena, because I finished all the lace! I am working on the hem now; it's a picot hem that's sewn up in the back...a first for me; should be exciting.

I did manage a bit on Pretty Little Thing:

It's slow going because I can't work on it when it's dark (like while watching TV).

I don't know, though; am I in knitterly denial here? I'm not sure if I should've gone down a needle size so the fabric would be denser. What do you think?

Also, EXTREMELY exciting, all the sparkles on Dasher in that nasty pearl braid are done!! It seems like they took approximately forever.

Since I took this picture, I've also almost finished his reins, and that means that all that is left is...BEADS BEADS BEADS!!! Woo hoo! He just MIGHT be done for Christmas THIS year.

Unpictured is progress on an ornament for an exchange (mailing tomorrow...I'm nothing if not last minute. =)

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

The Geekend That Was, 11/27

2011-11-28T08:16:00.000-05:00

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Loooong weekend. I love it! We spent Thanksgiving with my parents, which is usually a big to-do, but my three sisters were all elsewhere. So, my parents just took Michael and I out for dinner to their local club, which had a fabulous buffet. I was ready to leap into the middle of the sweet potato casserole they had and eat my way out. The bad news: THIS MEANS NO LEFTOVERS. *sob!*

That night, Michael attempted to get us Dance Central 2 and Kinect Sports 2 for $15 at Wal-mart. After two hours, the manager finally said they hadn't gotten any Xbox games in at that location and refused to sell the ones already on the shelf for the lower price. I had a friend tell me today that his Wal-mart DID sell the ones off the rack for the advertised price. So, there is a strongly worded letter in my future and we won't be patronizing Wal-mart next year. I did manage to score Assassin's Creed II for ten smackers on Amazon, and some clothes at Anthropologie (but that was on Wednesday). It didn't feel worth it to try to brave the crowds for the 50% off sale prices, but even at 25% off, I got $546 (original price) of clothes for $112!

Friday we spent the afternoon at Michael's parents playing Settlers of Catan, eating crazy good cake, and wrapped the evening up with Christmas Cantina at the Aurora Theater. If a show that combines rock-n-roll tricycle-riding, a heartwarming military tribute and giant men in pink bunny suits sounds like your kind of thing, check it out! (It was definitely our kind of thing. I never, Never, NEVER thought I would see Triplets, from The Band Wagon, performed in real life. But there it was. Hit this link if you've never seen it. Triplets cannot be explained; it can only be experienced. And yes, that really IS Fred Astaire.)

Saturday...let's not talk about any football that may or may not have happened on Saturday and talk about us seeing The Muppets Saturday night. Definitely good; definitely some belly laughs...and NPH (Neil Patrick Harris, donchaknow?) had the best line of the movie.

Sunday both Michael and I had massive headaches (impending sinus infection, anyone?) which did nothing to make our mandatory nursery duty at church any more ~~enjoyable~~tolerable. For me, it's kind of like being locked in a room with small aliens for a couple hours. What are they DOING? What do they WANT?!? WHY CAN'T THEY JUST TELL ME??!?!????

Ahem.

We spent the rest of the day belatedly watching the parade, trying to make our heads stop hurting by consuming chocolate (maybe that was just me), and finishing up Clone Wars season 3 (excellent).

In closing, allow me to share this very inspiring comment left on my last post:

UGG boots the narration of the principal snow from Australia, but it is the honest American brand. When we beginning saw UGG boots snow, do manual arouse is deeply honest, but the character how to see is a abundant feeling. But UGG boots amiableness retention feature, the snow super standard work not only make the Hollywood star upon, more let a grouping of MM lining up.

I hope abundant feeling that someday I feature amiableness retention and deeply honest narration of the principal snow. Or at least make the Hollywood star upon.

So say we all.

JiffNotes
Tryptophan-induced nonsense!

Thankful for the TUSAL

2011-11-25T08:41:00.001-05:00

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(What's a TUSAL?)

Soo many sparkly jewel-colored threads in there from my class with Tony Minieri! Pictures are coming! (Yeah, I always say that, don't I?)

Welcome to my new followers, and to those signing up for Theme-a-licious 2012! Michael (the hubby) is working on a graphic for us! I saw his first draft...needs more cowbell. Or sparkles. But we're getting there! I'm already mentally picking out projects for Jardin January. =)

JiffNotes
I blame the turkey coma for the tardiness of this post. Yeah, that's it.

Chocolat Weekend

2011-11-22T21:58:00.000-05:00

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I know you've all been waiting to see WIP pictures of Chocolat after my class in Arizona! Well...the WIP pictures aren't going to be as thrilling as we all might have hoped. Also, I suffered from a severe case of camnesia, but let's work with what I have.

Teresa and I arrived in Arizona Thursday night and immediately set out to get some Mexican food.

Carnitas fried tacos

YUM. Probably the best carnitas I've ever had. We walked back to the hotel, while I marveled at the local flora. See, I do this. When I go someplace, I ogle all the "exotic" (i.e., "ones I've never seen") trees and plants and continually ask people, "Oooo, what's that? What's that bush over there? How big do they get? How often do they bloom?" and so on. I am told this is not normal behavior. However, any kind of geeky behavior is normal for me, so there you are.

It rained a little that night, so the next morning, the "weird green trees" we saw the night before were sporting yellow flowers.

But no one knew what they were.

We found out when we got back to the hotel that we really didn't need to have the copious prestitching done for class. SAY WHAT??!? Apparently, "people" demanded prestitching. Who are these people? Anyway, also not-so-apparently, the prestitching directions subtly and indirectly made an allusion (or "said") that the prestitching would be used by you at home to finish the project. I don't feel so bad since it seems everyone missed this!

The next morning after a leisurely breakfast, we headed to The Attic. I'll have another post with stash pictures, although no stash was purchased that day, since I was way overwhelmed. There are sooooo manyyyyy fibersssss there...they have all the colors of Gloriana, Dinky Dyes, Weeks, Crescent Colors...and the FABRICS!! Never seen so many Lakeside Linens in all my days. Teresa wanted to run in and take a picture of my first look.

Not an accurate portrayal of my awe.

Then came class. Now, I had my prestitching done, and I could have actually done something with it if I'd wanted to approach one of the scary mechanical beasts crouching in the front of the room (these would be called "sewing machines" by people who aren't me). I actually don't think anyone used them in our class. Instead, we ironed and cut silk fabric (or, if you were me, ironed and conned someone into cutting your fabric for you. ROTARY CUTTER!! DANGER, WILL ROBINSON!!) I did man up and use the rotary cutter to cut some mylar. That...was not the funnest thing I've ever done. The next step was to iron some more with stitch witchery, but we didn't know that was in the room. So at the end of the day, we ended up with some cut silk and cut mylar, and a lot of oh-so-pretty ribbons and goodies.

Let's all pretend this is a really impressive WIP.

The Attic's owner, Jean Lea, was there for all the classes, I think. She's a really nice lady and we all had a packet of goodies with a ruler and this cute little kit, including the lavendar to make it into a sachet.

The next morning Teresa and I had another leisurely breakfast while being completely freaked out that there was college football on at 9am. I think we freaked out some male hotel guests by daring to be both female and interested in football (Fact: I will probably yell something akin to "Are you going to dance with him or tackle him?" within minutes of starting to watch any random team I've never seen play before.)

Then came the real fun! Annette (who stunningly almost had her prework done even though she only registered for the class, like, less than a week before?) graciously picked us up for lunch. She gave us a "look" when we told her where we'd had dinner...a look that meant we were about to get some reeeeally good Mexican.

She drove us to Rancho de Tia Rosa.

Atmosphere out the wazoo.

Still more atmosphere.

I got some killer chicken mole.

And for dessert...

Sopaipillas and flan! Mmmmm...doughnuts....

After lunch we went to The Fiber Factory where I scored some recycled sari yarn and some Knitter's Price size 4 DPNs (because I may or may not be thinking of getting into that whole Beekeeper's Quilt nonsense).

I'm planning on making a mobius with the yarn.

Then we headed off to The Attic again!

We'll talk about what happened there later. But here's a preview...Jackie du Plessis had some things for sale at the class, but this little gem was back at the shop. Meet Percy and his jewel-toned fibers of fantasticness:

And here's the bit that put me over the top with purchasing him.

Pin butt!

JiffNotes
Seriously, I did go to Mesa to stitch, not eat. No, really.

The Geekend that Was, 11/19 (Late Night Edition)

2011-11-21T20:58:00.001-05:00

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Maybe we should back up to last Tuesday.

That was the day Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary came out. I took a half day off work to go to a good old-fashioned LAN party that included a few guys I played the original with on VGA monitors after work on our small company's LAN! As you can imagine, that was a late night. Especially since when we got home, I found a Kindle Fire on my pillow!

Finally, I can play Angry Birds like everyone else.

I'm not sure I was really recovered when I started my four day class with Tony Minieri on Friday. That class just ended today at 4pm. It was 9:30 - 4:30 or 5 every day, although I left early Saturday to go to a wedding that lasted until late. We even had homework during the class! I'm pretty much comatose on the couch right now. I can't believe that before this class, I thought, "Gee, what the heck are we going to DO for FOUR WHOLE DAYS??" BWAHAHAHAHA!!!!

Yes, that's right...I had ANOTHER class before I've even blogged about the class in Arizona. (Yes, Annette and Teresa, I promise the post is coming so you can just link to it. ;)

JiffNotes
Zzzzzz.... Also, welcome new followers! I promise pretty WIP pictures are coming.

Make That Five

2011-11-15T10:20:00.001-05:00

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Yup, another one this morning. Michael took it to work with him in case it's the same one. I assume he's going to release it (and not train it to bring him tea). Had to leave a note to the cleaning lady to explain why the kitchen trash can is gone.

Mouse (say hey, that's capitalized, not just because it's at the beginning of the sentence) reminded me of a mouse I encountered in New Orleans with her comment.

While walking along Bourbon Street, we came upon an overturned beer can. Well, we came upon many of those, but this one had a small mouse lapping at the stream proceeding from the can. We were amazed that the little guy didn't seem to care how close we were getting. Finally, I stomped about two inches away from him. I've never seen a mouse stagger before, but there he was. He took almost a full minute to "escape" from us. Come to think of it, we may have saved his teeny life!

JiffNotes
Still not sure if it's really five mice or just the same two over and over...

The Geekend That Was, 11/13

2011-11-14T07:07:00.000-05:00

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We have had a couple of unwanted visitors this week. We're pretty easy-going people, but when a guest shows up uninvited, then proceeds to run around defecating wherever he pleases (near my stash, even!), we draw the line.

We attempted to give them a graceful egress.

The basic premise, here, is that there is a little spring-loaded ramp that the critters run up to get to the bait (peanut butter! Better than cheese!). The ramp descends under the weight of the pest, allowing him access to the bait (PEANUT BUTTER!), then snaps back up, trapping him until he can be relocated.

It worked great! Michael dropped me off at home, then rushed to a meeting. I checked the trap. We had a check-in. Like the girly girl I occasionally am, I left it on the stairs for him to deal with when he got home.

The problem? When he got home, the mouse was gone.

That's right, folks, so close to Georgia Tech, the mice are clearly smarter. We thought it was a fluke; maybe I had jostled the trap so that the ramp was down? So we set it again. When I checked later, half the peanut butter was gone, there were little peanut butter mouse footprints, but no mouse. Next check: peanut butter gone. We moved the peanut butter farther in the trap, thinking he was able to balance on the ramp and get the bait. The next morning: no peanut butter, no mouse. Clearly, we had turned into the In 'n' Out of the mouse world.

I was ready to go all Red Queen on his tail ("OFF WITH HIS HEAD!"), but my tender-hearted spouse decided to...wait for it...

build a better mousetrap. (Please to ignore all the mess in the closet; focus on the white trash can and cardboard tube.) You can just make out the blob of PEANUT BUTTER at the end of the tube, yes?

You balance the cardboard tube oh-so-precariously on the edge of a ledge, and when the mouse reaches the end, he gets dumped into the trash can.

The magic is the quarter counter-weight.

Which has to be at least two feet tall, because those suckers can JUMP. Also, you're supposed to put a little water at the bottom because a wet mouse can't jump or climb as well.

So far we've caught four.

The Perp. Don't let the innocent face fool you.

Or possibly two twice.

JiffNotes
You really can build a better mouse trap.

And I Win, Too!

2011-11-13T22:27:00.001-05:00

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Picture if you will, my excitement when I learned that I had won a prize in Daffycat's blogoversary giveaway. Then double that when I learned that my prize was some of her hand-dyed fabric! This cheery package arrived on Saturday:

And inside...

Omigosh, not one, but TWO fat quarters of lovely fabric (they're folded in half here). There was also a cute card in there that got flung aside during my victory leap, so it didn't make it into the picture. I had to use a light flash to try and capture the lovely lavender color of the Belfast, but I didn't quite get it. It's sooooo pretty. And it turns out the super-cool tea-stained linen is famous...it's featured in this post that explains how it's made.

The day before, some yarn arrived that I won from Knit Picks. It's their new Stroll Glimmer yarn. I've tried Dream in Color's Starry, so I can't wait to see how this compares.

Speaking of stash, I promise pictures from my trip to the Attic in Arizona are coming! I had to wait until today to try and get some decent light!

JiffNotes
Lucky month! Now to figure out how to fit this nifty new stash into my Theme-a-licious 2012 plans...March Madness, if nothing else! =)

Fall Giveaway Winners!

2011-11-13T22:10:00.000-05:00

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I had the wonder-husband draw names from a ruffly bowl! First, for the knitting goodies:

The winner is...

Mostly Nerdy Creations! (My online imaginary friend. =)

And for the needlework goodies:

The winner is...

Peggy!

Congratulations, ladies! Please email me at heather at lottloft dot com with your mailing address so I can get your goodies to you while it's still Fall. ;)

JiffNotes
I hope my new followers will stick around now that the giveaway is over. And maybe join me for Theme-a-licious 2012?

Fall Tea

2011-11-13T07:00:00.000-05:00

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The last Saturday in October, we had tea at my sister's house. My sister hosts fabulous teas, and this one was no exception. Michael and I were given a cute little love seat to sit on while we had tea. Perfect for snuggling together and enjoying tiny delicious treats.

The view from the love seat. Don't you adore the flowers? And the red fall leaf that is protecting our sparkling black cherry water? And yes, the pansies in the wee tussy mussies by our places are real!

First up, cream scones with chocolate chips and gingerbread cinnamon scones.

SO GOOD. And get a load of the teeny scoops of ginger butter in the pear dish! Also, my sister makes THE best clotted cream and lemon curd on the planet. I used to not like lemon curd because it tastes too "eggy" to me. But hers is perfect!

Next course was hot apple soup, replete with oak leaf crouton and little cinnamon muffin with crumbly topping, just perfect for nibbling between sips of soup.

Then, the Tower of Yummy Goodness came to the table.

It was hard to ignore the sweets on top and start with the savories, but we managed.

Clockwise from the top: pumpkin leek tart, Brunswick stew puff, curried egg salad moon, and pecan chicken salad shell. NOM.

Time to switch from black tea to herbal...and dive into the sweets. Not literally dive. But I wanted to.

Again from the top: pumpkin bread pudding with rum cream sauce (omigosh), rum-soaked acorn pound cakelet (zomigosh), fig jam thumbprint (best. cookie texture. EVER.), orange cream brownie petit four (OMIGOSH), and the classic Bakewell Tart.

Just take a look at the teensy layers in the orange cream petit four.

Yeaaaaahhhhhh....

JiffNotes
Nobody, but NOBODY, does tea like my sister! And hey, if you're in Atlanta, she has upcoming Christmas teas on December 3rd and 10th. Check out her blog for contact info. Scroll past the Fall tea menu and you'll see the invite with dates and prices.

Life of Flowers

2011-11-12T16:57:00.001-05:00

One of my sisters sent me this link...super-cool, super-zoomed time-lapse video of flowers blooming. You might want to click to make this one full screen!

Life of flowers from VOROBYOFF PRODUCTION on Vimeo.

Theme-a-licious 2012

2011-11-09T18:08:00.000-05:00

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One upon a time, a few friends and I decided it would be fun to have some monthly themes to stitch on during the year. You know, shake things up, get us out of our stitching rut every once in a while. It was a lot of fun and had us visiting some WIPs we hadn't seen in a while, and finishing up some we should've a long time ago. I haven't done it for the past few years, although I usually observe some form of March Madness (so. Much. FUN!)

This year, I wanted to stitch (and maybe knit) with some themes again. And I thought some of you might want to join me. Here are the themes I'm thinking of for 2012 (special thanks to Teresa for helping me switch things around and get jiggy with the alliteration):

Jardin January

The holidays were a little stressful...let's relax in a nice garden. Work on any piece with flowers or gardens.

Fangirl February

Send a Valentine to your favorite designer...or at least work on his or her designs for the month!

March Madness

Stitch or knit on something different every day...it's madness...of the funnest possible kind.

Amazon April

Dip your needle into the vast swath of fabric dedicated to your BIGGEST projects!

May Memories

Remember when you took that class? Or decided to commemorate that event? And then abandoned your poor WIP? Take a stroll down memory lane by working on it again.

Jumanji June

Is it a jungle out there in your stash? Give some love to the projects with animals or birds.

Jolly July

It's a jolly holiday with your WIPs...you can concentrate on Christmas designs, ornaments, or even pick a different holiday to render in stitchy goodness.

Altius August

Embrace the Olympic motto--Citius, Altius, Fortius (Faster, Higher, Stronger)--by elevating your mind. It's the perfect time to learn something new! Or maybe achieve some goals...

September Smalls

We all love gadgets, and none better than the teensy tools and holders we make ourselves. Let's stitch some smalls--needlebooks, fobs, biscornus, scissors keeps, pincushions--or knit some teensy things--amigurumi, jewelry, sachets....

Obligation October

Wow, the holidays are only a couple months away! Avoid that last-minute crunch and work on some gifts now.

Nail It November

What's lying around that's so close to being finished you can't stand it anymore? Get to it and finish it!

Delightful December

The holidays are a time for relaxing...at least, that's the theory! No stress here...work on whatever you want and enjoy!

Interested in joining me? I'm thinking of two posts a month, one on the 1st to share your plans and show progress from the previous month, and one on the 15th to share progress. You can participate in the theme however you want--all month, a couple weeks a month, weekends, even just one week a month! I don't want this to be troublesome or restrictive; I want it to be FUN...and maybe a leeeeettle bit challenging. The great thing is that you can easily fit this in with whatever challenges you're doing for the year...WIPocalypse, Year of Projects, One at a Time, Crazy January...whatever! I might even have some theme-related goodies to give away to participants. =)

If you want to play along, sign up on Mr. Linky on the Theme-a-licious 2012 page. You might want to use a tag for your posts, like "theme-a-licious", and link that tag there. Or you can just link the main URL for your blog. I'm not choosy. I'll just be happy if anyone plays along. =) I can't wait to see how you all interpret the themes!

I'll host a Mr. Linky on the 1st and 15th of each month so we can all visit around and celebrate the themey goodness together. Eventually, Michael the wonder husband will do a nice banner graphic (and blog sidebar graphic) for us. I promise it will be cool, although Nathan Fillion may not appear in it. =) I also toyed with the idea of doing three posts a month--on the 1st, 11th and 21st. If you think that's a better idea, or have another suggestion, hit the comments on this post.

JiffNotes
Come work on monthly stitching/knitting themes with me in 2012! Please? =)

WIP Wednesday (not Chocolat)

2011-11-09T07:18:00.000-05:00

I was able to knit almost a full skein of Lydia's cardigan while I was in Arizona...I'm over halfway done with the lace section!

Since I had switched project bags for the trip, I gave a little love to the project whose bag I borrowed.

Urban Necessity Gloves in a very yummy Malabrigo Rios I got at Stitches South.

And I did a little on Lapland Santa, since I had taken him to Arizona.

Don't forget my Fall knitting giveaway! There's a needlework one, too!

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, perhaps with more engaging commentary, head over to Tami's Amis!

The Geekend That Was, 11/6

2011-11-07T21:56:00.000-05:00

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So you may remember I was away all weekend in Arizona (which, by the way, does not go on Daylight Saving Time, which means my shiny extra hour got dumped somewhere in a Colorado lake as I flew back home). The class was...overwhelming. More sewing than I am really capable of (like, with a MACHINE, oh noes!), so I am going to have to figure out how to bribe someone to help me or something.

Unfortunately, I have not been home while it is light in order to take pictures of the stash that followed me home (I am NOT responsible, I tell you), so for now, all you get is...

A NEW CAR!!!

This is our new Prius, only three days old in this picture (taken at the Dwarf House--the original Chick-fil-A grill--just before Michael dropped me off at the airport). Michael is now obsessed with raising the fuel consumption over the life of the car. He's already up to 50.5 mpg!! Hilarious. I guess if you're going to obsess over something, fuel efficiency ain't a bad thing.

JiffNotes
New car! And jet lag. Don't forget the jet lag.

WIP Wednesday (lacing along)

2011-11-02T07:03:00.000-05:00

Helena is coming along nicely! Still no morning light (I think I have to wait 'til next year for that), so another flashy picture.

I've finished the bodice, put the sleeve stitches on holding yarn, and started the lace pattern. The lace pattern is easy, and it flies, but I've had to fix a few things due to my inattention (I blame Grimm and Once Upon a Time). Last night I ripped back a six stitch wide by five row deep section and reknit it...yarn-overs, k2togs, ssks and all!

I did a little work on Random Thoughts, and it was truly thrilling to be working on something that was NOT Chocolat!

Speaking of Chocolat, I finally got it ironed and took a photo. I suppose this is technically a Finished Object, but since it will turn right back into a WIP on Friday, when it should be parading as a FO, it's here:

I'm super-excited about this class! I can't believe I leave TOMORROW!!! And of course, I am not packed. But like I told my boss yesterday, I can always throw some underwear and a toothbrush in my suitcase and buy clothes there! Hmmm...sounds like a good excuse to go shopping. ;)

Don't forget my Fall knitting giveaway! There's a needlework one, too!

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

Better Knitty Printing

2011-11-01T07:42:00.000-05:00

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The first step to starting a great pattern from knitty.com is, of course, printing it out. Unless you're going to knit it straight from the screen, of course. Newer knitty patterns have the "Print only the essentials" button, which removes most of the "alternate view" pictures from the pattern to save paper space and ink. Older ones, like the one I wanted to print, don't have that feature. Besides the increased paper/ink consumption, those additional photos can sometimes cause layout problems on the printed page...text can bleed on top of a photo, or even be obscured by it.

Michael happened to be walking by as I was about to print, and I said, "Ugh, I wish there was a way to print without graphics. Wait, that wouldn't work because I still need the charts. I really just want to remove the photos."

His response? "Oh, that's easy." So I thought I'd share what he told me.

This only works with the Google Chrome browser (so you'll have to download it if you don't have it, but it's so much faster, I'll bet you'll keep using it). And it may not remove all extraneous spaces, but it'll probably do a better job than just printing willy-nilly.

Step 1: Right-click on top of a picture you want to remove. Pick the "Inspect element" menu option.

This will open up a separate window titled "Developer Tools". Don't panic.

Step 2: There's a little HTML here, but don't worry. If you mess this step up, you can always "reload" the page and start over. The "img" tag (short for "image") corresponding to the picture you right-clicked over should be highlighted. You can see in the background that the picture is highlighted, too...that's how you know you're in the right spot. If you accidentally click somewhere else in that window and it's no longer highlighted, just close it and repeat step 1. Otherwise, right-click on top of that highlighted "img" tag and pick "Delete node".

(For advanced users, i.e., those that know some HTML, in this particular case, you might want to remove that entire table row ("tr" tag), or "div" tag if it's around the picture...that's what I did, thinking it would readjust spacing better.)

Voila! The picture has disappeared. Repeat steps 1 & 2 for any other pictures you want to remove. When you're done, close the Developer Tools window, print the page, and the pictures won't be there! Remember if you mess up, just "reload" the page (although you'll have to start over with removing pictures). There's a chance, due to the layout of the page, that there will still be a "space" as if the picture was still there. If you know some HTML, you can probably figure out which node to remove to fix it. If you don't...well, you're going to have to use that extra paper. =)

Hope this helps someone out! (I'd love a comment if it helped you. =)

Don't forget my Fall knitting giveaway! And hey...there's a needlework one, too.

JiffNotes
Print from knitty.com without alll the pictures!

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T05:50:00.000-05:00

This cute little owl made it all the way here from New Zealand, courtesy of Lee, to celebrate Halloween with me! He is so adorable, and the stitching is beautiful, especially his little bullion knot feet! He even brought a little pouch along with him.

This weekend's festivities are going to have to comprise their own posts...Saturday we went to tea at my sister's, which was typically wonderful, and Sunday...we bought a car. =)

War of WIPs Call to Arms #15

2011-10-27T07:14:00.002-05:00

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Thank you for all the comments on my Squirrel! You all had some great name suggestions...I love all the adjective combinations. But I feel like this guy is a simple squirrel, so he needs a simpler name. I'm going to go with "Herr Skutt," suggested by Jenny. I'm squirreling away the other names for future residents of the Lottloft, though. *groan* =)

The next battle looming on the horizon is Astrid, which requires 13 large circles, 14 medium circles and 26 small circles (or something like that). I got two small circles done this week (I may pass out from this extreme speed). And here's what I have:

Yeah, a little ways to go. And some MAJOR blocking to get them all the correct size. Anyone have any tips on blocking 1" circles to 1.5" circles?? Speaking of which, can you tell which one of these things is not like the others? (Hint: It's not the one without the tail.) I seem to have knit the top right one "upside down" so the cast-on edge is on the front. I nearly discarded it, but then I thought...eh...once the whole thing's sewn up, who's going to be able to tell that from the back of a running horse at midnight?

Which, of course, is exactly how I'll wear it.

Don't forget about my Fall Giveaway! (yarn edition and needlework edition)

JiffNotes
Join the battle with us! Visit Revelations of a Delusional Knitter to enlist!

WIP Wednesday (Finally, yarn!)

2011-10-26T09:02:00.000-05:00

Finally, a WIP with some yarn! Yes, Chocolat is done (still haven't managed to iron it, though, so no picture), so I have cast on for Helena for a friend's (very, very) little girl.

Craptastic picture. There's just no light here either in the morning or at night. Impossible to get good pictures! So far I'm loving the Knit Picks Swish DK yarn. I was worried it wouldn't be soft, since it's a superwash (but what the heck do I know, anyway??) It's nummy and squishy, though. Very nice to work with. Now if I can just get past all the booooooring stockinette....

I've also done a little on Random Thoughts (I was kind of giddy to work on it after so much Chocolat), but, hmmm...somehow it didn't even occur to me to take a picture! Maybe next week. Although I do need to start on the prework for my next class, and considering that it's completely, 100% basting, there probably won't be any pictures of that, either!!

Hey, I've got a Giveaway going on right now, so please visit that post to enter!

For more effectively photographed WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

October TUSAL

2011-10-26T08:40:00.001-05:00

(What's a TUSAL?)

My, that's a lot of brown. Well, there was a lot of stitching on Chocolat (still sadly unironed). Also a few intriguing bits of lovely cranberry yarn...check back tomorrow for their origin. =)

Fuzzy Felted Fall Giveaway

2011-10-25T08:29:00.000-05:00

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Want to win a cool interchangeable needle holder and some fuzzy yarny goodness?

This is dellaQ's Que-i double interchangeable needle set. I didn't realize how big it was when I got it, and as most of my interchangeable needles are stuck in WIPs right now, it was woefully underpopulated, so I got a smaller one and I'm passing this one on. It's very nice; it's even padded, unlike some of their other needle holders. It has US numbers for the needles, pockets that hold your cables, and a zippered pocket that holds all the connector accouterments. Included with it are some nice fluffy novelty yarns and Bags: A Knitter's Dozen (which for some reason means "twenty-one").

So how do you enter? Simple; you get one chance each if you...

Leave a comment on this post by November 11th at 11:59pm, EST. Tell me your favorite Fall dish (or even better...recipe). No need to be a follower, because you will get an extra chance if you happen to...
Be a follower!
Post about this contest on your blog. Feel free to use/link to the picture of the goodies. Please put a link to your post in a comment...I thank you. =)

Giveaway is now closed! I'll be announcing the winner soon!

JiffNotes
Who can't use some nice fluffy yarn??

Fall into Winter Giveaway

2011-10-25T08:19:00.000-05:00

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Would you like to win some Fall and Winter stitching goodies??

Included in the package are two stumpwork kits for a scissors protector and thimble nest, Permin 28-ct. linen, various Fall-colored threads to try (linen, tweed, bamboo...!), Mill Hill buttons, Just Cross Stitch Nov/Dec (I think!) 2010, 3 skeins Dinky Dyes "Bush Christmas" silk floss, and some Madeira metallic to try out.

So how do you enter? Simple; you get one chance each if you...

Leave a comment on this post by November 11th at 11:59pm, EST. Tell me your favorite Fall dish (or even better...recipe). No need to be a follower, because you will get an extra chance if you happen to...
Be a follower!
Post about this contest on your blog. Feel free to use/link to the picture of the goodies. Please put a link to your post in a comment...I thank you. =)

I was going to make this a shorter contest, but I'll be at The Attic in Mesa, AZ for a Jackie du Plessis class (Chocolat...you may have seen me mention it once or twice...or fifteen times) and I'll be doing well to get the package off on the 12th! I want to get it to you in time to use the Fall threads while it's still Fall! =) Hopefully you'll have time to stitch up something nice for Thanksgiving. Well...unless you've already celebrated Thanksgiving. (I'm looking at you, Canada =) In that case, you'll have a spiffing start on next year.

Giveaway is now closed! I'll be announcing the winner soon!

JiffNotes
Surely giving stuff away will make me feel better about cold temperatures coming my way!

The Geekend That Was, 10/23

2011-10-24T07:52:00.000-05:00

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Remember last weekend, when practically no protein invaded my weekend? This weekend was practically the opposite. Friday night, Michael's company got us tickets to the preview party for Taste of Atlanta, which was a limited entry, limited-menu version of the full event. The good news: all you can eat/drink. I'd looked at Taste of Atlanta before, but admission ($25 in advance) only gets you 10 tickets, and most "entrees" cost 3 tickets; desserts are 1-2. There are over 100 restaurants participating! You can buy extra tickets for a buck each, but I don't want to have to go through that kind of decision process!! That's not my idea of fun. Being let loose in a corral where I can sample whatever I want, however, is just my thing. Bonus: We saw some friends we hadn't seen for *years*! And one of them has me almost convinced to try aerial silks. The food was awesome (especially the pork belly taco from JCT Kitchen...ONE OF THE BEST THINGS I'VE PUT IN MY MOUTH), but there weren't that many (i.e., NO) sides. The only disappointing thing, really, was that they ran out of cupcakes before we got to that tent. =( However, we were able to sample four different ice creams from High Road. This stuff is SERIOUSLY good. We had three pints in the freezer already (they sell locally at Whole Foods) and Michael went all fanboy on them, so they gave us a branded ice cream scoop. Too cool. It turns out they do factory tours on Saturdays; we are so going to do that one weekend.

Saturday was not too egregious in the protein department, but Sunday we went to the Park Tavern because I had bought a TravelZoo voucher for a Salt Block Experience.

Since our "VIP cabana" (and those are air quotes due to the extremely LOUD group replete with stone-throwing children that bled over into our cabana) was outdoors, and I figured nice, warmish days were going to be really few and far between from here on out, we booked it for 1pm.

I was overdressed (unusual for me)...though this is a "nice" restaurant, it's right by Piedmont Park, so there were dog-walkers and joggers eating alongside us. Whatever; fashion never apologizes, right? ;) After edamame and a green salad (yummy), the hot (800 F) salt block and a swath of roll-making ingredients arrived at the table.

Salmon, tuna, butterfish, wagyu beef, sticky rice, and nori wraps formed the basis of the rolls, but you were left to experiment with the additional ingredients of avocado, cucumber, jalepenos, cilantro, crispy garlic, sesame seeds, ponzu sauce, mustard sauce (NOM), wasabi, and pickled ginger (double NOM)!!!

So fun to hear the meat sizzle on the stone, though the (slight) smoke from the spicy marinade made me cough a bit at first. Figure out the prevailing breeze before you sit, LOL!

All in all it was a very fun experience. I told Michael I was glad it worked out, because I did absolutely no research whatsoever; it just sounded fun and unique. He said it was both, and that maybe he was going to give up planning from now on. Noooooooo!!! =)

JiffNotes
Much healthier than last weekend. (PLEASE TO IGNORE THE AMOUNT OF ICE CREAM CONSUMPTION.)

KEEP CALM (and cast on)

2011-10-23T19:56:00.000-05:00

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IT'S OK, EVERYBODY!

I OPENED THE BOX.

(Oh, yeah, and I finished the prework on Chocolat, which obviously wasn't nearly as exciting as opening the box, since there is no picture of my HAPPY DANCE, which does not even happen very often around here but although very exciting OH LOOK, YARN!)

Yarn, there is a picture of.

Actually, my excuse is that I was going to iron Chocolat before its glamour shot, because, you know, I finished it Friday night, so obviously it'd be no problem to have it ironed by the end of the weekend. And yet here we are. And there it is, unironed.

Hmmm.

So, yarn! The four skeins are for a sweater for the adorable Lydia. I have cast on! See, I am really normal! Yarn came, I cast it on! Normal, yes?? (Really, call off the nice men in their clean, white coats.) The Dishie is for a couple dishcloths (The angels have the TARDIS and a mosaic squirrel one I was gifted by Jean). The Felici came to live with me because I agonized over this yarn when Knit Picks had it two years ago, and then they ran out of those colorways, and I always regretted not buying them. They brought back some favorites, so this time I snatched them up! Also, there is some unpictured yarn for a seekrit project.

I reorganized a closet (well, two square feet of it, anyway...LET'S NOT GET CRAZY) and told Michael that I need to learn to knit a lot faster. He was skeptical that that would actually decrease my stash volume.

I mean, of course it would...right? I'm not crazy, am I?

Don't answer that.

JiffNotes
Situation normal. We're all fine here now, thank you. How are you?

WIP Wednesday (Sooo close)

2011-10-19T07:58:00.000-05:00

It was a dark and stormy night.

Well, at least a dark and stormy morning. Therefore, a flashtastic picture of being so very close to finishing the class prework for Chocolat. Just need to do those last two lace wheels and some Smyrna stitches and then two more "wrapper" bits (with their lace wheels and Smyrnas).

I really want this done...here's how much: There is a BOX from KnitPicks, that arrived Monday, and I have not opened it. That's right, folks...beautiful unseen yarn resides en mi casa, and I am ignoring it because I know that the pretty preciousssss colors and haze of yarn fumes that will be released will be a HUGE distraction and I just want this thing done.

I promise there will be pictures of actual! yarn! here next week.

Oh, and did I mention that the 2nd class I'm taking in November...after Chocolat...I just found out that has prework, too?? *sob*

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

The Geekend That Was, 10/16

2011-10-17T08:01:00.001-05:00

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I have just completed what was probably the most unhealthy 48 hours (eating-wise) in history. Saturday was technically a day of prayer and fasting for our church. Now, I really cannot completely fast; my blood sugar drops to nothing and I pretty much go comatose. But I did try to eat less; this translated into a granola bar and a cup of Greek yogurt...after working out. Have I mentioned I am completely out of shape after three weeks of almost-getting-a-sinus-infection (i.e., sitting around being pitiful)? I was not doing well by 6pm (end of fast), but the bison burger from Yeah! Burger did a lot to cure me. At least all that organic locally-grown stuff was healthy, even if a giant burger doesn't necessarily scream, "Good eating choices!!" But it's OK, I HAD LETTUCE ON IT!

Sunday my company sponsored a day at Six Flags over Georgia for us. I have mixed feelings about Six Flags. It's got great roller coasters, and the park's setting is beautiful, with all the trees, but...it's dirty. Run-down. Cheaply constructed. The staff really doesn't care. Rides load inefficiently. I want to be loyal because it's my hometown park, but I really spend the whole time wishing I were at Disney World. We left right after church, and with our FREE! refillable soda bottle (ironically called a "sports bottle"), I proceeded to consume:

half a cup of Coke
half a bag of popcorn
half a cup of strawberry soda
finally, at 3:00, "picnic" food: barbecue pork, baked beans and a cookie
another half cup of strawberry soda (because: FREE. STRAWBERRY. SODA. Have I mentioned that if I were an animal, I'd be a hummingbird?
half a cup of artificial-flavored-and-sweetened fizzy water
a couple sips of Powerade (because: sports bottle. Now it all makes sense!)

SIGN ME UP FOR NUTRITIONAL HERO OF THE YEAR!

When we got home at 10pm, I ate an egg, some dried fruit and nuts and some string cheese (because 7 hours without protein is a long time for me). Second healthiest meal of the weekend.

I am only moderately sore today from the roller-coaster punishment I put my body through. My crazy friends convinced me to ride in the front of most of the coasters (it's amazing how peer pressure, even at my age, can override my fear of heights). I screamed like a banshee the ENTIRE ride. Every time. I found it a great way to release my TERROR at hurtling through space without the comfort of other seats in front of me. (I really do love roller coasters, but not feeling like I'm going to die by being flung out into space.) I have my cheerleading training to thank for not having laryngitis today, I surmise.

JiffNotes
Has anyone seen a vegetable? I've forgotten what they look like.

Teeny Tiny Heroine

2011-10-14T15:07:00.000-05:00

Be courageous; no matter your size!

Via Berroco's newsletter

Talk about extreme crafting.

Squirrel!!!

2011-10-13T07:57:00.000-05:00

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Remember these pieces?

That got nice and felted?

They have become a real squirrel!!!

Sadly, this is the best picture I could get with the dark and rainy weather we've been having. This is the "rainy" version.

And here's the "dark" version.

This is probably the best picture to see his mouth, which is black on the dark brown, but actually shows up pretty well in "real life".

I like this "Halloween glamour shot" where it looks like he's scurrying away from the menacing bird whose shadow you can see in the background.

I did something weird and sewed the white details onto his eyes before I sewed them onto his head.

It didn't turn out too badly, but I'd sew the eyes on first next time. I was frustrated from fighting with the fleece I used in lieu of felt. I would not use the fleece again; I'd use felt. But the problem was that I couldn't find felt that was a nice, pale pink rather than electric Pepto-Bismol pink.

And here's a side view, where you can see his puffy tail.

More puffy than "bushy", but still cute, I think!

I'm very pleased to declare victory!!

Edited to add: My squirrel needs a name!! Please share your suggestions in the comments. =)

Edited again to add: I'm also linking this to Finished Object Friday at Tami's Amis. Go there for more finished things!

JiffNotes
Join the battle with us! Visit Revelations of a Delusional Knitter to enlist! Also visit Tami's Amis for more Finished Objects!

Shake Well

2011-10-12T23:36:00.000-05:00

I won some really fun blog candy from Vanessa at Mixed Martial Arts and Crafts. (Doncha just love that blog name?? Go visit; her header graphic is perfect and priceless.) Take a look at the awesome randomosity:

Three beaded rings traveled along in a padded envelope with all this whimsy that spilled out when I opened it. I may have squeed a little.

The funny thing is, I thought that "SHAKE WELL" tag was attached to a ray gun. Later I realized I was just looking at the ice skate upside-down. But for some reason it amuses me more if it's a ray gun. Shake, aim, and FIRE! *pew pew pew!!*

WIP Wednesday (still Chocolat)

2011-10-12T08:07:00.000-05:00

Four more motifs done!

Four to go! I may actually get this prework done before the class! Sorry for the dark/blurry picture, but it's all grey and rainy here again. We're supposed to see some sun peeking through this afternoon, but so far it's still cloudy.

I ordered yarn last night for Helena, which will be my first sweater for a little person. I may or may not have ordered a couple skeins for myself as well.... If, hypothetically, I did, I'll be sure to (hypothetically) share pictures of any yarn that (hypothetically) shows up.

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

Thanks Overdue

2011-10-11T06:16:00.000-05:00

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I have been very remiss in thanking two fellow bloggers for graciously giving me a couple awards...right before I lapsed and didn't blog for a couple weeks! Not cause and effect, I promise!

First, pinkundine gave me the Liebster award. This is extremely exciting...my first exotic foreign award! LOL!!

The Liebster award ("Liebster" is the German word for dear, sweet, darling, beloved) originated in Germany.

The aim of the award is to bring more attention to blogs with fewer than 200 followers, that people think deserve some additional attention.

How cool!! So here are the "rules" of the award:

1. Show your thanks to the blogger who gave you the award by linking back to them. (Thank you thank you thank you, pinkundine!
2. Reveal your top 5 picks and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.
3. Post the award on your blog.

Ooookay...picking just 5! I follow about 300 blogs! 300! Yikes!! I gotta admit that this post has been moldering for a while longer because this prospect was too daunting. Maybe you'll forgive me if I totally wimp out and don't pick at this time?? I reserve the right to bestow the award later, though. If you're looking for something good to read, take a gander over to the right at my blog list. It shows the most recently updated, so you'll get something different every time you visit.

I was also given the Versatile Blogger by RugbyMad!

After accepting the Versatile Blogger Award, the blogger must:

Thank the person who gave the award and link back to them in your post.
Share 7 things about yourself.
Pass this award along to 15 recently discovered blogs.

Fifteen!!!!!1!!one!!eleventyone!!! *faints* OK, that's even worse. But I will share seven things...some of these you probably already know if you've been hanging out here for a while, or know me in real life, but the award didn't specify that the things be "unknown" or even "interesting". =)

The hubby and I met when we were cast together in a musical the summer before my senior year of college.
He'd been doing theater most of his college career, whereas I'd been doing Chorale (classical to Cole Porter). Some theater types had shown up at our summer Chorale rehearsal to recruit singers, since most of their singers were out for the summer. We were both dating other people at the time...but that's another story. =)
I have three older sisters...like, way older.
My youngest sister is twelve years older than me; my oldest sister is seventeen years older than me. I took my first steps when she came home for Thanksgiving her freshman year of college. It was like being an only child most of the time. I feel like I didn't really "meet" my sisters until I was an adult myself.
I have trouble answering, "Where are you from?"
I was born in Michigan to parents from Pennsylvania, who had also dropped kids in Florida and Texas. When I was three, we moved to Atlanta, then five years later we moved to Oxford, Mississippi. After my junior year in high school, my dad got transferred back to Atlanta, but he commuted for a year so I could finish high school (thanks, Dad!!)
I was a cheerleader in high school for three years.
Depending on what context you met me in, you either find this incredibly easy or nearly impossible to believe.
My favorite vacation was to Japan, but our cruise in Europe and last summer's trip to France, Belgium and Germany run as very close seconds. I think have been to sixteen countries, but I may have been to an extra one in the Caribbean (it's kind of hard to keep track when you're on a cruise!)
I have a Master's degree in Computer Science, but my undergraduate degree is in Electrical Engineering. Therefore, I can "legally" sing all the original lyrics to "(I'm a) Ramblin' Wreck from Georgia Tech".
I am NOT a morning person.

JiffNotes
Lots of good blogs to read!

The Geekend That Was

2011-10-10T16:53:00.000-05:00

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I meant to write all sorts of posts this weekend, but that didn't happen.

Friday after some minor dermatological surgery, I headed to a mall to kill an hour or so before I met up with Teresa, in town for work, and Jean (and unexpected bonus Ann!) I scored some major bargains at Macy's...including a skirt where they botched the security tag (two halves of different types put together). Originally $80; I got it for $8.50. The security tag's still on...their machine wouldn't take it off. I figure with a hammer, and maybe a hack saw, I can liberate it. We'll see.

After lovely butternut squash ravioli (I'm helpless to resist), we headed to Teresa's palatial hotel suite to stitch. Well, I stitched on Chocolat while poor Teresa finished work and Jean attempted to assimilate me to The Beekeeper's Quilt. I remain puff-free...for now.

Saturday Michael and I had a lunch on the deck, enjoying the lovely weather and the bees buzzing among the basil and mint. I have no idea where these bees come from! One guy had so much pollen it looked like he was carrying little yellow buckets on his legs...I'd never seen that live and in person before. After some Dance Central to combat my two weeks of complete lack of exercise due to sickness, we rounded out the day by driving out to visit Michael's parents who are about to go out of the country again (two vacations in three weeks...that's the life!)

Sunday we picked up the first installment of Michael's Cupcake of the Month Club. This month was Pumpkin Pie. These cupcakes are very yummy; they are 70% organic and so not "super sugary" (not that there's anything wrong with that) and very lightweight (though still not "lite", I am sure). Afterwards we finally saw The Help. Fantastic movie, and I immediately downloaded the book and started it this morning.

And there was stitching! I'm now on row 6 out of 7 of Chocolat.

JiffNotes
See The Help. Macy's has killer sales right now. Bees have pollen buckets; who knew? The ~~only good thing~~ best thing about Fall: pumpkin-flavored things.

WIP Wednesday (Chocolat only)

2011-10-05T08:38:00.000-05:00

No knitting this week; I'm starting to panic about getting the prestitching done for my class at The Attic the beginning of November.

I'm almost halfway done, so I'm feeling pretty good about it, but I won't be calm 'til it's done! I do need to get started on a baby sweater for a friend (the sweet little girl arrived yesterday, so now I have no excuse!) I've never knit a baby sweater, and I'm terrified of lots of little seams, so any suggestions are welcome! I want something lacy and relatively seamless and not in fingering! I'm thinking of Helena. Has anyone knit this one? Comments on Ravelry seem to be that the details are a little fussy but worth it, and it's in DK weight. I think I can handle that.

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

Fall TUSAL

2011-09-27T08:39:00.001-05:00

(What's a TUSAL?)

Forced perspective; gotta love it! It looks like a massive pile of orts, when in reality it's a teensy tea light holder stuffed full of organza from the Bumblebee. Ah, it makes it look like all those single strands of silk from Chocolat are really amounting to something.

The weekend at Disney was fun (but of course!) but I did get the creeping crud while I was there. Fortunately, it waited until I was on the plane on the way home to really manifest itself, so I didn't ruin any of Michael's birthday weekend. Except for last night, maybe, when I was too unconscious to watch Fringe or even watch him open the presents that were too heavy to take with us (he got a Disney book to open on the plane and then some Godiva Pumpkin Spice Bark to open on his birthday before we threw ourselves into the parks).

War of WIPs Call to Arms #10

2011-09-22T14:52:00.000-05:00

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Ooooo...I must really love you guys. I have to leave the house in TWELVE MINUTES to catch a flight.

But yesterday I promised felted things. My first felted things ever.

Glamour shot. Getting stuffed with plastic bags while drying. What does everyone else use?

I've actually sewed on the nose and ear linings since this dark, cloudy picture. I'd take another one, but NOTIMENOTIMENOTIME!!!!

And what am I going to do NOW??!?

GO TO DISNEY WORLD!

Have a great weekend!!

JiffNotes
Join the battle with us! Visit Revelations of a Delusional Knitter to enlist!

WIP Wednesday (Slow as a Turtle)

2011-09-21T07:57:00.002-05:00

Got a little bit done on the Origami Turtle.

I made minuscule (hunh, that's spelled with two u's, eh? I really am losing my spelling ability as I get older) progress on my qiviuk, like HALF A ROUND, so no photo. I did my first bit of felting, EVER, but you'll have to wait until tomorrow to see that. Well...my first INTENTIONAL felting, anyway.

I got a little more done on my pre-stitching for Chocolat. Sorry for the "flashy" photo, but it's been dark and rainy here in the mornings.

It looks more impressive than it is...I DOUBLED the amount I have done, BUT I have to have 10.5 more of these round motifs done by November 2, and I am NOT on pace for that. Also, we're going to Disney World this weekend for my better half's birthday, and it's too much trouble to take this on the plane. I'm toying with what I should take...socks which are not on any de-stashing list whatsoever but are very portable? The qiviuk cowl which stands in the way of starting a shawl but might break my sanity if I drop a stitch? Astrid which is on the War on WIPs list but would involve bringing a scissors since I'm working on teensy, theoretically quickly-finished motifs? Something small from the Crazy Challenge (My WIPs go to 11 list) but requires clean hands?

True story: I once got on a plane with but one needlework project (and one needle). The minute I got in my seat, I pulled out the needle to thread, and immediately it flipped out of my hand. It was one of those slow-motion moments where I watched it tumble through a graceful arc, flashing periodically as it flipped end-for-end before dropping into oblivion. I spent the rest of the flight reading Sky magazine. *the horror!*

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

Alaska: Glacier Bay Part Deux!

2011-09-20T17:15:00.000-05:00

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Previously, on the Alaska trip--
Glacier Bay, Part 1

Sailing out from Margerie Glacier, we went by Lamplugh Glacier again. This one is much smaller, but the blues and teals were deeper.

The palm trees around the pool seem especially out of place.

Although, there were some people who stayed in the hot tubs THE ENTIRE TIME. (Once again, temperatures were about 40F!) Yikes!

Click for bigger, teal-ier colors.

Conditions were favorable for us that day; we got to sail back and see John Hopkins Glacier.

And Topeka! Yup, that's a glacier up there in the dip between the mountains. Also, I'm pretty sure there's a bear there somewhere, as our helpful park ranger on the intercom was saying, "If you look to the right of the boat, there is a bear...right by the triangular rock."

Ohhhhhh, the TRIANGULAR rock. Of course!

No, we never actually saw a bear. However, we did see eagles. If you click to embiggen this picture, you'll see them on the ice floe right in front.

In fact, we saw so many eagles, that things started to go like this:

HEY! What's that on that ice floe?!? Is that a sea otter?

Aw, it's just an eagle.

In fact, it started to sound a lot like "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!":

"What'd you see??"

=) "I saw a sea otter!"

=D "I saw a bear!"

=( "I saw a rock...er, eagle."

We did end up seeing some (extremely cute, squee-worthy) sea otters later, with their little paws tucked up to their chins, when we were leaving the park. But again, no zoom lens to speak of, so no pictures. They were visible with the binoculars (did I mention this before?? If you go to Alaska, ABSOLUTELY BRING BINOCULARS!!), but that's about it. I actually have tried taking pictures with the weensy camera through a binocular lens, but this works just about as well as you'd expect it to (i.e., NOT AT ALL).

Finally, we had to leave. The clouds lifted as we exited the park, and the whales began to wave hello.

Can you see them in the lower-left corner? (Click for bigger) It was really hilarious; when the whales started to show up, we were inside the forward lounge, looking out the windows and only half-listening to the "Who Wants to Be a Bazillionaire?" gameshow going on. Every time a whale tale appeared, there was a massive gasp, applause and rush to whichever side was seeing the whale. The poor crew member who was emceeing, upon seeing most of her audience had fled, started saying, "We are going to charge you extra for the whale-watching expedition!"'

After we went outside, I got to enjoy one perky whale who breached, over and over, for about five minutes! Again, this was a binoculars-only experience, but it was such fun to watch.

Unbelievable that all that mistiness was just a few miles away.

There is STILL MORE Alaska to come! But pictures should be much easier to wade through. So the post should be up sooner. BUT OF COURSE THAT IS NOT A PROMISE. =)

JiffNotes
Otters and eagles and whales, oh my!

Alaska: Glacier Bay

2011-09-19T20:36:00.000-05:00

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Previously on the Alaska trip...
Skagway

It felt like it took me forever to pick out the pictures for this post (I'm sure that for the two of you who've been waiting on a new Alaska post, it felt like that, too), because it was so hard to narrow down the choices! I'm actually splitting it into two posts just so I can get one out! Most of the pictures will become MUCH bigger if you click on them, and I would highly recommend it...not due to my photography "skillz" (or lack thereof), but because these things are all massive and huge and have amazing details.

From the moment we sailed in to Glacier Bay National Park, we were met with incredible views like this one.

I'm not going to lie; staring down at the milky-blue water, I had a few thoughts of Titanic. I had a vain hope that we'd have a sunny day; I had in my head that sunlight sparkling off of the glaciers would be awesome.

But I'm so glad that is was cloudy and misty. I think bright sun would have just meant I'd have to wear sunglasses. Plus, I kind of liked the slightly spooky atmosphere. When the ship's engines aren't running, it's pretty silent out there. The crowd even seems hushed. It's hard not to be awed by the views.

We passed a smaller glacier, Lamplugh (pictures in the next post) on our way to Margerie. This was the view as we were sailing towards Margerie. You're looking at it from an angle; it's about a mile wide, so the only way to get the whole thing in the picture is from an angle or with a wide-angle lens (which I don't have on my bitty point and shoot digital camera).

The boat stops in front of Margerie for a while. I don't know how long I could have stood there just staring at the different colors and formations in the ice.

Can you see the tiny seagulls in the foreground? If you only click for bigger pictures in two pictures in this post, click on these. Pictures of Margerie were the most difficult to pare down, because I took approximately 3.79 bazillion, and they were all subtly different, showing different details.

See that snowy-looking ice in the water in the bottom-left corner? That means the glacier has calved recently. I did manage to capture part of a calving on "video" (consider those as "air-quotes" because the "video" was taken on my digital camera). The visual isn't that great, but if you listen past the "oooing" and "aaahing", you can hear the thunder of the glacier.

Back in the day, the ships used to blow their horns to make the glaciers calve, but I'm sure the wildlife didn't care for these noisy visitors. No matter; we saw four or five good calvings while we were there. No dramatic crack-and-tumble; they were more like mini-avalanches or snow slides. But still very awesome. The park ranger who was on board giving a color commentary over the ship's PA system told us to zoom in with our binoculars after a calving to see the seagulls dive for all the goodies that were stirred up in the water. This really gives you a sense of how big things are. Margerie's about as tall as the Statue of Liberty! Since I did't have a macro lens to capture the gulls, here's a little bit of scale for you.

Yeah.

Poor Ferris glacier is just to the right of Margerie, but doesn't get as much love, because, well...it isn't nearly as photogenic.

Ferris is carrying the dirt along on top, as opposed to Margerie, which occasionally has it mixed in, or on the sides.

You can see that just a few of our shipmates were also out on deck, braving the cold (it was around 40F).

I had to splurge on some hot chocolate (replete with whipped cream and in a thermos!) to stave off the cold. I must admit that the "preservatives" they added to the hot chocolate certainly warmed us up! Watching the guy pour, I wasn't sure there'd be any room for the hot chocolate! Later when I thought about it, I was pretty sure that he was just trying to empty all his bottles more quickly so that he could go inside. =)

As the boat turned to leave, we dashed down to a lower deck. Still a great view. You can see the ripples coming from the glacier, which means that I got this shot right after a calving.

Next up: we leave Margerie behind and see three more glaciers. Stay tuned!

JiffNotes
Glaciers in Alaska come in many shapes, colors and sizes, and turbo hot chocolate makes them all seem better.

Ahoy, Me Beauties! (And Scalawags)

2011-09-19T11:05:00.000-05:00

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Arrrrr! Today be Talk Like a Pirate Day! Don't be a lubber...remember that pirates don't say "argh"...that's the sound we makes when some bilge rat tries to make us eats our vegetables, savvy? Now move along smartly and sling some lingo about!

JiffNotes
This PSA has been brought to you by the letter "R". Arrrrrrrrr.....

All The Buzz (but no yarn)

2011-09-16T15:03:00.000-05:00

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I FINISHED THE BUMBLEBEE!!!

I finally had an hour of daylight to fuss with attaching the wings. I ran into a few problems. First, I had a wing with only one trailing end on one side of the wire. It was impossible to pull the ends of the wings together that way, so I had to anchor another thread on the opposite wire.

Second, I had this idea that I was going to thread the wires to the back and tack them down back there...yeah...not so much. The bulk going through the linen would have been too much. So I clipped the wires shorter (with my giant kitchen shears, of course), and in the process clipped an end off...see "First". The ends are just kind of hiding under that fringe of the turkey work (TECHNICAL TERM: i.e., "fuzzy stuff").

After that, it was just a matter of fiddling around with pulling the two ends together/through, and tightening the veins.

Sorry these pictures are kind of blurry; I just have a basic point-and-shoot camera (um, maybe I should read the manual? It probably has some fancy settings) and no swanky macro lens.

If I had the wings to do again (OH PLEASE NO), I would reshape them a bit. See how this guy's wings are straight across the top, rather than curved? You know, WING-SHAPED??

Hunh. My camera can take SOME good close-ups.

Also, I'd make the two ends of the wires meet on the organza before cutting out, rather than having an 1/8"-1/4" gap between them that had to be pulled together. Doing that made the wings kind of pucker or ruffle, rather than lying flat.

See what I mean? And real bees' wings don't do that. Makes my bee look kind of like a "bee fairy" or something. =)

Still, I'm pretty happy with him!! And very happy he's done! If anyone is interested in the pattern and instructions, drop me a line at heather at lottloft dot com. You'll need more linen, wire, organza and beads, but there is plenty of the Madeira floss left over, and there is a sample of the beads, wire and organza so you know what you need. If I get more than one request, I'll do a drawing at the end of the weekend.

If you're looking for actual yarn-related "Finished Objects", head over and visit Tami's Ami's:

&nbps;

JiffNotes
The Bumblebee is done! That makes a whopping two projects finished from my Crazy Challenge. That's...sad. But YAY FINISHED BEE!!!

War of WIPs Call to Arms #9

2011-09-15T07:09:00.002-05:00

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I declare victory!!

I have toed the line to de-feet my arch enemy, the Errant Lace Socks!

Nothing can com-pair to the well-heeled campaign that has resulted in my sole finish for the month.

Aaaand...that's enough of the bad puns. After waffling on whether to just finish them (due to the CRAZY DIFFERENCE in the pooling or whatever between socks) or totally rip them out, I finally decided to just finish them and move on.

I will wear them with very long jeans.

I have enough Tofutsies left to make an extremely small shawl. Like this, maybe. You know. In a few years. When I run through the rest of my stash. ;)

JiffNotes
Join the battle with us! Visit Revelations of a Delusional Knitter to enlist!

WIP Wednesday (Closer to Bee-ing)

2011-09-14T08:11:00.000-05:00

I finally cast on for the front of my Origami Turtle:

I'm doing the left and right fronts at the same time, on the same needle, so they look a little crowded. I'm actually a little farther now than this picture, which was taken on a very dark and grey day, so the color is not the best. The directions have you do the same pattern sequence on the left side as the back, but then they SWITCH IT UP FOR THE RIGHT SIDE. Like, the left is 4" of moss stitch, then 3.5" of eyelet pattern, etc., and the right is 2" of moss stitch, then the eyelet pattern. Schwunh??? I don't play that kind of crazy, so I'm making them the same. Otherwise I'd be walking around with one shoulder slumped down by 2" all the time.

The Bumblebee is getting dangerously close to being finished.

I trimmed the thorax and cut out a wing. I may have done more than that since I took this picture, and you may want to drop back by on Friday. ;)

Side view of the bee. The thorax is supposed to be a "dome". Well, it's something like a dome, anyway.

Again, I didn't want to trim too much lest I create a bee with a crew cut!

Finally, I did make a start on Chocolat, a class I'm taking with Jackie du Plessis at The Attic in November.

I have to have 12 more of these motifs done by November 2...I GOTTA GET CRACKING!

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

Who? What? When? Where? ...but Mostly Who

2011-09-13T21:48:00.001-05:00

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Blimey.

I was gone for a while there. My only excuse (besides work) is that we started watching Doctor Who (I've never watched before), and it's nigh impossible to blog while watching Doctor Who. At least, it was while David Tennant was around.

You see, we watched a few episodes at the beginning of the new series (starring Christopher Eccleston). Michael had loved Tom Baker growing up, but I just didn't get it. I was all like, "What? Why? What??" the whole time. After three episodes, I was ready to give up. But I knew a few people who loved it, and also said that David Tennant was awesome.

So we skipped ahead to the end of season 1, and when David Tennant showed up on the screen, I said, "Now that's MY Doctor." Long story short, we then watched seasons 2-4 straight through. I grieved for a day when season 4 was over. I won't say why ("Spoilers!") but I was seriously upset.

Anyway.

Labor Day weekend is always Dragon*Con here, and since we're so close, we always try to go to the parade. We had a couple jerks who decided to stand up in front of us (they'd been sitting on the curb) AND put on giant hats right before the parade, so I don't have any really good pictures. Instead, here are some entertaining ones. =)

In honor of my newest obsession, excellent Blink cosplay, a couple 10th Doctors, and...

...well, let's say that's Rose taken over by Cassandra, shall we?

The Harry Potter section was on the weak side, but Luna made up for it with sheer enthusiasm.

This guy's always around.

Darth Vader begs for snacks.

Sure, there were Green Lanterns, Orange Lanterns, blah blah blah. But this Pink Lantern is using the power of love to conjure a martini!

If you're ever screamed, "NOOOOO!" at the end of Buffy, Angel or Firefly because of a cliffhanger, you've probably shaken your fist at this guy.

Awesome.

Fantastic Halo costumes...some great Reach armor...and a SQUEE-worthy Grunt!

SQUEEEE!

Sci-Fi janitors...only awesome if you've seen Dragon*Con TV...which I was shocked to discover is very funny.

Michael went briefly on Monday to check out the art market and merchandise market, and he got this shot of a yute being subdued by a Sand Person.

Excellent enforcement against shenanigans.

Ashley Eckstein, the voice of Ahsoka Tano in the Clone Wars animated series, conned Michael into buying me a Star Wars shirt...his words.

Hilarious. And I love the shirt!

And just so there's some stitchy content here, this is the latest progress picture of Random Thoughts. The color's a bit off; I had to brighten it because we had several days of cloudy, chilly weather and there was just no light ever!

JiffNotes
I was AWOL for a while; I watched a LOT of Doctor Who.

Last Summer TUSAL

2011-08-29T08:38:00.022-05:00

(What's a TUSAL?)

I can't believe this is the last one of the summer!! There are some interesting bits in here: yarn from a finished scarf, fluff from trimming the Bumblebee, organza bits from his wings and sparkly bits from Dasher. And some single silk threads from Random Thoughts, but they get kind of lost in the mix.

We had an exhausting weekend; we helped with a "While You Were Out" style makeover on one room of a friend's house...we even ripped up the carpet and put in flooring and my knees are still paying for it. Sunday we went to see "Dralion" at Philips Arena. We'd seen the show years ago (10?) under the tent. It was interesting to see how the show had changed over the years, and how it had stayed the same.

War of WIPs Call to Arms #6

2011-08-25T09:00:00.001-05:00

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I really thought I was going to be proclaiming victory today but--alas and alack!--it was not to be. I actually finished my second Errant Lace sock last night! However, when I held it up to the one that had already been finished, a couple problems stuck out...much like the toe of the sock I had just finished. Even though I wrote notes when I did the first sock, I clearly changed up the toe decreases from what I wrote. Now I have one nice, rounded sock toe (the one that was already done) and one sock toe that looks like it was made for a banana. Since my feet are relatively symmetrical, the toe needs to be redone. I should have taken a picture, but it was late and, as Moaning Myrtle would say, I was DISTRAUGHT.

The second problem was that I seem to have been WAY MORE TENSE as I was finishing this sock. Even though I did the same number of rounds (Notes! I made 'em!) the sock ended up about 3/4" (2 cm) too short. I finally just pulled out the entire toe.

Also! And here is where I really should have taken a picture...these socks look crazy. I mean, the color variations between the two are so insane, it looks like someone made them crazy looking on purpose. It doesn't even look like a mistake. It looks INTENTIONALLY INSANE. Unsurprisingly, this immediately endeared the socks to the hubby (I'm not saying he's crazy, he just likes crazy things...HE MARRIED ME, DIDN'T HE??) while I stared at my feet in disbelief.

So I went to bed waffling between:

I will add like 8 rounds, then reknit the toe (*grumble grumble* have to splice in more yarn 'cause I already cut it *grumble grumble*) and just get them OVER WITH.
I will knit AN ENTIRELY NEW SOCK with the same yarn on bigger needles...the color will be better, since it started to calm down on the foot (top-down, they are). BUT THIS YARN IS SO SPLITTY UGH!
I WILL RIP BOTH THESE SOCK ENTIRELY AND KNIT A SHAWL. (but yarn splitty)
I will knit entirely new socks with this yarn...I have almost 1/2 the ball left! 450m total! I could knit some DANG KNEE SOCKS if I rip these two socks out!

Opinions?? What should I do?? I am mad at these socks and they may need a timeout. After I get them back on some needles. They lay in a pile of ripped-out yarn carnage right now.

But such is the nature of WAR!

Edited to add: I nearly forgot! I did successfully complete the side quest of organizing all my needles! They're all listed in Ravelry now, with the project in the comments if they're currently in service. Although...I know I have some size 9 tips wandering the countryside somewhere...they did not come up in the cataloging of in-service and out-of-service needles. Hmmm....

JiffNotes
Join the battle with us! Visit Revelations of a Delusional Knitter to enlist!

WIP Wednesday (Pretty Fuzzy Bee)

2011-08-24T10:04:00.000-05:00

So this is my "big" progress on Pretty Thing:

Well...at least it's more than last week. I used Jeny's Surprisingly Stretchy Cast-on, because I tend to cast on and off very tightly, this piece has a sewn cast-off, and I wanted it to be consistent. However! The cast-on was a HUGE pain in the neck to knit the first row into. Despite the fact that it's really stretchy NOW, it was SO TIGHT on the needles it was ridiculous. Even the stitches on the cable, before they are knit, stretch by creating gaps between them rather than the individual stitches getting bigger. I'm sure it will pay off in the long run, but it wasn't fun. And I also decided to switch my cable length to 24" AFTER I had knit two rounds (I added two extra repeats...that was some math there...figuring out if, as others had done, an extra repeat in the length equaled to an extra repeat in the width). For some reason, switching the cable was mind-bending for me...probably because I was going from Magic Loop to...not.

I also made some progress on Random Thoughts...

SQUIRREL!!!

And I finally screwed up my courage and cut the loops on the Bumblebee! Here's a closeup after I cut half the loops on his abdomen.

All of the abdomen and half of the thorax cut. Mmmm...thorax...have I used that word since eighth grade biology? Shame on me if I haven't.

Then I trimmed. And trimmed. And trimmed and trimmed and trimmed. And finally I stopped, because I was afraid I'd keep "evening up" until there was no fuzz left. You know, kind of like my mom used to do with the brownie pan..."I'm just evening up this row!"...and then suddenly there were no brownies left. So here's the result...the thorax still needs trimming, but I was mentally exhausted from trying not to FREAK OUT the whole time I was cutting, so that will have to wait.

The wings are FINALLY done (I had to redo some veins I had stitched when the written directions didn't jive with what I remembered from class). Well...I still have to cut them out, too...SCARIER EVEN. But the end is in sight!

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, with 50% less drama, head over to Tami's Amis!

Gorgeous Giveaway

2011-08-22T16:54:00.000-05:00

Head over to ! Happiness is cross stitching ! to enter her giveaway for an absolutely gorgeous stitching set!

Top 100 Sci-Fi and Fantasy Novels

2011-08-18T19:19:00.000-05:00

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Stolen from Annette, who stole it from Measi. =)

I'm not sure I entirely trust a list of sci-fi and fantasy novels compiled by listeners of NPR (I listen, but don't consider myself a "listener")...nothing's wrong with NPR listeners, but I would expect the list to be more heavily skewed towards books with a political/liberal bent (yawn!). Nevertheless, (ooo, I just lost my non-NPR-listener status by using that word, didn't I?) I'll probably try to read most of these!

Bold = ones I’ve completed
Italics = ones I won't read in the future (switching things up...I generally finish books I start, so I'm leaving out the "attempted/started" category.)
Plain = let's assume I'll read them someday. ;)

1. The Lord Of The Rings Trilogy, by J.R.R. Tolkien (Can I double-bold? LOL!)

2. The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, by Douglas Adams (Or triple-bold??)

3. Ender’s Game, by Orson Scott Card

4. The Dune Chronicles, by Frank Herbert

5. A Song Of Ice And Fire Series, by George R. R. Martin

6. 1984, by George Orwell (Listen, I went to a really...umm...non-literature-intensive high school, so there are a lot of "classics" I never read.)

7. Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury (Saw the play, though.)

8. The Foundation Trilogy, by Isaac Asimov

9. Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley

10. American Gods, by Neil Gaiman

11. The Princess Bride, by William Goldman

12. The Wheel Of Time Series, by Robert Jordan

13. Animal Farm, by George Orwell

14. Neuromancer, by William Gibson

15. Watchmen, by Alan Moore (Although I love graphic novels, I probably won't get through this one. I think we own it, though, so maybe....)

16. I, Robot, by Isaac Asimov (Saw the movie, though =P)

17. Stranger In A Strange Land, by Robert Heinlein

18. The Kingkiller Chronicles, by Patrick Rothfuss

19. Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut

20. Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley (Movie definitely doesn't count, I think.)

21. Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?, by Philip K. Dick

22. The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood

23. The Dark Tower Series, by Stephen King (I know...but I don't think I can handle Stephen King, really.)

24. 2001: A Space Odyssey, by Arthur C. Clarke (I HAY.TED. the movie, so I have no desire to read the book. Anyone want to tell me the book's better?)

25. The Stand, by Stephen King (See 23.)

26. Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson

27. The Martian Chronicles, by Ray Bradbury

28. Cat’s Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut (Plot summary doesn't sound remotely interesting to me.)

29. The Sandman Series, by Neil Gaiman (Omigosh, this sounds hilarious.)

30. A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess (No. Nononono.)

31. Starship Troopers, by Robert Heinlein

32. Watership Down, by Richard Adams (Gee whiz! Finally another one that I've actually read!)

33. Dragonflight, by Anne McCaffrey (Loved the book until the first mating flight. Really?)

34. The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, by Robert Heinlein

35. A Canticle For Leibowitz, by Walter M. Miller

36. The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells

37. 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, by Jules Verne (Hmm, not sure if I ever read this!)

38. Flowers For Algernon, by Daniel Keys (I keep thinking I've read this because I've read "Harrison Bergeron," which for some INEXPLICABLE REASON I keep mis-remembering as "Algernon Bergeron".)

39. The War Of The Worlds, by H.G. Wells (Seen the movie.)

40. The Chronicles Of Amber, by Roger Zelazny

41. The Belgariad, by David Eddings

42. The Mists Of Avalon, by Marion Zimmer Bradley

43. The Mistborn Series, by Brandon Sanderson

44. Ringworld, by Larry Niven (Duh, Halo, of course I wanna read it! =)

45. The Left Hand Of Darkness, by Ursula K. LeGuin (I gotta admit that the brief summary on goodreads makes it sound like I'll hate it, but I'll give it a try.)

46. The Silmarillion, by J.R.R. Tolkien (Oooo, now here's one I DID give up on. But now that I'm older--out of middle school and not so loathe to read anything reeking remotely of history--I want to give it a try again.)

47. The Once And Future King, by T.H. White

48. Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman

49. Childhood’s End, by Arthur C. Clarke

50. Contact, by Carl Sagan (Ugh.)

51. The Hyperion Cantos, by Dan Simmons

52. Stardust, by Neil Gaiman (Had to read it after I saw the movie...I had questions about whether some things REALLY happened in the book. Unsurprisingly, they did NOT.)

53. Cryptonomicon, by Neal Stephenson

54. World War Z, by Max Brooks (I add this to my list...hesitantly. I like zombie books in theory, but not in practice...they're gross. Also, I was recently scarred by watching a couple episodes of Walking Dead...UGH.)

55. The Last Unicorn, by Peter S. Beagle (*gasp!* How could I have not read this already?? IS ABOUT UNICORNS!!)

56. The Forever War, by Joe Haldeman (War. Hunh. What is it good for?)

57. Small Gods, by Terry Pratchett (Gotta read The Color of Magic first!!)

58. The Chronicles Of Thomas Covenant, The Unbeliever, by Stephen R. Donaldson (I will try the first one, but I am skeptical that I will enjoy it.)

59. The Vorkosigan Saga, by Lois McMaster Bujold** (Have the first couple..)

60. Going Postal, by Terry Pratchett

61. The Mote In God’s Eye, by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle

62. The Sword Of Truth, by Terry Goodkind (Read the first one...not sure I can stand the sadistic sections for a second, third, fourth....)

63. The Road, by Cormac McCarthy (Ugh, I'll probably hate this one, too, but I'll give it a try.)

64. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, by Susanna Clarke

65. I Am Legend, by Richard Matheson (Holy crap, I'll probably hate this, too!)

66. The Riftwar Saga, by Raymond E. Feist

67. The Shannara Trilogy, by Terry Brooks

68. The Conan The Barbarian Series, by R.E. Howard (I don't even want to read the summary. I'm supremely uninterested.)

69. The Farseer Trilogy, by Robin Hobb (Another triple bold!)

70. The Time Traveler’s Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger (Note: not for pre-teens!)

71. The Way Of Kings, by Brandon Sanderson

72. A Journey To The Center Of The Earth, by Jules Verne

73. The Legend Of Drizzt Series, by R.A. Salvatore (Holy shamoley, how many books are in this series??? I'll at least try the first one! Homeland, right??)

74. Old Man’s War, by John Scalzi

75. The Diamond Age, by Neil Stephenson

76. Rendezvous With Rama, by Arthur C. Clarke

77. The Kushiel’s Legacy Series, by Jacqueline Carey (Ew, no.)

78. The Dispossessed, by Ursula K. LeGuin (The summary's not really doing it for me, but I'll give it a go.)

79. Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury (Sounds like horror...me no likey.)

80. Wicked, by Gregory Maguire (LOVE the musical. HATE the book. As I tell every parent that takes their children to see the musical, NOT APPROPRIATE for kids.)

81. The Malazan Book Of The Fallen Series, by Steven Erikson (Hmmm, the summary's not grabbing me here, either, but I'd give it a try.)

82. The Eyre Affair, by Jasper Fforde (LOVE. Love love love! Triple bold! Exclamation Marks!!! Scared to read the latest because then there will be no more to read!)

83. The Culture Series, by Iain M. Banks

84. The Crystal Cave, by Mary Stewart (?? I feel like I read this book in high school; I remember reading some book of Arthurian fiction and being wholly shocked by the amorality contained in it...pretty sure it was this one.)

85. Anathem, by Neal Stephenson (Eh, sure, I'll try it. Anyone else starting to feel this list is very weighted to books in the last 10 years?)

86. The Codex Alera Series, by Jim Butcher (Already on my list!)

87. The Book Of The New Sun, by Gene Wolfe (OK, I'm not thrilled about reading a book about torturers. But it's been called the second-best fantasy series behind Lord of the Rings? I suppose I'll try it...maybe...someday....)

88. The Thrawn Trilogy, by Timothy Zahn (A THOUSAND TIMES YES. Timothy Zahn, you have spoiled me for any other Star Wars author. Thank you for gracing the Halo-verse with your presence.)

89. The Outlander Series, by Diana Gabaldan (Also already on the list!)

90. The Elric Saga, by Michael Moorcock (This poor guy must have gotten teased unmercifully when he was a kid....)

91. The Illustrated Man, by Ray Bradbury (Oh, heavens. I remember reading "The Veldt" and that it was creeeeepyyyyy. This book will probably scare the heck out of me!)

92. Sunshine, by Robin McKinley (Just not interested. I read Twilight under heavy protest, and I'm embarrassed enough that I liked that.)

93. A Fire Upon The Deep, by Vernor Vinge

94. The Caves Of Steel, by Isaac Asimov

95. The Mars Trilogy, by Kim Stanley Robinson

96. Lucifer’s Hammer, by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle (Ah. Finally a synopsis that doesn't include the words "epic battle". =)

97. Doomsday Book, by Connie Willis

98. Perdido Street Station, by China Mieville (Wow. I'm not sure what to think after reading that synopsis!)

99. The Xanth Series, by Piers Anthony (So, I've read Ogre, Ogre, and A Spell for Chameleon...twice, because I forgot I read it the first time. I really, really want to like these books, because I LOVE puns, but.... Well, first, I don't like toilet humor. And A Spell for Chameleon really annoyed me with its female character that it either pretty and dumb or ugly and smart. Ugh.)

100. The Space Trilogy, by C.S. Lewis (I've read the first one and it was great. I'll definitely read the rest. But DUDES, where is The Chronicles of Narnia on this list??!? I just can't read those too many times!)

JiffNotes
Yikes, only 16?? I may have to give up my geek card! My "to read" list on goodreads is now 392 books!

War of WIPs Call to Arms #5

2011-08-18T07:12:00.000-05:00

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After last week's victory, this week's progress has been more sedate, just dipping my toe into starting another campaign.

These are the Errant Lace Socks, knit in Tofutsies, which is a great yarn but VERY splitty. I should have taken a picture of the other sock; the spiral is much more consistent. Oh, well, such are the trials of variegated yarn!

JiffNotes
Join the battle with us! Visit Revelations of a Delusional Knitter to enlist!

WIP Wednesday (Buzz)

2011-08-17T06:23:00.000-05:00

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The only "progress" I made on the Origami Turtle was to get yarn wound so that I can start the right and left front sides simultaneously.

See what I mean about it not being stretchy AT ALL?

Since I finished my lace learning project last week, I did cast on Pretty Thing:

Er. Started to cast it on, anyway. I'm using Jeny's Stretchy Cast-On. I've only done it once before, so it's not like I can just sit there whipping it on like long-tail.

And I did finish my redo of Bumblebee's wings!

Whew. I'm glad those are over. But now...there is only...

Dun dun DUN!!!

Cutting. That's right; I have to not only cut all the loops on the bee and trim them to a bee-shaped fuzz, but I ALSO have to completely cut out those wings from the organza. Yikes. This is way scarier than hardanger! With these, I have no confidence they won't just fall apart.

I'll leave you with a picture from our trip to the Botanical Gardens this weekend of an orchid which only blooms for a day:

Lucky us to be there!

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

JiffNotes
Next week: Actual stitches with yarn rather than just yarn!!

How to Recover History in Subversion (geek alert)

2011-08-16T12:15:00.000-05:00

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WARNING: The Geek Content of this post is rated R for Really Technical Programming Mumbo Jumbo (don't read unless you're familiar with source control systems and hate dealing with them! This post exists to help Googlers like me with similar problems....)

Seriously, you might want to skip it.

Yesterday I spent about three hours fighting with Subversion. Somehow, it deleted a file from the server, when I was trying to switch to a revision. Due to some things that happened today, I'm thinking it actually occurred when I tried to resolve a conflict. Whatever.

Now, I had another local copy of the file, but I needed the entire history, because I was desperately trying to avoid branching (the default strategy for branching: Desperately Try to Avoid).

"No problem," I thought. I'll just commit this here local version, and it'll hook it back up to the history, and I'll be able to get to it."

WELL THAT DIDN'T HAPPEN. The old history didn't show back up; just one line of history from the commit I'd just done.

WHY did I think that'd work? Because it worked that way in CVS, and no one has told me there's any difference between the two in that regard, just that Subversion is "better" than CVS. So far, notsomuch.

Anyway, to reduce my epic battle to the solution you're really here for, if you Googled, there is no way to rectify this situation through Subclipse in Eclipse. You need to use the command line interface to svn. I used this vanilla version for Windows (just unzip the distribution and plop it on your hard drive...there's no install), but you might (and I might!) want to explore TortoiseSVN.

The magic command is then:

svn copy --revision 9752 http://svn.lottloft.com/svn/app/trunk/myProject/src/com/lottloft/test/Test.java http://svn.lottloft.com/svn/app/trunk/myProject/src/com/lottloft/test/Test.java

(Note: svn.lottloft.com doesn't exist, so don't go looking for things there ;)

This looks REALLY strange, but you're essentially copying a past revision on top of the current one. You need to replace 9752 with the revision before you deleted the file (to do this, Show History for the folder containing the file; you'll be able to tell the last good revision from there).

I found lots of sites that suggest you can do a Reverse Merge to get a deleted file back, but that didn't bring the history forward for me, since I deleted then added the file, wiping history. If you just deleted the file, try the Reverse Merge first.

If you got here through Google, would it kill you to leave a comment telling me if this was useful to you? ;)

JiffNotes
Nothing to see here! Move along! Pretty pictures coming tomorrow!

War of WIPs Call to Arms #4

2011-08-11T07:30:00.001-05:00

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Comrades, I have success in battle! The Kingdom of Peaceful Knitting now has leaves which twine gracefully rather than a mess of unruly vines!

Pattern: Branching Out
Yarn: Knit Picks Elegance (sadly discontinued...I LOVED this yarn)

There are a few mistakes right at the beginning, but that's OK, since this was my lace learning project. Hey, all work with needles is a learning experience, no?

Here's a pre-blocking picture...well, half pre-blocking, anyway...because it's more true-to-color. This yarn is ridiculously hard to photograph for some reason. It's a nice grassy green. A little yellower than my normal taste, but I think it will work well in the Fall.

I learned tons doing this pattern; I even recharted it because I couldn't figure out how to fix a mistake from the chart that was originally given. It...how do I say...didn't line up decreases above the stitches that were being decreased. Impossible to tell how you'd gone wrong. I'm going to blog about it when I get more time, and also show some of the mistakes I made along the way.

So for my next lace project, I think I'm going to do Pretty Little Thing with the qiviuk I got in Alaska. I don't think that'll advance my lace learning, but I do want it done and it will work well with my whole "you can buy anything if you start it" mantra...that has otherwise been beat up a little this week. =) After that, I want to do Juneberry by Jared Flood. I saw an awesome one at Ravelry made with Silky Wool...and I just happen to have some of that in my stash!

JiffNotes
Join the battle with us! Visit Revelations of a Delusional Knitter to enlist!

WIP Wednesday (Cheesy)

2011-08-10T07:15:00.000-05:00

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Michael took a business trip to Wisconsin.

He brought back Wisconsin, made from cheese. This was a much better gift than the cheese top hat. An actual top hat. That you're supposed to wear on your head. Yeah.

Hey! Knitting!

I finished the back of the unfortunately-named Origami Turtle! I think I'm going to cast on for both sides of the front at once. But I need to wind some more yarn, so that's going to have to wait for a few days.

I did make a little progress on Dasher.

And I used some precious daylight hours to finally restart the large wings for the Bumblebee.

I briefly tried to rip out the old ones, but that was going to be WAYYYY too much trouble. Fortunately, I had just enough thread-covered wire to make a new pair.

Unfortunately, I am an idiot and started them on the backside. It doesn't really matter, once they are cut out you totally won't be able to tell. Just for grins, here's a closeup of the small ones (with the one I started on the backside).

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

JiffNotes
State-shaped cheese is definitely tastier than regular cheese.

Hogwarts Leavers' Party

2011-08-09T16:54:00.009-05:00

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At the end of June, the first wave of invitations went out.

(You probably need to click to read it. You may not be able to tell, but the envelopes/paper are metallic gold. You know, because MAGIC.)

This was a change from the past seven (7!) parties we'd done: Before, we'd met Friday night to eat, play games, then head to the movie at about 10:30pm (fewer kids). But we'd all agreed that we'd like to discuss the final movie, so we restructured the party. At the time the "save the dates" went out, we weren't sure what movie times would be available, but we figured there'd be one around 10:30am.

Once we found out that the 3D IMAX was either at 9:45 (AM!) or 12:50, we changed our "lunch" plans just a bit, and the second invites went out.

Fancy postcards...(also sparkly gold)

If you're in the US, google leavers' party right now.

This cleared up something for me...after O.W.L.s, there was talk of "continuing" to N.E.W.T. level. I wondered what Hogwarts students who weren't "continuing" would do? Was there a vocational school at Hogwarts? Now it all makes sense.

So around noon on Saturday, Michael and I set out for Atlantic Station: He to hold places in line and save seats, and I to sit at a nearby cafe and distribute tickets. And snacks.

You know, just so people would have energy to walk across the street to the theater. ;)

My long-suffering waitress was much confused by the fact that I arrived alone, Michael showed up, then left, then another male showed up and plopped down across from me. I think she eventually caught on. After all, the cafe was serving drinks like "Gryffindor Punch".

Every Harry Potter party at the Lott Loft includes a few constants: Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans, licorice wands, and pumpkin pasties. Several of you asked where to get Peppermint Toads.

I'm afraid that this particular packaging is available only at the Lott Loft. If you wanted a Muggle sweet that was similar, I'd pick up a package of Junior Mints, though. ;)

After the movie (which I thought was fantastic...and I don't think that always!) we repaired back to the Lott Loft where tea awaited.

(My sister manages to turn her back in practically every picture I take!)

My wonderful sister, along with my equally wonderful nephew and niece, not only made tea but had everything ready for us when we got back. She does cream teas at her house which are completely mindblowing. This was more of a high tea (in other words, a meal), with sweet scones with her amazing clotted cream, and super-delicious savory scones (sun-dried tomato and basil) with basil butter frogs I made.

The savory scones are a keeper. There was only one left!

While everyone enjoyed tea, we discussed the movie. We also enjoyed the scrapbook Tony and Julie brought of their time at Hogwarts. (Remember the invitation where we requested guests to bring "favourite memories to share"?)

The scrapbook is awesome!! I wish you could see the whole thing, but you can at least see the pictures and some of the captions in their picasa album here.

We handed out attendance pins.

Our seven-year attenders were very proud. =) As they have every right to be...anyone who survives seven of our parties deserves a major award! (Though these pins are not really fragíle.)

Next course of tea was shepherd's pie.

Which was on this tiered server...so cool. But that's not what's sitting there.

What's sitting there is Bakewell Tart. It looks rather unassuming (though pert and pretty), but it is SO. GOOD. Jam, cake crumbs and almonds with fantastic icing on top.

I mean, really.

We also had a trifle I made. (That's Pumpkin Juice there to the left.)

It was also yummy (and, as my nephew said, "It's filled with fruit! It's healthy!" Yeah...that can of sweetened condensed milk would beg to differ...). However, my attempt at a Hogwarts crest didn't go as well as I'd have liked. Maybe they were appropriate for a "student-made" dessert.

Special thanks to the spouse for making a late-night run for more heavy whipping cream. Note to self: YOU CANNOT HAVE TOO MUCH HEAVY WHIPPING CREAM. This is impossible.

After dessert, we ~~subjected our guests to~~ had a trivia contest...you know, a review session for our N.E.W.T.s. I restricted myself to only asking questions from previous parties. But I am known for creating wicked hard trivia. I thought there was going to be a mutiny over the characteristics of a werewolf...hey, I go from the books ONLY. ;)

Perhaps the Butterbeer dulled the pain a little. =)

Butterbeer is not for the faint of heart, nor for those trying to watch their sugar intake. I'm pretty sure this is the most sugar you can drink, per fluid ounce, unless you're drinking straight simple syrup. Actually, this may be MORE sugar than simple syrup.

Warning label on the side:

WARNING! Bottles from authorized dealers equipped with Summoning Charms for recycling purposes.

Not for consumption by gnomes, house elves or people who don’t fancy butter. Muggles may experience dizziness, dry mouth and/or additional limbs.

We had one Muggle at the party, and a couple bottles were labeled, "Muggles, such as Mr. Ralph Dulap, may experience...".

We've had an epic, over-arching Butterbeer storyline through the eight parties, which I am not sure any of our guests really grasped, but which amused Michael and I, anyway. According to Quidditch through the Ages, Butterbeer sponsors the Ballycastle Bats. So the very first party, we had bottled Butterbeer with a sidebar featuring Ballycastle's mascot, Barny the Fruitbat, and boasting Butterbeer as "proud sponsors" of the Bats. The second party, we noted that the Bats weren't doing as well, but we were still "loyal sponsors". The third party, the label was much less enthusiastic. Finally, at the fourth party, we only had Butterbeer on draft. Honestly, producing the bottles was a lot of work and fuss, and few were keeping them as souvenirs. One year we had hot Butterbeer, and last year we had Butterbeer à la Wizarding World. But this year, we had to do the bottles again...there were some attendees who had never experienced bottled Butterbeer. I give you...the triumphant return of Barny the Fruitbat:

After trivia we had "Hogwarts, a History in Four Minutes or Less". Guests were challenged to produce a short skit (poem, song, limerick, kabuki, flaming mime) depicting their time at Hogwarts (or Harry's time; we weren't being choosy) and they were given pipe cleaners to enhance their presentations. Guests had been dropping like flies, though, so we were down to a skeleton crew of two teams of 2 and 3 rather than 3 teams of 6 like we'd planned. So things were much more restrained than, say, the Goblet of Fire party where fans of the Bulgarian and Irish Quidditch teams were yelling competing cheers. =) My favorite highlight was the pipecleaner Pygmy Puff, modeled by the lovely Vicky.

We handed out Hogwarts "Who's Who" forms. The winners will be announced when the yearbook comes out. I'm still trying to persuade the yearbook staff to wrap things up.

Finally, we played Kinect Harry Potter. I wish I had pictures of this...or better yet, video...that was some awesome flailing we all did. ;)

This is one of only two or three pictures of me across all eight parties!

It's been a great run! But I must admit, I'm a little relieved. I stress out big-time over making sure everyone has enough food, and that the games are fun and able to be enjoyed by everyone.

So, now that I don't have to keep my "trade secrets"...is anyone interested in any recipes? Pumpkin Pasties? Pumpkin Juice? Butterbeer? Last year's Cauldron Cakes or Golden Snitches?

JiffNotes
Thanks to my guests for all the great memories...Gilderoy Lockhart Kabuki will go down in history as the funniest thing ever. Filch sure is glad we won't be trashing the place anymore.

Mail Call!

2011-08-05T12:25:00.000-05:00

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It was a good mail week! First, Jenny graciously sent me her kit leftovers for Sweetheart Tree's Sunflowers and Bumblebees Welcome.

I love the card! She even drew me a cute Mickey Mouse inside!! Thanks, Jenny!

Then, I may have had a really bad day at work last week and decided I needed to join Nordic Needle's Hardanger Ornament of the Month Club.

You get all the fabric, fiber and beads for the whole year in a zippered pouch, complete with needles and a threader, and then you get a pattern sent to you each month. There's a charge for the initial pack, then one per month (not 100% clear in their explanation...and it looks like the initial price now includes the July and August pieces). They are layered ornaments, or you can keep them separate for two a month. I love the first one...the second one I think the layering doesn't really add to the design, so I'll keep them separate. You know, when I eventually stitch them....

I also got this book (thanks to the wonderful hubby):

It reminds me of our trip to Europe two years ago when we visited Istanbul (not Constantinople). Yes, I know I never blogged about that...maybe someday (once I get thru Alaska!) I'll do some "retro rovings" posts.

JiffNotes
I just can't keep the new stash out of this place....

War of WIPs Call to Arms #3

2011-08-04T19:36:00.000-05:00

OK, I couldn't resist doing my own war graphic once I saw Calophi's. I'm really more of a *pew pew pew* gal than a hack'n'slash or mana-user, anyway. So with Delusional Knitter's kind permission, I've made my own banner to enter the fray!

Successes this week in the war! First, a reconnaissance mission resulted in a photo of the squirrel!

Er, yeah. Or a somewhat-squirrel-shaped blob.

Also! Although no photographic evidence exists, I am ONE ROW AND A BIND-OFF (and, you know, blocking and such) away from restoring order to the Leafy forest of the Land of Peaceful Knitting! How could I stop short of my goal??!? That Doctor Who episode ran out just a leeeeetle too soon.

Join the battle with us! Visit Revelations of a Delusional Knitter to enlist!

WIP Wednesday (not an actual turtle)

2011-08-03T05:43:00.002-05:00

So once again, let me apologize to those of you who came here last week expecting to see some kind of turtle made out of origami and awesome and instead got only part of the back of a sweater. Maybe someday I'll design an actual knitted, folded turtle to make up for your trouble. ;) To those of you who missed the whole kerfuffle...this project is named "Origami Turtle" in Ravelry because it's made with Berroco Origami yarn in colorway "Turtle Bay", and that was a lot more interesting than its pattern name, "Santos". I did make some more progress:

I wish that I had figured out the length of the sweater versus the moss stitch/eyelet pattern section measurements before I started, because I would have decreased the moss stitch sections by an inch each (I'm making smallest size). I did not want the very top of the sweater to be eyelets, because I thought joining two eyelet sections across the shoulders would look weird (or at least unbalanced). So I'm truncating the height of the final moss stitch section. Hopefully *that* won't look too weird.

A couple of you asked how the Origami yarn is to knit with. I don't mind it. It is completely and utterly UNstretchy, though. If you love love love wool, you would probably hate it. But it is not splitty at all, and that's usually what makes me dislike a yarn. It reminds me a little of a yarn I got from Habu. I think the color variation is wonderful and it has not pooled in any unattractive way, so that's good, too. The unstretchiness of it makes me a little nervous about my tension while knitting, since I'm pretty much self-taught and feel I don't know what I'm doing in that department. But the finished product looks great to me, so I'm happy so far. It'll be interesting to see what happens when I block it. In my finger-blocking tests, it seems I'll have a lot of leeway as to vertical vs. horizontal stretch...could be a good thing, could be a bad thing! If you have specific questions, I'm happy to answer them. =)

I FINALLY finished my July portion on Random Thoughts (on the 31st!)

I've put it away for a little bit, and put a few stitches in Darling of the World:

Now I'm trying to decide if I should throw myself into trying to finish the Bumblebee, or work on Dasher a bit. I think I'm going to bite the bullet and finish Bumblebee!!! I am going to have to restitch two of the wings to make myself happy...the first two I did are crap!

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

Yet Another July TUSAL

2011-07-30T10:09:00.000-05:00

(What's a TUSAL?)

Well, the canvaswork pieces certainly fill up the jar a lot quicker than the one-strand-of-silk samplers, now don't they? Most of the volume here is due to my work on Sapphire Star, with a sprinkling of Random Thoughts on top.

Hmmm..."sprinkling of random thoughts on top"...sounds like a lot of my blog posts....

Alaska Stop Two: Skagway

2011-07-29T13:11:00.000-05:00

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Previously, on the Alaska trip...
Alaska Photo Highlights
Setting Sail from Seattle, the Sunny
Cruising to Juneau

So did you guess that the weird-looking contraption in the Photo Preview post...

...was actually a train?

Snowplow, yes...on a train. So cool; I'd never seen this kind of thing before.

Skagway is a gold rush town, where people would come before hiking into the Yukon with the year of supplies required by the Canadian government. (The Diamond store probably wasn't there back then.) Most of them were on foot and would group up to transport that massive pile of food a little ways, then turn around and go back for more of the pile, "inchworming" up the trail, while some of the group guarded both piles.

The National Park Service has buildings throughout the town set up to display what life was like.

Apparently, it was like Cheers. With an arctic fox.

Seriously, though the displays were pretty good overall. This house was restored to look like it did during that time period. These people were packrats! I didn't take any pictures inside the house, but one room had a display of brightly beaded moccasins...nailed up on the wall, over VERY busy wallpaper. =)

Their story was kind of tragic; they realized there would be a need for a port here, so they claimed a lot of land, built their homestead and docks (entrepreneurs!) and then...people pretty much just took their land. They also had tragic personal lives...lots of divorces and such.

They did have a great view, though.

We did not go on the White Pass Railway, which pretty much EVERYONE ELSE did. Instead, we hung out, sampled some local cuisine (I had a pumpkin cookie which I pretty much could have eaten a dozen of), and made our way to...

...featuring Soapy Smith! Was he a political activist? A shifty salesman? A philanthropist? A downright outlaw weasel?

(Answer: YES.)

We sat in the front row, and when this charming gentleman came out on stage, he asked me where I was from.

When he heard "Atlanta", he said, "I've got a song about Atlanta." I expected "Georgia on My Mind" (it's very cool having a state song pretty much everyone knows, but it can get tiring)...HOWEVER, he launched into a song about Atlanta, naming highways and all, that I'd never heard! And no wonder...when I asked him about it afterward, he said his buddy wrote it! He also did some other songs and some entertaining poetry reciting. I KNOW.

If you go to Skagway, see this show. It's unfortunate that a lot of guests probably got on the railway, missed all the shows, and got right back on the ship. These actors and actresses had been on national tours, and the pacing of the show was great.

I've found that "local theater" (or community theater) typically suffers from lax cue pickup ("you could drive a truck through the space between the lines") and poor pacing, or else actors thinking EVERY. LINE. Is soooooo... IMPORTANT. These guys were great.

Also: Audience participation.

Michael wishes me to tell you that my leg is on the downswing here...there's another picture with me facing the other side where my foot is in front of my face (and he wishes me to tell you THAT was on the downswing as well). But I do like our synchronization here, and the fact that I'm completely skunking the other audience member. ;) Goodness, I still need to send the theater pictures! When we talked to the girls afterwards, they asked for them. They also said they usually pick much older ladies to Can Can with them, because it makes them look good, LOL!!

After the show, we went on a van tour of the same valley the railroad winds through. We had wanted to go earlier in the day, but this worked out great because it ended up being a private tour for just the two of us!

One advantage of the van tour is that you get to stop and get out and wander around (which you clearly can't do while on a train).

The other advantage is that you can actually see the train! We also could see some of the actual path that the prospectors took to Dawson just below the train...it pretty much follows the original route.

It was chilly, but the views were totally worth it. Make sure you check out the cool bridge in the background, which is designed to move with the tectonic plates!

Parts of the landscape almost looked like the surface of the moon.

The Spring thaw meant that running water was everywhere, even up here at the summit.

Will you believe me when I tell you that these trees are over a hundred years old? We had a great guide who answered all our questions.

I never knew this, but the reason these trees are so short is not because they are "stunted" because of their difficult environment, per-se. That is, it's not that they don't grow, it's just that when it gets really cold, any part of the tree that's sticking out above the snow will die. In the snow, the temperature is a constant 32 degrees F (0 C), even if the outside temperature is negative! This is also why you'll see trees along the road with branches on only one side...not because of the wind causing branches to break or bend, as I thought, but because that's the side the snowplow piled the snow against!

These are the kinds of crazy questions you ask when your Dad was a Forestry major in college. ;)

After a few more photo ops, we headed back back to town, just in time to snag me some qiviut yarn. Our guide was kind enough to stop off at a grocery store on the way back so we could get some lotion...there was none on the ship!! I've never been to any (decent) hotel that did not provide lotion!

(No lotion here.)

JiffNotes
Skagway, the starting point for the gold rush, gave us history, some aerobic exercise, and more great landscapes.

WIP Wednesday (Origami Turtle)

2011-07-27T06:56:00.001-05:00

I have made a little progress on Random Thoughts...I finally buckled down over the weekend and used every daylight hour to finish the over-one verse. But other than that, there's not much to see.

So instead, here's my "Origami Turtle" (Santos by Berroco).

I've made it to the armhole shaping on the back!
Edited to add: Sorry for the misleading title! "Origami Turtle" is my Ravelry project name, because it's knit with Origami yarn, and the color name is "Turtle Bay". I can't promise any actual turtles, but I will have an actual squirrel soon!

For more WIP Wednesday eye candy goodness, head over to Tami's Amis!

Remember That Poll Thing?

2011-07-26T20:39:00.000-05:00

I had put up a poll recently because I was considering splitting out travel, or maybe the more geeky posts, into another blog. Thanks so much to those of you that took the time to vote. We are agreed: The blog stays as one. I'm much relieved; if I don't update the blog enough, I start to feel...not guilty, but pressure. All I need is pressure on more than one front!

Sorry the poll just disappeared...I had this wacky idea that when the poll closed, Blogger would have some way for me to post the results...not so much. The majority of you said you read everything, a few said you just skipped the stuff you didn't care about (and that was OK), and two of you said, "Where are the game posts??" Hey, I'll get around to them someday!

Thanks for your support! =)

War of WIPs Call to Arms #1

2011-07-21T21:00:00.000-05:00

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So, when I started the Crazy Challenge in January, I was restrained. Some people were starting fifteen projects! FIFTEEN (15)!! I was only starting five. AND I was committing to finish six existing WIPs. I was awesome.

Well. Let's ignore for a moment how that's all progressing, shall we? And focus on something more important...I HAD NO KNITTING WIPs on that list!

So to rectify this egregious oversight, I DECLARE WAR!

Here are the miscreants threatening the border of my Peaceful Knitting Land:

Leafy aka "Branching Out"
When you think of nice green leaves, you think...calm...peaceful...relaxing.... BUT THIS IS NOT YOUR GRANDMOTHER'S LEAF. Scarf. Whatever. This is LACE, (somewhat) serious lace. WITH K3s!!! This. Must. End. (Especially since I want to knit some even more serious lace, and this was my learning piece).

(no pic; Ravelry page)

Squirrel
This scampering scalawag has been left literally in pieces, just a warm bath and some embroidery away from being A REAL SQUIRREL. I am going to go all Blue Fairy on his tail.

Errant Lace Socks
NOTE: Out of date photo!
These lawless lacies have been toeless long enough. Only one exists in sock form; it's hoped that once a mate is finished for it, it will settle down from its life of recklessness.

Astrid
Stare straight into its eye...OF DOOM! The heat generated by this swirling vortex needs to be channeled into something productive...like keeping my shoulders warm this Fall. Alone, this circle has no end, but with others, it will reach its conclusion!

Herringbone Block Shawl
Not sure what it wants to be...is it a scarf? Is it a shawl?? This identity crisis has caused it to plague the Land of Peaceful Knitting with doubt. It must be helped along to reach its full potential (whatever that may be).

Acorn Bag
Born as an experiment in technique, can this creation live a normal, useful life?? It can, and IT WILL, as it is hooked into service!

JiffNotes
I think it should be pretty clear by now that I desperately need sleep. Visit The Delusional Knitter to declare your own war!