copygirl x

Today

2008-06-19T13:07:00.003-06:00

Today I'm trying to be the dancing, carefree, happy girl I want to be and know I truly am, but I'm stuck being the skulking, burdened, grumpy girl I hate being.

Bleh.

I'm having dinner tonight with a friend who I haven't seen for a year. But right now I'm going to go roll some Katamari. During the load scenes I'm going to do some mountain climbers to chase the clouds off my shoulders and out of my mind.

(I don't like to post about my dark moods, but it's a very real part of my life, and I'm working toward living out loud, so there ya go)

Summertime, and the livin' is easy

2008-06-09T11:08:00.003-06:00

I know I said I had a project to show, but I can't find the pictures! I'm afraid that I deleted them off the camera before I could upload them. Boo.

I'm trying to get into a summer schedule that will make it easier to go back to work in August. In the summer my body wants to stay up until 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning and then sleep in until 9:30 or 10:00. It's murder when I have to go back to waking up at 5:45!

Last night we turned off the TV and the computer and hung out in the front room. It was so nice! We put on some music and just chilled for the evening.
Rocketboy got "comfy" on the couch and read.
Pixy got truly comfortable on the arm of the couch and wondered why Rocketboy didn't push things out of the way to make a cozy place to sit.
Link got snugly on the back of my chair.
And I worked on some designs in my sketchbook for a project. I'm having a really hard time translating a treasure chest into a 2D design.
LisaLove was out having fun, so she didn't join us.

We're going to try for four TV free days a week. There's nothing on TV anyway. Except for American Gladiators. Have you been watching it? You should! I find myself up out of my seat cheering people on.

Huh. That's interesting.

2008-05-13T13:35:00.002-06:00

Just a little note for those who like to slack at work and use the free high speed Internet- CrimethINC is often blocked by a net nanny because it's "Category: Terrorist/Militant/Extremist"
That makes me laugh and cry at the same time. Sometimes I can't access instructables for the same reason.

Uh, not that I would ever use the Internet at work for time wasting purposes. No way. Not me.

Shake Girl

2008-05-11T10:47:00.002-06:00

I've got a finished project, but I can't show it yet as it's a surprise.
In the mean time, go read Shake Girl, A really good graphic novel written by fourteen Stanford students.

Wasting time

2008-05-03T13:37:00.003-06:00

DSCN1344
Originally uploaded by Pearliepie.

I have three big projects that I should be working on right now, but bleh. I have no crafty mojo.

Here's the second quilt block I was working on in my big crafts in progress list. The three projects I'm currently working on also feature embroidery quite heavily, and I'm getting sort of burned out on the needle and thread.

This is the make or break point- either I push through this bleh moment and finish on time or I continue to sit in front of the computer, feeling more and more guilty and becoming less and less likely to finish. Guess I'd better get my rear in gear, yeah?

Tree square

2008-04-05T20:45:00.003-06:00

Tree square
Originally uploaded by Pearliepie.

One of the teachers I work with was diagnosed with Leukemia this year. The school has really pulled together to support her. Her students have started fund raisers to help with her medical copays, because she has to be in hospital so often, and the staff all decorated a muslin square to be sewn into a quilt for her.

I thought it would be fun to document my progress by taking a picture every time I ran out of thread. In the middle of the experiment I misplaced my camera, so there aren't many pictures of the top in progress, which was the most interesting bit. Oh well.

I did the outline of the treetop first with backstitch.

Then I got bored with green and started the trunk.

When the trunk was almost done I went back to the treetop and started filling it in.
I used two colors of thread held together for a blended look. The bigger circles are stain stitch, filled web stitch and button hole stitch.
In the middle of the trunk I used a raised rose stitch to look like a knot in the trunk. The rest of the trunk is modified long and short stitch to represent bark.

Blah blah. Back from the dead?

2008-04-01T08:59:00.005-06:00

I always write here "I'm gonna..." and then I never do, probably because I'm catching up on old episodes of Lost or The Wire. Or Deadwood. But mostly Lost. Curse you Netflix! Uh, and my own laziness and love of television, I guess.

Speaking of Lost, there's a line that's been bouncing around in my head since we watched it a few weeks ago, "If you want to change, just change."

Duh.

But at the same time- sort of earth shattering for me. Instead of talking about all the things I want to do, why don't I just do them?
Will I change? I don't know, but I don't want to say that I'm going to do things and not do them anymore.

So. Here's a list of some of the crafty projects I've got going right now. I'm not allowed to go to the craft store for supplies until I finish five things, or start any new projects until I finish ten things.

Woo Woo swap- I need to finish two collages and find one that went missing.
Surprise project that freaking broke as I was packaging it up to send.
Scarf for MIL *Done and sent! She loves it!
Blanket for sister
Blanket for SIL's high school graduation present
Lady is a Tramp's quilt square ***Finished!
Quit square for work ***Finished!
Needlework swap package
3 giant rasterbations for my basement
Sock monkey baby blanket for my cousin's baby
Granny square blanket for my other cousin's baby
Surprise Mobiles
Thrifted polo blanket
Butters ami for Rocketboy
blue/green circle blanket for me
Replace broken buttons on winter coat

I'd like to post pictures when I finish these things, but will I really do it? Who knows.
It's sort of like Lost- tune in each week for no answers and even more burning questions!

The new year

2008-01-03T13:01:00.001-07:00

DSCN0899
Originally uploaded by Pearliepie.

Last year my resolution was to live out loud. I don't know if I really accomplished that or not. So it's my resolution again this year.

I've been thinking a lot about this blog and what exactly I want to do with it. I always feel like there is a better way to say what I want to say. I've started a million entries and then deleted them because they didn't seem like "enough". Not personal enough, not interesting enough, not good enough.

But that's not living loud. That's staying in my hermit comfort zone and letting the world pass by.

I uploaded a bunch of photos into my flickr, and over the next few weeks I'm going to write about old projects I've finished and show a bunch of the UFO's floating around the house.
I may write about them, I may not, but I do want to show them off.

So step one to living loud- Stop being so shy and start sharing things with the world.

Getting there is half the fun

2007-11-20T10:06:00.001-07:00

DSCN1223
Originally uploaded by Pearliepie.

We're almost finished with LisaLove's bedroom floor. We just need to put up the trim and throw on a coat of paint and she'll be able to move back in!

next up- the downstairs bathroom.

Oh ,YEAH!

2007-11-01T18:49:00.001-06:00

I am wiped out. People tell you how much work a house is, but you don't believe it until you're neck deep in crap like the above. We had to get the basement floor mudjacked because it had sunk almost four inches in some places. Now that the slabs are raised the upstairs drains are acting up. Fab. And the floor is bare dusty concrete in the basement, but that will be another post.

This post is about something AWESOME.
That's right- a Kool Aid Man lamp. Try to control your jealousy. I got the pitcher when I was just a tiny thing. I collected Kool points for ages so I could get the pitcher and four matching cups. I was SO EXCITED when it finally arrived. But then disappointment set in. Don't get me wrong- this pitcher has served many a frosty glass of flavored sugar water, but every time you'd pour out of it your delicious beverage would spill onto the counter. The spout on this thing is terrible. There's a lip on the top that makes pouring a real bear. So I had a dilemma. Should I toss it? NEVER. Cut out a better pour spout? No way (to much work) . No- the solution was found in the holiday decoration isle at the local hobby store.

One pack of red mini light later, a star is born. Seriously- this is like the coolest thing in the house right now. I just plopped the lights into the pitcher, added an extension cord, and viola! Fancy (& high class!) mood lighting in the kitchen!

Our house, in the middle of our street

2007-08-09T11:34:00.000-06:00

We're buying a house! We'll occupy in two weeks.
It's in an actual city with access to parks and shopping and high speed internet!

To be honest, I'm not sure what that means for the future of this lil blog. On the one hand, a faster internet connection would encourage me to write more, but on the other hand, is that really the reason I never update? Sometimes this blank E-box is so intimidating. Often I sit down to write something but blank out when I open a new post. Will that go away when I'm happier in my living situation?

My sister and I have discussed creating some podcasts as we've always wanted to do a wacky sister radio show, and the house needs loads of work that Rocketboy and I are going to do ourselves so I'll have lots to write about, but I don't know if I'll really do it.

We'll see, I guess. For now I'm putting this blog to sleep (as if it weren't already sleeping, right?) so I can focus on packing and moving.

See you from the new digs!

Hooray for crochet!

2007-06-18T14:24:00.001-06:00

I haven't left my ugly yellow chair for days now. Crochet is the only thing on my brain. I even dreamed about crocheting last night.

So far I've done four dishcloths (I'm sending away three of them for a swap), countless learning swatches, a tiny flower that I've somehow lost, and four practice circles for a really cool blanket from the Craftivity book.

These are my two favorite circles. I'm going to try starting all three colors in the middle of the spiral next time, I think. And the other one has three colors in it, not two. It's a shame I couldn't get the camera to pick up the true colors because they look so nice next to each other. For now I'm going to throw these ones into the wash next time I do laundry to felt them. I think they might become coasters, but we'll see what they do in the wash. I'd like to lightly felt the blanket I make, so I want to see what happens to the yarn in one wash cycle.

Oh, wait- I did get out my sewing machine to make a little needle roll for my hooks. It's pretty small, but I only have seven hooks so far and I don't need anything bigger.

I love crochet! I hope everyone will be happy with scarves or hats this holiday- I don't see myself losing interest in making things with hooks and yarn anytime soon!

I think I'll call him Fiver

2007-06-13T16:47:00.000-06:00

Yet another good reason to put covers on your basement windows. Every summer we get at least one sad little bunny who has fallen or jumped down into the window well and can't get out. I'd put covers on them myself but our landlord in a little funny about things like that.

It worked out just fine this time- I was using the computer and heard the skritch-skritch THUMP of something trying to hop out of the window. I looked over and there was a little fuzz face sniffing around the window screen trying to find a way out. He darted to the other side of the window well when I opened the window, so I snapped a quick picture through the screen. Then I ran out to the garage to grab some gloves and popped the screen out from the inside because the window well is nearly six feet deep and I hate climbing down the little escape ladder.

Of course that terrified the little guy so he hid from me in the weeds. He did a pretty good job too. I scooped him up all gently, but he got even more scared and hopped out of my hands. I had a moment of total panic because I hadn't closed the window behind me when I came out of it and he was sitting on the window ledge sniffing inside the house. Having a wild rabbit, no matter how cute, loose in my house is not something I want to deal with, thankyouverymuch.

So I grabbed him up and put him over the edge of the window well and then watched him hop away as if nothing strange or exciting had happened at all. I hope it makes for a good story in the warren tonight when all the bunners are getting ready to sleep.

Summer crafty

2007-06-10T12:53:00.000-06:00

So far this summer break I've met my goal of working on a project everyday. I have not yet reached my goals of a blog post or a finished project everyday, but I'm getting there.

I needed to send out a thank you card for a beautiful capelet that one of the glitter girls sent me, so I went a little crazy and made a whole stack of cards.

The mermaids are my favorite. I used parts of the illustrations from The Water Babies and some random lady illios I had laying around for inspiration.

On Friday my friend Laura and I sat around for hours teaching ourselves to crochet. Well, teaching ourselves the "real" way to crochet using patterns and all that. I should have something crocheted to show soon!

Yesterday Rocket Boy and I drove around with my sister looking at houses. We've got a realtor lined up to start showing us some and hopefully we'll be in a house of our very own by the end of the summer! It's a little overwhelming, to be honest. I had a little bit of a freak out this morning because I act like a spoiled three year old when I'm faced with any sort of long term change.

I'm off to do some more crafty things- Maybe I'll finish another project today!

We'll fill our mouths with cinnamon

2007-05-31T12:03:00.000-06:00

This photo is from a month ago while we were visiting my family in Oregon. I love when my accessories match my delicious frosty beverages.

Today is the first day of my summer vacation! Hooray for school jobs! I'm planning lots of craft projects and day trips with my sister (house hunting, WHOO!!), but today I'm just going to be lazy and enjoy the freedom of summer time and no work/school responsibilities.

so fresh and so clean

2007-05-20T12:44:00.001-06:00

, originally uploaded by Pearliepie.

Sorry I've been gone so long.
Things are...mm. I don't know. Things just are I guess.

I'll be updating more often with photos for awhile. I feel quiet but creative- I like this feeling.

Still hibernating

2007-02-19T11:40:00.000-07:00

Of course I did not do what I said I was going to do in my last post. Oh well.

I have been crafting though! One of my students gave me a beautiful blank book for the holidays. I wanted to turn it into a photo album or something because the pages are a beautiful shiny black. Then I decided that it's perfect for my sister and I to send back and forth to each other while she lives out of state. We're filling the pages with letters and art and scrapbook type things. Here's the inside front cover. I used a library pocket from a used book I bought years ago and some of my favorite stamps from my collection.

Then I wrote her a letter and made a little letter pocket to put it in. I was making a stamp for the corner too, but I sliced my hand open with the exacto knife and abandoned that project for awhile.

Hibernation, day 45

2007-02-03T12:46:00.000-07:00

We've had snow on the ground for 45 straight days now. This is the first weekend in almost 2 months that it hasn't snowed. This sort of thing does not happen in Colorado. The sun always comes back out and melts any snow we get within days.

No updates because I've been stressed out at work and hiding under a pile of blankets while at home.

But I'm sick of hibernating! I'm finishing up projects 1 and 2 for the 50 projects in 07 challenge I joined (some of the other participants are on projects 6 or 7 eek!), and next week I'll be following SouleMama's lead and posting at least a picture every day.

Wanna take some bets on my progress? Seven updates in a row- Will I do it? We'll see!

Ch-ch-ch-changes

2006-12-26T19:20:00.000-07:00

Sigh. Have you ever wished and wished for something new and shiny to replace something old and worn, but when you finally got your wish you almost couldn't bear to part with the tattered item it is replacing? That is exactly how I feel about the present that Rocket Boy got me.

This is my old wallet. I've carried it since I lost my Hello Kitty wallet during my sophomore year of high school. That was many years ago. I bought it at the Contempo in the now demolished mall in Boulder, back when edgy, punk rock girls shopped at Contempo. It served me well all those years.

Once in college it was stolen out of my purse right behind my back. Oh, how I mourned the loss of it then. Whoever took it used my credit card, took the cold medicine and cash out of it and then dropped the empty wallet into one of those blue post boxes. When the post office sent me a notice weeks later I cried with happiness. I had to pay the post office $8.15 to get it back, but I didn't care. It was my perfect wallet. Satiny soft on the outside, (that's all worn off now. It's as slick as deer guts on a glass doorknob, as my dad would say) roomy inside with lots of room for discount cards (I'm a sucker for a coupon) but still cute and ever so slightly punk rock.

Cash never really fit into it all that well, so I developed a way of folding my bills that drove everyone crazy. I always had to unfold the cash before I paid for something and then carefully fold the change back into my wallet. If I wasn't ever so careful, the bills would catch in the zipper and it'd get stuck. I ripped the corners off of more bills than I care to remember. Sometimes I'll get a ripped bill now and wonder if somehow it has been in my wallet before.

I started tucking a twenty into the middle change pocket after one horrible trip to the gas station. It was before I had a credit card and one morning before work I filled up my tank with gas, grabbed my wallet, and noticed there was NOTHING inside. "No big deal," I thought, "I'll just use a check." Except I didn't have any checks either. I panicked. I stood there next to my car crying. What was I going to do? Nothing like this had ever happened to me! Thank the Maker, a very nice stranger saw my distress and paid for my gas for me. I don't think I even thanked him properly. Sir, if you are out there, you made a huge impact on the seventeen year old me. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

A few years ago the front pocket started to rip after I pulled my ID out of it a little forcefully. I was in a hurry to a doctors appointment and got pulled over for doing 40 in a school zone, only I wasn't actually in the school zone while I was speeding. I know I wasn't because I worked at the school in question, and the school zone didn't start for another 2 blocks, and it was 2:20 on a Saturday, so (I thought) it didn't matter anyway. Got a double fine for that one, but I haven't gotten a speeding ticket since. The anger I felt at getting the ticket wasn't worth the few minutes I would have saved if I hadn't been pulled over.

Just now when I cleaned it out I found Rocket Boy's fortune from one of our first dates. Actually, it wasn't a date. We were just hanging out at his place before we "officially" started dating and decided to get something to eat. He took me to a little Chinese buffet where we pigged out on fried rice, sesame chicken, and veggies. We got our fortune cookies at the counter when we paid and opened them in the car. I knew as soon as I saw his fortune that things were going to work out for us. I tucked the little promise into my wallet and promptly forgot all about it. I am tucking it into the change pocket on my new wallet to serve as a reminder of all the wonderful, magical things in this life.

Here is the shiny new one. I sent Rocket Boy to the Queen Bee site and told him which color combos and styles I liked and he picked this one out for me. Isn't it sweet? Look at the tag- the bee just makes me melt.

Oh, I will miss my old wallet. But I'm sure my new wallet will carry just as many memories for me. And look at how nicely it goes with my new purse from ten thousand villages!

SNOW DAY!!

2006-12-21T14:55:00.000-07:00

Woo woo!Here's the view from my bedroom window. This looks like nothing, right? There are places where you can still see the grass and then drifts that are taller than I am!

Today is actually day two of the snow day. Yesterday I was SO grumpy when I got up and got ready for work. I was mean to everyone. When I left the house it was snowing a little and really windy, but I didn't think it would really be a blizzard. I had gotten all the way to the highway before I heard that my school district was closed on the radio. To be honest, I didn't believe it when I heard it. My district almost NEVER closes. So I just pulled over to think about what to do. A few minutes later the secretary from one of my schools called me to make sure I wasn't driving to work. So I turned around- it's a good thing I did, because it had taken me 20 min. to drive from my house to the highway, but it took me 40 to get back to the house!

Around 11:30 Whit called us from school and asked if Rocket Boy and I could come pick her up. Instead of taking the truck we took the car which was a bad plan. There were places where the snow drifts were taller than the car's clearance. We spun out pretty badly on the way over to the school, and we didn't dare stop anywhere for fear that we couldn't get going again. The ride back was pretty uneventful, except that there were high school students who had tried to drive home in the ditches everywhere. We all felt awful about not being able to stop and help them, but since we took the car there was nothing we could have done anyway. Highway patrol is really good about rescuing people out here though, so I'm sure they all got home safely.

I am so lucky to be one of the people who made it home before the storm really hit- some people on the highway had to sleep in their cars all night! I'm praying that everyone is okay.

Rocket Boy and Poppa J discussing the best way to try to clear the driveway.

See? Huge drift right next to nothing on the ground! Crazy. Also, I'm noticing that we look like we have a ton of crap parked in the yard, which is true, but most of it isn't ours. The tanks are water and propane, but I have no idea what's leaned on the table there. The boat, truck, and camper are all Poppa J's- I don't think any of them run right (I KNOW that the truck doesn't, but that's Rocket Boy's fault for driving it and gassing it with the wrong gas when he was 16. Don't tell him I told you!) Good lord, we really are country folk now. At least nothing is in the front yard up on blocks.

Rocket Boy churning up snow and mud at the edge of the drive.

We left a trailer piled full of uncut firewood on the driveway. Under the trailer there is almost no snow at all. I think some bunnies took shelter under there for a little while last night.
I love the edge of this drift. Doesn't the wind do cool things?

This is the view from my studio window. It's like a tunnel!

Alright ya'll- I STILL haven't wrapped any giftmas presents, or finished sewing my sister's present, so I have to get off the internets and get to work!

Before and after

2006-12-17T15:34:00.000-07:00

So, I'm ready to get started on making some holiday gifts but uh, this is what my crafty space looks like.

So, my first project of the day is going to be cleaning. Whoo! Hopefully I'll be back in an hour or two with an updated picture.

Ahh. SO much better. Although, I didn't really clean up all my beads. I just moved them off the table and onto the hutch. That's okay, because organizing my beads is on my list of things to do. I just haven't done it yet because it will be a whole weekend task. (Excuses, excuses)
Okay- I'm off to make a pattern (that's why the open notebooks are on the table. I don't plan on leaving them there!) and a holiday monster.

One year

2006-12-16T11:12:00.000-07:00

Rocket Boy took me to a cabin in Allens Park for our one year anniversary (December 13). I cannot believe that I've been married for a whole year! I am so blessed to have him in my life- he is the kindest, most imaginative, sensitive man I've ever met. He's my bestest friend, and I've learned so much about myself just by hanging out with him.

I snapped these photos of the ancient first aid kit I found in the kitchen right before my camera decided that it didn't like working there. I was really sad that it was broken, but as soon as we got home it started working again. Stupid technology. There were a ton of cool things in the cabin, old leaflets about the mountains, cool books, and knick-knacks. I wanted to get pics of everything, but oh well. Maybe we'll go back in a few years.

The cabin was lovely. It was built in 1914, and it was pretty drafty, but there was a fireplace to snuggle in front of. My only complaint is that I forgot my pillow, and since I'm such a tender, fragile flower I woke up with a sore neck each morning. We drove into Estes Park twice to wander around and got another blown glass ornament for the collection (which I'll take a picture of some day...) we also picked up a few presents while we were there.

Okay- I'm off to wrap some presents and make a final list of things to do before Christmas.

I want my 2 hours back

2006-12-11T13:09:00.000-07:00

Firstly, I'd like to say how much I enjoy being a member of Netflix. We've seen some really great movies that we never would have seen since we joined. I like the way their website is set up, and their pricing system is fair (unless you get black balled for watching to many movies in your price bracket, but that's another post) the only problem is that sometimes a movie is recommended to you that really, really sucks.

So I'm rolling out a new feature here at Copygirl X. I'm calling it "I want my 2 hours back" and it's where I'll review said craptacular movies. Hopefully I won't be using this feature too often. This week I present:

Elephant

Directed and written by Gus Van Sant and released in 2003, this movie got surprisingly good reviews. The tag line is "An ordinary high school day. Except that it's not." The movie follows random high school students through their day and ends in a gory school shooting rampage. A noble subject to make an honest film about for sure. I have no problem with the subject matter of the film. My problem is the way the story is presented.

This is NOT a normal high school. Long spotless hallways, a population of mostly Anglo students, and the apparent optional classes. None of these students seem to ever go to class! Instead, they take endless, meandering walks down school corridors on their way to nowhere. They play football or relax in the quad. Now, we do see a gym class and the humiliation of locker room changing when you aren't part of the popular clique and a GLBT meeting, but no lectures, no homework, no note passing.

During lunch the camera takes us on a tour through the kitchen- again, huge and spotless- where we notice two students taking a quick break from working to smoke a joint in a kitchen closet. Here's the thing- high school stoners are smarter than that. No student would smoke a j. in the middle of his lunch shift INSIDE the kitchen. They'd walk across the street to the park or the laundry room of the neighboring apartments or where ever the smoking place is. True, they might come back higher than a kite with reeking skin and clothes and eyes so red they look like the undead, but they wouldn't smoke in school.
We also meet a group of girls who go to the bathroom together to puke after lunch. Once again, these are not real students. I mean, I knew those girls in school- they didn't all puke at once because that would be too obvious and someone would talk to a teacher who would call the girls into the principals office to have an intervention.

One nice (sort-of) part of the film is that the shooters motives are never explained. We're supposed to gather that high school is so terrible, so lonely, so whatever that the students were driven to kill their classmates.

It really made me sad that every character in the film was reduced to the most blatant of stereotypes. I have a feeling that it was a choice to present them that way, and it makes the movie 2 dimensional and crappy. It is a beautifully shot movie, so if you like watching "film" for the sake of film, have at it. Otherwise, don't waste your time.

Go ahead Mr. Wendall

2006-12-07T17:37:00.000-07:00

One post in the last month? Bor-ing! I've made a little challenge for myself- one post a week for the next 3 months. We'll see what happens.

I've been in a pretty deep funk, to tell the truth. I think it's the month of November. I don't know why, but every year in October I get all excited about plans for the upcoming holidays, and then BAM! it's the first week of December. It stresses me out because I never get everything I planned on doing actually done.

I have been crafting lately though! Here are some ATC's I made for a glitter swap. I found this great dog stamp in my stash of stuff and decided to make a set of cards around it. So I present Wendall the Wonder Dog! There's Wendall walks at sunset, Wendall swims in his dreams, Wendall catches a bitchin' wave, Wendall dreams of being King, Wendall contemplates making lemonade, Wendall leaves the weeds, and Wendall in Bat Country.

I started by laying down a layer of watercolor on one big sheet. I was just playing around with the colors, enjoying the process of painting. Then I cut the big sheet into ATC size (3.5 by 2.5 inches) and decided where to place the stamp. I colored Wendell and the other details with colored pencils and gel pens (for his collar and any spots that didn't stamp shiny enough). Then I added crepe paper or other collage stuff. I think they all came out pretty nice, but Wendell in Bat Country, my homage to the late, great Hunter S. Thompson is my favorite. I almost didn't send it to be swapped!

I can't wait to see what I get in return. I love swapping, but I'm so bad about it- I almost always send late because I freak out about my stuff not being good enough.

People get ready....

2006-11-08T17:28:00.000-07:00

I had written a very long post about how much I think the new Colorado constitutional amendment that marriage is only one man and one woman sucks sweaty goat balls, but it was full of anger and cussing, and I don't want to put those feelings out into the world right now.
But I will say this: Denying people the right to marry is the most judgemental thing I can think of. And don't even get me started on denying homosexuals the same basic legal rights that we allow common law couples (which, let's face it, is fancy talk for "living in sin") because it's dangerous.

Dangerous to who? I don't need someone telling me what my marriage does and does not stand for. It's MY marriage. I'm positive that same sex couples don't need their long term committed relationships defined for them either.

I think it's bullshit. Whoever wants to marry should be allowed to do it. I pray that none of the people who voted that way have children who will one day have to tell their parents that they are homosexual.

That's all I can say about it right now.

Easy like a Sunday morning

2006-10-17T16:56:00.000-06:00

Okay, okay, so today is actually Tuesday but what did you expect? I should rename this blog "Super Lazy Girl x" or something. Here's a photo essay from Sunday. Rocket Boy changed the oil in our cars and did a bunch of tune up stuff while I took a million pictures and drank cold frosty beverages.

And we ate popcorn. Lots of crunchy, salty, garlicky popcorn. Yum. I think I'll make some more right now...

I call this one Portrait with The Captain (and coke).

We are family

2006-10-09T17:42:00.000-06:00

Whew. So we got back from Palm Springs last night, and Rocket Boy had to leave at 3:00 this morning to work out of town all week. I have no idea how he can do it- I was so worried about him driving after he left this morning that I couldn't go back to sleep. Well, if we can't be together physically at least we can both be equally exhausted! Ha.

The trip was...not what I expected, but good overall. The airlines lost our luggage (If you ever think it's a good idea to save money by changing airlines in the middle of a trip, don't do it. Avoid it at all costs!) and the Las Vegas airport smells like dirty wet feet. But they did find our bags and deliver them to my Grandpa's house (at 10 pm) for us.

We also missed some of the cousins that I really wanted to see, but there will be other trips.

I did score some fun crafty things from an antique store we stopped at on the way back from an orchid show. We also went to Thousand Palms and walked the fault line and stopped at the oasis, which is the most beautiful place I've ever seen. No pictures though- My camera was packed in my bag and it hadn't been found yet when we went. That's okay. I like having it just for my memory.

Rocket Boy had his first ever In-N-Out Burger, animal style of course. I think he was impressed. Okay- I know he was because we stopped at another In-N-Out on the way to the airport and had double doubles before we left. Yum!

Here's my to do list for the week:
1. Finish patching Rocket Boy's work pants. There are 3 pair left. It's embarrassing to have a husband going to work in hole-y jeans because I'm to lazy to sew them up.
2. Finish my Big Lebowski swap package.
3. Finish 2 necklaces for a personal Glitter swap.
4. Finish 1 Necklace for a personal Craftster swap.
5. CLEAN THE HOUSE. Ew. Just thinking about this one makes me sad. It's such a dump around here.
6. Change my car registration to our new address. Um, yeah- we've lived here over 2 years now. Noticing a trend are you?
7. Something else, but I've forgotten what it was.

I don't mind, the thing that bothers me is someone keeps moving my chair.

2006-09-20T22:26:00.000-06:00

I'm feeling like I can't catch up at all. Work is crazy, my latest projects are failing, I'm planning an unexpected trip to see some family, and I keep walking into rooms and instantly forgetting why I'm standing there.

I can't wait for the weekend!

Recharging

2006-09-03T08:49:00.000-06:00

I just finished the most draining week ever. A whole bunch of little things went horribly wrong, which I could have delt with, but I also had a sinus headache for 5 days straight. Lovely.
The week ended with an all day work meeting that I was an hour and a half late for because of a really bad (fatal) car accident on the highway. The meeting was a total waste, and then when it was over, I lost my car. A friend drove me around and around for ten minutes before I remembered that I was driving my FIL's car and we had already passed it twice. So I went home and went back to bed.

But look! Kitten!

He belongs to my sister and he's 7 weeks old. This was the closest to still that he was all day. I wish I could have gotten a shot of his face, because he is the cutest little schmoo I've ever seen.

So things are looking up. Thank the sweet baby Jesus for 3 day weekends!

Gift giving

2006-08-29T20:43:00.000-06:00

I like to go a little crazy when I wrap gifts. I love doing it so much that one year one of my coworkers paid me to wrap all of her Christmas gifts on my lunch break. I had a lot of fun doing it, and she kept bringing me presents to say thank you.
My favorite presents to wrap are books, because you end up with a flat, thin-ish surface to work with. Making the wrapping a part of the gift just feels better, like I'm creating less waste. I also try to only use what I have around the house because buying pretty paper that's only going to be thrown away seems strange to me.
This one is a book about Bob Marley that I bought for my sister during the last Chronicle Books sale. First I wrapped it with a piece of drawing paper that had been sliced with an exacto knife on accident. It looked so tempting as a blank canvas that I had to rewrap it with a nice piece so I could draw on it.

I was listening to great music while I drew which gave me the coolest idea for the circle journal swap at Glitter, but more about that later.

I used a picture in an old embroidery book as inspiration- I think it came out pretty nicely.

This one was a copy of The Prophet for my friend Laura. I had to add all sorts of pretty stitches because I cut the ribbon to short and didn't have enough left over to fit around it either. The butterfly sticker is covering where I sewed the ribbon together. Then I decided that I couldn't just write her name on the wrapping, like I usually do, so I made the little butterfly tag out of origami paper.

Someday these will all be swapped

2006-08-19T13:10:00.000-06:00

I made these pendants out of porcelain and fired them using various techniques- some are regular gazes fired to cone 10 and the shiny ones are raku fired. The plan is to use them for jewelry for swaps, but some of them I like to much to send away.

Birthday No. 27

2006-08-19T10:43:00.000-06:00

I adore birthdays, both my own and other people's. I've never been one of those people who thinks of it as "just another day".
This year I had a very quiet birthday, which started with the perfect morning for sleeping in. Cloudy and cool- we don't get days like this in August very often.

For breakfast I made myself Special Gunpowder green tea in my favorite mug (my momma made it for me) and oatmeal with fruit. I ate it at my desk downstairs while listening to the best college radio station ever. After I ate I changed the sheets and enjoyed the quiet beauty and bliss of a freshly made bed. Someday when I'm rich (but not famous, because I don't want to be on TV or in People magazine like, ever) I'll have fresh sheets everyday.

Then I hit the thrift store and the magazine stand for some birthday goodies. The cards crack me up!

Later, while I was buying myself a flikr pro account with my b-day money from my parents, I heard something smacking against the window in my studio room. It was the biggest toad I've ever seen trapped down there. I don't know how they get down there, but in every window well we have a colony of toads and salamanders, and sometimes snakes. The toads jump up to catch bugs and thump the windows. They're cute, but it sounds so gross.

When the hubster got home, we got ready to go out to dinner at Hapa in Boulder. On the way we saw a rainbow and these clouds that looked a lot like a mushroom cloud. We couldn't decide if that was a good omen or a bad one.

Dinner was wonderful! I don't have any pictures of the sushi because it disappeared to quickly, and I don't have any pictures of us because I drank sake and cocktails and got really ah, well you know.

Then I spent the rest of the week in blissful laziness. I gave myself the gift of being forever 22 years old on the inside. So, while on the outside I'm now in my "late" twenties (oh eww) with a "real" job and plans to buy my very own house and finish grad school, on the inside I'm still the giant slacker who loves playing video games all day, drinking at all hours, and just doesn't care about silly things like bills and other people's opinions. Twenty seven is going to be a great year!

Cruel, cruel Summer

2006-08-11T09:00:00.000-06:00

Beautiful morning
sun, I wish you wouldn't use
your power to melt

Oh, it's a sad morning here at the Copy Shop .

For work I have to cart my own supplies between 5 different schools. To keep the disaster in my car to a minimum I toss everything in a plastic crate in the back seat. When school ended last Spring I left the crate sitting under the window in my studio room until I needed it again. I have to make a lot of my own games and supplies and was planning on doing that this summer, but being a slacker I found "better" things to do with my time. I climbed trees, played hours of video games, went camping, slept in, watched the Tyra show and Starting Over (Shut up. It is real life. It's not just another stupid, whiney reality show. It's not!), and mostly ignored the fact that I'd have to go back to work in just 2 short months.Sadly, reality is setting in. Last night I realized that I'd better get my act together this weekend. So this morning I pulled out my crate of supplies to get ready for next week. And there, on top of the pile, was my plastic bag of crayons that the kids use. All melty and sad. No one will use these now! Look at them. The horror is almost unbearable.
I'm not a crafty sub-hero for nothing though! I'm gonna melt these babies down all the way and make some mini crayons to give as prizes for the little ones! I felt bad last year that I only used praise as a reward, so it will be nice to have some incentives. If only I could find a way to get the teens excited about high school.

But dang it, now I have to buy new crayons. Poop.

Professor Chaos!

2006-08-10T11:10:00.000-06:00

Sometimes I think I need to put in for a crafty sub-hero name change. You can do that while you're still a sub-hero, you know. It's when you get the promotion to full time Hero that the paperwork is too overwhelming to deal with.

This is the current state of my sewing table, from craft project view. It's a HUGE mess, but I think I work the best when I'm surrounded by crafty bits and bobs. Current projects in the hopper: Hedwig and the Angry Inch Apron (I was going to make it for Tie One On, but uh, I didn't), Needle book, T shirt quilt, necklaces, sleep mask, and a way over the top planetary mobile. I think that last one will take years, as it's still in the planning stages and, like I said, way over the top.

Hopefully I'll finish something off this list so my WIP post tomorrow won't be so huge!
Of course, I might just go play Fable for the rest of the day. I am NOT watching any more news though. No water bottles on airplanes? Wow. I don't... just wow.

Woo woo swap

2006-08-07T11:20:00.000-06:00

Shrine, originally uploaded by Pearliepie.

I finally finished it! I have been working on this shrine for a swap on glitter for a year. I am so excited that it will soon be in it's new home. Click the photo to go to my flickr photos, the shrine pictures are in the art projects set.

Now I have so many crafty ideas for myself that I don't know what to work on next! I still have a huge project to do list, so I'll just pick something off of it. I'm trying to finish up all of my UFOs laying around, because it's really bad Fung Shui to not finish things. So I'll put the new ideas in the sketchbook and finish something else up.

On Prayer

2006-07-26T20:28:00.000-06:00

You pray in your distress and in your need; would that you might pray also in the fullness of your joy and in your days of abundance.

For what is prayer but the expansion of yourself into the living ether?
And if it is for your comfort to pour your darkness into space, it is also for your delight to pour forth the dawning of your heart.
And if you cannot but weep when your soul summons you to prayer, she should spur you again and yet again, though weeping, until you shall come laughing.
When you pray you rise to meet in the air those who are praying at that very hour, and whom save in prayer you may not meet.
Therefore let your visit to that temple invisible be for naught but ecstasy and sweet communion.
For if you should enter the temple for no other purpose than asking you shall not receive:
And if you should enter into it to humble yourself you shall not be lifted:
Or even if you should enter into it to beg for the good of others you shall not be heard.
It is enough that you enter the temple invisible.

I cannot teach you how to pray in words.
God listens not to your words save when He Himself utters them through your lips.
And I cannot teach you the prayer of the seas and the forests and the mountains.
But you who are born of the mountains and the forests and the seas can find their prayer in your heart,
And if you but listen in the stillness of the night you shall hear them saying in silence,
"Our God, who art our winged self, it is thy will in us that willeth.
It is thy desire in us that desireth.
It is thy urge in us that would turn our nights, which are thine, into days which are thine also.
We cannot ask thee for aught, for thou knowest our needs before they are born in us:
Thou art our need; and in giving us more of thyself thou givest us all."
~Kahlil Gibran

As I pray tonight, I give thanks for a very sweet and loving friend who allowed me to pour out all of my black thoughts and then comforted me even though she is miles and miles away. I was able to enter the temple invisible with gladness in my heart and a smile (and, I'll admit, some tears) on my face.

If you're a hippie and you know it,

2006-07-23T21:08:00.000-06:00

Patch your pants!
I patched the knees of these (thrifted) work pants for the hubster while he read me an article out of National Geographic about the dire state of our environment.
It was sort of a pain because I had to rip out the side seam to get the pants onto the sewing machine, but they came out great. Of course, now I have to add some more patches because there are new holes up near the pockets, but I'd rather patch these until there isn't anything left than contribute to the destruction of the planet by buying a new pair.
Hooray for recycling!

swap preview

2006-07-13T09:09:00.000-06:00

Just a preview picture I need to show someone.

It's for a swap, and I've been working on it forever. I feel so bad that I'm taking so long! I think from here on out I'm only going to swap things I've already finished so I don't have this problem anymore.

Walkin' in a spider web

2006-07-03T14:25:00.000-06:00

DSCN0233, originally uploaded by Pearliepie.

EEEEE! Poor neglected blog! So much has been happening around here, and I haven't been updating at all.

Here's some of the things that are coming soon:
Botanic garden trip
Sewing room update
Projects I'm working on

Hmmm. There were some other things as well, but now I cannot remember.

Long road

2006-06-12T16:23:00.000-06:00

Cleaning not only opened the crafty block, it let out a monster! I talked to our housemate, Whit, over the phone (she's out of town) and decided to totally redo the sewing room! It's really just the corner of the never used game room, which is part of the reason I never wanted to do any work in there. It's huge, messy, lonely, cold, and worst of all, dark.

Thankfully Whit was excited about the idea, and I let her pick the colors that I'll use, since she won't be here. So everything is going to be blue and purple, with a little bit of red and orange thrown in for fun.

I started with all the crap that's been laying around for months. That lead to cleaning out two closets, getting rid of stuff, packing stuff in boxes. Now I'm working on getting everything out of the room and washing the carpets.

If I ever finish the floors, I'm going to move everything back in and as soon as my sewing machine is set up work on stuff to make the room a nicer place to hang out. Maybe I'll have some company down there at night instead of being a hermit crafter! Here's some of what I planned:

Make a T shirt quilt for Whit to go in the room. We both had a huge pile of clothes to donate and I pulled out some shirts to make blankets with.
Make a blanket out of Dana's soft old polo shirts. (I also pulled these out of the donate pile)
Recover the 2 green plaid chairs down there. I really like the fabric they are covered with now, but it's very worn.
Recover the recliner. I think I'm just going to sew a thrifted sheet right to the upholstery that it has now, because I am way to lazy to make a fitted recliner cover. Eww.
Recover the reclining couch thing. This will be with sheets too, I'm sure.
Make a floor rug. Or thift one. I hope I can find one.
Make a flower thing for Whit's door.
Pillows! I'm gonna try some floor tuffets and such-like, and a little bed for Whit's dog. He hates the basement almsot as much as I do!
Some kind of quilty wall art thing.

I have some posters from my old office that will look great in there, and I'm going to hang this big trivet thing on the wall, just to be silly. And I'm getting lamps! Goodby gloom.

I'll post pictures as I go- I can't leave those messy pictures of my house up with no cleaner follow up shots!

All great truths begin as blasphemies

2006-06-10T17:56:00.000-06:00

I've been fighting a craft block for weeks now. My brain is exploding with ideas, but I haven't been able to make anything. This morning I took a long hard look around and discovered (I hope) the cause of my problem.
Here's the "sewing" room:

And the "studio":

Now, I don't have these rooms to myself, so not all of this mess is mine. I'm still horrified at the state of these rooms. I guess that means that this weekend will be all cleaning. blah.