Friday, July 20, 2007

New Shirtz !!!!11!!OMGponies!!!11111!

Git ur geek on with our new shirtz. A lil sum sum for teh crafty bloggers.

i can has sock yarn? (yes, u can has more sock yarn)

While it is distinctly possible that I am the only one who finds me funny, if you have no idea what I'm talking about, start here. Then go here. Then be ashamed that you wasted 2 hours looking at stupid pictures of kittehs at work.
Then, go buy some shirts, because I'm going to get fired if I keep looking at stupid pictures of kittehs at work.

Labels:

Friday, July 13, 2007

Christmas in July sucks

Look what arrived on my doorstep yesterday:








This was the box of toys and blankets that I had shipped in early December for the GetCrafty Handmade Holiday project.





These guys should have been delivered to Project Night Night, but alas, they have apparenly been languishing in a PO Box somewhere for 6 months.





Not exactly the Christmas in July surprise I was hoping for. Oh well, I guess I'll send them along to Project Night Night direct.








In other news, check it out:





A sock! That looks like a sock! Of course, now it needs a friend, but I'll get there. I should have a little free time between now and when Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows comes out next weekend.

Labels: ,

Thursday, July 12, 2007

This tastes...purple

Generally speaking, Emily is way better at creating a themed event than I am.

But I think I gave her a run for her money last night: I give you the first annual purple dinner!

Wait, The First Annual Purple Dinner! (yes, I think it's much better in purple font)

The absurdity began over the weekend at the Farmer's Market. One of the stalls was selling purple beans. They are like green beans, only purple. And then they turn green when you cook them. (I'm sorry - color changing vegetables? where were these when I was a kid?) So much fun.

Later, I was shopping for potatoes, I decided to get (purply red skin potatoes instead of regular ones because I thought they looked nicer with my beans. (don't question the logic). Finally, I came to a stall that had purple bell peppers, at which point I was officially out of control and invited my friends over for purple dinner.

And what kind of theme would it be without appropriate decor?





Earlier in the week, my friend Lizzie sent me this adorable pad of paper. It's actually made from recycled elephant poop (no, seriously check it out). My favorite part is that it is apparently acid-free and suitable for scrapbooking. They even sell poop paper in 12x12 sheets and cardstocks just for crafters. I think it is my favorite new craft supply. But for our immediate need, see how some of the papers are purple? Can you say placecards? So great.

In the category of slightly less funny, but still pretty I picked up a purple flower at the Farmer's Market. Conveniently I already had a purple bud vase.






And you can't talk about a dinner party without talking about dinner. Voila, the purple dinner menu:

(Purple) red skin potatoes roasted with butter and herbs and a bit of purple basil.


Roasted eggplant with yellow squash and purple peppers.

Purple green beans.


Purple chicken (more or less coq au vin without the tomatoes, the red wine turns it a lovely lavender).


(Purple) red leaf lettuce and mixed greens salad, with (purple) blueberries.





And for dessert, pound cake topped with (purple) blackberries.

Once my friends came over, I forgot to take pictures of the finished products so you'll have to forgive me for the photos of the leftovers I packed for lunch today.

I must say that for such a ridiculous exercise, it all came out quite tasty. I'll have to see what kind of beating a dead horse dinner party I can host next.



Labels:

Friday, July 06, 2007

Babies!

Here are two of my projects of late. I was slow to post as I am big on karma and superstition.

Baby One. This is the shower invite for the recipient of the fab-u Duck Hat and Feet.





Yes...I had help with the sewing. But c'mon... there were 55 of them! I also conveniently slammed my thumb into my door the day we assembled them so I was only able to color most of that day. As I am obsessed with theme.... I used the same image to make candy bar wrappers and stamped the front of all of the gift bags. I remembered to pack four different shades of pink soda into my car... and forgot my camera so you just need to trust that the prizes and favors actually happened!

Baby Two. Here is where the superstition comes in... a dear friend of mine adopted her daughter from Guatemala. As an adoptive-mom-to-be, or "waiting mom" for those of you hip to the lingo... I simply HAD to produce the BEST baby gift ever for a fellow a-mommy. BUT...we had to wait and wait and wait for her travel clearance so I didn't want to post these until they were home. They have now been a family of three for two full weeks. So here is part of the baby book I scrapped for her...


Here is perhaps my finest moment as a scrapbooker.... I hand created the flag of Guatemala! Seriously - google all ya want....there is not a 12x12 flag of Guatemala! So the first few pages of her book are the colors from the flag, with country facts from the year she was born as accents. Plenty of pages to scrap their travels. The pages are mostly blank so mom and dad can fill them in. I also threw in the bag blank journaling boxes, pens, tape runner, etc for them to customize at will!



Here is a page with envelopes for her first tooth and first haircut. I apologize for the glare... after my prowess with the flag of Guatemala I just couldn't chance fingerprints!!!















And a page for milestones and firsts. These are mostly blank so their family firsts would have a special spot. The book has a full montage of pages for baptism, the nursery, a shower, first friends, family, etc. that are standard to a baby book. There are also some pages that are a-specific like a foster family page and a "while we waited for you" page. But adoption or not.... this was a SUPER FUN project for any new child as the scrapbook post binding lets you add or subtract from the book as you like or change the order. We'll see if I muster the energy to make more baby books.....















Thursday, July 05, 2007

A few hits and one major miss

(insert excuses for my lack of knitting progress here - I won't bore you with my need to re-read books 1-6 before the 7th Harry Potter comes out later this month - I'm such a nerd)

I have knocked out a couple of quick projects though. First the successes...
Quickie Head Band
I'm not sure where I got this ribbon, I'm sure it was tied to something. But for the past few weeks it has been sitting on top of my desk. I keep looking at it and thinking it would make a good headband. Finally got around to actually making said headband.


Ingredients: length of ribbon that will more or less fit around your head and one generic hair elastic.

I started out thinking I would measure things. My hair elastic was about 2.5 inches unstretched, so I would subtract 3 inches from the circumfrence of my head to cut my ribbon.

But that just seemed too fussy, so I sewed up one side, wrapped it around my head and winged it. If I knew how to take a photo of the top of my head (and don't think I didn't try), I could show you that we're calling this project a success. But, you'll just have to trust me.


Running Scrapbook Revisited
I had been making a scrapbook for the half marathon I "ran" back in April, but since I hadn't made much progress on it since the race. Much like my training regimen, it was pretty much shelved.

I pulled it back out yesterday and knocked out a couple of pages. I also figured out the cover.

I had purchased this album way back thinking that the little window would be a cool place to affix my finisher medal. But when I actually got the thing, the way it hung off the ribbon was the wrong dimensions for the window. So I had to improvise a bit.

I took the medal off the ribbon and just hot glued it in front of the ribbon. Otherwise, the red really wouldn't have shown up. Hopefully no one will notice that it isn't really hanging from the ribbon.

And for more MacGuyver-esque scrapbooking, I made these pages of our adoring fans.

The background papers are actually 6x8 sheets spliced together to make an 8x8 page. I needed something to cover the line where the papers switch.

Enter the flip flop.
Emily and her husband Chris - who both friggin' rule by the way - not only drove all the way to Kentucky to cheer me on during the race, but brought me a fun pedicure kit for afterwards when my feet were sore.

Although I have used most of it for its intended purpose, the kit came with those little disposable flip flops that they give you at the nail salon. Well, at my house I can just wear regular flip flops, which leaves these guys open for crafting.


Doesn't it look like it was meant to be scrapbooking supplies?

The flowers came from the signs that Emily made for me (I love that I have a crafty sister - ours were the fanciest signs on the whole route). You can see them in the finished pages...




So, I'm calling those the "hits." Which brings us to one serious "miss"
Gardening Disaster

This year, I decided to "garden" by purchasing two already planted flower boxes for my balcony. How could I mess this up - someone has already done all of the actual gardening for me?

Turns out, I can still totally mess that up. One flower box was doing just fine.

Almost everything had died in the other.


So, I decided to dig up some of the petunias from one box and move them to the other, to even things out a bit.

Oops.

That would be my downstairs neighbor's patio. That would also be the flower box that was alive. Of course the one where I had killed nearly everything wasn't the one to fall to its doom. Nope, all of the healthy, pretty flowers. Sigh.

Labels: , ,