Welcome to my office... (Explicit due to excess enthusiasm)

On Christmas eve I completed a real life sewing pattern, the first ever.  Today I created a sewing desk where my sewing machine can permanently reside and have located my sewing Mount Everest, McCall's 4769.

Yes.  I have gotten REALLY enthusiastic REALLY FUCKING FAST.  All because of this child's apron.

The pink zigzag trim:  I fucking invented that shit.

I have sewn shit before.  I have made two quilts.  I am short so I have hemmed the shit out of all kinds of pants.  I have sewn a chemise and skirts to wear at the renaissance festival.  I have made pillow cases and curtains.  None of these items involved any kind of pattern.  I have bought patterns before, opened them and thought "What the FUCK?!" despite the "It's so Easy, it's Simplicity" assurance on the front of the packet.  This summer my friend Emily got some instructions from her grandma and helped me get started sewing an apron, and I discovered that one merely has to follow the instructions and the shit will magically come together.  I have yet to finish that first apron, due to complications involving my seam ripper going missing.  But this recent apron has given me whole new hope.  I have done it, and I have done it all by my self.

And now I have a SWEET sewing station which I have already started to call my office:

I even have a thread holder-majig which is actually a repurposed library drawer which up until now has only been used to prop up a window every now and then:

I have to build up my stamina and know-how before attempting McCall's 4769.  I cut out the pieces just now to Simplicity 3881, version C.  We'll see how that one goes, but it looks like a piece of fucking cake.

I also recently crocheted the cutest hat that ever existed, but gave it away before I could take a picture.

Close Encounters (of the Randy kind)

Me: Hey [patron], you need help putting anything on hold?
Patron: Yeah, I'm looking for the new of the Kris Longknife series.
[I look it up and discover that we don't have the newest one, and show patron this]
Patron: Ok...I'm in charge of some new missiles that were discovered hidden in San Antonio.
Me: Oh, really?
Patron: Yeah, and I just discovered that my superior is the lady that plays on Murder She Wrote.
Me: Angela Lansbury?
Patron: Yep, she's here restoring an old family home.  But they don't want me around because I have the missiles.
Me: Yeah, I can see that.  Have you already studied the missiles to find out what kind they are since they've been discovered?
Patron: That's what I'm doing right now.  That's why I'm here.  We are going to test them in the desert of Nevada.
Me: You better watch out because somebody might be trying to take you out.
Patron: They can't.  I can detonate the missile and it can be in D.C. instantaneously, and the amount of explosives on the tip of this pen [motioning to my pen] can destroy an entire city.
Me: So what are you going to do with the missiles after you study them?
Patron: Sell them.
Me: Who are you going to sell them to?  Don't sell them to any hostile countries.  Don't sell them to Cuba.
Patron: I won't.  But Cuba is part of Atlantis, the lost continent anyway.

At this point a librarian called on the phone from across the room to save me, but I totally admit that I was asking him questions because I was bored.  He has a ready answer for everything, always does.

Sappy embroidery

As it turns out, when you only work part-time and don't attend school or watch television you have a heck of a lot of time for delightful activities that you never had time for before.  This is what I created yesterday from a pattern I had prepared about 6 months ago:

I made the pattern by printing out the text in a font I liked on plain white paper.  Then I printed out some graph paper with the tiny boxes and traced the words on that by drawing an x in each applicable box.  The graph paper was a guide to the spacing and stitching pattern on cloth.  I learned during this process that you need to print out the text of the original bigger than you want it all stitched out, because the tiny box graph paper is still bigger than the little stitch boxies on cloth.  All I need is one of those pretty oval frames to put it in.  It inadvertently became a companion piece to this one I embroidered before we were married, as I somehow chose the same color for the text of both:

That one was freehand.  I got inspired by Jenny Hart one day and cranked it out using some embroidery techniques I googled.

Although I am impressed with how these turned out, embroidery/cross-stitch is not my poison of choice.  Knitting, you're still my number one, babe.  At least until I rustle me up some chickens and honeybees, or if I stick with banjo playing long enough get y'know...skilled.

Bread fail (again)

Looks like a brick, and when I hit Oliver with it he said "ow".

Bread is always a fail for me.  I think I must offend the dough somehow, but at what part of the breadmaking process I have no clue.  Maybe I offend the dough during the kneading, when I put my hands in all of its little pudgy crevices.  Maybe during rising when I either shove it in the oven before the yeast has fully performed its duty, or leave it too long languishing in a hot room until it starts to fall, defeated.

Someday I will figure this out, and then I will be a bread MASTER.

Simplicity in 13 measures

1. Did the dishes by hand today.  It was satisfying and it saved some electricity, plus the dishes look cleaner.  I get to appreciate my prettiful Fiestaware plates more than just eating off them.

2.  Yesterday made Danish wedding cookies which are/were dangerously delicious.  I ate about 12 of them and threw the rest away to banish the temptation.

3.  Cleaned the whole apartment yesterday in a single hour of determined frenzy.  It all started after I washed the dishes by hand in preparation for my IHOP pancake recipe.  I was done cleaning at almost lunchtime, so I didn't make the pancakes after all.  Meatball sandwich.

4.  Bought some fresh millet bread, organic apricot jam and loose-leaf chai tea at Central Market yesterday.  It made for an outstanding breakfast today.

5.  Trying out this recipe--I've got two loaves rising.  I've had the recipe printed for weeks, but just bought some more local honey.

6. Went to the park and marveled at the Medina River this morning, and felt like a pilgrim at Tinker Creek, even though I've never read Pilgrim at Tinker Creek.

7. Resolved to try and learn Spanish after all--give it a good go.

8. Almost done knitting my Grandma's swallowtail shawl.  Discovered I enjoy nupps.

9. Looking forward to the end of school and beginning of leisure.

10. Decided we will buy a house this year since we are both finishing school.  This dear hope all rests on the prospect of either or both of us snagging full time jobs.

11. I am all set to graduate this December.  I applied to be a children's librarian, but we'll see if I get the job.

12. Been off work for four days and haven't watched any trash television whatsoever, only Survivors on Netflix.

13. Witnessed and documented on film some top-notch feline hilarity.  The Christmas tree didn't think it was so funny.

Rudimentary television cover

 

I have improvised a solution to the clash of opposing viewpoints in my apartment.  The question: What do you do when you are morally opposed to trash television and the zombie-like trance that too much television stimulates, and you would rather get rid of the television altogether but you are married to a total screen-a-holic who will never back down?  The answer: Television cover!  For now my television cover consists of some stash cloth draped over the thing, but I am already quite impressed with it; it seems to have cured the living-room-black-hole effect.  This project will involve my sweet sewing skillz once the semester (and graduate school altogether!!!!!) is over.

 

Wow!  Peaceful!  Cozy!