Crocheted Marilyn

Oh my word, how freaking awesome is this??? I'm still a beginner at crochet, and I need a person-to-person tutorial on changing colors, but this would be such a cool project. For someone to make for me.
This came from Craftster.

49 Sensational Skirts

I've got a lot of skirts in my closet. Skirts for every season. Skirts for almost any mood. Unfortunately, I don't have a skirt for the PROM this year. Yes, I'm still a prom adviser for my high school, and yes, it matters what I wear. I'd wear the off the shoulder peach number that my mom loving sewed for me 18 years ago, but I think she got sick of storing it in her house and donated it to the good will. Anyway, I picked up 49 Sensational Skirts the other day, and the book is fantastically inspiring. This book is not about learning to sew a skirt. Although that is one possibility offered, the book is mostly about taking a skirt you already have and embellishing it. Not with your be-dazzler, but with other cool stuff.
This first skirt is embellished with cordouroy loops, and I think it looks like a muppet. I've got some silk from Thailand that I could cut up to make the loops. I like the idea of the edges fraying a little bit.

This second skirt needs to be a couple sizes too big before you start because this plume will take in about 1 1/2 inches all the way around when it's done. I'd need to go to the the thrift store (if I must) to find the perfect skirt for this one.


I can't decide which one to do...

March Retail Therapy

Oh man, I love this print. Found at anh-minh.

Frida Vans

Z had these painted for my birthday. I absolutely love, love, love them, in the kind of way that makes me not want to wear them, but instead cherish them safely in a box. I broke down and wore them out today, stepping carefully around puddles and other such harm. It's a longish story, but I've got a really-almost-exactly-the-same-extra-pair in a men's size 6 (women's 8?) that are up for grabs, too. If you know someone that might be interested send them my way, I'd be up for making a super deal. Matt Kriske is the talented young artist and he's done a bunch of other pairs too. The x-files pair is lovely and he takes commissions.

Happy Easter!

Today my sister brought over our little nephew Joey at like six in the morning. The coffee was barely even brewing and we still had sheet marks on our faces, but he was awake and excited and ready to play. He spent a lot of the day with us and man-oh-man, he's got us charmed.
Here he is so sacked out that he can't take one more turn around on the sit and spin without a quick little nap.


And here he is wrestling with Zander.

PS: I'm officially on ALL candy detox. The amounts of Easter candy that I've eaten this year is insane. Robin Eggs. YES. Reeses Peanut Butter Eggs. YES. M & M's. OH YES.

Spring Break

We're back from our little spring break in Mexico. It was wonderful. I'm peeling. I'm reeling at all this snow today. Barf. I'm also wasting tons of time today. I'm alternating going downstairs to get another handful of speckled robin egg whoppers with surfing around on the internet. Oh spring break, how I love you so.

Just when you'd stopped checking in...

It's been a long time, hasn't it? Wowza. When times get especially tough for me I hunker down and do the essentials. I shy away from friends a little bit, I get sloppy about returning emails, I neglect calling my grandma, I certainly don't update this thing, I under-water the plants, and I over-feed the cats. I'm not trying to make excuses, just realizing some patterns, and really just wanting to STOP THE NONSENSE. I remember back to waiting tables, when I was on the verge of so-freaking-busy-induced-freaking out, I'd get totally silent and do my job. All other systems would shut down so my machinery could just hum along at top speed until I could collapse in the break room. That system sucked. I still have nightmares about waiting tables, and in my dreams I usually spill water on some fat guy at the Pannekoeken. This all sounds dire, I know, but in the whole scheme of things, I'm doing just fine. Is my marriage falling apart? No. Is my house flooded with sewage? Not yet. Did I start using drugs that make all my teeth fall out? No. Is my health failing me? No. BUT, our adoption plan for Colombia fell through. All those eggs that I put in one basket got scrambled and so did I. SO... We dropped our adoption agency and started over. We've started working with another agency (Children's Home Society) and things are working much differently. Colombia is out and Korea is in... For now, and hopefully for the next 10 months or so! Tomorrow our social worker is conducting part II of our home study at our house. Everything is clean--even the knobs on the stove that never get any attention. We're attempting to appear normal by stashing the Vicodin away and keeping the wine on the counter. And Ben, if you've found this blog, that was a lame attempt at pre-home study humor. Anyway, despite my over-use of cliches in this entry, I'm feeling good and especially hopeful, and even a tiny bit peaceful. I'm ready to start watering the plants again! Speaking of plants, I just got this notice about $25 trees! I guess they go really fast, so I ordered mine a few minutes ago.

In other news, my copy of Rhett Butler's People is in at the library. Too bad it's a hard cover because it is coming with me to Mexico for spring break. I hope the library folks don't mind it coming back smelling like suntan lotion and margaritas. Oh Rhett...

This will be a quick post. We're heading out to a friend's birthday celebration at Buca tonight. I haven't been there in forever, so I'm thinking of a dinner made of mashed potatoes and chianti. Yum.

Here's our little tree this year. I love it. I can smell it when I walk in the door. We have so many sweet decorations for it that friends and family have given us, and it just makes me smile.

Here's a project that I started a little while back. Willy Nelson was awfully important throughout my Nebraska youth. This is my linoleum tribute to him, and one of my first tries at printing with oil-based inks.

When the time changed this fall, and everything got so dark so fast, the only thing I've wanted to do is curl up on the couch and watch a movie with my sweetie pie. I'll watch anything, even if it's not that interesting... Which has been making me feel very not-that-interesting. So, we're turning it off throughout the week for a month, and maybe catching up on a Netflix on the weekends. Who knows if this will extend past this month, but I think it'll be interesting to see how we fill up our time. Today was day 1 of the experiment and I made 2 draft snakes for the kitchen and a gnome hat. I also have surfed the web, talked with my hubbie, made a real dinner, done some reading, and now I'm off to take a bath. It feels like the weekend when I have time for all the stuff I love to do AND it's only a Monday.


PS: I love Jan Von Holleben's photos.

I got a new haircut last weekend, and life was a little more simple when I could just slap my dirty hair back into a ponytail. Now: day 1 hair looks ok, but not quite right, day 2 hair is the perfect amount of dirty and clean so it looks good, and day 3 tries to ride out the same look but it feels a little bit over-polluted with pomade.

Here's my newest and most favorite thrifty find. Someone spent a lot of time latching this rug and I'm going to enjoy it in the kitchen every time I wash the dishes.

Wow, all of you computer nerds out there will be officially not impressed, but really I'm excited to play around with this Vector Magic site (via Boing Boing). I didn't take the time (obviously) to play around with the colors, but changing this picture of our niece took all of about 2 minutes to do.

Smile

Staff pictures are going to be taken at 7 AM tomorrow, and I'm thinking about how I usually look like a crazy woman when I'm posing. Right this second, I'm searching for tips on looking more natural in photos. This is a really interesting test by the BBC on interpreting fake vs genuine smiles.

It's buy one get one free at John Golden's Etsy shop and I'm having a really hard time picking just two.

Have you seen Amy Sedaris' Manhattan house over at Design Sponge? It makes me drool a happy smile.

Now, for a few side-notes:



1. We made it out to the Frida show on Friday night. It was wonderful. I'm almost done with her biography and I think that made the show especially the best thing I've ever seen in my whole entire life.

2. In my early 20's I was at my Grandma's house and I said something about how baseball hats never fit my head because it's too big. At that point I saw my Mom and Grandma exchange knowing looks. This obviously convinced me that they knew about a head swelling disease that I had but they refused to tell me about because they knew I'd freak out. Now that I'm in my 30's, I have the internet to tell me what disease I might have, and the head swelling one is not looking very likely. Nevertheless, I do have a very large head, and I'm working on sewing a hat for it. I've got it all cut out and ready to go but I'm dragging my feet because I doubt it'll fit. Yes, I measured and it says that it'll fit, but those pesky measurements on the pattern backs are more often bullshit than not. I'm using an old wool skirt for the outer fabric and a cotton printed with mallards for the lining.

Happy Halloween!

I don't normally smile with my jaw unhinged, but we were saying "Raaa" for the camera.

Joey's favorite question by far is, "Where'd the kitty go?"

We had such a fun time with family in town! And we just loved getting to know Campbell. I think she might be the cutest ladybug of all time.

Happy Birthday to my Sweetie!

Happy, happy (and just a day late) birthday to the sweetest man I never even knew could be out there. You make me smile every single day.

This website is "funny".

I am Blue (and Barb)

Your dominant hue is blue, making you a good friend who people love and trust. You're good in social situations and want to fit in. Just be careful not to compromise who you are to make them happy.

Your saturation level is very high - you are all about getting things done. The world may think you work too hard but you have a lot to show for it, and it keeps you going. You shouldn't be afraid to lead people, because if you're doing it, it'll be done right. Your outlook on life is very bright. You are sunny and optimistic about life and others find it very encouraging, but remember to tone it down if you sense irritation.
spacefem.com/quizzes/colors
(well thank you internet, this is certainly very flattering, if not-so very accurate)
Are you a Big Love fan? If you're not, I'm thinking you haven't watched it yet. I think it is television at its absolute finest. Apparently I'd be Barb if I were a sister-wife.

I'm NEVER going to donate anything to Savers ever again...

There's a woman at the Columbia Heights Savers that has always been cranky. I think she aims to steal my thrifting bliss by either shouting at someone about something, or at the very least shouting about how stupid the whole wide world is because they take more than three garments into the fitting room at a time. I try and make her happy by following the three garment rule even when there's no one else around who wants to try anything on. In the middle of my trying to make her happy, she has pounded on the door wanting to know exactly how many items I've got and if it is my stupid cart that is so purposefully blocking her from doing the work that she doesn't get paid enough to do. I usually take it in stride. Today I pulled up wanting to donate. I think that would make her happy because I want to give them stuff to sell... Almost no strings attached, except that whomever I unload my crap to should at the very least be mildly courteous. No dice. She was rude. She did everything except spell out and perform an interpretive dance on exactly how stupid she thinks I am because I have never donated items at the back door. Only idiots drive up and want to give away their free stuff at the front door. Duh. So, I drove to Arc Value Village, which is was just a little bit out of my way, and I donated there. I bit my lip at Savers because I didn't want to be mean, which I regret. I basically missed my
chance to tell her how much she sucks. Here's my letter to her.


Dear Savers Lady,

I wish I would have told you that I think you're a pain in the ass, and that because of you I have left your store several times without buying anything because I can't stand listening to all of your bitterness.
I wish I would have told you that even though you were wearing bunny ears and whiskers to work today that you are not the teeniest bit cute or cuddly. The opposite in fact. I bet your grandchildren don't even like you.
I wish I would have told you that Savers has been over-pricing their jeans for about the last year or so. And it's probably all your fault. Just because something has a JJill tag on it, does not mean that it should automatically cost $9.99.
I wish I would have told you that you have bad breath.
I wish I would have told you that are not the boss of me.
I wish I would have told you to take your secret back door donation spot and stuff it down your ankle length tapered jeans.

THE END (of our relationship)

Sincerely,

Julie

Here was my stab at one of the Built by Wendy dresses. I LOVE the fabric, but HATE how I look in this shift-like dress. Maybe it'll work if I take in the sleeve at the elbow. But maybe, shapeless dresses just won't look good on my almost 5'2 and somewhat curvy frame. SHITBALLS. This cool Polaroid montage is done using the Hockneyizer.

Geez, just call me blog-slacker. I don't even have something in mind that I want to write about tonight, I just wanted to get something written, and then hopefully I'll feel more inspired to write throughout the week. I had Thursday and Friday off for MEA weekend, and it just flew by. I spent some quality time at the fabric store. I want to make some bibs and I need velcro for the closure. I made this one out of an old orange towel for the back and then the front panel off of a denim skirt that I don't wear any more. I've only made one and it's big enough for me to wear, but cute. I wish this bib-making was my secret code for a very quick adoption about to occur. I think it's going to take a while, so our babe might just have about a thousand bibs when the time comes. On Thursday night we took my mom and step-dad over to see the Soapfactory's Haunted Basement. I might just be a big fat baby, but I thought it was super freaking scary. Go. I dare you. In other news, I rode my little scooter over to Open Book to show support for who I affectionately call the freaks that like to stay up all night and draw comics. They amaze me. I just couldn't do it. I would have a melt down in front of all those people because I need and love sleep. On the way home I stopped into Surdyk's for a couple of bottles of wine, and had to fight my way through the crowd. I forgot they were having a sale, so I was a little bummed to spend that much time and only be able to take what I could hold on the scooter. I wonder if the sale is over now? The last little tidbit I've got is about microwave popcorn. Recognize us?