|
|
Wednesday, December 26th, 2007
|
|
Wednesday, October 31st, 2007
|
|
|
I'm going to be donating these, well, ONE of these to a contest on craftster. So stencillers, get your spraypaint or whatever you use ready! Hopefully the sewers/stenciller hybrids are paying attention :) If not, the winning stencil champion will have a gift to pass on, or will be inspired to learn how to sew or embroider.
mod city: the grey and yellow abstract/mod one has two sets of pages internally, one yellow and one black.
the woodsman: the green "sew what" needlbook has one set of brown felt "pages" inside.
hugs and kiss: the one with the xox with large stitching has two sets of pages, one forest green and one lighter tan. the lighter tan page features additional embroidery.
They range from about 1.5-2.5 inches up to 2 by 3.5 inches or so.
I'm going to be attempting an entry. I doubt I will craft the winning entry, but in the off chance that I do, the second place person wins the needlebook.
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
Wednesday, October 3rd, 2007
|
|
|
I've got more of these up my sleeve, but here's my first raised garden bed:
Not super pretty YET, but I'm going to stick a whole bunch of the random midsized rocks I keep digging up around the outside to disguise that ugly black stuff.
The only thing I didn't have when I started this project was the mesh weed barrier that is on the bottom. I didn't tear up the grass underneath when I started. The black stuff came with the house. It's meant to be a barrier between beds and the grass part of a yard. Eventually, I'm going to have very little grass, and I think that this particular barrier is ill suited for my vision of the yard.
These are the steps I took:
1.Lots of planning for placement and types of plants to be planted in a relatively shallow bed.
2.Placed the mesh directly on top of the grass. Put rocks on top of the mesh to hold it until I could put dirt on top.
3.Placed the black stuff around the edge, on top of the mesh, using the tent-spike like holders supplemented with more of those damn rocks to keep it in place.
4.filled it with wonderfully perfect soil.
5.Planted my two year old seeds that had survived several moves without being culled from my inventory :)
6.Carefully put little skewers in the ground to keep neighborhood cats out.
7.Rejoiced when my green onions and bush beans started coming up. They're both supposed to be varieties that are happy in cool weather, so we'll see what happens.
|
|
Comments: Read 1 or Add Your Own.
|
|
|
Frolicking!
I made these. I've had the pattern printed out and they WERE gonna be an xmas present for my grandma but they turned out about a size 9, too big for my nana. Instead, they're going to be a suprise for well, I've said too much...
Here they are:
I used superwash wool that was on sale (50% off!!!) at Yarn Garden. It used about the whole skein. I didn't go all out on the flowers, just put 'em where buttons or a buckle would ordinarily go. I still have to put some fabric paint on the bottom so the pregnant recipient doesn't fall on her pregnant bootie. Next ones I make are gonna be green with eyes and a reptilian face embroidered on the top, I think.
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
Tuesday, August 7th, 2007
|
|
|
|
It went fairly well. I went in expecting to sell nothing. I sold two Hey Lady! cards, and two of my own journals. So the green journal with black stars is no longer available, and the wolf with the cassette resides in another girl's home. The wolf journal was actually part of a trade - I got 5 cards (my fiance was bummed I didn't pick up more of the bridge ones)from the lovely creative mind behind Icarus.
Beautiful, well presented photographs that she takes herself.
Incomplete sentences that fail to describe adequately.
Sentence fragment IS a sentence fragment. xoxo
stepharoo
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
Thursday, July 26th, 2007
|
|
|
Yeah.
I knew home owning would be hard work.
The first thing we did was tear out the carpet upstairs. It was kind of a dirty avocado green that probobly predates me. I'll be thirty in a little over a month. I don't know how old that is in carpet years, but my carpet was dead by a century or two. Zombie carpet.
Thankfully the dumpster from the previous owner was still in the driveway. I wasn't thrilled at first, because it was the first full day it was MY turn for occupancy, about a week after it was my house. The fourth of July. Me and my mom roll up, and the husband of the previous owner was there. So was the dumpster, and an engine block that I probobly might have noticed amongst the other random items if the husband hadn't pointed it out. He promised someone would be by in the next day to pick it up.
So. The carpet was tossed into the barely used dumpster. My mom tells me that the next day, the dumpster was ridiculously full. And sometime a few days later, the dumpster was picked up. Hurray! Farewell, Zombie Carpet. The day after the Zombie Carpet was ripped out of my upstairs, me and my fiance went on vacation to Illinois.
While we were gone, my mom and two of my cousins painted the two rooms upstairs. It was converted from smoky yellow to a pale, bright blue. Incidently, if you take pale, bright, beautiful blue paint and put it on a wall illuminated by a pink bulb, it looks lavender. Not what I was going for. Thankfully the solution was easier than repainting - we just got new light bulbs which are gonna save us money and decrease our carbon output too.
We put OSB boards over the subfloor. Subfloor was a little weak. OSB boards were my mom's idea. Eventually, I'd like to put some kinda environmentally sound hardwood floor up there, but for now, it's painted OSB boards for us.
In summary:
Ripped out upstairs carpet.
Put down OSB boards.
Painted bedroom/sitting room walls pale blue.
Painted bedroom/sitting room floors brown.
Ripped out four o' clocks from around roses - they kind of were choking them out.
Ripped out lambs ears to make room for vegetable garden. Lamb's ears, incidently, have lots of spiders and room for grass to hide. They look hella ugly after they bloom and get all gangly.
Tomorrow, we'll start moving bedroom stuff upstairs.
Then Saturday is a Big Garage Sale, and SUNDAY IS REBEL RABBIT AND I AM TOTALLY NERVOUS.
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
|
It's summertime. It's nearly the Fourth of July. Independence Day. Time to appreciate fightin' folks of the armed forces, and the peace that they strive for. My first featured indie craft business is the wife of a fella who helps the military machine. She also happens to be my sister in law, and one heckuva gal.
Heylady is the creative awesomeness spawned by Tia. Her shop is on etsy, with 22 and rising stellar feedback. She sells cards, gift tags, and miscellany. Heylady donates a portion of proceeds to environmental causes. Enough with the talking.
In the spirit of Independence Day, here's a few of her cards:
when I think of the military folk, I think of missing loved ones and writing letters. I think that's kind of what Heylady has in mind with these:
and... good for military personnel and pacifist left-wingers like me alike (plus folks who are all of the above)
and, if you're a big boy/girl and are over 18, she's got a whole line of pinup correspondence.
<3 <3 <3 hotness <3 <3 <3
yeah. so check it out.
heylady.
hey lady.
Hey, Lady.
Hey! Lady!
So what if this review is biased? It's my damn blog.
P.S. I HATE the "War on Terror." I think George Bush's war is was and will be terrible. I think we need to get all our kids home, apologize to the world, and stop making more folks hate us. HOWEVER, the folks who join the military are not bad folks. I read something hella cheezy somewhere that goes, "Hate the war, not the warrior." Pretty much sums it up.
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
| Time: | 1:26 pm. |
| Mood: |  giddy. |
|
I got my craftster shirt in the mail today! I loved the ones I saw in real life at the craftster mod meetup in Portland. Picture here. So, thanks to jungrrl's link that overcame my easily distracted craftster searches, (which, by the way is this link to spreadshirt before I get distracted and go search for some random craft I might do someday), I ordered my shirt and GOT IT IN THE MAIL TODAY. it took like four days to get to me.
I decided to represent craftster AND my adopted home town and crafty crew, and but my money where my boobs mouth is.
It's black as black can be. It's the American Apparel Classic Girl in medium. I actually measured myself before I ordered, which I never do. It's a pretty good fit, but I probobly would order a large next time. But I recommend this version of the shirt. It's my new favorite shirt and I've only had it 28 minutes.
And yes, the mods all had scissors for bones. But I'm a hooker at heart, ya'll.
xoxo
OH YEAH, I AM AS OF TODAY A HOMEOWNER AND A MORTGAGE HAVER!!!
Brian McCann with Golden Eagle Realty and Julia Earnest with US Bank home mortgage have been absolutely stellar and uber awesome. If you're in the market, they're a great team to have on your side. Julia worked her tail off even through root canals and other dental trauma. Brian kept on the lookout until we found the right house.
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
Wednesday, June 20th, 2007
|
|
|
I have a secret.
Some days I come home from a long day at work, looking forward to stitching something up or painting or attaching snaps, or, lately, sleep. But I end up on the computer playing Heroes or WOW or checking myspace or craftster or getcrafty or a thousand other websites. Then I can't fall asleep and stay up until 3AM and get up at 10AM and repeat.
Healthy? Hells nah. It sucks the energy and creativity right outta me.
At least with Heroes, with the hotseat option, I stitch things up during Brownbear's turn.
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
|
I've been on the mailing list for the Portland Church of Craft for months. I read about the Church of Craft's manifesto a few years ago. After procrastinating waaay too long, I finally went to one today. Each month, Sister Diane sends out an email about the month's project. This month, I was off, feeling a little less shy, and was pretty interested in the project.
This month's project was a variation of Mexican Shrine Wallets. They're sort of a portable triptych shrine, or, like I phrased it to my Nana, a "momento wallet." She's very steadfast in her Christian beliefs, and I think she'd object to the shrine terminology because she'd think of it as idolatrous. Whatever. Good clean fun :)
So, here's the front:
and you open the first bit:
and fully opened:
Shaky camera syndrome!
This is for my Nana. When more grandkids come, I'll have to make her a new one maybe.
Yeah. So that's what I made at Church of Craft.
Thank you, Sister Diane.
On a related note, I think I'll be much more adventurous with my needle books.
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
Saturday, June 16th, 2007
|
|
|
I'm not a scrapbooker in the sense of what scrapbooking has become. I like reusing items, found items, and have a long standing distate for buying overpriced trinkets solely for the use of SCRAPbooking.
Now that you know where I'm coming from, let me tell you that I was impressed by Collage. I'd only wandered in once before, on a random Last Thursday.
This visit, I had lots of time to look. It's small, but I found new stuff each time I made a loop around the store. Stamps, paper punches, and scrapbook paper, twill with words screened on, stickers, the usual scrapbooking stuff, yes. But the scrapbooking stuff wasn't the more stereotypical teddy bears and daisies. They have skull papers and non-cutesy stamps. (Which is still not my thing, but much much better than JoAnn's or Michaels. Plus it's LOCAL).
Collage also has acrylic and oil paints, pencils, pastels, charcoal, lots of different artist papers, fixatives, diamond glaze, and cosmetic grade glitter. They have some jewelry making supplies, but mostly they focus on 2D paper art.
Some of the stuff seems priced a little more than I'd like to pay. But some of it's very reasonable. I swooped up some black glitter and an alphabet stamp set for less than most stores. Plus, good luck with finding that black glitter anywhere else.
They have a workroom in the back that they let folks use. They have a crew that comes by Friday nights to work on various projects, and folks that love them so much they donate stamps and old books to 'em. The lady who was working the counter when we were there was very nice and helpful too.
If you haven't been in, you should give 'em a chance. Even if you're "not a scrapbooker."
And if you haven't swung by Scrap yet, get your bootie there post haste!
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
|
Jun 16 2007 - 3:00pm
End:
Jun 16 2007 - 6:00pm
Description:
Portland Crafty Vixens get together every two weeks. A free form crafting session to complete your latest projects and meet new people. Bring your craft supplies and a smile. Open to everyone that would like to join!
Location:
Haven Coffee, 3551 SE Division St
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
|
I rarely update even though I do spend way too much time online. I have tons of crafts I've done, but rarely post about them.
Now I have something fairly big to post. I applied to Rebel Rabbit Craft Fair and have to be ready by July 29th. I am so nervous. I'm going to be teaming up with Sarah from craftster. We'll be sharing a 4x4 table, so we won't have that much room. I donno how I'm going to display the journals yet. I'm wondering if I should leave some of them out. I'm wondering if I should make some stuff with a Rebel Rabbit theme. I'm wondering if I'm crazy for signing up at all.
Here's the front images - except for one which is a shot of the back - of some of the journals I'll be selling.
I'll be selling needlebooks also. Here's what one looks like open:
Also, next Last Thursday, Brownbear will be manning (bearing?) a booth for me. He's gonna be selling other crafty stuff. I'm saving the journals for Rebel Rabbit. I haven't decided if I'll have him sell the 30 odd purses/bags I've stitched up, or the 30 something skirts and tops I've revamped. I'm so nervous about the pricing too. Some are kinda high, some are kind of low. It's gonna be a bit of an experiment.
Alright. There it is. I'm stepping outside of my comfort zone.
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
Tuesday, January 16th, 2007
|
|
|
This is the second one I've made, and the first one that doesn't suck. The first one was stitched with some unknown thick stiff woolish fiber. The resulting baby sweater was thick and stiff - very unbecoming for a baby.
This is acrylic, less fluffy than called for by the directions. The directions are here, by the way, on the wonderfully awesome Crochetme magazine.
It's actually a marigold/mustard kind of yellow with rust trim, and avocado buttons. Wooo for the seventies! It's for my cousin's baby due this spring.
and the matching hat. I made this pattern up as I went along.
 .
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
Monday, January 15th, 2007
|
|
Friday, November 11th, 2005
|
|
|
I finished one of my nephew's Christmas presents. A hoodie with devil horns!!!!!
I also made my nephew and my sister matching hats...
Well, mostly matching. I figured my sister might rather have something adult-like, so I left the ears off of hers.
The next post, I'll start listing things I have for sale, maybe.
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
Tuesday, October 25th, 2005
|
|
|
I have been sewing, crocheting, and drawing for as long as I remember. Through creating various projects, I've decided that the ones that I'm most fond of combine different skills: painting and sewing, crocheting and applique, embroidery and drawing. This hybridization of various techniques, plus my hopes for the years ahead gave me the name Hybrid Clothes the Future.
So there.
I welcome livejournal editing tips. Help!!!
xoxo
|
|
Comments: Add Your Own.
|
|
|
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.1){kind=small}
hybrid_clothes's journal
creative.
cold.
contemplative.