Before & After

This is what the fridge looks like on Thursdays before my sweetie comes home.  Stocked full of salad, fruits, vegetables, etc.  

And this is what it looks like on Sunday.  All that's left is some leftover fruit salad, a few sad vegetables, bottled water, eggs and condiments.

Sunday, Sunday

March started off cold and icky.  I just cannot take much more of this crap.  It's gonna go from this to hot and humid with no spring at all, I just know it.  

I'd had the hubster home for a week, so my first day without him was really blah & lonely.  It was cloudy and grey.  I came home from dropping him off to find the bread bag on the floor.  It only had a couple slices in it, but I was careless and Sagan got it off the counter, but didn't get to eat anything because I got home so quickly. See how pleased he is with himself?  He tried to convince me that he had no idea how the bag got on the floor!  There's Pepper's little nose.  I'm sure she was in cahoots but of course played innocent too.

Then I was cornered against the counter by them till I bought my freedom with biscuits.  

This was a project I saw on Pinterest and I'd saved the picture quite awhile ago but never got around to making it.  Here is the Pinterest picture.  Whoever made this was able to draw their own TARDIS.  I, however, am not that talented.  Their canvas is also a bit bigger than mine was.  They used 32 crayons but I could only fit 23.

I first painted the canvas black, then hot glued blue, white & silver crayons to it for melting.  I'd printed a TARDIS picture off the internet and used thick foam double stick tape to attach it to the canvas, to give it a little 3D depth.  Not sure what I'll do with it....I wouldn't really call myself a Whovian, but I am enough 'in the know' of their fandom.  If Christopher Eccleston had remained on for a few seasons, I would definitely have gotten into it more, but he only did one season and I was gutted when he decided not to return.  His one season really left an impact on me, to the point where I will never be able to see a gas mask again without hearing that little boy's voice saying, 'Are you my mummy?'  *shudder*

Anyways, here's my version of it.  As they say in Pinterest-Land, "Nailed it."

I made the all important discovery that self adhesive rhinestones do not stick to metal at all well.  That meant removing nearly every single rhinestone in all the keys I already made, and re-adhere them with E6000.  It was time consuming and tedious, and so I only had time to make 3 new ones.  

I am wicked sick of eating cereal, cheese & crackers, sandwiches and canned soup.  So I made a couple quiches (one for freezing).  Spinach, onion, mushroom & feta.  

I'd also pinned a recipe for 'the perfect mac & cheese' from Picky Palate.  I'd never made a roux before and it came out pretty good.  I'll definitely make it again.  The recipe stopped after mixing the cheese sauce with the pasta, but I added panko and baked it for a bit, then turned on the broiler to brown it.

Overall, not a bad way to spend the day.

One of Those Days

It seems like, for me anyway, there is always that one incredibly dull, lame, boring day in late January.  It's always on a Sunday.  I even have specific memories of days like that throughout my childhood and have been kind of tracking it to see if it happens every year and it really does seems to.  There's nothing to do. Even if it's nice out, it's too cold and windy to go anywhere.  TV sucks.  You can't find anything good to eat in the kitchen.  You have so many things to do inside, crafts and chores, but no energy or desire to get up, and at the same time you are so restless you feel like you're gonna explode if you don't get out of the house soon.  I could feel it when I got up this past Sunday.  Facebook and the blogosphere were even dead.  Just a Bucket of Suck day.  I ended up in my craft room, to at least try and make some stuff and salvage the loneliness.

Anywho, I've finally tried to get a handle on my out of control needlework projects.  They are so perfect to do in the livingroom when Russell's home.  I discovered that a few of the floss packs had free designs on their packaging or instructions.  I decided to do a couple just for fun before I got back to the projects that have been started.

OK this one looks nothing like the pattern I started to follow because I made such a huge mistake that I couldn't go back and rip out all the work I'd done, and had to free form it.  This is the first time I've ever deviated from a pattern on my own and just made something up.  The pattern also didn't call for beads but I added them anyway.  The instructions showed that it was to be done in just blue, so I used varigated blue floss.  It was stitched on perforated paper and doesn't photograph well.  It looks much nicer in real life.

I also used my own colours for this peace sign design.  Again, all varigated floss, then outlined in shiny gold. The original pattern had 'PEACE' written on all four sides but I did not like the way it looked on the paper so I just eliminated that whole part of the design.  I may mount these small projects on cards.

OK LANGUAGE ALERT HERE!!!  Over the holidays, Axe & I were cracking up over a cross stitch picture that she or someone posted on Facebook.  It took me off guard, especially when sung, and I thought it was hilarious.  I told her that I was pretty sure I could recreate the cross stitch from the picture because it was a very simple design.  She asked if I could make it for her.  Since I was getting together a package to send her anyway, I decided to knock this out now rather than next fall, so that I wouldn't have to send a second package (believe me, sending to S. Africa can be somewhat complicated, especially for the addressee picking it up so you want to have it all together and just send it once).

This is the picture from her timeline:

I first enlarged the picture so that I could count the stitches, then found my cross stitch graph paper and sketched it out.  It only took a couple of days of stitching to get it done and it will fit in a 5x7 frame once ironed.  The original picture didn't have the words and holly trim outlined, so I added that to make it pop and easier to read.  If I never stitch the word 'la' again it'll be too soon.

Since I had the black floss & Aida cloth out, I did this simple Snoopy design in about an hour.

I made the small ones into cards.

I had another felt peace sign and decided to round up my sparkly pin collection and earrings I can no longer wear anymore due to metal allergy.  I snapped off all the pinbacks and earring hooks and glued them to the felt. In addition to the pins & earrings, there are a few items that I used to fill in the gaps. I love sparkly pins but they are kind of expensive and I don't wear them, so this was the best way to showcase my modest collection.

I love keys....everyone I know seems to love keys.  I like how the craft stores sell new ones made to look vintage and I always buy a package because you can always find something to do with them.  In my case, I broke out the rhinestones and went to town.  Must. Bedazzle.  Everything. 

I posted them on Facebook and got a lot of inquiries about possibly purchasing these or having custom ones done.  There is a craft show coming up in April and I am not really sure what to make for a spring show.  All of my shows have been geared towards ornaments and stocking stuffers, so maybe I'll try and sell the keys.

My bff Michelle requested the steampunk one on the right. 

2 Seahawks themed bracelets and the one in the center is Notre Dame's colours, that I made for Kris.

Do any of you have a particular Bucket of Suck day that seems to happen at the same time every year?  Is is also late January like mine is?

Sundays

I've mentioned before that Sundays are the loneliest day of the week for me.  It's the first day without my squeeze, after he's been home for a couple of days and I miss him a lot.  It's a transition day, and I usually end up doing laundry, taking a walk or crafts, just to keep myself occupied.  I can't go onto the Cape because the traffic coming home would be a horror show, so overall it's a very, very lonely day.  

All time spent together is amazing, but recently (the one before our engagement), he and I had an extra awesome weekend.  We had our very first movie date complete with popcorn, Twizzlers, holding hands and my blubbering on his shoulder near the end of the movie.  We saw an early afternoon matinee of "Ted".  I highly recommend it...it's very funny, profane, irreverent and inappropriate, yet sweet.  Mark Wahlberg and Mila Kunis were brilliant, and Ted...OMG I just loved him!!!  Plus it was shot in Boston, always a plus and they kinda all went a little overboard with the famous Bostonian accent.  After the movie, we got Italian sandwiches to bring home.  The next day we lazed around, he did work on the truck and then we got Chinese takeout for a late lunch.  Just a perfect weekend all the way around.

He left on Saturday night, during a pouring rainstorm, which I'd hoped would cool us down, or at least push the humidity out, but didn't.  The next morning I woke up pretty late, and was already feeling blue and lonely.    It was cloudy but extremely warm and humid.  I forced myself to go out and get some gas in my car before the construction downtown started up again on Monday.  It had also been a long time since I indulged in any shopping, so I drove to my fave souvenir shop, Sand & Surf (check out the link) to use my 10% off coupon before it expired, then stopped at a couple antique/junk shops in town.  I got some great deals!

I got this adorable bear, for free, at one of the shops.  His ribbon says 'Spokane', and I had to have him.  The shop was giving away the whole box of stuffed animals for free, and believe me I was very tempted to rescue all the stuffies, but since I have no room for the ones I already have, I only chose this guy, since he's so far from home.  I got the Mt. Baker patch at the same shop, and the Washington shot glass at Sand & Surf.  Go figure:  Washington souvenirs all the way out here!!!

This is a sack of crafting 'beach glass', which is man made, not ocean made, also purchased from Sand & Surf.  Since I won't part with my personal collection for art projects, this is an awesome alternative.

There was a large bowl of glass blobbies and more craft-quality beach glass that I spied.  I figured they were asking at least $15 or $20 but there was no price tag.  Then I thought, maybe it was just on the shelf for decoration, so I walked away but I couldn't take my eyes off it.  I kept glancing back at it, as if I expected someone else to spy and snag it. Finally I decided to at least ask.  Can't hurt to ask, right?  The old guy behind the counter had no idea how much it cost, and had to seek out the other guy.  They consulted in the back of the store, and finally the old guy said, "He wants five dollars for it".  Uh...YUH!  That bad boy was definitely coming home with me!!! 

I also went to the junk shop where I'd seen the concrete yard decoration of the little girl with the strands of beads around her neck.  Unfortunately, she was gone, and I was crestfallen.  Till I went inside and saw this super unique cobalt blue bottle.  And a steal at only $7!!

Finally, here's a large maple leaf pin and one cool enameled earring that I bought on Saturday, also in downtown BBay.  I plan to use them in altered art pieces.  

Total spent for all of the above:  $23.20.