Artsy Fartsy

Yes, I know. It is hard to type with this sore arm from patting myself on the back so much, but I’m so thrilled that this sudden and random sewing ability has struck me that I just need to show it off! Check this out:

I made a wristlet! With Heather Bailey fabric. Isn’t it cute? Look, here’s the inside:

I had bought a handmade wristlet on Etsy and I loved it so much I stared at it and measured it and analyzed it until I figured out how it was made. I made this one for my sister and I’m going to start working on one for myself tonight.

Last night I decided to try to make Miss Molly a pretty little d-ring collar with some other pretty fabric I bought and here it is:

Miss dirty paws just came in from a run in the yard, ignore that. Isn’t her collar pretty? I love that fabric. Here’s another shot:

So what’s next, you ask? Well I did find some great batik fabric on sale last week and I was thinking of making a skirt. I’m a little leery about making clothes, though, especially a skirt or pants. I’m always afraid that I won’t make them well enough and I’ll sit down and the seems will tear and the whole world will see my undies. But maybe I should give it a try. If I do, I’m sure I’ll brag about it later so stay tuned.

Apparently it’s been way too long since I went to the movies. Luke got home from work yesterday and decided to beat my birthday blues by taking me to lunch and a movie. I love the movies and he hates to go so we almost never get to see a movie on the big screen. I can’t even remember the last movie we saw in the theater. Was it Departed, last winter? Yes, I think so.

Well in the six months since I’ve been to the Showcase Cinemas in Manchester, changes have been taking place. Did you know, for instance, that there’s a bar in the lobby? No kidding, but that’s not the only strange new thing. For an additional $3 per ticket, you have the option to watch a movie in the “Director’s Hall”. Moviegoers in the Director’s Hall (or “DH” to those in the know) get their tickets in a special little folder with “Cinema De Lux” printed on the front and containing of all things, a wet-nap and a menu of items that your server will happily bring to you while you lounge in your roomier “leather” high-back viewing chair. Sound intriguing? We thought so, too.

It just happened that when we got to the Showcase, the only movie starting in less than an hour was Shrek the Third in the DH. Since we were getting the “bargain price” ($6.75) for seeing a movie before 6pm, we figured another $3 per ticket wouldn’t hurt. We walked past not one, but two concession stands on the way to the DH with high hopes of the leather chairs and the servers. Ahem. Seating is assigned in the DH, so our usher led us to our seats (oh, by the way, there were five people including us in the theater for this 1:00 viewing of Shrek.)

Well, the “leather” chairs were big, black, rubbery chairs and I think they were roomier, but I couldn’t quite tell.  they were firm, that I can say, my butt fell asleep.  I think my motorcycle seat is softer.  We took out our menu and saw that we had the choice of $8 popcorn, $10 pizza, hot dogs, or mozzarella sticks.  Wow, some menu.  Oh, and you’re supposed to tip your server.  We walked past the concession stand and could have picked up our own damn $8 popcorn without the tip, but since we were in the DH and it was my birthday and all, we acted like royalty and had our bag o’ popcorn and bucket o’ Cherry Pepsi delivered to us.  It was interesting.   I can’t imagine what it’s like when the theater is full, I assume they have bunches of servers.  I don’t know why people would WANT to pay someone to bring them their popcorn when it’s not like they need to save their seats - the seats are assigned - and you walk past two concession stands - one was just outside the door to the DH.  De Lux, I’m not sure, but different, definitely.  Perfect for my birthday.

Oh, and Shrek?  Eh… it was alright.  Not the laugh-out-loud riot I was hoping for.  But hey - I got to go to the movies!  And have popcorn DELIVERED!  It was a special day after all.

I can’t sleep.  Luke left for work an hour ago and I’ve been online shopping for motorcycles and catching up on blogs.  I just noticed that it’s after midnight.  It’s my birthday.

I’m pooped. It’s been a great long weekend and I’m so glad I have tomorrow off, too. Saturday, what seems to be our new favorite routine, Kim and Keith came over to ride motorcycles. Our friend Chris from Ohio was up visiting, too, and we taught him how to ride. (Don’t tell his wife or kids.) Here’s our favorite video of the new biker. It starts out with me and Chris ready to race but I stalled the bike after laughing at Chris running down my garden. It ends with Kim’s voice saying “can someone get him off my new dirtbike?” Awesome. You’ll see why when you watch it.

Sunday we had some more friends over for what we like to call Guitar Night. Chris is a great musician and has a James Taylor-like singing voice and it’s always fun to hear him play. Our friend Roland is also a great guitar player and singer and the two of them together could start a little act playing in pubs and backyards everywhere. There are pictures on Flickr if you want to see, click here for the evidence.

Today we cleaned up from Guitar Night and then went to my mom’s for my birthday dinner - Mexican food from Moe’s and a delicious three-layer cake that my sister made. Of course I forgot my camera so I can’t show you everything, but trust me, it was fun. My mom and sister even teamed up to get me a ticket to go with them and see Wicked at The Bushnell this December! Yay!! I may be the last person left who hasn’t seen it so I’m pretty psyched.

Tomorrow’s my actual birthday and I’m taking the day off from work to rest, you know, cause I’m a year closer to being old now. And not to be all melodramatic, but I’m not really looking forward to my birthday. I’m just not excited about them anymore. It’s been a few years now that I kind of wish I didn’t have birthdays. What makes me sad is that I can’t remember why I used to be so excited about my birthdays. I used to wear a badge that said “Today Is My Birthday” and I used to try to make it such a great day. Not anymore, though and I don’t know why. Now I feel bad that people are buying me stuff and going out of their way for me. What’s wrong with me? I ran out of festivity somewhere along the way. But anyway, I have tomorrow off and it’s going to be another beautiful day. Luke has to work and will probably sleep all day because he didn’t sleep enough today before going to work, but I’ll still be able to work in my garden and soak in the sunshine.  Speaking of my garden, my irises are blooming.  I’m so excited.  I’ll post some pictures tomorrow.  And I have some more bragging about my new sewing abilities to do.  Wait until you see!  you’ll be so proud.

How cool is this?   This is a beautiful and strange plant called Jack-in-the-Pulpit.  I’m strangely happy each spring when I see these weird little plants pop up in the woods of our property.  I had been told that they were rare in our area, but I think that whoever told me was just lazy because if you look hard enough, you’ll see them all over.  From the top they look like this:

Not all that exciting or remarkable.   But if you get down and peek underneath, you see this:

And then you peek under that flap and see this:

Isn’t that beautiful?  In early spring, the flower, or “pulpit” is all green with darker green stripes.  As the flowers mature they turn reddish purple.  In the fall when the pulpit dies off and leaves poor “Jack” standing there all by himself, Jack turns into a beautiful cluster of bright red berries.  I just love these things.  They’re like little surprises hiding in the weeds.

Can you tell I finally got some sleep last night?  I’m practically writing poetry about woodland weeds.  I took a nap and went to bed early and slept all night long and felt so good this morning that Molly and I went for a walk down by the river where I took these pictures.  Ahh… sleep and weeds, two things I love.

I blame the Internet. Or the blogosphere, whatever you want to call it. So many of the blogs I read and love are written by very handy women who can and do sew. They make it look so easy and their photos are so inspiring that I was determined to dust off my sewing machine and give it another go.

It started like this:

Pretty fabric, isn’t it? It’s sort of canvasy and thick. It’s lovely. I had a bag in mind that I wanted, as my sister pointed out, I pretty much wanted a diaper bag with the pockets on the inside. So I made up the pattern in my head, cut the pieces, and off I went. One movie, (The Holiday - very cute), and another hour and a half later, these fabric pieces became… a BAG!

Can you believe it? I really can’t. It’s especially amazing to me that the handle hasn’t fallen off or something else hasn’t gone wrong. It’s perfect! Here’s a shot of the inside with the pockets for my water bottles and stuff.

So are you impressed? Sorry about the harsh look of these photos, it was about 1:00am when I took the pictures and the lighting at that time of the morning isn’t the best for photographing a dark brown bag. This prototype worked out so well that I think I might make it again a bit wider and put some sturdy interfacing between the layers so it holds it’s shape. Might as well do something since I’m not sleeping, right?

I’m so tired. My bones are tired. My hair is tired. My skin feels like it’s vibrating and it could be that I really need to lay down, or it could be the massive caffeine intake to compensate for the tiredness. So much tiredness.

This month has been so busy and in the last two weeks there has been a party at my house every weekend, one more coming up this weekend, and all that on, at most, 6 hours of sleep each night. Luke’s 3rd shift schedule is cutting into my good night’s sleep, leaving me wide awake and reading in bed at 11:30 when he leaves for work. 6:30 comes waaay too early for me.

On the upside, I’ve been watching movies and sewing (yes, you read that right - sewing!) to keep myself awake in the evenings when Luke is sleeping. I had planned to show you what I’ve been making, but as I may have I already mentioned, my recent lack of sleep and the lovely side effect, tiredness is affecting my rememberability. I forgot to bring the memory card that has the pictures of the bag I made on it with me today. Tomorrow, I promise.

So forgive me for my whineyness and my less than creative writing. I’ll get some sleep in June and I promise it’ll get better.

Yesterday was mom’s graduation and Mother Nature was, thankfully, kind to us. It rained a little on the way to the school, but once commencement began, the sun came out and it was a beautiful day. I held my breath, hoping that her name would be pronounced correctly. Being named Patrice and being accidentally called Patricia all of her life, I thought she deserved to be called for her degree by the correct name, which she was.

Congratulations Mom!! You done good again.

So what else is new? My mom is away on vacation now, without an internet connection, so I know I can brag about her without hearing her complain about it. My mom is graduating this weekend from the University of Hartford with a Master’s degree in Nursing. Last night, the graduating class had a poster presentation ceremony where they showed off their final projects and the posters they made to go along with them. To get her back for making me pose for pictures whenever I did anything significant in school, I made her pose in front of her very nice poster.

She may not look the smartest in this picture, but trust me, she is. My sister was making her laugh so she wouldn’t give a fake smile. Then my dad grabbed the camera so you could see where I inherited my smiling for the camera ability. That’s my sister on the left, too. Isn’t her hair adorable?

After Mom’s poster thing, we of course had to go out for ice cream, because that’s what you do after big school events. Here are my sister’s chocolate-covered munchkins.

And despite the fact that it was nearly nine and way past their bedtimes, I seemed to be the only one who was tired at that table.  Here’s a big sugar-induced smile from Cameron. Man, I wish I had some of that energy.

It’s official.  My external brain, my life organizer, my PDA, she is dead.

I had been getting the occasional “Fatal Error” message that told me death was imminent, but I deleted all unnecessary programs and photos and it seemed to be doing much better.  Then tonight at Stop & Shop, I went to use Splash Money to record my check for groceries and I found that my PDA had been completely wiped clean.  It was back to the “Welcome to your new Palm device” intro and the date was January 2003.  Ug.

I’m going to get the new Treo 755p and finally combine a few of the devices in my purse, but if I want to save myself almost $300, Sprint says that I have to wait until July 1st when I’m eligible for a new phone.  That means a month and a half without my PDA.  Without my calendar!  Now I actually have to write stuff down!  It’s going to be a long wait.