I maked sushi.




Actually I had a bunch of scraps from the retreat so I played a bit. Yeah, I overcooked it. Don't blame me, blame the ghost who made the oven door push in so far it stuck when I know I left it unlatched.

that jerk




clickie for big

So I need to shake the miserable. G and I have yet another falling out and I need to resist the urge to *fix* things. The more I go out of my way to do things for other people the more I get spit on... there are a few exceptions of course but I'm back to my original opinion, most people are fucking bastards.

and for no reason other than I can...

here are some teeny tiny girlybits beads...

Nancy happened upon this "wild boar" AKA the Scary Driveway Pig while doing field work the other day!

Ha!

This was originally posrted on Constance Pelkey Designs, comment here or there - up to you! *smile*

Or Faux Opal and Faux Turquoise. Here is my mornings work of my versions of faux opal and turquoise I made.

This is taken just as they are going in to the oven. They still need to be baked, iced, tumbled, acrylic painted , buffed, drilled, strung, PMC bezeled, finished and foto'ed.

Just thought I'd share my works in progress today. *G*

This afternoon I plan on taking more finished work photo's out on the deck. Yesterday I got all of 3 finished and my batteries died! Simply MUST get more rechargeables!! Arrggghh!!

This was originally posrted on Constance Pelkey Designs, comment here or there - up to you! *smile*

Before I go list a bunch of new stuff I notice that the Claychicks store on Etsy has 100 items sold! Yay! The first big milestone. Hopefully the next 100 goes a little quicker (ie: we don't take six months off in the middle).

http://www.polkadotcreations.com/blog/?p=503

The swap is coming together! I’m still waiting for about 15 packages, but I thought I should get started sorting, and assigning. Packages have all arrived here from those who have been visiting the Flickr group and telling me which sheets they like, so it seemed like those people would be the logical place to start. I’ve divvied up many of the sheets and put them in envelopes ready to go. I haven’t sent them yet, though… I’m thinking I should wait for another few packages to come in, just in case there might be some better matches to be made.

I did pick out which ones I’m keeping, though. It got a bit out of control…

I had intended to swap six sheet pieces, but then I found another sheet that gave me three more, and one of the swappers gifted me with three more pieces (thanks, Regina!) So twelve it is. And I’m pretty sure these are them.

So there I was, after supper tonight, face-to-face with a tempting pile of colorful fabric, thinking about the special “Moms Day” tomorrow morning at the little guy’s preschool.  Clearly I needed a pretty skirt to wear.  And clearly none of the dozen or so existing skirts in my closet would do.  Clearly. I thought for a moment that I probably ought not to dig into my new sheets until the swap packages had been sent out. (Isn’t is cheating to start making things before anyone else has had a chance?)  But in the end, the urge to make something new won out.  Yeah, I know you’re not surprised

I seem to have wrap skirt fever lately, so that is what I made.  I used the beach wrap instructions in Sew What Skirts as a guide as usual, and I took advantage of the sheet’s existing hem.  Since it’s Eamonn’s school I’m going to tomorrow morning, I asked him to choose a sheet from the pile for me to use.  He picked this pretty butterfly floral pattern from Jackie.  It’s perfect for me - I love the pattern, and the colors are some of my absolute favorites.   Thanks, Jackie, for a lovely sheet!

I can hardly wait to play with some of the other sheets in my pile now.  I’m going to try to control myself, though…  for now.  One of the sheets I kept was a plain yellow one.  I initially thought a completely plain sheet would be boring, but I’ve since decided to think of it as a blank canvas instead.  I have big plans for it now, involving fabric ink and polymer clay buttons.  Stay tuned, because you know if I actually do it, you’ll be the first to know!

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I am having a lousy fucking day.

It should be fairly obvious by now that I don't make any effort to tie the Clarkesworld Magazine cover art to a particular story. I like being free from restrictions when it comes to the art I feel like featuring that month. Sometimes, however, it seems like fate intervenes and insists that I pay attention to both.

One of our June stories will be "Clockwork Chickadee" by Mary Robinette Kowal. A couple of days after we bought this story, I was browsing Eli Effenberger's gallery and found something that screamed "buy me!"  As a result, June will be a month of Clockwork Chickadees and Wind-up Ducks.

lucky_starshine is celebrating it's 1 year anniversary!  There are tons of new designs (earrings, bracelets, necklaces, soon anklets) - including bracelets I designed last July and am very proud of but never posted before - and a brand new sale section with items 25% off!

Click lucky_starshine to go to my shop! Thank you for stopping by!

There are few things in life that make me happier than new books.
I just received three lovelies in the mail. 2 art books and Mr. B. Gone by Clive Barker
*shakes butt*

a trailer for a book? weird...

MR. B. GONE Trailer

http://www.polkadotcreations.com/blog/?p=502

Have I mentioned how much I like spring? I think I appreciate it more every year, as I grow to dislike winter at a similar rate. After a long cold spell, nothing invigorates me more than being able to throw open all of the windows and feel the lovely warm breeze on my skin. It’s been hard these last two years having a little one with seasonal allergies. The windows remain closed just when I am feeling an intense need to have them open. I realize the physical toll of the pollen on Eamonn’s teary eyes and runny little nose is more profound than the emotional toll of a stuffy house on me, and so the pleasant breeze remains just out of reach. And all of us hope for a day of rain, to wash away the pollen and allow us to welcome the outdoors in. If the weather report is to be trusted, we may get that day tomorrow.

So, Polydelphia was fun. I did eventually manage to win something! This is a fun, colorful dragonfly pin by Kim Korringa, and I am finding it hard to stop looking at it. I am mesmerized by the wings. I’ve made similar ikat-like blended stripes myself, but I never put them together in this way. I love the combination of stripes and swirls. So pretty. I won’t post images this time of all of the auction items I didn’t manage to walk away with on the second day, but you can see them in my flickr account, if you’d like.

I expect my visits here to be few and far between this week. I have a certain 8-year-old’s First Communion this weekend and would kind of like to have my house in decent shape for the inevitable invasion of relatives. Plus, in an astounding display of forethought (yes, that is sarcasm, in case you didn’t recognize it) I scheduled a swap for this week. So while I’m cleaning the crafty supplies out of the dining room, I’ll be working around 100+ vintage sheet remnants. The current count stands at 116, but I’m still waiting for, I think, seventeen swappers’ sheets to arrive. There could potentially be another fifty sheets showing up here in the next few days. I’m having a lot of fun with this, but the timing really could have been better. I blame the US Postal Service. If they weren’t planning an increase on Monday, I’d be taking my time with this instead of scrambling to save my 20 cents per package

One last thing before I go… I’m thinking of shutting down my radio station. The big thing that’s holding me back from doing it, is that, frankly, it’s cool to be able to say, “yeah, I have a radio station.” But when I think about it, is that coolness really worth almost $200/year to me? I’m leaning very heavily towards NO at the moment. So I’m looking into alternatives. I still want to be able to share my favorite music with anyone who will listen. But I want to do it cheaply and without the pressure of updating my playlist every couple of days. I’ve really fallen down on the playlist-updating part of the job lately. Live365 gives me about 7 hours of playlist time with the package I have now, and unless I rotate songs in and out frequently, hearing the same 7 hours of music is going to get pretty old pretty fast to my listeners. My stats definitely back this up.

I’m looking at last.fm right now. With their plugin for my media player, every time I listen to music on my computer, it is noted on my last.fm profile. Visitors to my profile can listen to a radio station that is built based on my personal listening history. So, if I’m on an Indigo Girls kick, and playing RItes of Passage while cleaning the kitchen all week, my last.fm radio station is probably going to be queuing up “Galileo” for your listening pleasure. And, if I prefer more control than that, I can create a playlist, filled with songs I’ve listened to that I specifically choose to share. I’ve been building a playlist for the last few days, if you’d like to have a listen!

I don’t have any last.fm friends at the moment, so if any of you use the service and would like to be friends, visit my profile and add me.

And now I must be gone.  There’s laundry to fold, a dishwasher to unload, and orders to get ready for shipment.  And I see a certain 5-year-old on the other side of the room who looks like he could use a good tickle

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I found dried blood smears on the floor and freaked a bit...

steph inspected closer and it's something else..

We found Siddy under my display cabinets, she was nervous and spazzing a bit but she's in one piece.

I wonder how the hell that happened?

I seem to be short one lizard.


I just went to check on her; her gargoyle was tipped, her lid was askew and the substrate looked dug up. Ferrets!!?? Xipe says he saw her last night though, after the ferrets destroyed the house, so hopefully, god I don't know...

he's coming home at lunch to help look for her, I'm nervous :(

Ever feel too damned lazy to wash your hair? meh.

Slept funny and then someone left the stupid window open so I was rudely awoken by school buses at 7am. Makes me feel kinda stabby.

Also cut my stupid thumb open shaving vulvas (well, the backs off so they lay flat...) and now I'm down one usable digit. This makes jewelry work pretty difficult...

ugh, so tired

isn't that a fascinating entry?
no.

Here's pictures of my surgery for those who like such things.... *G*

And here is a shot of my incisions - had the stitches removed last Friday and the steri strips are to be left alone and will fall off on their own.

It's really feeling so much better these last couple days. I'm very encouraged that it will be OK in a few more weeks. I have to wear the sling and pillow for 6 weeks total and I have my first PT appointment tomorrow. I plan on calling or going in to see my boss later in the week to talk about coming back to work. I won't be able to do my regular job for a while still, but I can go in and cover the sales floor and do customer service, perhaps in the afternoons. Not real sure how I'll bag fish though. We'll see how things go.

This was originally posrted on Constance Pelkey Designs, comment here or there - up to you! *smile*

So I'm standing there, brushing my teeth in the nude. Deep inside my head Rod Stewart is singing softly and I'm secretly admiring how nice my boobs look in the mirror.

Suddenly, I'm attacked, viciously, unprovoked.
I feel sudden pain in my foot, it's rising fast, up my leg.
I scream and shake my leg, a fat weasel goes flying! He runs back and charges at me again, trying desperately to climb my bare leg using his needle nails to take hold.
I scream again and run from the room, foaming at the mouth (toothpaste ya know). He gives chase! I collapse on the bed, just out of ferrety reach, giggling. He is captured and released to the floor below to join the others of his kind.

the moral of this story? fuck ferrets.

or...
close the bathroom door while you're primping.

It was suggested over in overheardnyc that I share this with you fine folk. Enjoy:

B&N story: I went into one once, leisurely poked around, and picked up a couple books and a magazine. As I did said poking, I noticed another guy poking around at about the same rate I was - walking through all the aisles, reading this or that back cover, etc. I noticed him because he was taller than me, which is saying something, and really skeezy, wearing one of those Members Only jackets and a greasy haircut.

He got to the front counter just before me, where there was only one teller who was helping a third customer with something long and involved, I forget what it was. This guy who moments ago was slowly wandering the store suddenly seemed to be in a major hurry, tapping his feet, checking his watch and making displeased noises, noisily clearing his throat, the whole schtick. He finally piped up and in a loud voice said to the teller "HEY, CAN WE GET SOME MORE HELP UP HERE? JESUS!" She kowtowed, saying she'd page someone, and I said "Dude, leave her alone. Two minutes ago you were in no rush, now you're flipping out. She'll be done when she's done, and we'll both be out of here." He turned around and I thought he'd punch me, then nearly screamed "OH YEAH? I DON'T NEED YOUR SHIT!", threw down the books he had, and stormed out the door.

Those of us that were left stood there kind of stunned. I picked up his books just as another teller came from the back, who had heard his yelling. I told her the story, we laughed, I bought my books, then left.

OK, pretend this is a coherent ending. THE END.

I had a dream that I was sitting around chatting with Bob Blumer. He'd recently had an accident and his face was very damaged. He needed a large skin graft which was taken from his stomach.

He lifted his shirt and showed me this, the strange thing about the skingraft was it had literally just removed the skin. What was left was essentially a window looking into his stomach.

He amused be my swallowing different things which would then float around in his tummy before being digested.

it was pretty fantastic.

http://www.polkadotcreations.com/blog/?p=501

I guess I’ve done a fair amount of polymer clay related travel this year. I hadn’t realized it until two Real Life friends said to me, when I told them that I was heading to Philadelphia this weekend, “you’re going away again?” They’re just jealous And what’s not to be jealous of?

I’m here to sell books and videos at the Philadelphia Area Polymer Clay Guild’s annual retreat, otherwise known as Polydelphia.  I really enjoy my trips to Philly, and I’m not just saying that because of the sales I make.  It’s those sales that make it possible for me to get a hotel room and pay for gas, but I really enjoy the social opportunity.

Yes, I said “social opportunity.”  I know, I know, you may have seen me today with my nose buried in a magazine, or engrossed in a frustrating phone call with my pay-as-you-go cell phone company [who would’t let me “go” until I’d “pay”ed despite the fact that I still had a few days before the minutes expired], or having a chuckle during an IM conversation with my husband.  Those things probably didn’t look particularly social.  And they weren’t.  But with the exception of the phone call, I always stopped what I was doing when someone approached the table.  Just ask Neil.  His end of our IM conversation was so funny, I had to close my laptop lid on him just to keep from being distracted away from my socializing.

Usually when I sell books, I leave it at that, but I happened to have my newest earrings with me, and figured, “why not?”  Glad I did, since I sold two pairs today

It wasn’t all socializing and book selling though.  There was also a decent amount of eating.  And speaking of eating…

If the person who brought in this maple fudge is reading this right now, I just want her to know that whoever she is, she has set my diet back several weeks.  I couldn’t keep my hands off of these delectable little squares today.  So soft, so melt-in-your-mouthy, so mapley.

What do you think of this earring and necklace set?  I know it’s kind of hard to tell, since the image is somewhat blurry, but you see, I didn’t think it would be necessary to have a crisp image.  I figured they would be mine soon enough and that I could take them out to gaze upon them whenever I wanted.  Alas, my ticket was not chosen in the silent auction.  Farewell, sweet Julie Picarello earrings.  I hardly new ye.

Check out this set by Jana Roberts Benzon.  I don’t think the pendant is really my style, but what about those earrings?  Aren’t they cool?  They would look so lovely peeking out around my soft brown curls, don’t you think?  Good thing I have the mental image (and a nice, crisp photo) to keep me company because somebody else won the actual jewelry.  Bummer.

Grant Diffendaffer:  Man of polymer.  Maker of interesting tools.  Writer of amazing book.  Benefactor of unique choker.  Lisa Clarke:  Loser of silent auction.

These are weird.  These are so weird that I felt in no uncertain terms that I must win them.  I must own the weird Kathleen Dustin Smithsonian-caliber earrings and wear them with my Target t-shirts and thrifted sheet skirts.  I put more tickets in this bucket than in any of the others.  It was the last auction item called, and the whole time I was waiting to hear them call my ticket number, I was imagining myself in them tomorrow.  That burst of yellow would be perfect with the skirt I’d brought to wear.

I suppose I don’t have to tell you that somebody else won my weird earrings.

Somebody tell me that there is something cool for me to win tomorrow.  Poor me.  Always a ticket-buyer, never a prize-winner.

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