I'm not dead yet!

See, now this is what I meant when I said I knew I wasn't going to post anything. I've been so wrapped up with Ravelry and Facebook and, I don't know, life, that I haven't put anything up here. At all!

New news from life: I have started taking lessons at my son's martial arts school; a whole bunch of us go together, and it's very fun and kind of physically grueling. I think today's been the first day this week that I haven't been sore or stiff. But it's so empowering when I do the moves correctly - it makes me feel like I'm a ninja or something. A white belt ninja. Woo hoo!

The Boy is kicking second grade's ASS. He's getting good grades, and his behavior is remarkably awesome! He's also really getting into classic, old-school Nintendo - and I am in favor of that! He's an extremely fun, smart, funny, awesome kid, and I couldn't be more proud of him.

In August, I opened a shop on Etsy; The Crafty Hamster. I sell hand-dyed yarn and other stuff. That's the best way to describe it; "other stuff". right now it's coffee cup holders and knitted bags, but who knows what I'll make for it? It's had a slow start, but I'm certain that I will pick up my mojo as I go.

I'm still with Z, still in love, it's a good good thing. We're working out a timeframe as to when we can get a house together. Unfortunately, there was a bit of a financial setback when I lost a lot of hours at work, but I'm feeling hopeful about it. I have polished my resume and am going to present it like a crazy offering to all of the temp agencies in the area.

So not much has changed over the course of a year, really. Still making stuff and loving people. Life is good.

Hum. Been a while since I posted.

So take a look at all the yarn I've dyed recently.



This is everything except the five balls that are being used in other projects. Everything that's in a skein will eventually be sold, once I get my act (and my Etsy) together. If you click the photo, it'll take you to the Flickr page, where I've put notes on everything, so you can find out what I named these. I'm a big ol' dork. :) EDIT: It's part of FO Fridays!

In other news: lots of work lately, despite some of my stores being cut back to once a cycle. There's still a lot of big projects going on regardless, so it's the same amount of work, just in one long visit instead of several shorter ones. I'm not sure what this is supposed to achieve.

WATCHMEN TONIGHT!!!! It should be full of awesome and great.

Are you on Ravelry?

I figure, most people who find this are either coming through Facebook or Ravelry. Now, if you know my real name, you can find me on Facebook... but on Ravelry, I'm "hamstergal".

Now you know!

Playing on Wordle

Got me this:


Now go make one yourself at Wordle.net!

Happy New Year, and some news we can all smile about.

It's 2009!

And guess who's gonna be a knight!

No, not me. But here's hoping the next Discworld book will have his new title on the spine. "Sir Terry" has a nice ring to it, doesn't it?

Here's hoping the rest of the year has as good of a feeling to it. Yay!

SoupyNette

SoupyNette
Originally uploaded by 7 Seconds of Love

I totally forgot that I had uploaded this a million billion years ago.


I then gave it to my brother.

Soup on your head!

Interesting discovery.

Upon Googling my name, I have discovered that there is a model out there with the same name as me. And we're the same height. Alas, that's about all we have in common, as I could easily make two of her with a bit left over mass-wise, but I still find it amusing. This may be why I've gotten some entertaining misdirected emails...

However! Photographic proof shows that I too am a hottie!


With my Favorite Kid.


Going out for the Knight with a few of the girls.


Rocking a bad-ass mustache.

Yes. I do have productive things to do, but choose not to do them. :)

˙ɹoʇıuoɯ ɹnoʎ ʇsnɾpɐ ʇou op

Stand on your head to read this post. :)

¡sɟɟo-ʇsɐɔ ʎɯ ʎnq ǝɯoɔ ˙puǝʞǝǝʍ sıɥʇ ǝlɐs pɹɐʎ ɐ ǝʌɐɥ ǝʍ :sǝʎ ɥo

˙llɐ ʇɐ unɟ ʇou ˙ƃoo ʇnq 'ƃuıɥʇ ʎɹɐssǝɔǝu ɐ s,ʇı ʍouʞ ı ˙op ʎllɐǝɹ ˙ƃuıʇǝıp ǝʇɐɥ ˙ʍou ǝɯ llıʞ ˙ʇǝıp ɐ pǝʇɹɐʇs 'oslɐ ˙os op oʇ ʎǝuoɯ ǝɥʇ dn ƃıp oʇ ǝʌɐɥ ʇnq 'uoos lıɐɯ ǝɥʇ uı sǝƃɐʞɔɐd oʍʇ ʇno puǝs oʇ ǝlqɐ ǝq oʇ pǝǝu ı puɐ 'dn pǝɥsıuıɟ ǝq oʇ pǝǝu ʇɐɥʇ sʇɔǝɾoɹd ʍǝɟ ɐ ǝʌɐɥ ı *ʇuɐldpɐǝɥ* ¡ǝɯıʇ ǝɯɐs ǝɥʇ ʇɐ uǝddɐɥ sƃuıɥʇ ǝlʇʇıl ǝɥʇ llɐ lıʇun sƃuıɥʇ ǝlʇʇıl ɹǝʌo ʇǝƃ noʎ dn-pǝxıɯ ʍoɥ ǝzılɐǝɹ ʎllɐǝɹ ɹǝʌǝu noʎ ˙sɐuɐuɐq ʎlʇɥƃıls os ɹǝʌǝ ƃuıoƃ ǝɯ sɐɥ ǝɟıl

Yarr!

My pirate name is:

Mad Jenny Bonney

Every pirate is a little bit crazy. You, though, are more than just a little bit. You can be a little bit unpredictable, but a pirate's life is far from full of certainties, so that fits in pretty well. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network

Meet Taco

My brother's calling himself "Daddy". Wouldn't you? Meet Taco.


She's seven weeks old, just adopted this weekend, and Dayv and Kris brought her to the family reunion yesterday.


She is super-tiny and apparently made of full-on cute.


She slept over last night, and I got to go to PetSmart and help buy a bunch of toys and stuff. So! Cute! She attacks fingers and will fall asleep on your chest. We joke that she's a lesbian kitty because she snuggles between boobies.

After meeting her, Z and I talked and we've decided we may need a kitty to help warm up his place. More to follow...

EDIT: See more Taco!!!

Just a friendly reminder

Hey kids!

Do you know what tomorrow is?

TALK LIKE A PIRATE DAY!!!!!!!!

You simply *must* talk like a pirate! It's the law in these parts.

In other news - the Kid is enjoying first grade, I recently celebrated five years (FIVE YEARS!!!!) with Z, I am no closer to finishing the second Thelma story, and have written out but not typed out a felted bag pattern. And I learned how to dye yarn with Kool-aid, but I may have covered that already.

It's tough when you never ever blog, and suddenly there's all this stuff to talk about. I've been trying to contact friends from long ago, whether via facebook or some other medium, and have been doing well so far. :) In a way, it feels good to have people who remember who you were, as well as those who know who you are now. Also, it's interesting to see who knows who and how. You do get some unexpected crossovers.

I need to make a point to get back onto irc again soon. I have been so busy with life in general that I just forget. I also need to work on my swap packages! For several lovely people! Also the Minion Hats for the Ravelry Venture Brothers group. Fun!

Natalie Dee says it.

This would rock SO MUCH MORE if I actually wrote in this mofo. :)



Also, Hi Melissa!

Adventures in crafting. Again.

I made my own hand-dyed yarn yesterday. For the first time ever. I know, I'm awesome.

I used Fisherman's Wool for my base, and Kool-Aid for the dye. Grape and Cherry, if you care. :) It still smells a little fruity-sweet. When we laid it out and dyed it, the Kid and I made alternating bands of red and purple, but we muddled it a bit when we put it in the microwave to heat it. It still came out beautifully, though. Look!


My hands are still purply-red. But I don't really care... it was a lot of fun, and I officially have started looking for different colors of Kool-Aid to try it again. (There only seems to be Grape, Cherry, and Lemonade available in the local supermarkets. Sad, I know.) I have most of the skein of Fisherman's Wool left...

This lil' ball will end up being at least part of a hat. I keep picking it up and petting it and smelling it. Hi, I'm weird. :) I hope to do a semi-solid purple to pair it with so it doesn't have to be a teensy lil' hat.

Hm, I did name this appropriately.

It's Olympics time! Once again, my family and I celebrate the spirits of world togetherness and athleticism by sitting on our butts and watching different events at opposite ends of the house. Yay! Well, that is an exaggeration; we are often together watching the same event. But I do find it amusing that as a world, we celebrate our athletes by sitting and staring at them on television. Go irony! As for me, this is the first Olympics that I suddenly realize that I am *way older* than most of the competitors (especially in some highlighted events - I'm looking at you, gymnastics - where the athletes are literally half my age) and super out of shape, so my shoulders and arms are sore from doing extra time with Wii Fit in the mornings.

Ah, Wii Fit. I have a love-hate relationship with my daily routine on the balance board. I haven't seen whether anyone else has a hardware problem with it, but sometimes, my board freaks out in the middle of longer step and boxing sessions, and I have to get off, turn it off and on again, and resume, having now missed several steps, breaking my flow and lowering my score. Yes, I know score doesn't really matter, but I do get a bit miffed. I'm the only one in the house that has this issue, but ever since last month, I'm the only one really using it besides Liam on the balance games. I actually deleted a few family profiles since they hadn't been used. At least I'll be getting my money's worth out of it - even if I just keep losing what seems to be the same five pounds over and over. Whatever. It's better than doing nothing, and even if I weigh the same, I look and feel a bit different. Also taller. Hard to explain.

One of the other things keeping my on my butt is participation in the Ravelympics! During the Olympics, I have taken it upon myself to finish three different knitting and crocheting projects. If they are completed in time, I win. If not, no medal for me! I chase a back-to-school vest for Liam, a Pokemon stuffed toy, and (in the Works-in-Progress Wrestling event) a promise to finally complete that green Megaman backpack I started two years ago and never bothered to sew together. There's time to do this! I'm almost halfway done with the vest already, and I'm feeling confident about the rest.

Another fun treat for me has been my subscription to the Venture Brothers Shirt Club. Oh my god. Awesome. Every week, I get a new, VB-themed t-shirt. My favorite is the Dean! shirt, but they all rock pretty hard. Well, I'm not crazy about the OSI one, but I'm sure it'll grow on me. I've seen the shirts going on eBay for much more than I paid for them, so I'm glad I decided to get in on it when I did. Especially since they only make each design available for one week. Yikes.

Instead of going on a big vacation this year (although I must confess the Disney Weekend in May was rather good), my family has been going on a series of short trips. Camping with our friends at their place in the Poconos. Anime Next (and the kid cosplaying as a Moogle, super cute). Wild West City. The one I'm missing to go to work today, at the Crayola factory. The Butterfly Gardens. One I'm plotting for Saturday to Nintendo World and maybe Jekyll & Hyde's. Many of these are known only to the planner (it's me, mom, Judy, and out friend Donna plotting these) until we arrive at our destination. It's pretty awesome. And I find I can work my weekly assignments for work into four days, so it's easy enough for me to take a day off if needed.

Stuff I need to do: take the Kid back-to-school shopping (ack, first grade!), do my financial aid paperwork, schedule my last six classes. It's too hot to think about school, though. Just. Too. Hot. It's not too bad outside, but somehow my bedroom and living room have become giant easy-bake ovens. Last night I woke up around two because it was so so hot in here. The boy was fine; he managed to get a breeze through his room somehow, but it was stifling in here. I grabbed some iced tea, turned on the house fan (why was it off?!?) and moved the floor fan to the foot of the bed. And fell asleep immediately. I prefer a cool room for sleeping, so summers are not a restful time. Yes, we have air conditioning. No, we're not using it. Unless it goes over ninety-two (or it's horrifically thick and heavy with humidity), it's lower-cost fans.

No fiction lately, although I have been considering some of the early-Thelma ideas. Nothing seems to gel though. I want to get it in gear so I can amuse myself and others. The world needs more humor; I'd be honored to provide it.

Hahahahahaha!

Take that, figure-eight cast-on!

You're my bitch now.

*continues going insane*

No more stealthiness

Just a humble request.

If you happen to read this blog, leave a comment and say hello.

I'm dying to know who drops by.

I can has cheezburger strikes again!

more cat pictures

Wheeeee!

I may have to go with the subscription. But... money... argh.

I will decide by the deadline. :)

eBay again....

Just arrived today!

Because writing letters is fun!

Dear Inappropriate Crush Object,

If you'd stop being so darned clever and charming, maybe I'd stop feeling like a silly teenager whenever I talk to you. So knock it off. Thank you.

Love,
Me.