So there's a huge craft fair in Santa Cruz, a month before I get to California.
There's a Renegade Craft Fair in Brooklyn next week, three weeks after I leave the east coast.
There's another Renegade Craft Fair in Chicago in September, a month after I get back to Philadelphia.

Argh!

Simplicity patterns were all $1 each (usually $8-16 each) and yarn was 40% off. I got five patterns, saving me at least $50 and some yarn: it's thick, pseudomohair, and variegated from black to red and will make a lovely fuzzy hat or something. In patterns I got Simplicity 9000 (some neat square asymmetrical bags), 4966 (awesome, easy skirts that I might be able to use for my photography final project), 4940 (a Renaissance/LOTR style princess/wench/faerie dress for fun and possibly Halloween), 5201 (cute apron for pottery next semester), 4817 (the CUTEST animal-headed terrycloth wrap things for kids, like my brand new cousin).
Oh baby. I love a sale.

have started knitting: did some swatches, did some in the car, first scarf almost done, future projects

made postcards for the froshies

art piece from glass bottles for the garden?

I'm currently at my summer job as a teaching assistant at an academic camp deep in Pennsylvania's Amish country. Armed with only the clothes I could carry and a few books, I am markedly unarmed with any of my sewing and other crafting materials. It seems sort of inevitable that I'd turn to "the new yoga": knitting. It's portable, it's cheap, it can be simple, and goddammit, it'll give me street cred.

I'm off to ask another TA to teach me tomorrow. Hopefully this will be one of those Newfound Life Love things and not one of those Oh Yeah, I Remember When I Tried That (Like All The Hipster Kids) things.

Any advice?

Ooo...I noticed that my parent's spice rack has a big tube of lavender that they haven't touched. Inspired by the memory of best flavor of ice cream I've ever had on the side of that hippie mountain in Mexico, I'm looking around for lavender recipies. I think I may just *have* to make these:

( Oh my god! Lavender margaritas! )

( Lavender Lemonade )

( Lemon Lavender Cookies )

I spent about a half hour of my life today staring at an artificial right buttock for academic credit.

This weekend I have to draw a four foot tall version of my head. I'm absolutely terrified, especially since we went from drawing cubes and eggs right to people. I think I will do about 3095802 studies first, which I don't usually do, because I cringe to think what my first attempt at my face will be like. "Klingon! Run away!"

I finally finished my quilt. It's awesome. I'll probably post something about it in the next few months when i get pictures of it, but I did learn two things from it. First, don't use terrycloth to back the thing, because although the texture is wonderful it collects lint like nothing else. It's also really, really heavy (albiet warm). Also make sure that you're prepared to hand-notch all the denim edges if you want them to fray. It made me want to cut off a finger. The next one I do, if at all, will have fewer seams and be much lighter. But my bed looks really cool- the effect worked.

tester post. why is lj harfing?

Why didn't I think of it before?
I study physics, and there's always an equation or constant or two that I can never remember, and I have to go shuffling around in the text for it over and over and over again. If I make a textbook cover out of grocery bags, I can just write all over it. No more shuffling!

bonk bonk munch, my friend. bonk bonk munch.

So, as you may have noticed, I've been pretty inactive in the last few months. This is because school consumes my life, as does mono, both of which I've had to get through in the last four months.

But now I am home for break and have a new toy (serger!!!) so expect lots more in the next month if I can find myself a digicam. I would also appreciate ideas and references and such for sergers.

Also, I finished sewing the quilt! It ended up being a zigzag pattern of denim bricks with a dark magenta terrycloth backing. The seams are on the outside, but i've been too scared to wash it because i'm afraid of the fraying not working. But I will do that when I get back to school in February.

I want the patchwork to look like the second image here:
http://quilting.about.com/library/01lib/bl01_railfence-qlts8.htm

or rather, that's the general idea. It looks miles better with more contrast and real fabric.

some important things about quilting with flannel:
http://quilting.about.com/library/weekly/aa010215.htm

So twin/twin long beds seem to be 30-39" by 80-85", depending on who you ask. My mattress at home is really wide and my mattress at school is narrow and long.
http://www.reddawn.net/quilt/measure.htm
http://www.specialtylinens.com/sizes.htm

I'm doing bricks of 6x10" finished, so I think my quilt will end up being 72x100" finished. That may cause a problem with the backing (since I'll need to do squares), but I'll deal with that when I come to it- I may not have time to do a patchwork backing.

so i'd say i've put in 2-3 hours tonight, pressing, occasionally stitching, and cutting out bricks for the quilt. I cut out almost 50, and then on whim calculated how many i actually need. I accidentally did about half- I need 108 for a 70x90" quilt.

Oops! what about the bricks on the edges? I forgot to leave a margin. I think i'll just leave them and bind them- they can be a little smaller. it's not worth the hassle the way i'm doing it

so I wrote a long intro to this, and livejournal ate it. so long story short:

I'm making a denim quilt, and that will be the topic of the next fews days' posts. But don't unadd me even if you have no interest, since I'll have lots of pictures of other projects up after I'm done, which is really why you have me added (if you want my personal journal drop an email).

The top will be denim cut from old jeans with inside-out seams so that they fray nicely. It will be cut into bricks (no fancy shapes since it's denim- ie, really hard to sew) and the colors will probably be laid out in a chevron pattern with blues, black, and possibly white.

The backing will be a really soft flannel. Ideally it will be pieced with colors ranging from dark rust to marigold orange, but I'm getting discouraged by the lack of selection. I may run out of time&energy and just use one color of fleece. There will be no batting since I don't need warmth and denim is really heavy.

A few weeks ago someone posted pictures of a denim quilt that they had made with inside-out seams that were frayed in the dryer. I can't for the life of me find this post. Can anyone point me in the right direction? I will be forever grateful.

I'm trying to make one myself- or, at least, something made out of insideout denim patchwork (i'm referring to the technique where you leave the seam allowances on the outside and wash the piece to make them fray as decoration). I'm having trouble getting the denim to fray enough- should I just leave it in the dryer for a really long time, or is it the washer that does the trick? Or am I using the wrong kind of denim, and the right kind should fray instantly? (i'm using a variety of old pants). I also can't decide which way to press the allowance- open and to the side seem to look equally tacky, since seams butt up against each other. Is there a proper way to do it?

Hrm...maybe I'll try overlapping the seam allowances instead of doing them the usual way...I'll post again if I figure this out better. Any thoughts or tips are appreciated, as always :)

Date:	2003-08-02 16:45
Subject:	room dividers and folding screens
Security:	Public
Mood:	lazy
Music:	guster guster guster

I'm doing some thinking about my room for next year. I'm going to be living in a big one-room triple, and there are gradiose plans to triple-bunk the beds and build a slide off the top (my roommates are nuts and not engineers).

But anyway. Since anyone sticking their head in the door can see our whole room at a glance, I think it would be nice to divide up the room somehow, with curtains and/or folding screens so that we can have visitors even if one of us is changing or whatever. We're technically not supposed to put nails in the walls, but as long as we fill in the holes or whatever when we leave I'm willing to do it.

However, I'm not willing to shell out the $75-100 I see for decent-looking folding screens. I'm not necessarily looking for something I can pass on to my grandkids, but I am looking cheap and portable. I also don't have an advanced knowledge of carpintery, nor do I have time to learn that this summer. How can I make/obtain a folding screen relatively easily? And how big is too big? Screens seem to be standardized at three panels, but I'm thinking 4 or 5. Is that unweildy? I found one way to do it, but I'm a little worried about it warping.

I'm also looking for ways to hang room dividers. I found something in Pottery Barn Teen (page 49) that's posts you stick into the wall, 20' of metal wire, and clips to string onto the wire. It's not cheap, but is versitile and nice looking enough to be worth the cost in the long run. Any other ideas? I'm looking for something that will slide easily and will work strung across the whole room (around 15 feet, but the curtain will only cover 1/3 of that). I plan to make the curtain part myself with light fabric.

( here are my ideas for how these will fit into the room )


Crossposted to craftgrrl, digsmagazine, and saucydwellings. (Are there other diy housing communities that I don't know about?)

i've posted 755 comments in my 1+ year with this account.

!!

ok, i'm really really going to sleep now.

oh man oh man oh man.

I am so in love with Gomez recently. Especially Even Song, my old favorite Make No Sound, and the glory that is Rhythm and Blues Alibi.

get! now!

My dad threw a party today that involved lots of his past and present coworkers milling around eating burgers on our lawn. I got into a discussion with one lady and her kids about Harry Potter, and I was suggesting other books to her that are better than potter in the same genre. I made her a list of neat books, and seriously thought about giving her daughters a zine or two, but people tend not to understand when they are handed them out of the blue. So then it hit me:

why not make a zine about zines the "what's a zine?" zine. I'm thinking that it would be pretty short, so that it is more widely distributed, and covers the basics of construction, outlines the idea of zines, examples of existing ones, and provides lots of websites and resources for further exploration. This would be perfect for the person in your life who's curious but doesn't know where to start, or just leaving in random places around town (or papering your local middle school).

So I want your thoughts. Specifically about these two questions, but also reactions and ideas in general.
- Has this been done in paper zine format before? I've seen lots of websites, but not a zine devoted to this purpose.
- Is this something that would be useful/informative?

oh, and want to submit something? :) drop me a line. if i get a chance to finish this this summer i will definately be back for contributions.

thanks!

I am playing with bottlecaps in my basement. I want to make a locket or necklace of some sort, but I'm not sure what yet. I don't know if I should just run around the corner to jewel and pick up a bottle of clear nail polish (or better yet, raid my sister's room) or think about resin. I think resin is really neat and has lots of possibilities, but I suspect it is too big a hassle if this is the only project I do that would use it.

I have discovered a couple of things about working with bottlecaps. First, if you wash them to get rid of that disgusting smell (i can't stand beer, which makes finding bottlecaps a little more challenging) don't leave them on anything you care about to dry- they leave little rust stains. I recommend a paper towel.

All my attempts at reshaping them with a hammer were not anywhere near okay. They look like shit. I think they're going to have to stay their original shape. I was hoping that I would be able to fold in the edges to sort of make a frame for whatever I choose to put in the middle. Has anyone else had success with that?

However, it is really, really easy to put little holes in with little nails. So long as they are the right width for a jump ring, I'm in business. Still can't figure out how to do the locket, though.

Speaking of business, I have work tomorrow. Time to get my ass in bed. I need it, after today.

(nts- locket from mini altoids tin)