Author: cycadia

Flamingo Part 1

Posted on by cycadia

While visiting my mom this summer, I worked on some cross stitching.  She dragged out one she’d been working on and asked if I could finish it.  “Sure Mom!”  I should have looked at it first.  It’s a super ugly flamingo (Cover Band Name?).  I’m a bit spoiled by my current projects.

Most of my current patterns are easier to read. These new projects have colored charts with symbols and they are much easier to work with.  Not to mention all the colors used with the ugly flamingo are very close together, so it is hard to see what you are doing.

To top it all off, penciling was used to show the area’s that had been worked.  That’s not so much the problem, I’ll probably do the same.  But diagonal lines were used.  Visually the printed, black & white pattern is just bananas, and then to add gray pencil diagonal lines on top of it? No wonder she felt as if she was going blind working it!

tribble, flamingo 054tribble, flamingo 056

And don’t get me started on the back of the work.  I like stitches to be neat and it almost looks like the work was done in rows.  Disaster – a complete disaster.  It’s a bit hard to see here (ed. excuse potato), but I did the not-pink section.  You can see the difference.  I’m such a cross stitch snob.

Back of Flamingo

I may have to wash it before I go to much further as well.  There’s some weird baby powder/lavender thing happening that assaults my nose when the hoop gets too close to my face.  Which, for a teenager, happens more than you would think.  There must have been some strong hand lotion in the mix for the odor to linger like this.  Maybe I’ll just hose it down with some febreeze and see if that helps.

Hope you aren’t reading this Mom!  I love you and am super happy to be helping you out! 🙂

Clo Clo

Posted on by cycadia

Sometimes I speak like a teenage girl, cause I’m cray cray. I don’t remember the exact conversation I was having, but it involved me telling my son to put something in the closet.  Or “clo clo” as I put it that day. Lightbulb!

Clo Clo should be a female led indie band.  Something like Frente.  Go listen to their cover of “Bizarre Love Triangle”.  You’ll thank me later. Unless you don’t and then you are dead to me.

Tribbles

Posted on by cycadia

Logan decided that he wanted to be a red shirt for Halloween this year.  Easy enough.  I’ve got this one! Years of Star Trek experience has led me to this point in my life!

First was finding the shirt, I chose this one on Amazon. Most of the reviews were right.  The shirt does run small around the torso and long in the arms.  However, the adult men’s small size worked for a very skinny 12-year-old. Shirt acquired, Logan thought it would be funny to add tribbles to the costume.   How awesome is that?

I wasn’t going to shell out $20+ each for a ton of tribbles.  So I found this easy pattern on Craftster.  I pretty much just scaled the pattern to about how big I thought most should be, and then cut the fabric either smaller or larger to give my tribbles some different sizes. Pattern in hand, it was time to find some fur.

Buying the fabric was fun.  Not.  Jo-Anne’s Fabric actually had several kinds to choose from.  So the costume wouldn’t be too crazy, I chose two different fabrics I thought looked good together.  I got 1/4 yard each.  It was folded over and is enough to make a ton of tribbles. While shopping, I also found some grey IKEA ornaments that looked amazingly like tribbles.  Not sure if they’ll make the final costume yet!

tribble 026 tribble 037

Since the pattern instructions are already handy, I won’t rehash that here.  But here some things to keep in mind to make it easier!

  • When cutting the fabric, make sure it’s fur side down.  Make tiny snips with just the tips of the scissors.   This helps keep you from cutting off the fur.
  • Pay attention to the “grain” of the fur.  If it is running lengthwise to the pattern, it will be much easier to sew on the machine.
  • That being said, I made about half with the fur running across the pattern instead.  It gave the tribbles a little more variety.  This really only matters if you are making a lot!
  • Loose fur gets everywhere!  Including inside your sewing machine.  You’ve been warned.

 

tribble 050For the grand finale, I tried used clear thread and just basically looped a bit through the fabric of the red shirt and the tribble. Then tied a knot.  The clear thread is made of Nylon and doesn’t knot very well. So, I ended up switching out and using traditional brown thread instead.  That decision saved my sanity a bit as it is much easier to see!  I did two loops for each just so they wouldn’t be flopping around too much.  I tried to put them on so it looked like they were falling on him from above.  There is even a couple on his back and a few on his treat bag!  I ended up not using the grey IKEA ornaments.  They were just too much of a contrast to these, plus I only had four.  How sad for me, I just have to use them as Christmas decorations!tribble, flamingo 050

Paved Babies

Posted on by cycadia

Paved Babies came to me as I was walking with the Family.  Sometimes we like to go for walks in the afternoon. I’m pretty sure I just misheard someone as we were walking.

A lot of these band names come from mishearing someone  — since someone always likes to talk to me when I’m walking behind them.  I can never understand a person when they’re not facing me.

Paved Babies – I imagine this to be the name of a heavy metal band.  It seems like a perfect metal band name to freak some of the more mundane people in the world. I by no stretch of the imagination advocate paving over babies or using babies as pavers.