clever-like-a-fox-toberfest

today's post is brought to you by my hilarious incompetence! so i'm blogging from mister man's computer because he's in bed not feeling well watching a movie on my laptop. and blogging about my quilting bee blocks wouldn't really be that much fun without...pictures of my quilting bee blocks. hilarity ensues. long story short, i managed to set one of my bee blocks as his desktop photo. and i can't figure out how to change it back, so giggling, i changed it to me and him tiled across his screen. now to see how long until he notices/calls me out on it and i have to fess up to my crafty-nerdiness.

so my first block comes from belinda at the beehive. she was so organized, and her instructions were wonderful--she'd even made a pdf and emailed it and included a print copy in our packages. and i still think that i fucked it up. mind doesn't look at ALL like the others (well, it kind of does. i mean, i pieced it right, it just looks...off...)





i don't know why i had such a hard time piecing this, but i laid it out with different fabrics in different places like 10 times, and it just never looked quite right. i hope that it isn't terribly out of place with all the rest. :(

i also had enough left over for a 9.5" log cabin-y block, as requested.





and then i started on the wonky star block for brioni at bee addicted 3. this bad boy started out as one of those "seemed like a good idea at the time" ideas. Brioni had asked for wonky stars, and made the mistake of saying that she didn't care what the configuration was, so long as the block came out to 12.5"...so yeah. my block was ambitious, and looks great, but has a LOT of seams! which, in retrospect, i should have pressed all open, but i really wanted the ones IN the blocks to be perfectly matching, so i pressed them in opposite directions, but that made things quite bulky. ANYHOW. it'll be fine once it's quilted, it's just doing its own thing right now...as well, i feel bad because everyone here seemed more than able to make two blocks with the fabric bri sent, but i only managed to turn out one, with VERY little leftover. i'm not sure that i'm up to snuff with these bee ladies. next month, i suppose!





in other news: the man is sick, the dog has been limping and is a suckface, and i don't think that i've eaten a vegetable all day. sigh! better tomorrow, although with less crafting, i suppose.

blogtoberfest, lazy sunday edition

oh my. we had our thanksgiving dinner last night, and i ate far too much, and now i'm feeling bloated and lazy...still. but it IS sunday, and so a lazy day. except that i've got to clean a bit, and i'm going to get going on the blocks for my two bees. i've started on a HUGE block for belinda. they're going to be 18.5" square, which is by far the biggest block i've ever put together, and despite several explanations of the VERY SIMPLE directions for the block, i'm kind of confused. i've got it laid out and it's according to the pattern, but i feel like it still is different from everyone else's blocks....will post pics later, and see. :)

also, i just can't believe how lovely everyone at the quilt festival are with their nice comments. i can't wait to start checking out everyone else's and getting some more inspiration, which is just what i need!

blogtoberfest, NOMtoberfest

this weekend is canadian thanksgiving, and i'm already starting in on the food. diamonddog and i started out early this morning to get park'd, wine'd and going early enough to beat the crowd, as well as to come home and bake before heading to the rents' place for dinner tonight. so far, i've got a spinach, feta & bebeh shrimp quiche done, and pumpkin spice cookies in the oven. but it turns out that the cookie recipe that i had was more of a cake-cookie recipe, so i'm going to just make cake out of it, and hope that it turns out to be yum. yum with cream cheese icing.

i'm also hoping that this weekend will have some good crafting in it as well. i HAVE to get started on sandwiching the wedding quilt for the wedding LAST APRIL. sigh. and, i really need to get started on figuring out what i'm making people for christmas. :P

blogtoberfest: oh yeah!

i kind of forgot to update re: my birthday weekend. i went down to l-town to visit with my lady, miss a (aka bride numero two) over my birthday weekend, and much fun was had. she asked me to be her maid of honour, which of COURSE, i said yes to (silly monkey, of course i would say yes!!), but i'm also stressed about, cuz i might have to speech, and i'm not a good train fluffer, and you don't get much practice time with that. it's like a one shot deal, day-wise. i gather that in that one day, there are many opportunities to hone the train fluffing skillz, but still. i digress.

ANYHOW. much fun was had. we bridal show'd. the only photo i took, which had to be done, was of this lovely cake topper:





and yes, that WOULD be the bride dry humping the groom. on top of your wedding cake. dream? i think so! it kind of upstaged the "classic" bride-dragging-groom-to-the-alter behind it. also noteworthy: the amount of camouflage wedding things you can get. like a guest book. saw that. why you would WANT that tho, escaped me.

next up, we birthday partied with all of the lovely crew down in london--her friends are just DOLLS, and i took this photo. it's a self portrait. of me. grasping her cat like i'm an over-eager 5 year old. and the cat is thrilled to be wearing the tiara that i got because i was the birthday girl. and because i spent the week leading up to the weekend of bridal shenanigans talking about how i really needed to get a tiara just to wear around places. anyhow, here's jel, the most patient cat ON.THE.PLANET.





also, the group was amazed that the cat put up with all this (although he IS a bit of an attention whore) and that i didn't get bit. i think that adrian actually offered to bite me for the cat, since he thought i really deserved it.

this post takes care of a shout out to my lil' bride, and a lovely weekend, and totally justifies the RIDICULOUS photos i took on my cell phone camera, and have subsequently saved as my background photos for my phone. :)

here is my quilt submission. i meant to submit it last spring, but then missed the date, and felt silly about it! so i'm starting early this time around.





this quilt is more or less a denyse schmidt quilt, and it was a gift for one of my bestest girls. it was also one of my first forays into lovely designer fabric--amy butler in pinks and oranges. the orange especially is out of my comfort zone, but it was SUPER easy to choose because the colours were all in the one fabric range, and i just love how the colours come together here.





i had the quilt professionally quilted by one of the women in my guild almost right after i decided to join the guild, so that was a good way to meet people. and she was even extra nice to me as a new quilter when she had to call me to tell me i'd measured the backing wrong and would need to bring her an extra 10" strip of fabric (the pink fabric that isn't striped), which was actually pretty hilarious because now the back has this stupid stripe at one end, because i can't count, and i certainly cannot add. but i think (and my friend whose quilt it is also thinks) that this just adds to the charm of the quilt. and, i guess, it was a good learning lesson...

upholstery class marches on. :)





emily's ACTUAL words "i can see you *muffled giggles*" while i'm trying to have a serious discussion with the teacher about how i'm pretty sure that i've effed up my cutting...which i had, but not that badly.

blogtoberfest numéro 7.

today, i'm going to discuss my insanity at the orthodontist. i've been back and forth (long story) to my orthodontist recently. their records indicate that they haven't seen me since 1999. at which point, i was 17. IN-SANE. but the other interesting part that i've found is that going there, i totally morphed back into my 17-year-old-orthodontic self. i keep forgetting my purse--first in the waiting room, then beside the chair because when i used to go, i didn't have anything, i just went from the waiting room to the dentist's chair and my mom or dad looked after everything. and then i have to remember to pay (boo-urns!), which my parents always handled. and then deal with the appointment (and my 17-year-old self had today forgotten her agenda, which actually, my 17-year-old-self would not ever have done.), and the stupid claim forms and my jacket! all the while the staff is just shaking their head at me, because really, i guess it's not just me that this happens to, but i'm amusing about it.

and i'll leave you with this little bit of intimacy:





yes, that would be my very own teeth, plaster-casted. in fact, i already have a set of these bad boys from circa 1999 in my drawer at home. i should start a collection on a mantle or something. i just find them SOOOOOOOOO creepy, i'm not sure why. so i figure that everyone should have to look at the creepiness courtesy of my orthodontist. who isn't creepy at all, by the way.

ps--i definitely texted this photo to everyone i know with a cell phone! because today, i'm obsessed with my teeth.