Flooded Lizard Kingdom

In case the previous post is not enough artistic endeavor for you, I give you the results of a performance piece by The Dog, entitled "How I Feel About Thunderstorms."

I suspect it doesn't have as much impact as seeing the piece in person, but neither C-Man nor I had that privilege since it happened while we were at work. The laundry began its day innocently stored in the basket, which was stored upright in the cabinet. C-Man came home to find The Dog trapped in the bathroom with the upended version. There were muddy paw prints in the bathtub as well. He had to disturb her creation by shoving the door open to allow her to escape, but she seemed glad of the trade-off.

Come to think of it, perhaps it was not art, but actually a pitched battle between mighty foes?

Yesterday I did get off the computer as promised and work on a quilt. Though it did not have the mood-lifting properties I was hoping for, I got a lot done.

This will become one of the two quilts for Jped's twin girls:

I'm still deciding whether this blue is a good border (it's brighter in reality than in the picture). It sort of jangles me to add a blue border to a red, yellow, and cream quilt, but adding a red or yellow border looked like overkill. We shall see.

This is the quilt that I was trying to complement, which I got up on the wall in March:

I didn't want to make these two quilts matchy-matchy just because the girls are twins, but I didn't want one to look amazingly more elaborate and complicated than the other. Because of the fighting, y'know.

But here's the question. When you're making quilts for twins, which one is for which?

As regular readers will recall, I declared on October 22nd that I would finish 10 unfinished projects in 100 days. That deadline was January 31st. How did I do?

Well, on November 16th I reported that I had finished three projects, but I neglected to specify which they were. Basically, three baby blankets that had been started a year previously. Quite boring, not worth pictures.

Now I will report the rest of the projects in the order they were dealt with. Summary: 9 completed, 1 with a plan for completion.

On October 30, 2004, I emailed C-Man this photograph:

He must have appreciated it, because on January 1, 2006, at approximately midnight and one minute, he asked me to marry him.

To no one's shock or amazement, I said yes.

This year was very much about getting rid of stuff. I have a very small apartment, and a strong aversion to clutter, so I went on a tear and Freecycled, Goodwilled, Half Priced, Half.com-ed, donated, or otherwise removed a large number of objects from my home.

During the sorting process, I realized I was keeping a number of objects because of the sentimental value attached to them, not because I actually wanted the objects. So I figured out a plan. Digital camera + blog = memory preservation without storage headaches.

Dear The Dog,

You know this picture is a lie.

You look aloof here, unconcerned. But we both know what really happens. Around 8:00 in the evening, you pick up the duck (the same duck that you are so casual about in this photo!) and run around the apartment. Around and around. Again and again. Whining continuously.

What IS that ABOUT?

Love,
The Princess

Someone painted an Austin building like a Mondrian painting several months ago, and I've been meaning to post these pictures I took for my friend in Montana. She's making a small quilt in this style.

One of the things I am thankful for is that I bought 4 cases of macaroni and cheese and one case of spaghettios from Annie's Homegrown a few months ago, so I have something for dinner tonight even though I refuse to socialize today and C-Man is at his dad's which means there is no one to cook for me.

My friend B. had challenged me to create furniture out of the boxes if I couldn't find enough cabinet space. So I built tiered extensions onto the coffee table and took a picture for her, then completely forgot about it for quite some time. But here it is:

You can see how the spaghettios in particular made a nice platform for the remotes. However, I did eventually store all of the cases, so I am also thankful that I have more cabinet space than I think I do.

The Dog and I wish everyone a good Thanksgiving. I made pumpkin muffins, so we are celebrating by not letting her have any.

Before I left for Houston, there was some strange card-switching between the palm-pilot-with-a-camera that UnwiredBen lent me and my happy new Kodak digital camera. (Not to imply that the palm-pilot-with-a-camera, a.k.a. the Zire, is not happy, but since it's not a camera, the pictures it takes are not as good.) This card-switching resulted in a bunch of old photos from the Zire being downloaded to my hard drive. I had quite forgotten about them.

So I present to you one of those photos, taken in early 2005, entitled, for obvious reasons, "David and the Burrito".

That's a refrigerator magnet that someone brought me back from Italy, in case you're wondering.

I've been reading small hands for a long time. It's written by an African-American (I think - this may be my term and not hers) single mom lawyer who does things with crafts and food that make me envious. She signs herself "a."

Recently she highlighted an idea offered by acechick. It's called the finish along. Acechick's concept was to have knitters swap and finish each other's languishing projects, the ones that are practically done but just need finishing. Finishing is apparently some technical knitting term that surely involves witchcraft.

a. of small hands proposed a variant where you commit to finishing your own unfinished projects and post the pictures on your blog as you go. She set herself a deadline: 3 quilts, 100 days. She's already finished her first one. I never thought I was that big on white sashing, but with the quilting she's done it's quite lovely. All y'all quilters out there should check it out.

I have 9 projects sitting on my quilt rack waiting to be finished, after having spent $3200 on a new sewing machine in March that I have barely used yet. Some of these projects just need quilting and binding, one needs borders. I hereby commit to finishing them all in the next 100 days:

From left to right, oldest to newest:

• Alien baby quilt, started in 1998 for myself. I made a replica for a friend's daughter, but never finished my own. it needs quilting.
• Round fish quilt, for me. Started in...1999? Needs quilting and binding.
• Tiny paper-pieced wall hanging, I think the block is called Oddfellows. Started in Boston c. 1999, needs quilting and binding.
• Lightweight flannel that needs to be made into a super-large baby blanket. I made one already for my sister last fall when my nephew couldn't sleep without being swaddled. I had so much trouble with it that I wanted to use starch on the second one, but then it took me forever to buy starch and now I'm afraid of it. Note to self: deal.
• Bugs quilt, which I bought the fabric for two years ago. It's for my nephew Nicholas, who is now one and a half. Needs quilting and binding.
• Lizard baby blanket with ribbon "tags", needs quilting. I made this prototype for myself this spring to figure out how to make the green one for my nephew, which is next.
• Green "tinkertoys" blanket with ribbon "tags." I dreamed up the idea while visiting my sister in Colorado a year ago, because my nephew was in the stage where he was obsessed with grabbing tags on clothing and trying to eat them. This needs quilting. It will be for the new baby in my sister's household, since by now my nephew is past the tag stage.
• Ocean quilt, for my friend E's baby daughter. I got it pieced before she was born this spring, then it fell by the wayside. Needs quilting and binding.

And on the wall:

• Crop circles quilt, started as a holiday present for my ex-husband in 1999. Though I wish with all my heart that I could do over the machine applique (it's a mess), I'm not going to. It needs squaring and probably an additional border to stabilize it, then quilting and binding.

100 days from now is, I think, January 31st. Time to get moving. After all, my sister's having another baby and Jped and his wife are having twins, so I have three more commitments behind these old projects!

For the purposes of this joke, the word "OOL" means "cube."

This sign was around for two weeks:

Then these appeared:

This is my souvenir from NYC, where C-Man is currently vacationing. Have I mentioned how much I love this man?

Editor's Note: For those of you who are mystified by the image, go here. Or ignore it. Totally up to you, no hard feelings either way.

I have now lived in this apartment for just over two years. I'm surprised that I didn't mark the occasion of moving in here with a blog post - instead, it looks like I didn't blog at all for May and June of 2003. I can see why that might have happened. I was exhausted from grad school and finally ending a relationship that should have ended long before.

The move into my first "alone" living situation was absolutely bewildering. I couldn't figure out what to buy at the grocery store. I remember being on the phone with my ex-husband at midnight saying "I don't know when to go to bed!" His response, gently: "Well, are you tired?"

I have now figured out when to go to bed (after I should) and what to buy at the store (not the Whole Food whole wheat tortillas, because although delicious they are only 6 to a package.) And surprisingly, I am also in love.

I made a card to email to my mom as a PDF so she would get it while she's sick instead of several days later. (OK, I actually emailed it to my Dad to print out and give to my mom, since he's online more often.)

Thanks, anonymous graffiti artist who decorated the bus stop corner at 21st and Rio Grande. :)

Damn winter.

It's going to be a very good year.

I had seen a brief email about sorryeverybody.com and apologiesaccepted.com, so when I saw this billboard:

...I connected it with those projects in my mind. But it's not that at all.

Instead, it says this:

Dear Everyone,

We are sorry. As Christians, we are instructed to love everyone unconditionally. We know there are many people who claim the name of Christ but don't show the love He instructed us to.

For every time we have judged you, we are sorry. For every time we have hated you, we are sorry. For any and every time you have experienced anything but unconditional love and respect as a beautiful creature of God, we are sorry.

We see the way you have been treated and it hurts us because we love and respect you. We offer no excuses, just our sincere apology.

-The Christians

Hmm. Not sure what to make of it. I'd rather get respect as a human being instead of being forced into someone else's conception that all humans are beautiful creatures of God, but that's a minor complaint.

(For those of you in Austin, this billboard is in the parking lot of the Kerbey Lane on Guadalupe, where the Marines' recruiting billboard used to get defaced on a regular basis.)

See, I do exist. Here's proof.