Christy Nelson.net's Craft challenge

Through swap bot I signed up for a craft challenge:

Here is a sort of diary of the process:

Christy Nelson.net craft challenge

June 3rd

My package arrived to day and frankly I was hoping for something to cheer my bad mood and it did not. Literally I got a half handful of raffia, a CVS medicine bottle with a small package of blue modeling clay of some sort no labling at all (could be FEMO could be plasticine both work very differently), A crushed dixie cup and 2 sparkly pieces paper/card stock that are 4.5 by 6.5. The letter has the dates for May on it. I’ll be emailing her to make sure I got the right stuff.

My reaction was I paid $5 for this? I am sure I could put something like this together for less than a buck.

Ok I have an idea of what to make and I think I have some things I can add to it which although the directions say I can I feel it is cheating.

At this point I am thinking I am not doing this again. Such a great idea but so far so badly put together. Well I have other things to do tonight so back in the envelope it goes.

June 21st
I didn’t think about it or look at it again until Until today so much was happening and now I only have a few days. I am struck on what to do I received my partner’s craft while we were on vacation so I saw it today and it is so similar to what I thought I have scrapped that idea.

June 23rd
I went to the craft store and picked up sm gorilla glue and some more sculpty. I knew I at least needed the direction for how to bake the clay and I though I may want some other colors.
I took my with me to My daughters swim practice and started to play with the peices and I even cut on of the pieces of paper. I also discovered that I remembered how to make a basket and started on with the raffia. But I still was not sure what I was going to do there was not enough raffia to make a good basket and I didn’t think I had enough at home and I wanted to finish it the next day.

June 24th
I decided finally what I was going to do. We have been talking a lot about Vincent van Gogh in out house and I decided to make a tribute to starry starry night.

I used the start of the basket I combined all the blue sculpty clays I had rolled out a chunk flat and made some ropes too. I punched some holes out of the gold paper and the medicine cup. I cut the bottom off the pill bottle. I baked the sculpty glued all the rest together and mounted on the red piece of paper. I accented the piec with some fabric puffy paint I had in the house.

Here is the result.

Well Voting is up on Christy’s site check out vote for me or one of the others….http://www.christynelson.net/2010/06/june-craft-challenge-voting-2/

Posted via email from geekgirl33's posterous

No Sugar

Thirst and the need for a sweet snack is beginning to take over.  The vending machines call in a soothing hum from 10 feet away. It would take her stepping out of her comfort zone and talking to the parents around her. The teacher parents behind her gossip un aware that every disparaging word about their work is being listened to.
Next to her is the grandmother who’s cell phone pierces through the sound of the gossip and the music piped over the every 2 or three minutes unnerving her as it is. The other three parents who have cared to stay are so riveted watching the kids flip and climb on the other side of the thick sound proof glass that she would never approach them.
The difficulty is that the cute bouncing boy that she is waiting for cannot share in her snacking choices and his class is about to finish.

She will wait the only money in her wallet is a bill to large to put in the vending machine. Maybe he won’t notice the candy bar slipped on to the ash register's conveyor belt with his shorts at the next stop.

observing

She lifted her hands slowly and placed it gingerly on the table. Taking a large breath she shifted her weight to her hands and her face winced as she hefted her frame to standing. Steading her self she leaned over the game table counting squares. With a quick smile that was contrary to her slow movements she announced her move. She tossed her head and cocked her hip. This display was so typical of the coleege student I had spent many hours with that I could almost see long hair moving about her head and a cotton dress swirling with the expected twirl.

She sat hard with a deep sigh and propped her bald head on her hand. Smiling I knew that she was in this for the long haul. She would be back and I would really see the long hair again.

Mid-Life?

I am thinking that this 40s thing is all bunk. I was exited ti turn 40. So much less drama was promising this was supposed to be the decade where I had smooth sailing.

What I wasn’t prepared for was the beginning of the decent.

I am sitting here on my comfy couch cheering on friend around the world as the fight for their lives. My mother too. Cancer has come out in spades. I was somewhat prepared for parental cancers. My Father just won his first battle (rarely is there only one) and my mother just finished radiation and is looking toward medication later this year. But I was not prepared for college friends to start getting cancer and heart problems and spending large amounts of time with medical procedures and tests. We are a few decades too early are we not?

Another friend has posted on her blog if this is mid-life for us. She is not prepared as she has just rewritten her life. I want to rewrite mine just a tweak or two. If this is mid-life am I too late?

Well I don’t want to chance fate but when more divorces start happening I think I’ll feel like it.

(I must give a nod to Stephanie for unintentionally prompting me. Go read her stuff it's better than mine. See ya!)

Writing together

My good friend Heather and I decided to share brain power tonight to get something written.


We used a 4 line structure with the word Clown from "Daily Writing Practice"

We each wrote a first line and then swapped so each one has 2 lines from each of us.  It was a lot of fun and here are the results:


Version VHVH

Laying in the bed listening to the pips and clicks of the machines, I am drawn to the sound of the shuffling-flapping rhythm of footsteps. I slip out of bed and walk to the door of the room, slowly craning my neck to see who is responsible for the flapping sound, but no one is there: the hall is empty. I turn to go back to my bed, convinced it is a hallucination from the heavy medication, and see a brightly colored clown holding a bunch of balloons looking at my body in the bed. "Oh shit," I mutter, "I'm in clown hell."

Version HVHV

The doctor was perplexed by the man's symptoms: wide darting eyes, heavy sweats, stuttering, the hospital curtain clenched tightly between his ashen fingers. As Dr. Jones listened to the halting mutters, he noticed the words evil, red, and harlequin made the man's heart race harder. Dr. Jones' head snapped up fiercely, his face as sour as vinegar lemons. "Who the hell brought a clown to visit someone who is clourophobic?!" he shouted as the smiling painted face of a French clown receded from the curtains hanging on the other side of the bed.

Use the Force to get Coookies! or Come to the darkside we have cookies.

A Few weeks ago some friend posted on face book about their swag they got at the Star Wars: Episode V The Empire Strikes Back Special 30th Anniversary Screening at the Field Museum in Chicago (http://www.fieldmuseum.org/calendarsystem/program_item.asp?ID=1960)

Among the swag was a box of Star Wars cookie cutters. I was in want. I googled, I binged, I Asked Jeeves....to no avail. Today a different friend posted this link to Williams-Sonoma https://enews.williams-sonoma.com/servlet/website/ResponseForm?PlEVTUT-TY-VZ_3z_zmHk.25VT3HklErHksRLspSHILmoFohmtHpsDJht

I half an hour I will call my local WS and see if they have any in. otherwise I am Ordering them on line today.  My little Jedi and I will be making Star Wars Ginger Bread cookies very soon.

Posted via email from MOMMA IS A FAN GRIL

Happy Towel Day! and Towel day take one

The Date: A thursday in approximately November of 1983
The Event: Sprit Week at 32nd Street USC magnet school, Freak out day.

Now give me a break it was the 1980s and we were a preforming and visual arts school.

I post this picture because it is one of the few pictures I have of the tradition of towels on Thursday.

Long before there was an "offical" Towel Day and while the illustrious Douglas Adams still lived and walked amoung us. Before the Movie was mad (But after the radio show and the BBC series)

One of my friend introduced me to the Hitchhikers Guide books and I devoured them several of us did. One of our more fannish type displays was that we began to wear towels on Thursdays to prepare for the Vogon's arrival.

Yes that is me with the bow tie adorned towel. If I had a color copy It would hurt you from my memory of the day. I tried my best to be a hoopy frood who knew where her towel was.

Many other geeky things came out of this picture and another form the year book taken on the same day. But that is for another day and another post.

For more information on Towel Day see http://www.towelday.org/. I have my Towel do you?

Posted via email from MOMMA IS A FAN GRIL