This past week has been one of those weeks where all I seem to be doing is bashing my head against a wall in order to solve a problem that those with the control to solve said problem are not willing to do anything about.
Did that make sense? Probably not.
In other words - somebody royally fracked up the budget and I am expected to make something absolutley friggin' fantastic in a non-existant build time with bare bones labour.
So what is a girl to do?
Why go get herself a cup of coffee at the local grocery establishment, and run into this machine:
Can you see what it is? Sorry for the fuzzy pic, but i used my cell phone camera to get the quick pic while i was on my way to teach a knitting lesson.
HOW could i resist????!!!! I could not! So i dug 4 quarters out of my pocket, and took my chances. I am sure you could guess which one of these ridiculous 1" tall Pooh Bears I wanted. Well, 2 choices....and I got.....
Can you believe it? I actually got the one i wanted! How rare is that? Very, if you ask me. It is like buying Kinder Ueberraschung Eier and hoping for the latest cute toy and getting the exact one you wanted (which, by the way, never happened).
I think there is a theme for me today:
the latest picture of Max sent home from Daycare. So damn cute!
(warning: no knitting content today, but there is fabric!)
I am a slacker of a blogger, I know. But i have a legitimate excuse. Several of them, actually.
we opened a show
the baby was sick
fritz was sick
the baby was sick again
I was sick again
Did I mention that the baby was sick? As it turns it out, the entire eastern seaboard (okay, i exaggerate) and their children has some sort of flu-plague :) The adults go quick - but the babies can take up to 3 weeks to get better and that is a lot of diapers, if you know what i mean. So that explanation covers 2-4. What about #1?
#1 is all about LOST AND FOUNDLING, a sort of fairy tale told inside a big box store.
L to R:Susan lynskey, Chris Mancusi, Taisha Cameron, Mark Krawczyck
At first I wasn't sure about designing this show. I occassionally have a mental block with contemporary shows. I think it is because most designers want to create something that is fantastical, be it historically accurate or a fantasy piece (such as THE NEVERENDING STORY - which is our summer show or HEIDI - which we might do next year and i so want to design it!)- which leads to fabulolus elegant fabrics and creating items that are not practical. But I really loved this design because of the every-day quality of the characters. There is a lot of body padding for several characters, ie: saggy boobs, big bottoms and big bellies.
There is also a lovely review over here. Okay, it is the Washington Times and not the Post, but it is a very nice review that actually gives me props. I will now pat myself on the back :) If and when there are more reviews, i will post them. There are always links posted on the theatre home page.
One of my favourite moments in the show is the Never Ending Line - and the song GO SHOPPING by Bran Van 3000 (from the soundtrack for Y tu mamá también) has become the shows unofficial anthem - minus the dirty parts of course.
Here is the video from the band along with the entire song - it goes on a bit - but you get the idea after the first 2 or 3 minutes of how this song fits our strange little show (again, minus the dirty bits of course - 'cause this is children's theatre after all...)
As for my own shopping, there has been way too much fabric buying over the last 2 months. Some I blame on work. I mean, I HAVE to go fabric shopping for working and I HAVE to go to the thrift store where i end up seeing cute fabric like this:
just a fat quarter for 99 cents along with 1 yard of hot pink cotton/poly blend
and then this:
the blobs are about 4 inches wide. i am thinking purse or apron - who knows. I think there was at least 3 yards worth in pieces for about $5.00. Ideas anyone?
But the scary part is this here:
do you see it? look a bit closer....yep! who over owned this fabric before me, had intended to make a jumpsuit out of it, maybe for a 6 foot tall clown, or maybe as a fashion statement...who knows!
no max pics - sorry to the baby obsessed! but he has not been all that cute latley.
I am not one to get into the Blythe craze (tho they are cute and i love the fact that you can change their eye colour on a whim) or any other doll obsession. But one of my yarn customers asked me to make a dress for a Madame Alexander doll as a gift to her niece, and i couldn't resist.
Ms R has given her niece a Madame Alexander doll every year for her birthday and now it is the big one - her Bat Mitzvah. Apparently, they do not make a Bat Mitzvah doll - so Ms R asked me to make one for her. She asked me to copy her niece's dress for the Madame Alexander doll - as well as crochet a little pink kippa (made from Patricia Roberts 2 ply cotton - hey it is a yarn type blog after all).
Here is the original dress:
And here is the doll: It was so much fun to make something that you would know would be appreciated and loved. And it was a great distraction from tech week along with a very sick Fritz.
Our latest show, LOST AND FOUNDLING, opens this weekend. It is a sweet little story (as told in a video here) about a little girl Found in the Mega Price Mart and raised there by its employees...and then it is a bit of a fairy tale ala Red Riding Hood or Alice in Wonderland. I hope to have pics by the end of the week - my batteries died just before the final dress and i wasn't able to take pictures.
and gratuitious baby shot - or i should say baby butt shot:
I say "sort-of" because our honeymoon happened about 6 months after our wedding (as we were busy opening a show the weekend after our wedding. We went to Williamsburg, VA for the historic aspect and Busch Gardens. (We also spent 6 weeks or so working for this theatre in Germany about 2 months after the wedding, so that was our other "sort-of honeymoon") It seems we also went for the shopping. So I bought this jacket for Fritz and he wore it - alot. But the cats liked to claw at it when he forgot to hang up. It had been repaired, and then shredded buy pointy sharp claws again and again.
Well now Fritz does not fit in this lambskin leather jacket and I couldn't just donate it to my costume stock at work - or give it away to GoodWill. So i repurposed it!
I mean, really! Aren't those the cutest little shoes you have ever seen? (okay you might have seen cuter, but just nod your head in my general direction and PRETEND they are the cutest little baby shoes you have ever seen)
I made 2 pair using the pattern found here. The first pair was a plain black pair, no decoration - and since i blew up the pattern 1.25% they are HUGE!!!! Toddler size, at least.
So I went back to the original pattern and compared it to the shoes he wears now (a la target). So I amde the original pattern, added some decoration (he is only 10 month old now and he can't say NO yet - heehee) and they fit Max FABULOUSLY!!!!!!!!!!!!
There is plenty of leather left over. I am thinking baby biker pants!
Wow! 2 weeks already? Crazy I tell ya! Well between the baby being sick and me being sick - not much has been going on.
Well that's not true becasue there has been crocheting and sewing happening and a bit of knitting. And of course there are always cute Max pictures that i need to upload at some point....so let's start with what i have sorted out
Yarn: Cascade 220 in a lovely camel shade, 2 skeins (I did have to break into a 3rd only because I threw out the yarn from the 3 times I started and failed) Hook: G (4mm) Pattern: Crochet Cable Bag, Family Circle Easy Crochet Spring 2007 Changes to Pattern: LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS. I view this Bag as I do a rendering from a Costume Designer. Someone else designed the bag - came up with the end look. But I did all the technical work and created the pattern. The original pattern was not charted and the wording was very complicated and very very difficult to follow, basically not well written. I could not find any links (when i started it in September) that might help. I also lined the purse and added a pocket and magnet snap ( i am a sucker for a magnet snap). It is currently sitting in my "sunshine box"*****
So what i have to say to crochet designers is CHART CHART CHART!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Also, why all the back posting from the wrong side when the same texture can be created with front posting and having the correct side of the work facing you.
Okay enough complaing - I LOVE THE END RESULT. I will make more I am sure. Once i had that chart, it was so easy to make.
I would love to find out how to have a link to the chart i created - it was done on graph paper since there does not seem to be a program for charting crochet - if you know of one, please let me know. People link to PDF's for their personal patterns and i was wondering how I do this. Is it possible with Blogger? Do I need to have a proper server? More research is involved on my part I am sure.
*** A SUNSHINE BOX is a box full of gifts - sort of. When we were little, my Nana had her Sunshine Box (big box with a sun on it) and in it were little gifts. More like the gifts you get out of the bubble gum machine - small toys, stuffed animals, doilies whatever little kids would think were fun. When you visisted you were allowed to pick out one item from the Sunshine Box. So I have always had a drawer or a box in the closet with random little gifts in it - instead of letting someone else pick - i use my Sunshine Box as a place to keep gifts for a future date - for birthdays, holidays, house warming gifts, going out to dinner etc. Some are actually lableed for people and some are just plain random weird things...
It has been a heck of a year, hasn't it? I am not one to write out deep thoughts (unless they are by Jack Handy)...but there has been ALOT happening at Casa de Knit-or-get-off!
Some moments sad, but so many happy! Holidays were the worst - but made fabulous by this guy:
How could you not love that face!?!?!?!?!? Okay I am very biased but i am so happy to have this little guy. Fritz would like you to believe that he doesn't think that Max is all that cute. I have to remind him, that Max looks like him, sooooooo....Fritz must be cute too :)
I am getting back into knitting and hope to have the rest of my presents finished soon. Though sewing is still happening. Like these lovely slippers:
They were modeled after my favourite IKEA slippers. There was a bit of embroidery and embellishment added too. I am annoyed that I lost the second name label for Cathy (these were gifts for my daycare ladies) - but I was running out of time and i had to pick up the baby and get these gifts to them. The gray fabric is a wool that bought years ago in Illinois. It is very soft and drapey, that is until you wash it and felt it (on purpose). The ladybug is an embroidered micro-suede left over from a show and the purple butterfly is woolfelt purchased at JoAnn's last summer. Other than the cost of foam ($2.50) and time, I was able to make these guys for free. :) Free meaning I spent the money more than 6 months ago...i think that means free... :)
My brother also received a version, more manly, and way too big. His feet just seem sooooo much bigger than mine - but i guess not 3" bigger than mine :) oh well. But they matched the jammies i made him for xmas - and of course there is no photo! Why would i do that? As you saw in the previous post, I was way to busy taking pictures of the cuteness of Max!
Happy New Year! Prost Neu Jahr! Prospero Ano Nuevo! (okay i know that there is supposed to be a tilde' over the N but i don't know how to do it - or the Umlauts...)
one toddler, one fat cat and a husband who brings me coffee in bed every morning...what more could i ask for? oh yes! to be drinking that coffee in vienna, austria...
the latest picture of Max sent home from Daycare. So damn cute!
