It irritates me to no end when I get sick on my vacation and spend my precious time off miserable instead of relaxing and resting. Why is it you can't sleep when you're sick, the time when you most need to be doing just that? I spent a lot of time attached to a heating pad, standing in a hot shower, or trying to boil myself in the tub. Not only is my head 10 pounds too heavy with gross sinus infection, but there is not enough heat on this planet to keep my cold cold bones warm and the body aches at bay. This morning seems moderately better, so I'm sitting here at work, too amused by the fact that my hands don't seem to be attached to my body. Sudafed does strange things to me but I didn't have any other drugs in the house. I need to go buy knock-out stuff tonight so I can sleep.

Got to the homestead before noon on Turkey Day. We did not have turkey this year, but had a pot roast instead, and did a much smaller spread. We need all the fridge space we can get for all the family and food that will be descending this weekend for my brother's wedding. I did not come down with the ick until later that night, so I at least had a fun and plague-free Thanksgiving.

Christmas sales seemed very disappointing this year, and we felt no strong need to get up before the crack of dawn. We wandered out to the mall at a respectable hour to look around. Mom took me to an upscale consignment shop where she bought me a few new things to replenish my gutted wardrobe. My boots were there, never been worn, for $215...in a size 8. I jumped around and babbled about them to Mom, bemoaned their size, touched them lovingly, and then cursed at them for taunting me. It was quite emotional. They were beautiful. Spent the evening with Lucas' future in-laws over at the house, ate dinner with them, and talked wedding while he went out with his groomsmen for his bachelor party.

Saturday was spent in IT mode, because it never fails- one of the children is home for a break, and something has gone wrong with a parent's computer. Mom's got a really nasty bug that disabled every avenue you could think of to try to eliminate it. So after a few hours of that we just backed up her stuff and nuked it. After spending 6 hours tearing the house apart looking for her OS install discs. It's really awful listening to your parents stress out about technology; "who touched my stuff", and :who won't listen", and "why does this always happen". By the time we were leaving at 5 on Sunday she was up and running again. I am back on board for looking at a Mac.

Sunday was a late breakfast, gathering things that had spread all over the house and re-packing, and then Mom, Amy, and I went to see New Moon. ( Cut for quick blathering. Head is too full of snot for a proper review. )

And then I came home to starving kitties, put clean germ-free sheets on my bed, cranked up the heating blanket, and zonked out after flipping wistfully through the new J Peterman catalog.

Friday I went out with Naiad for her photoshoot with Chris Florio. As is photo shoot tradition, I got to carry stuff and throw out ideas for poses that other people actually listened to. It's like having puppets on strings. Dance! Muahahaha!

It was REALLY nice not to have to worry about being presentable, or getting anything done, or having to be anywhere at a particular time for two whole days.

I did nothin' for nobody all weekend and it was great. A surefire way to turn you and your cats into useless paperweights for 48 hours straight? An electric heated lap blanket.

I have three knitting projects going right now. Sure all my knitting is for other people, but the process of knitting was for me. So it was fun. The heat-seeking cats even snuggled butt to butt with each other, and joined powers with the artificial source of warmth to generated the heat of a small sun. On Sunday they both ran downstairs and jumped onto the couch where the blanket was and looked at me expectantly until I turned it on again.

Luckily there were lots of bad yet entertaining movies on TV this weekend, so I had something moderately engaging to listen to while knitting without being so good as to be a distraction. I will admit to watching Demolition Man, Troy (whyyyyyyy?), and bits of Mr. and Mrs. Smith, which was too much fun, so I had to switch to Waterworld. That is one long ass movie. I took a break and finished looping all my rag yarn together while watching The Secret of NIMH yesterday morning. I love Don Bluth. I love Justin, but maybe because he reminds me of foxy Robin Hood.

I don't think I'll ever get the hang of knitting without having to look at it. Bad things happen when I try.

I started thinking about Christmas decorations a bit yesterday. I won't be able to decorate during Thanksgiving, since it won't be at my house this year, the weekend after is just a tiny bit busy also, and I feel bad waiting until the middle of December to put up a tree! So I'm thinking of just doing the mantle and little things in the downstairs. I got some cute casual red and white dishes from my aunt so I'm thinking peppermint this year!

I feel like I haven't really left my desk chair. The weekend was a blur of motion and things and happening. I'm already looking longingly for the weekend, except this weekend will not be still or quiet or restful either. If by Thanksgiving I have not succumbed to some sort of plague, donate me to science, for I will surely have the cure for what ails you hiding in my veins.

The outcome of all this kinetic energy? ( If you care! )

I wish it had been longer!

Saturday I spent dissatisfied with my closet and its failure to produce an exciting vampire outfit for Nick's vampire birthday party, but I had a lot of fun! And I was happy with how his present came out, and SUPER excited I actually finished it on time!

Any time on Saturday not spent scowling at my closet was spent flailing about the house. I tried to get started cleaning up for the pumpkin carving gathering I'm hosting tomorrow night in lieu of the usual yarn night. But a lot of the Halloween party stuff is still incomplete and in limbo and spread out EVERYWHERE. I was getting distracted and kept trying to work on that stuff instead of clean up, so not a lot of progress was made in either corner of that fight. Starting to panic...running out of time! Ack!

Also found out my parents are going to pick up the furniture we're all buying from my aunt and uncle next week, and will be bringing it all down Halloween weekend. Which reminds me I have utterly FORGOTTEN to measure and write up a listing for my bedroom set. I'm in a bit of a bind because I don't know if I can mess with selling it while I'm trying to get ready for the party, but by the time the party is here and done, more stuff will be arriving and I'll have a whole extra bedroom set just...handing around. Bah.

Sunday morning left me just enough time to take a shower and get ready to pick up people to go to the state fair. It was cold! I liked it though, it meant I could eat lots of hot fried food. I had alligator tail! It was really really good! I also had roasted corn and apple cider. I was seriously contemplating doughnuts, but I thought that might have pushed me over the edge. I regret not taking the doughnut dive. The new fair food this year was a "pig licker". Chocolate covered bacon on a stick.

Michelle won first place for her socks! Very exciting.

There were also cows, and bunnies, and little baby chicks...and goats, which all of my loving friends were happy to point out at every opportunity. But there was always a fence between us, so it was okay.

I had to hit up the grocery store for pumpkin carving dinner stuffs, and to get a pumpkin! For some reason when I got home last night I thought I'd be hungry, y'know, because it was dinner time. So I made food, sat down, and just stared at it before putting it in the refrigerator. By then though, I'd already thrown stuff in a crockpot to make tonight's dinner. I think I'll be pretty good about taking my lunch to work this week. Making foods on Sunday is really helping to keep me on track!

I went out to a local theater on Saturday morning for their costume sale. I found a pair of jodhpurs that fit juuuuust right. I put on any weight, however, and I'm out of luck. Pants styled before zippers take a terribly long time to put on, especially when the button holes are tiny! I went digging through my closet after I got them home and washed and I think I have a pretty good aviator's outfit now!

Michael and I picked out yarn for his Griffyndor scarf, and spend the rest of the day playing with sculpey and making things for my Halloween party.

There is a giant heinous hairy spider that keeps building a web on my sliding door, so every time I open the door to go out, the web goes slack and gets all tangled. For awhile the spider disappeared and Michael and I were both pretty nervous not knowing where it was, until we saw it show up again to start fixing the web.

I got my upstairs cleaned up pretty well, and spent Sunday running errands and spending an embarrassing amount of money on little stuff like organizer bins, hangers for skirts, and toilet paper. Man, that stuff can add up! But my laundry closet is now an OCD-pleasing grid of white organization. I can't promise I won't ever get so bad that I will only buy certain size packages of certain types of paper goods because it just happens to fit on my shelves just right.

Sunday night I cast on for Michael's scarf and got the first few rows done while Pirates 3 was on tv. I was consolidating baggies of catnip into a glass jar I found at the craft store, and Zuzu was absolutely wild for a while, and then slept for the entire rest of the day almost nonstop.

I kind of stalled out on laundry, and have several piles of clean laundry backlogged that need to be folded tonight. While I was organizing I thinned out the closet a bit more.

Food, drink, party, rock band, wash, rinse, repeat!

Two birthday celebrations this weekend, and some crafty in between. Also, apparently, old movie watching. In the crate of VHS tapes Mom unloaded on me were taped copies of Lady and the Tramp, Rogers' and Hammerstein's Cinderella, and The Sword in the Stone. The Wizard of Oz was on TCM last night for a grand finale.

Saturday I hit the flea market with Eric, Michelle, Amy, and Lucas for the last weekend until after the state fair. We were looking for top hats and didn't find any, but we did find nice vests for the boys. After everyone split I wandered around for a bit and found a good booth we'd missed earlier. Lots of old metal bits and pieces, reclaimed door knobs, and hardware.

I am an irresponsible birthday party attendee. I never seem to make the time to sit down and contemplate birthday gift ideas until celebrations are right in my face. Also of a hinderence is my compulsion to gift The Perfect Gift of crazy crafty creativity.

So I added Eric, Cassie, and Matt to my I.O.U. list of birthday gifts.

I like to think I worked off a little bit of that bad karma by spending my weekend puttering with Eric's present. I'm having fun with it but yesterday I was all over the place jumping from one detail to the next before I'd finished what I was working on. I didn't settle down and get focused until evening. But it should be done this week!

I realize I did not blather on about what I did LAST weekend! I went to Carowinds with le crewe, and zipped around on roller coasters and ate lots of food. Ta da!

This past weekend was recovery from three weekends away. Saturday I cleaned my house, ran errands, restocked my fridge, and spent a lot of time paying attention to the cats. They ate it up and were so happy they spent Sunday in bliss-comas or something. All they did was wander from one nap spot to another or rub all over the newly vacuumed carpet. Michael finally saw the cuddly sweet side of Zuzu, and Zuzu realized Michael generate lots of body heat, and contentedly curled up on his butt when he flopped face down on the window seat.

I sat Michael down to watch Newsies, which I finally went out and bought. It turns out that my plans to create a steampunked newsie don't even have to be nefarious or diabolical because 24 seconds into the movie Micheal is coveting every hat in the movie.

I cooked! I think the arborio rice was fully cooked sooner I thought it was, and so might have been a little overdone, but I haven't cooked anything using arborio before and was too busy scarfing other peoples' risotto dishes to really pay attention to the texture of "done" rice. Whether it was over cooked or not, it was delicious.

( Creamy Rice With Roasted Shrimp )

The long weekend didn't go as planned, but was enjoyable regardless.

I took Friday off, because I was supposed to go camping with my parents for the weekend. I got into town Thursday night, and got a haircut Friday while they packed up stuff and things. I have bangs for fall!

So we drive down to Myrtle Beach, pull into the state park, and thy are COMPLETELY booked all weekend. They have one spot for tonight, if we want it. My parents were shocked, and then mad at themselves that they didn't think to call for reservations. I guess everyone got on that "stay-cation" bandwagon and stuck close to home, or did less expensive outings. Dad swore, got all bummed out and disappointed, and swore some more. They were really looking forward to it, and once I got myself umplugged from everything for a few hours and started thinking about all the naps I could take, and fires I could poke, I was all revved too! Bummer. But we thought maybe someone might cancel their reservation, and we'd already packed up all the stuff AND driven two hours to get there, a night might be worth it. So we start unpacking...and the camper is broken! We started cranking the pop-up and it wouldn't stay. It just sort of slowly sank right back down. Dad attacked the gearbox with his toolbox up until he realized there was probably a very large spring coiled up in there ready to explode in his face. So we packed up and called it quits while I secretly wished for a hurricane to rain out south carolina. Consolation prize: all you can eat crab legs at a buffet on our way out of town.

By the time we got home and put everything away Friday was shot.

Saturday was camping-at-home. I started reading a new book, resumed knitting on an old scarf project, and realized waaaaay after I'd passed it that I flipped the design not once, but twice! Go me! Saturday night was Indochine, and a quick stop at Target to pick up Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box. It ate my brain. It's so much fun but I feel like a great big moron! All weekend every time I set the DS down to go get something or step away, I would find Mom or Dad working on the current puzzle.

Sunday and Monday blurred together and Monday it rained. And rained. And rained all the way from Wilmington to Raleigh. I didn't want to sell Monday short and just get in the car and go, so I left late. Along with everyone else on the eastern sea board. Bumper to bumper traffic the whole way up and a trip that should have taken 2 hours took 4. It got so crazy there was a car driving the wrong way down 440, into oncoming traffic. It's not like they just accidentally crossed the double yellow, no. They were on the wrong side of a concrete divider that stretched for miles. And it was still raining. So I got into dry clothes, fed the cats, crawled into bed and solved more puzzles.

My air conditioner blew, I suspect, last Tuesday after a power outage during the day. I did not catch on to this fact until Thursday night when I got home. Darling brother was nice enough to play with fuses, which failed to solve the problem, before setting up a service appointment for today. Thursday night sleeping on the couch in icky heat was no fun. Last night was considerate enough to bring a cool front so I could sleep upstairs with the bedroom door open and all the fans I own pointed at the bed.

Sib came over again this morning to wait for the repairman. $113 and 35 minutes later I am told I have a functioning air conditioner again. Hooray! In a sudden and spitefully timed taste of Fall, today's high is 65 -_-;

Last Thursday I finished knitting my cocoknits rag bath mat. ( knitting babble )

My "away every weekend gallivanting across the countryside" seems to be starting early this year. Like, a whole month early. ( traveling )

Too much to do! The weekend felt way way too short but it was full of stuff! I got a lot done, and still managed to whine to myself on Sunday night that more wasn't accomplished, or even touched. I bounce around from wanting to do a little of everything, to wanting to spend huge chunks of time on one single thing and nothing else-don't-EVEN-try-to-suggest-other-activities. A lot. This weekend was "a little of everything". Until I got to Sunday night when I wished I had another two days just to sew stuff.

( But! )

I slept until noon really quite easily on Saturday. It was awesome.

I did some sewing. I finished my first corset. And will give it away to someone bigger than I. Boo for following directions! I can't think I failed at measuring that badly. But it turned out nice! And I learned stuff! And there were 56 grommets!

Now I do things my way. Haha!

To make myself feel better I did more sewing NOT on corsets. Yay Finian!

I watched Kakashi Gaiden and it was good. Happy happy awesome. Little Kakashi was such a brat.

I bought fabric for my first tied bustle over-skirt. Michelle came up with the awesome idea of putting on our own sewing class, since everyone likes to dress up but several think their sewing machines have developed a taste for human blood. So basically a bunch of girls will get together on a handful of occasions to swear like sailors, tame the iron beasts, and come through the gauntlet with pretty pretty dresses.

I think we should have a "graduation" tea party at the end!

This weekend was sewing!

And sleeping. On Saturday at about 11:30 my Dad called and jokingly asked if I was still in bed. "Uh no, no of course not. I'm awake, and downstairs. Doing awake things." He knew I was lying.

He was bored and I know this because my dad never calls just to talk. But it's crazy role reversal week, as Mom has been the one out of town and Dad's been home by himself (he mostly works from home now). So I got stories of the errands he ran and what the cats have been up to. It was really funny, and also kind of nice.

I sewed spats, and started work on my first corset! I am being a good girl and following directions this first time around.

Last night I had weird Harry Potter dreams. I was Harry, or at least viewing from his pov. There was a parade/celebration going on and Dumbledore was leading it like Merlin ala Disney's Sword in the Stone. Dream jump! Then there was a curse that prevented anyone from being able to say "Harry Potter" or "Dumbledore". Another dream jump! Post-Dumbledore, and I/Harry have to start solving the riddle in the fake horcrux. I/Harry sit down with Luna, not Hermione, to puzzle it out. Luna is a better fit for cracked out dream plots.

I spent this weekend well and truly vegetating. I left my house only on Sunday to go find bead organizers and buy a light bult for my refrigerator. I spent the rest of the time sleeping, doing laundry, and playing with the cats. It was much needed and very lovely. I am a bit recharged because now I am wishing to do the weekend over so I can have that time for projects!

The problem is I don't know where to start. As always.

Last weekend I threw a really great party with rootbeerwoman and had a lot of fantastic people over for bunches of fun.

I don't remember Sunday.

Monday was work, but it was okay because...

Tuesday and Wednesday was not work. Instead it was playtime with Mom and Grandma.

Wednesday night I got lit on fire at least twice by a pyromanical Will. Oh and Michael pushed me off a cliff.

Thursday was a lot of work which was no fun, and then it was sleep time.

Friday was work but it's Friday so yay.

Saturday people are giving me influence over their wardrobe and I'm shopping for wedding veils with Amy and jeans for Michael. I am going to make him put on the emo kid skinny jeans and tell him they look good and he'll believe me because I teach him all kinds of things all the time and I don't lie. Ever.

Sunday I'm going to wear a tiny tiny skirt and watch Harry Potter. Hopefully Sunday doesn't get more complicated than that because I'm at the point where I'm forgetting whole days (see last Sunday).

Yum.

So Amy and I threw together our birthday party this weekend. By which I mean we planned it and came up with lots of awesome ideas and spent a lot of time in party, craft, and fabric stores, but did none of the work until the week of. Yay!

Everything got done, however, and we had a lot of fun doing it. Although Lucas probably won't let her come over and play for a little while because she was at my house almost every night last week. :)

I have fantastic friends. Despite having to drive home late at night, they travel miles and miles to come to a party, and they dress up in costumes and don't bat an eye when I send them out into my neighborhood, in daylight, for my own amusements. I waited a year before unleashing the true crazy on the community. The HOA can't stop me, hahahaha!

The original premise for the party game was quite different. It was going to be clue-driven but when we were trying to come up with riddles and things to lead the victims guests from one location to another they all came out really really lame. But we were so tired that by Friday night at 10 pm they were also really really hysterical. So we scrapped the clues and just slapped the locations on a map and said "Go!". Each location had a photo prompt for the group to play out.

The Wonderland Clue Hunt

So this weekend I pretended I was in college again. I ate a LOT of pizza, and was up until wee hours of the morning with no naps during the day.

Friday night was Clockwork Ball, and it was really fun, and really toasty. Especially in layers of crinoline and taffeta. But it was worth it because this was a really fun costume! I am totally in love with the skirt I made.

And despite loving the curly bouncy wig I bought for Cheetara last fall, and for a few costumes since, I never thought I was a good blonde. I think I have to change my mind about that now. Hee!

I didn't get any good shots of my awesome mini top hat though. For such a little hat, I still managed to run into stuff with it. Go go awesome feather plumes! And despite circumstantial photographic evidence that may indicate otherwise, I was totally sober the whole night.

We got a lot of funny and amusing looks walking five blocks from the parking lot to the club. They were just jealous that they weren't also going to an awesome party.

Saturday was Transformers (it was okay), and italian ice (yum) and a lot of Michael Jackson music videos. Sunday was brainless vegetating until going to McMullens' for celebrations!

I came home and almost immediately climbed into bed with some comic books before zonking out.

I'm really thinking it would be fun to organize a tweed ride this fall...

Saturday I spent lots and lots of time at the fabric store getting ideas and materials for the unbirthday. I am finally settled on the Queen of Hearts, and am moving forward! Before I can work on that one though, I have to finish my outfit for Friday's clockwork ball. Yay bustle skirt! ( cut for babbling about bustle skirt! )

Sunday was paint party, and prep for paint party! It was hilarious and after I got past the artist's block I had fun actually painting. It has been awhile.

Not much happened this weekend aside from the doing of nothing.

Friday night I flopped onto the couch and stayed there, telling myself I would do productive things later. That sort of set the tone for the weekend, however ^^

Saturday morning Michael and I went out to the farmers market and lusted after everything. He bought a bunch of food gifts for his family vacation. We were at the doors when the seafood place opened up for lunch and then I dropped him off to pack, and I crashed for a good nap. Unfortunately I'm useless after naps, and once again did nothing constructive.

Tiggy had an adventure on Saturday night. She was at the glass doors in the living room like she always is, and I was at the computer so the living room had gone dark. I can only theorize that Something got too close to her territory (regardless of the fact that she can't do anything about invasions or investigations of neighboring wildlife on the patio) or startled her in the dark, but out of the blue she is screaming and slapping the glass, and spraying the carpet. By the time I got my heart out of my throat and got lights on, there was nothing to see outside. I got to clean up cat pee and soothe a bushy Zuzu, who had been sound asleep upstairs. Tiggy spent the rest of the night on guard with her nose pressed to the glass. I have no idea.

Sunday I ventured out with Michelle, Amy, Nicky, Eric, and Chuck to the fairgrounds for an agro fair and perused the weekly flea market stalls. I ate nummy ice cream and Eric stood between me and the goats. SURELY as a grown adult I was big enough to take on the goats...except then we saw the grown adult goats and they are the size of small horses! I suspect steroids. Beware the bearded roid rage.

I took a little vacation this weekend and visited the homestead for Mother's Day. It was plenty fun, and Dad went with us to see Star Trek and it was completely awesome. I ate a lot of seafood.

Yesterday I took the day off work to take care of a bunch of appointments and things that REALLY needed to get done that just wasn't happening after work or on the weekend. Like all my laundry- which I swear has somehow become a never-ending chore instead of a once-a-week Saturday afternoon job. It's finally sinking in that I can no longer "clean the house" in an evening like I could with the apartment. I can clean one floor of the house in that time. Plan accordingly and stop getting cranky that I cannot bend space and time to my will. Yet.

I met my new doc. She is nice. Except she is flumoxed by my (again) elevated bp when there is nothing else that can explain it. I get to go back again for a morning appointment because there was no way I could fast from midnight until 2pm for all the bloodwork. Also, I got a bit of a sunburn (all the odd spots, like the tops of my feet, and stripes around my tank top I didn't get covered), and got a tsk-tsking from the doc. Because she couldn't find anything else to scold me on. Except for that damn bp.

The state of my house yesterday did not leave much time for cosplay, and now I'm beginning to panic. My fabric for Kyoshi Warriors HAS NOT ARRIVED. I would call, but that will have to wait until tomorrow because, well, I'm not done with the other stuff yet anyway. I feel a bit reclusive (or, conversely, I have just been extra extra social this past...year.), but now it's crunch time and I fear I will be hunkered over my sewing machine for the next week and a half. Sorry in advance for not saying hi, and if you do see me, for the glazed over seam-allowance-calculating going on in my dazed expression.

I made a prototype of the arm bracers and I am sufficiently satisfied with them to make the rest. I am going to assume everyone can wear one size (velcro has been utilized, for adjustability) and fly by the seat of my pants.

I hope my pants have strong seams.

Away!

Strawberry applesauce is a little bit weird...

Saturday was spent enthusiastically entrenched with the kyoshi warrior armor prototype. And by 10 pm I realized I had not made ANY progress, and had ripped out everything I had attempted to finish on it that day. The hazards of working without a pattern...

So I futzed with sleeve design from scratch for Maylene's dress, which I was able to sew up the next day with absolutely no problems.

Then I was in a good mood again and started in on the gussets for the dress, and went into train wreck mode again. WTF.

I am the plaything of the cosplay gods. But I'm pretty sure I can get the dress done tonight, and maybe even get the cuffs and buttons sewn onto it and have it REALLY done. I still need to keep an eye out for an appropriate shirt to go under the dress.