13 yr old daughter was going to her second dance. I had vetoed the stretch red satin dress of choice as inappropriate and had offered to make a replacement. I pulled out bolts of fabric, tons of trim, and told her to tell me what she had in mind. I want it kind of like the other one, and I like this green. She chose a mild sweetheart neckline after verifying that I would deem this proper. Day before the dance and we try it on to tearful eyes. MOM, this shows... (no words here just lots of hand motions at her upper chest) Wicked looks carefully and sees nothing inappropriate. (And HOW did we pick that first red trashy dress) "Ummm.... I'm not seeing what the problem is." "THIS!" more arm waving at the upper chest area. Thinking desperately, I grab a beaded green collar neclace and put it on her. She is satisfied, feeling more covered up now. Lip quavers, "No one will ask me to dance. No one would dance with me last time. " Me:" Don't sell yourself short". Well I hate to say it but it was NOT my keen sewing skills that saved the day. She found a pair of sunglasses in the car of her Advisor. When she asked if she could have them, the Advisor told her, "If you wear them to the dance." So she did, and was swamped with invites to dance that evening. Go figure, a pair of funky sunglasses would be a guy magnet.
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Mama’s Holiday Wish List Meme
TodaysMama and GameStopare giving away a sleighful of gifts this holiday season and to enter I’m sharing this meme with you. 1. What is your holiday wish for your family? To have Nana home and well for Christmas. 2. What is your Christmas morning / Hanukkah Nightly tradition? We have Christmas brunch at our house after opening presents. This is complete with scones, bacon, potatos and the MOST important- Sangria 3. If you could ask Santa for one, completely decadent wish for yourself, what would it be? --- ooooh completely decadent? One of those NICE Canon cameras that is the SLR digital and takes HD movies too. I would settle for the Canon Rebel T1i 4. How do you make the holidays special without spending any money? We love to participate in the Noel project with our church. I also have the job of decorating the church every year, this year memorial money bought me new decorations and tree so I got to make it even more special 5. What games did you play with your family growing up? We played Scrabble and Monopoly with Mom, and Grandma and Grandpa taught us Pitch- no real video games till we were older- but I did have an atari and played Pong. 6. What holiday tradition have you carried on from your own childhood? Christmas eve presents- Just one- often a nice set of pajamas so we look good in pictures on Christmas morning 7. Where would you go for a Christmas/Hanukkah-away-from-home trip? I would either go to Jenny's (my stepdaughter in Kansas) or to friends in Detroit- I really want to go to their "As seen on TV" Christmas this year. 8. Check out GameStopand tell us, what are the three top items on your GameStop Wish List this year? OH, we so want a Wii and Just Dance and the Sports resort games. When Wicked's beloved Stepdaughter told her that Grandchild wanted a play kitchen for Christmas, despite being 7 yrs old. Wicked knew it was time to step it up a notch for the "trimmings" for the kitchen. What happened was, after a bit of searching on the internet, Wicked discovered felt food- and decided she could improve on it! Face it, I HATED having to play kitchen with the plastic play food with my kids. You couldn't make a real sandwich- all the stuff slid apart. The pizza came with fake mushrooms on it, which I can't even pretend to eat without becoming sick, and it felt so cold and "unfoodlike". So between my needlefelting and sewing, I have become a food factory! I might even get to where I like playing make-believe again!
Wicked has adopted a great new saying, "I don't have hobbies, I'm developing my post apocolyptic skill set." Eldest birth child also thinks this is a riot! I mean really, when the standard answer has become - "oh yeah I can do that" it may be getting a little much. Of course husband objected when I made him onion cough syrup, with horehound, marshmallow, and golden seal chucked in there for good measure, but by golly it stopped his hacking quicker than that bottle from the pharmacy! I think too many people "specialize" to the point of not being able to do anything else. Its very good to be able to do one thing well, but I guess Wicked is just too darn curious to stop with only one thing. After learning to make my own paper and soap, I had to research how to drip my own lye (you know its getting harder to buy). It was not enough for me to know how to make bread, I had to learn how to capture my own wild yeast. It wasn't enough for me to be able to shoot well, I wanted to know how to gut, skin, and prepare my wild game. So, I'm not feeling too worried about my survival rate at this point. When I stop learning, I'll probably be dead
So, "reality shows" are usually not my thing. I have to admit to watching Project Runway, and my latest favorite- well, I'm not quite sure where it fits in. I have become obsessed with the "Pharaoh" Dr. Zahi Hawass in the History channel series "Chasing Mummies" Sometimes I wonder if they purposefully chose ditzy women for him to yell at or what. I mean if you are going to wet yourself in the Great Pyramid- you probably deserve to get yelled at! When I was a kid I had an obsession with Egypt, and have nursed my eldest child through her own Egypt period. All this Egyptian stuff, got me to thinking about pyramids and I recalled an article in an old threads magazine- many years ago. I had used the instructions they had given for a pyramid bag, to create pyramid boxes for Eldest's 6th birthday party, which had a Egyptian theme. I went back through the magazines and pulled out the instructions, and Voilla! Pyramid bags! I have to thank my fiber arts guild, the Fiber Fanatics, for giving me the idea that they would be great to hold a ball of yarn while you were knitting. Woo hoo- no more escaping balls of yarn scampering across the floor!!
Yes, Wicked has new chickens, and the girls have " A MAN!" We got them from a very nice young man who is raising chickens as a 4-H project. (Wicked has discovered he is trying to raise Phoenix chickens, so she WILL be back- can you even IMAGINE the hats I could make with one of those?) Youngest birth daughter went with us while oldest stayed at home to groom bunnies. We bring them home and just before dark hustle the remaining 4 hens into the hen house so we can put the new girls in there. For you non-rural type folks, a chicken will go back to bed at night, but you have to make sure they stay in there a day so they know that is where they sleep. We were doing pretty good until youngest decides she really needs to hold the last one and opens the cage to pick her up. These are not quite as tame as our older hens and this one was the skinniest, craziest one of the bunch. After 30 minutes of chasing her while she squawked and flapped about. I finally sent everyone in to the house to east supper. At just before good and full dark I watched her go up a cedar tree, that probably hasn't been pruned in 5 years. I very carefully squeeze myself into the tree, scratching up my legs and arms. Moving every so slowly sneak my hand up through the branches and manage to catch ahold of one of her feet, thereby saving her from certain death by bobcat. Does she appreciate it? NO I get a bra full of cedar, and a hearty flapping for my trouble. Wicked thinks somewhere in her family tree there must be fairy godmother blood. I delight in making ballgowns out of odds and ends. I adore fashioning things that make people do a double take. I love creating something out of nothing. I LIVE to make something that will put a satisfied smile on someone's face. This week while working on fair projects I got a chance to make a special order for my cousin/sister. She had just dumped stuff all over for the umpteenth time while going to a social event with food. "I wish I could find one of those casserole carriers that wasn't some sort of Granny floral print" she said. "Well, heck," says I, "They got some great designs on Urban Threads." We worked out details and I started on the most "non-granny" casserole holder ever. Zebra stripe interior and glitzy denim outside with the phrase "I love cooking with wine, sometimes I even put it in the food" Of course she has to wait until after the fair to get it, because it was too tempting to drop it in the potholder/hotpad class at the county fair. Hey, a Wicked has to have some fun!
So what inspires your creating? Do you like to see your creations find homes where they are loved? Despite the fact it is still hot as blue blazes, around here its fair time. This has caused Wicked to go into a frenzy of creation. Having only bullied my children into fair entries in the past- I decided it was about time to put my "money where my mouth was" and enter a few things my own self. Besides, I'm tired of seeing crocheted afghans. So I get out the fair book, and realize that may be all there are classes for! *insert wicked cackle here* So I hereby and now make it my mission to do my part to liven up our county fair. I will enter my skull emblazoned bottle sweater in the knitted household items category. I will enter my "Death in the Roses" hoodie in the decorated sweatshirt category. I will enter a necklace made of tiny handmade books in the jewelry category. Yes, you will probably see a bunch of handmade afghans and scrapbooking pages in the fair this year, but I'm betting there will be a few second takes as well. Maybe it will inspire a few young crafters to jump in there and make something cool!
I like wool, I have always liked wool. What do you expect, I grew up in charge of 200 sheep. They were my college fund, my allowance, my 4-H project- pretty much my life for many years!! Heck my brother even gave me some angora goats as a christmas gift. So I definately have a bias going on. I have been working on perfecting the bottle sweater, so it fits "just right" without sliding off. You see, husband decided he wanted one with a deer skull on it. I think I just about have the pattern right and was knitting away madly while watching my favorite type of television- something that scares the living daylight out of me,, when a random thought hit me. Random thoughts are not unknown to most people, but I have a tendancy to act on it. My bottle of Leinenkugel had been removed from the fridge at the exact same time as husbands. "I bet mine is colder than yours", I told him. Of course, mine did have its custom bottle sweater on its shapely form. Several taste tests later we determined that a beer sweater keeps it cold at least twice as long. Wool also absorbs up to 30% of its weight in water without loosing this insulation factor. Soo.... no need for looking for a coaster every time I want to set the bottle down. Now I really have to finish hubby's beer sweater!
Bottle sweater- based on design from TheAnticraft Cast on 42 stitches on #5 circular needles, join and knit 1 x 1 ribbing for about half an inch, switch to #6 needles and knit until its tall enough for bottle shoulder. Knit 4, knit 2tog one round, knit one round, Knit 3, Knit 2tog one round, knit one round, knit one, knit 2tog until you have 10 stitches left on each side (20 total- this means you have to just knit the last 3 stitches on each side) knit 3 rounds, knit about 2 inches of 1x1 ribbing and bind off. No not short tempered, although with the horrible experience Wicked has had trying to buy a new desktop from HP, it would be well within my rights. NO TODAY I have my mind on corsets!! I have needed a new one for quite some time and am very excited that Monday I will have a friend out and we will both construct a corset. WOO HOO- no more pinchy broken down stays! AND I get a "girls day" to boot. Wicked is browsing sites to find the best antique corsets out there and trying to make decisions on how hers will look. So far I have browsed the VA Museum the Met, Lara's Corsets, a very cool article on a plus sized corset and the antique corset gallery
Now off to my fabric stashes to see what may strike my fancy. |
AuthorWickedStepmother spends most of her time in her castle, and trying to control her minions, to little avail. Archives
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