Crafty Inspiration Has Returned

I started working on this hat last night at my mom's SnB. I think it's going to be a Christmas present for my sister-in-law, Cathy. I'm kinda just making it up as I go along. The yarn is this nice wheaty kinda color, and I wanted a big band at the bottom to look like a woven basket. I'm going to stockinette the rest of it up to the decreases. If I had to go back, (and I could if I wanted to, but I'm lazy), I would do a row of knit after the waffle weave to separate the next few purl rows as a border.

I'm suddenly feeling crafty again. The reason I think is that I've started to think about Christmas, and once again, despite all good intentions I'm miles behind on crafting my gifts. I dragged out last year's Martha Stewart Holiday and my heart went pitter-pat to make some prezzies.

I also owe a few blog friends some special treats, so I should get on those. I think that my recent crafty overload was due to the fact that I was swapping wayyyyyy too much. I needed to take a step back. Sometimes it's nice to just finish some projects for MYSELF, like the socks and the cross-stitch. It's nice to be able to beautify my space with my own handiwork every once in awhile.

OH GOODNESS - I just remembered! I saw my dream book the other day when I popped into Barnes and Noble to check out the new Last Minute Patchwork + Quilted Gifts - so beautiful by the way, I'm totally wanting it. There on the featured items rack was The Dancer's Book of Ballet Crafts. WHAT?! I've died and gone to heaven. A book combining my nerd-like love of ballet and crafts. YES!!! Each project is named after/tied into some classical ballet or ballet character, and they have little footnotes telling the story and such. It's geared a little bit to a teenage girl, but it must be mine! Alas - finance are more than low right now...but this one is going on the Christmas wishlist!

Skipping topics yet again - it was SO HOT TODAY. It's almost October! Fall where are you? Autumn is my favorite season, and I'm yearning for sweaters and cozy food and all that. I was literally weaving with dizzyness while I was teaching dance class today. Our studios seriously need air conditioning. My MacBook saved me today, because whenever I saw that the kids were literally melting before my eyes - I'd log on to YouTube and pull up a dance video for inspiration. I could watch dance on YouTube for HOURS. I found something very beautiful today - my Modern I students are studying Isadora Duncan and I had them watch Tamara Rojo of the Royal Ballet perform "Five Brahms Waltzes in the Manner of Isadora Duncan" choreographed by Frederick Ashton. See the videos in order here, here, and here. The ending of the last video is so beautiful and worth it if you don't want to watch them all.

Cheers, S

Mailorder Sampler - DONE!

This is the "big" craft project that I've been at. I finished the zero when I was stuck in the elevator yesterday. I've been working on this on and off since Memorial Day weekend back in May. It was my first cross-stitch project ever! I'm pretty pumped with how it turned out. My favorite part is the little squirrel :) I'm going to get it framed and put it somewhere in our apartment.

I'm still crafty - hurray! Now I guess I should start hauling butt on some Christmas prezzies!

WTF mate?!

I didn't think that I would be posting today. This weekend was stressful. Nutcracker auditions have fallen upon me and difficult casting responsibilities...it's been a weekend to say the least.

And then the cherry on top of it all fell from the sky.

My co-workers and I were headed upstairs to the studios to hash out the final list, check if the children cast could fit the costumes, etc, etc. Most of them were checking cell phone messages as we got out of our cars, so I told them, "I'll head upstairs and print out spreadsheets for everyone - so we'll be set to go."

I get into the elevator, press 3 and I go up about three feet when the whole elevator stops dead.

Frantic button pressing ensued and NOTHING HAPPENED.

On top of all of the high stress work weekend I GOT STUCK IN THE FREAKING ELEVATOR.

Luckily, I have a good sense of humor so I sat on the floor just laughing at the walls and called my boss. She proceeded to laugh harder than I was and called the fire department. Five burly fire men pulled up in their truck and rescued me from the abyss of about three feet off of one of the door openings.

The whole episode lasted about 15 minutes - giving me enough time to finally finish my big craft project! (Hey, might as well be productive right? Pictures to follow tomorrow!)

Ramblings of a Day

I found this via One Good Bumblebee Blog and couldn't resist!

1. YOUR ROCK STAR NAME: (first pet & current car) -
Bufu Cherokee
2.YOUR GANGSTA NAME: (fave ice cream flavor, favorite cookie) -
Chocolate Shortbread
3. YOUR “FLY Guy/Girl” NAME: (first initial of first name, first three letters of your last name) -
S-Cos
4. YOUR DETECTIVE NAME: (favorite color, favorite animal) -
Blue Sparrow
5. YOUR SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, city where you were born) -
Elizabeth Rochester
6. YOUR STAR WARS NAME: (the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 letters of your first) -
Cossa
7. SUPERHERO NAME: (”The” + 2nd favorite color, favorite drink) -
The Red Mojito
8. NASCAR NAME: (the first names of your grandfathers) -
Emile Eddy
9. STRIPPER NAME: ( the name of your favorite perfume/cologne/scent, favorite candy) -
Romance Hot Tamales
10.WITNESS PROTECTION NAME: (mother’s & father’s middle names ) -
Agnes Alfred
11. TV WEATHER ANCHOR NAME: (Your 5th grade teacher’s last name, a major city that starts with the same letter) -
Brandon Boston
12. SPY NAME/BOND GIRL: (your favorite season/holiday, flower) -
Autumn Rose
13. CARTOON NAME: (favorite fruit, article of clothing you’re wearing right now + “ie” or “y”) -
Plum Dressie
14. HIPPY NAME: (What you ate for breakfast, your favorite tree) -
Cherry Willow
15. YOUR ROCKSTAR TOUR NAME: (”The” + Your fave hobby/craft, fave weather element + “Tour”) -
The Stitching Snow Tour

Fun, fun, fun...

Today was a good day, a better day than nasty sicky yesterday. My mom came over and we ate yummy food from Terra Cotta Pasta Co...deeeelish risotto and we crafted, she knitted, I stitched and I even cooked something! I made baked oatmeal for breakfast tomorrow. The latest issue of Martha Stewart Living has me all hankering for hearty fall food and wool sweaters and baked oatmeal will be just the ticket I think.

As you can gather from the silly photo above the Year of Outfits project is still going strong. I'm having a lot of fun with this. I've always found that posting text everyday was too tedious for me, but this photo thing is easier to commit to. Plus, now that I've got my Mac, when Matt isn't around I can take pictures with photobooth...so convenient!

Cheers, S

Update

I think I'm sick! EW! Or at least sleep deprived, something of the sort. All I know is I taught two creative dance classes this morning and I felt like ppppperrrrrflooooey! So I decided to come home, but I'm on the verge of having to go back for the afternoon, bah. I thought I would take this opportunity to not just piss and moan, oh no, I'll give you the update.

Work: Insanely busy, but working itself into a happy ebb and flow, but Nutcracker auditions are this weekend which = more work for me. Ta-ta ebb and flow!

Craft: What's that? No, just kidding, I've been working on a labor intensive project which is very near to completion. I'm sooooooo pumped that it's almost done, and then I will have proof that I'm not just thumb twiddling over here. I've been getting in my sewing time at my mom's Stitch n' Bitch (how cute is that?) every Tuesday night. Supah fun!

Projects: I'm still plugging away on Year of Outfits. It's really funny to see the photos in a collective group over at Flickr and realize that yes, I'm only slightly more fashionable than a hobo.

Cooking: Haven't been doing a ton of it, but I had crazy luck making this Corn Souffle the other day - I got rave reviews for something other than a dessert - yay!

Ingredients:
1.) 2 Tbsp. butter
2.) 1 pkg. (8 oz.) Cream Cheese, cubed
3.) 1 can (15-1/4 oz.) whole kernel corn, drained (I replaced this with 15 oz of frozen corn, since I didn't have time to buy fresh and cut it - if you do this microwave it BEFORE mixing it in, or you'll end up with a momentarily disasterous corn cream cheese block of ice. I would never do that...yeah right)
4.) 1 can (14.75 oz.) cream-style corn
5.) 1 pkg. (8.5 oz.) corn muffin mix
6.) 2 eggs, lightly beaten
7.) 1 cup Shredded Cheddar Cheese

Preparation:
PREHEAT oven to 350ºF. Microwave butter in medium microwaveable bowl on HIGH 30 sec. or until melted. Add cream cheese; continue microwaving 15 sec. or until cream cheese is softened; stir until well blended. Add both corns, muffin mix and eggs; mix well.
POUR into greased 13x9-inch baking pan; sprinkle with Cheddar cheese.
BAKE 40 min. or until golden brown. Cool slightly. Serves 16.

I found this recipe on BakeSpace which is like MySpace for people who cook. I don't use it very often, but it definitely came through for me this time around.

And the BIG EXCITING NEWS is that I am typing this blog post from MY computer. MY NEW MACBOOK!!! And I love it - it's awesome and amazing :)

Cheers Peeps,

Sarah

Back to School

Our first day of classes was today, and it was...ugh, a long day. I don't want to go in to work dribble here, but the day was less than desirable, and I hope that it's uphill and not downhill from here. Instead of dwelling on the nastiness I will offer a fun picture to you...










I love this picture. It shows my students interspersed with brave, local, non-dancers of all shapes, sizes and ages dancing in the street! Last Saturday I led an inter-generational class at a non-profit fair. It was simple enough that anyone could do it, and every one could experience the joy of dancing in our pretty town. This is an idea that I've been kicking around for our outreach programs for awhile, and it was fun to finally do it, (I got to lead it with a microphone in hand so that half of the city of Portsmouth could hear my crazy teaching-ramblings. It was great!)! I love that there is such a wide range of ages just in this picture - and everyone was doing the same movement together. So cool and so fun!

This is a random tired post, but I just realized that it's September 11th. This day gives me the willies every year...Yep - I've officially run out of words. Signing off. -S

Year of Outfits

So I'm already having difficulties with my new project, "Year of Outfits", because my sleepy husband won't oblige and take arty, blogworthy pictures of me. But this is my outfit for the day. Stripey dress, Wonderland Q scarf, new earrings from Alleeeson. Not pictured: brown yoga pants, homemade socks and black mary janes. I'm documenting everything that I wear for a year, in an effort to discover what I truly use in my closet - so that at the end of said year, I can repurpose, reuse or throw out what does NOT appear in the photos. I don't know why I felt like doing this, it just popped into my head for some reason...

You can view my outfits by visiting the Year of Outfits Photo Pool. This is a nice little project too, because it will encourage me to blog. Even if I don't necessarily have a craft, or delicious meal or something witty to say, at least I will have gotten dressed that morning. Hopefully.

These are a few of my favorite things

Beautiful things in my life today:

my cat, looking contemplative



a work in progress



fresh bread for breakfast



a recently acquired vintage apron



my neglected stove (not anymore after tonight's yummy dinner)




close-up of the amazing hostess tray that I got the last time I was up at Silver Bay



birthday jadeite (at LAST, I'm a collector)



three Ashley G originals awaiting a spot on the wall



*a new ambitious project*
*sewing again*
*laughs with my husband*
*finally a walk on the beach*
*purply pink skies*
*a great summer day*

Birthday/End of the Summer Party

Recipe for a sweet party:

Decorate...





Add good food...

On the Menu: a Cuban inspired barbeque

Mom's Guacamole
Rachel's Mango Pineapple Salsa
Ginger Lime Marinated Chicken
Black Bean and Corn Salad
Mofongo (mashed plantains with bacon)
Jarritos
Ginger Iced Tea
Mojitos and Beer
Coffee with Lemon Cream Cake with White Chocolate Cream Cheese Icing (From the AMAZING organic Beach Pea Bakery)






Gently mix with people that you love...









and ENJOY!



It will be very interesting to see what year 25 has in store for me. If this year's party is any indication of the things that 2007-2008 will bring, I think we're off to a great start. I'm looking forward to a happy new year, new experiences, one more year of crazy, awesome life.