And a Happy New Year

I'm exhausted, and ready to hibernate for a week. BUt first! Here are some pictures of the things I have been working on (and completing!). Click the pics for descriptions, and whatnot:
Jewelry Pouch

Hand-painted, Hand-stamped Christmas Cards & Gift Tags

Robot Stamps in Altered Box

Crochet Baby Cap & Patchwork Cube Frame

Softie Cupcakes

The beautiful, gigantic quilt my mother made for us!

Feed me, Seymour!

I'm STARVING. I made pork shoulder, mashed taters, and green & wax beans for dinner. That's almost balanced; unfortunately, I used the last of the milk in the potatoes, so I'll have to make up the dairy group with peach yogurt for dessert.

Anyway, dinner has been ready for almost 40 minutes, all desperately trying to stay warm in the oven. My husband is not home, yet. I'm not gonna wait much longer for him!

Stuff to look at:

Arrrrghhh! The sweetness! it's killing me!


Gift tags my mother made. This isn't the best picture of them, but I tried! I'll have to make up one of those awesome lightbox thingys she linked me to in my last post X]


My stamps now have a happy little home in a re-purposed cigar box ^_^



Okay, I'm going to go eat my dinner now. Alone. I hate this stupid recruiting job *pout* -_-

Give it to me baby

I want THIS. I need THIS.

Goalies are hot

I've got to finish 2 Snowflake-themed ATCs, and a holiday-themed Dotee Doll today. Also, I will drag my sniffly ass to the post office.

While I'm here (again), I finished that mermaid Dotee Doll:

She's already on her way to her new home =]

In other news, I got in a big fight with my husband on Sunday, and we're still barely talking. He thinks I spend too much money at the craft store. I spend about 10% of our after-bills money at the craft store. Much less than that now, since I started working, actually; I don't use his money to bankroll my hobby anymore. Honestly, I think he's stressed out to his limit, and having issues with the fact that, yeah, I'm working now, but I really love my job. I'm tempted a "neener" here, but that would just be childish x_X

I explained to him last night that I really don't like being in charge of the bills and budget, and that if he would like to do it, he is perfectly welcome to the task; however, if he is going to trust me to take care of the bills and budget, he needs to trust me. I think it was effective; we slept in the same room for the first time last night.

We need to trade in our SUV for something smaller. I really don't want to; I love my car (btw, it's only "my car" when we have to buy gas). We spend 40% of our after-bills money on gasoline ($3.45/gal now). We drive 160mi every weekend to get the kids (round-trip); other than that, we don't really go far.

It's totally worth it, to see my kids whenever I want to, though ^_^

CRE8R

OMG, this cold just won't go away! I've fallen behind on 2 of my 1 on 1 swaps =[ I have them packaged & ready to ship, but I've been sleeping like shit, and during the day, just kinda...being. Staring at the walls. Well, not really. I've been making stuff, too, but, yanno, that's just what I do.


These are some of the stamps in my sketchbook that I am carving for December.

The robot faces and heads will all be individual stamps, and I am going to put them together with a nice blank journal, some ink pads, and metallic gel pens for Isaac, for Christmas =]

I'm planning on using the Christmas-y stamps on cards and gift tags.

The skulls are really just for me, but I think I'll make one up for my swap partner in the Skull Love Swap.

I love carving the Staedtler Mars erasers, but how do I get rid of the raised pattern on them??! =X I don't want little swirlies on my penguin -_-

I also need something wider; I wonder if they make different sizes of that eraser?


This blog is so fun, and has incredible patterns, including these two here!
Some bitsy elf clogs, and peppermint stars, made for a 1 on 1 swap (I traded them for a mix CD *full* of awesome Christmas music). These took me about 2-3 hours to make them all, but I took time out for dinner:


Damn, I make some GOOOOOOOOOOOD cheesesteaks!!

For dessert, we had fried plantains, with ginger & cinnamon (sorry Mom, I just love ginger ;) Oh oh! We also had these:


My yellow pear tomatoes! The only two that ripened before the cold weather killed off my plant *sniffle* There are almost 2 dozen baby tomatoes on the plant that are all shriveled up =[

Still, it's the first time I have gotten edible fruit from my garden (and I've been trying for almost 10 years!).

They were delicious =]

Flight of the Busy Bee

Cripes! Where haven't I been??!

I went to the emergency room yesterday. Severe dizziness and nausea. I couldn't open my eyes without falling over, because I was sooo dizzy.

Survey says:
Severe vertigo, caused by infection in my throat screwing with my inner ear.

I went to the E.R. for a COLD.

Anyway, this is what I have been doing lately:

Mermaid Dotee Doll


My first amigurumi ^_^ Cute little teddy bear, modified from a pattern in this Softies book. Excellent book for learning to make softies, but only one amigurumi pattern I wish I had more....and I wish I had more yarn!)


A couple sketchy drawinglings


A new ATC! This one has some tulle across it that doesn't show well. Come to think of it, all these pics are kinda blurry. Symptom of this wretched cold I've had =X


And, finally, some Skellington ornaments I've been working on. I really like how the mouths came out =] They are done and stuffed now, just haven't had the daylight to snap a new picture!

I need a nap.