mint tea at ultimo

Its been a long week. Accomplished some things this weekend, put aside some others for another time….

slightly rotting pumpkin

lizard dance!

Happy Halloween!

springtime dress

Grosgrain has another beautiful giveaway posted. This one is a beautiful yellow spring dress. Now I know its fall and everything, but I just love this reminder of the sun and spring in this time of cold dreary rain. There are also some absolutely adorable halloween costumes for kids. If I wasn’t so happy with my lizard dress, I’d be completely jealous of whichever lucky kid gets to wear one of those creations this year.

Last night while watching Beetlejuice I finally got around to finishing this quick little test of the reflective yarn:

lights on

lights off, with flash

So I’m not sure how bright it will be… I had a really hard time figuring out what to make. I already have scarves that I really like, and I wear a white helmet, so a reflective hat wouldn’t really add any safety value. I figured a cuff would be visible in the summer, and I can strap it to my bag when I’m not wearing it. Fits the bag great, but its a bit small for my wrist. I really should make something to attach to the back of my bag, since thats what is most visible when I ride. This reflective stuff is odd. More like thread than yarn. Think thin but strong tinsel. I’m sort of surprised there aren’t more projects out there that use this stuff, seems like a pretty natural progression for those crafters who go out around cars at night. I think this could make some useful items for your average pedestrian as well as bikers or runners… I see some Christmas presents in my future! Any requests?

my pumpkin friend

So, it may not have been the most productive weekend ever, but I did finally get a pumpkin to carve. I haven’t carved a pumpkin in ages… so I went pretty classic. (I’m snarling at the pumpkin, in case you can’t tell from the photo) And then toasted up the seeds… mmmmm.

We made one of the best salads ever for dinner tonight. Arugula, romaine, cucumbers, tomatoes from the garden, the toasted pumpkin seeds and some walnuts and pecans that I candied with sugar and vanilla. The house smelled amazing while I was cooking up the nuts, made me think of street vendors in NYC. The salad was paired with some mashed potatoes and breaded tilapia… seriously one of the best meals we have made in a while. Its funny, I sew and knit and make things all the time, but what I’m most proud of is a really tasty dinner.

salad

And about that reflective yarn- its more like thread really… I’m going to make a small cuff that I can either wear while biking or strap to my bag. We’ll see how reflective it is. I’m making it out of the recycled noro from the VNA, and basing it around Leethal Knits‘ cuffs… Her work is so amazingly colorful! I like her game knitting concept, too, especially because I often work while watching some cheesy tv show or movie. Hmmm.. a game knit hat while watching Dr. Who…. I think that would be pretty awesome.

What should I make???? The possibilities are endless……

reflective yarn....

He sees you…

The fantastic Where the Wild Things Are cupcakes made by Jes are featured over on Cupcakes Take The Cake today! mmmm…. I wish I had one to eat right now, they were so good!

There are lots of other tasty looking cupcakes over there too. Though I definitely think Jes’s are the cutest of the Where The Wild Things Are round-up. In the spirit of cupcakes, here’s another set… these made by a friend of my mom’s (well, made by her daughter, I think… ) They looked very labor intensive! Some very creative use of candy accents.

Butterfly Cupcakes

finally, a board game for two that doesn't take forever!

Ah Sunday. Time to relax and recoup from the busy weekend and previous week… C is preparing for starting his new job on Monday, and we took a drive out to the new office on Saturday. Of course, I’m probably the worst navigator of all time, so I led us totally wrong to start out with. Once we got on the right road, it all worked out… there’s even an EMS on his way to work, so we stopped by so I could get a new pair of sunglasses since I broke my last pair. Got a case for them this time, too, so I don’t break them again.

We got a bunch of games a few weeks ago, but haven’t had a chance to try them out. Today we finally played “Mr. Jack,” a board game for two where you are either Jack the Ripper or a Detective. Not too bad. I think it will be more fun now that we’ve figured out the gameplay and can focus on strategy. Although, I like Hive, another one of the games we got recently. (Both recommended by C’s sister)  Its got really cool game pieces, and is portable so I like to bring it out to Ultimo for a few rounds. I wonder if they’ll have any fall specials over there… mmmm… hoping for some pumpkin lattes or something.

pumpkin apple butter

crafty night! Started on the pumpkin apple butter as soon as I got home. I’ve never made this before, but it didn’t look too complicated, and seemed like a really good way to use the rest of the pumpkin I had left over from my muffins. I combined a bunch of recipes from the internet, added in a peeled and grated apple. Its pretty sweet, but I bet it will be great on pancakes.

reduce, reuse!

I also made some gift bags for C., since we didn’t have any wrapping. I thought at least we’d have some christmas wrapping or tissue that I saved, but nothing. Turned out to be a really good way to use up the fabric I bought for my lizard costume but didn’t end up using (its actually more of a light lime color, not nearly as dark as the photo). Now off to watch cheesy TV shows and knit. Yay productivity!

Its still a work in progress, but at least it has spikes now!

spikes!

materials

For some reason I decided to be a lizard for halloween this year. When looking for ideas, I saw this great lizard costume on flickr- its super cute and I figured I could definitely make something like it. First, for the fabric… I tried ordering some stretch jersey fabric online, but it didn’t really work out. The green was way too bright, thin and spandexey. The yellow was dull and fuzzy… not quite what I wanted, but at least workable. Last year I bought a green dress from American Apparel for my Jean Grey costume, and realized it would be perfect to alter to the lizard. And this year, it was on sale! I got two, one for the main body, the other to make a hood and tail. A trip to Jomar (very strange store, I like it!) and I got green and yellow thread, as well as a whole bunch of shoulder pads for the spikes.

I wanted to make a tutorial about making it, but I really only photographed the spike part. The hood was rather complicated, and I was too wrapped up in figuring it out to take any good shots. A bit of a how-to for the spikes after the jump…

laying out the spikes

First I wanted to figure out how many spikes to make… I cut the shoulder pads in half, and then a little smaller, based on what looked best. Originally I thought I was going to make a tail, so I made a few too many spikes, but better that then too few, I think.

pile of spikes

I cut the fabric into rectangles, and laid out the pads so I only had to sew down the curve. I left the cut side long so it could be a base for sewing onto the dress. My biggest fear was that the spikes would flop around and look ridiculous. I might look ridiculous in the costume, but it won’t be because of that. :-)

fabric folded under

I folded the long part under like wrapping a present… my goal was to keep the base a regularly shaped size, but I ended up getting a little sloppy about that. I sewed the rectangles down before placing them on the dress.

sewing a spike (bright color!)

Sewing onto the dress was a bit tough, because my machine only has a straight (forward) stitch. If I had a more modern sewing machine, I think I would have used a zig-zag stitch for most of this project… but the singer did well anyway.

As far as the hood- I started out with a sweatshirt that fit nicely, and traced out the hood. However, the dress had a v-neck in the front and back, so I had to figure out how to adjust the hood appropriately. I didn’t have too much fabric to mess with, so I used some of the original bright green to make a mock hood. The join to the dress is a little awkward, but I covered it with a spike.

All in all, its not the neatest sewn project, but I like it! I think I will add some spots or something to the front to make it more lizard and less dragon, but that can happen another day.