Beer Garden

For Valentine's Day, I got Eric a beer-themed gift.  In addition to this shirt and this beer yeast stuffed animal,

I got him this beer garden to grow.  I really do love ThinkGeek.  And he loved his gift.  Well, on Tuesday, he finally pulled it out and planted the hops.  After soaking the barley and wheat per the instructions, he planted those Wednesday.  The hops, which were planted first?

Nothing yet.

But you see those shoots in the backrgound?  Barley & wheat!  Already!  Look.

Barley.

Wheat.

At the rate those two are going, it's likely that while I've typed this post, they've doubled in size.

So why am I telling you about this?  Because you get to hold Eric accountable to taking care of this garden.  Now it can't be neglected, or we'll have to tell you all.

(He says this makes me accountable too, but nuh-uh!  I've got a brown thumb!)

Update:  I think these things might take over our bodies in the middle of the night.  They have to be alien plants.  They're getting so huge so fast we can practically watch them grow.  Look!

I mean, look at this guy!

He's already sprouting!

Mooshy Belly Birthday

This Friday is the first birthday of our nephew Zach, on Eric's side.

So in addition to two very cute outfits (one with a dinosaur, one a puppy), three books (one animals, one vehicles, one mythos), and a CD (Free to Be You and Me), he's getting a bunny I made.  Hope he loves it!

Artist Spotlight: Part Forty-Four

You've met this chick before, Teresa Rusk of TRusk4U!  In addition to her online store, she's still got her brick and mortar store, in North Carolina.  And you can keep up with her on her blog.

So what's new with her?

Well, my favorite is this necklace made from a wire wrapped foreign coin.  If you have coins left over from a vacation and want a great souvenir of your trip, she'll custom make one of these for you!

Other than that, she's still making her gorgeous pieces, like these.

Be sure to check her out!

African or Asian, do you think?

I'm proud of this guy!  I made him in just about one day, though I did cut out the pieces the night before.

All the sewing and stuffing, though, was in one day.  He was a lot of work, but I think he came out great.  I found the pattern online a while back, and hung onto it, since I knew I wanted to make an elephant for my nephew.

And today I'm spending the day with him and my sister, so I wanted to have a surprise to bring with me.  I hope Avery loves him as much as I do!

The slate blue is the great, soft fleece that I bought at Joann's back when I won that gift card.  I got the yellow felt that I used for the feet, trunk, and tail at the same time, to make Avery's birthday crown.  

And believe it or not, the plaid is an old flannel nightgown of mine.  I retired it, and kept it as fabric!

I love being able to recycle.

And I was happy with the elephant even as I was making him.  As soon as I had most of the body together, I could see it really taking shape.

Once I had it together correctly, that is.  Because seam rippers?  Best invention ever.  Yeah, I accidentally started to sew the right side of the belly to the wrong side of the back.  Realized when I had it 2/3 done.  Oops.

You know what's ironic?  Remember CTBS standardized tests back in grammar school?  Remember the questions where they'd give you a picture of a flat, open box pattern, and then pictures of 4 or 5 funky-shaped boxes?  And you had to pick which box would be made if you folded the pattern shown?  Well, I aced those.  Couldn't get 'em wrong.  I used to be able to see in 3D like that and test at some crazy level.

So where'd that go?!  How is it that the kid who couldn't possibly get one of those wrong can now sew a stuffed animal together incorrectly?  Sigh.  I thought it was innate, but maybe it's a skill that needs a little practice.  I know what that means.  It means I need to make more stuffed animals!  Mwahahaha!

Well, I finally got him together properly, turned inside-out, and then he took a crazy amount of stuffing; I felt like I was stuffing and stuffing and stuffing him!  He couldn't be mushy, though, or he wouldn't stand properly.

In fact, I'm especially proud of that.  This is my first stand-alone stuffed animal!  Cool, right?  And he's still soft, too.

For his eyes, if you're wondering, I used yellow embroidery floss.  I considered buttons, but this is baby-safe, and at 16 months, Avery is at that "eating everything" stage.

Now I'm just waiting for his verdict!

Shared with:

What's doin'?

A lot of life has been happening, so I thought a "what's new" post might be in order.

For instance, Eric and I went to our very first opera!  We saw Wozzeck at the Metropolitan Opera House in NYC.

This awesome chandelier was right int he lobby.  Fab!

We chose Wozzeck because Eric was pulling for a German opera and because it was only 1 hour and 40 minutes.  Plus, it was touted as being pretty twisted, dark, and intense, which we both like.  What we didn't realize was that box seats can be really cool, but you definitely want the lower level of them.  We had to go into this passageway, which was neat.

It's hard to see behind that railing, but there's a door there to the lower tier of the box.  The door at the top of the stairs was ours.  Our box had just the two seats, so we loved that, but it did mean a bit of straining to see the show.  We also didn't count on the fact that a lot of this particular show took place in the downstage right corner (the corner most difficult for us to see).  So that was kind of trying.

And the last bit we didn't know was that Wozzeck is known to be a great example of really discordant music.  Of which I'm not a fan.  I actually don't like jazz.  (Gasp!)  Eric loves it, so he loved pretty much everything about this opera.  I'm bright enough to realize that the orchestra was freakin' phenomenal, they really were.  And I enjoyed a good portion of the music.  But then there were those jarring bits.

So this was probably not the best starter opera for me.  The voices were incredible, the story engrossing, and the acting terrific.  But it wasn't 100% me.  I definitely want to go back and maybe see something a bit more traditional.  Maybe Italian and more melodic.  Betcha I'd like that 100%.

We definitely enjoyed getting dolled up for the occasion, even though some of the people there were wearing jeans.

Sigh.  What's with the jeans, people?  OK, maybe a red gown and a black suit were a little much, but how about a skirt and blouse?  Nice pants and a sweater?  Jeans?  Really?

Then again, jeans to a Broadway show kind of make me cringe too, and you see that all the time.

In other news... we have daffodils!  You'll remember that we moved into this place in September, so we really had no idea what Spring here would be like.  Turns out we've got some daffodils in the front yard.  So bright & cheery!

And, in keeping with the theme of yellow and happy... we've got forsythias too!

I've also (finally) been decorating my office the way I like it.  I still have one more wall to do and a few more knickknacks to bring in, but it's pretty good so far.

And then, this past Sunday I did the annual MS Walk with some friends.  It's our 11th year doing it.  Most of those years we've done the Manhattan walk, but this year we chose to do it in Ridgewood, NJ.  Nine miles, and my legs are still sore.  If you're keeping score, it's now Wednesday!  Ouch.  We did see some new sights, though.  Like this front yard with a strange sculpture thing happening.

I'm still trying to figure out what they were going for.  I kinda like the flowerpot as a piece of wall.

And the skulls in the coffee pot were definitely interesting.

This little guy was cute.

I'm just not sure what the correlation is between the broken brush and the baroque electrical plate.

Or whether the sneakers really fit with the theme.

The best photo I got was when I got home, though, and Eric posed Meg with her newest stuffed animal.

So that brings you up to date with our lives.  How about yours?