Autumn Zebra

I've been too tired and busy to update my blog once a day! I'm currently trying to draft a sleeve for an Edwardian top; the sleeve will have a close-fitting undersleeve and then a top sleeve with a poufy top and close fitting below the elbow. Unfortunately the pattern instructions for a close-fitting sleeve I have ends up creating a sleeve that is far too tight at the top. I think I might actually have to make a sleeve that is BIGGER at the top than a NORMAL sleeve pattern to make a close-fitting one for me! My upper arm is too big. Here is my pattern drafting table, a hive of activity. Wine is important. Two pattern drafting books, 3 rulers and 2 triangles (not all visible), a giant roll of paper, tape measure, smaller paper, pencil case with pencils and pens, more books and papers with instructions and notes, thick cardboard to sort of "extend"the table. Out of view - calculator, folder of drafted patterns, box of small paper, paper scissors, cellotape, masking tape...

Using the pattern we used in Industry Skills to make a hat I haven't shown you yet, I decided to make a paddington bear hat for my Mum. I was sure that paddington bear had a yellow hat, but when I looked it up it tended to be red. My family remembers it as yellow however, which is all that matters because it supposed to be like a paddington bear hat to Mum; other people don't matter. To my delight I found the following materials. A cotton with yellow ducks on it, and a water proof (resistant?) yellow material that I was hoping existed, and did, and wasn't that expensive. Then, here is Plucky the duck modelling the hat front and side.

I don't know if I'll have time to write anything later, but I am too tired now to do anything proper, so here is a picture of the two giant monitors I have at work. (It is like having walls, of being at the stock exchange, or something.) And the ergonomic keyboard I inherited. And the mouse which annoyingly has to have a cord because the keyboard is already wireless and the mouse that came with it is decidedly right-handed and I need to even out the pain caused by computer usage by using my mouse left-handed. Everyone else at work hates if they have to do something on my computer (like check out some Vistarism because my computer is the only one unfortunate enough to have Vista installed) because they can't use the keyboard or the mouse properly. Ha ha. The wallpaper on the monitors is some kind or massively magnified photo of some chemical crystal, but I forget what it was now.

The NYU Child Study Center in the USA ran a series of ads, briefly, fashioned as "ransom notes" from mental illnesses. The ads were pulled after numerous people complained and a petition was started to end it. The purpose was to raise awareness about childhood psychiatric illnesses, but the people who complained were adults with the illness as well as parents of children with them. This is the text of the ads: We have your son. We will make sure he will no longer be able to care for himself or interact socially as long as he lives. This is only the beginning…Autism. We are in possession of your son. We are making him squirm and fidget until he is a detriment to himself and those around him. Ignore this and your kid will pay…ADHD We have your son. We are destroying his ability for social interaction and driving him into a life of complete isolation. It’s up to you now…Asperger’s Syndrome We have your daughter. We are forcing her to throw up after every meal she eats. It’s on...

G doesn't like buying Christmas trees and stuff, and last year we didn't have one. It was very sad. So this year, we didn't go and buy one early enough, and I didn't want to wait any longer so on Tuesday evening I made one out of three small branches from a tree in the yard. It is very sad looking. It is about as high as the mantle piece. The cat was initially scared of it, but now she likes getting the decorations out of the bucket holding the tree. I need some lights for it because I love the lights. A few years ago I made something better. A wreath. I seem to be completely incapable of using any medium other than fabric for any activity, and it took me a long time to get even remotely good at that. I had tried to make wreaths out of branches, etc, but it didn't work (and the bases you can buy are ridiculously expensive) and I found inspiration and instructions for one of fabric. One doesn't really need instructions, which is good because they were either wron...

I thought maybe I should do a post a day until the end of my holidays, thus catching up on all the non-posting that has been happening. I've been busy reading stuff on Live Journal (if there weren't so many talented people in the world I wouldn't have this problem) and also I have a new forum I really like that I've been posting to instead. This is what I wore to my work-do; we went to the races. I've been wanting to make a 50's dress for a while, and this seemed like a good opportunity; races are a good opportunity to dress feminine, even if it is just your average boring horse races. Obviously I needed a new thing to wear since it was an EVENT. And all EVENTS need new clothes. It's the meaning of life. Generally planning and making the clothes is more fun than the EVENT itself. First off, I drafted a new bodice pattern and made a mock-up. It worked great. I copied and modded the pattern so I could make something like a rereleased pattern I had a picture of...

Do you think one could bake a cake/batch of biscuits/whatever every day for a month? The main problem, it occurred to me, is that you would have to eat a cake every day as well, which might be a bit excessive. One could bake a cake every weekend for a month, but that is only 4 times and not terribly exciting a goal. One could bake a cake every week for a year, but maybe that is too long? What about other experimental cooking; it wouldn't be good if it was neglected. It could be one of cakes/biscuits/bread/similar foods each week for a year I guess, that would be good.

I made some bread from my Moroccan cook book; this is half the recipe and you are supposed to make 3 loaves, but still they are not very big. Perhaps they eat small amounts of bread in Morocco. It worked out well though.