Update! I've moved!!!!
Mood:  a-ok
I did it. I set up a new account at Blogger. I've added my webrings and that's it so far. I'll be adding the links next.

All future entries can be found at:
fabricprincess

I'll see you over there!!!!!

Flickr
Mood:  a-ok
I signed up with Flickr a while ago. Just today I uploaded a few photos. Because everyone is doing it, ya know! So if you want to take a look...scroll down just a tad and you can see the little mosaic of pictures. It should take you right to the photos.

I'm also seriously considering switching my blog over to another blog service. But that would mean that I'll loose all of my previous posts and pictures. Stuff from Tripod isn't "moveable". Which sucks. And that's what's keeping me from moving to something more sophisticated.

I don't know. I don't want to lose visitors, but maybe it would be easier to find my blog if it was with Blogger or someone like that. I can't decide what to do.

blah
Mood:  down
I am still feeling "off". I got some fusing done this weekend on the quilt for "Changing Perspective". It looks good. Now I have to decide how to quilt it. I am debating between just plain straight lines to emphasize each section, or to just do something funky that has nothing to do with the image, but is just shapes.

I'm tired and so I'm totally uninspired to do any sort of creative work. In fact, I did nothing yesterday but look at the internet and take a long nap. But that didn't help so much today, as last night I ended up sleeping on the couch. I got about 4 hours of sleep. The damn dogs and husband were hogging the bed, and when I tried to scoot and turn over at 1am, the little puppy screamed. I'd had it. I went out to the couch, where I slept fitfully, as some cats came in to jump on me, sniff me and to paw at me. Then my allergies kicked in and I sneezed and sniffled for a while before falling asleep, only to be awoken by Hercules, who got out of bed at 5 to look at me. I thought he wanted out, but when I went to take him to the door he ran back to the bed.

That was my night. It was awful, and it showed in my workout with Kay this morning. I could only do some biceps and chest. She told me to come back tomorrow to do legs. Nobody else for any of the group training she usually has (and who I train with at the same time) came today, and probably not tomorrow. So I want to take advantage of that and get a killer workout in.

I did decide to start my diet today. It won't be too much of a change from what I do now, but there won't be any cheats...no M&M's, no bread (dipped in olive oil as a dinner appetizer), no wine, no granola. No cheat meals. No sauce or anything on the chicken breasts...just spice. Lots of veggies and protein. Simple for now, and in 4 weeks I'll decide what else to change. Right now it's 12 weeks out, which is plenty of time, since I'm fairly lean right now.

Oh, something exciting will be going on this Wed. The local Fox news crew will be at the gym Wed. morning to talk with Kay. She'll be training me and a couple of other people, and she plans to demonstrate with us how "group training" works. I got a new outfit for myself, and today I think I'll go out and get some new shoes and something cute to put in my hair.

Other than that, there is nothing new going on. I'm just struggling to get through each day, breathe in and out is tough when you're clogged and sneezing all the time.

I'm still here
Mood:  a-ok
I haven't posted because most days I'm just too wiped out to do any thinking, much less posting.

I've figured out the cause. It's my allergies. No matter how hard I push myself, I am still foggy and feeling like I am moving in slow motion. I realized it yesterday when I just couldn't lift more than the 40lb barbell Kay had me doing for bicep curls.

She looked at me and said she could see it was allergies. Makes me so tired. I fall into bed at night and am asleep within 2 minutes. And dragging my butt out of bed at 6 am is so hard. The constant slight headache that I have is not helping. I know it's sinuses, too, because it moves a bit depending on how stuffy I am.

Yuck. I get worse each year, and each year I deny that it's happening. I push myself to be "OK" and then I'm exhausted. Bad allergies run in my family, so it's no surprise that moving to a part of TX where everybody has them that I would be affected just as much.

At least I got something done yesterday. I embroidered on a t-shirt for Kay's birthday. It took 3 hours to make the computer talk to the sewing machine, and then to do a test stitch to see where I'd have trouble, and then the final stitch. But it was worth it as she just loved it this morning and showed it to everyone. It has a dumbell on it, surrounded by flowers and stars, and I added her name, and underneath it says "Super Trainer!". Oh, and it's all in cute girly colors of pink and purple and yellow. Too cute!

I still have to finish the stupid costume bra today. And clean up the house. I'm trying to spend just 2 hours a day cleaning, but I missed yesterday (groceries and too much time at the embroidery machine!), so today it must be done.

But first I must go take a nap. Or I won't be able to move enough to get anything done.

so far, so bad
Mood:  don't ask
I can't believe how fast this week has gone by and I don't know what I've accomplished. Something, maybe nothing...who knows? But I've spent a lot of time with the puppy.

Today I had to rush him to the vet. He was outside playing while I was inside doing some sewing (on a cosutme that I agreed to do when it was supposed to be an easy fix...ha. I should never believe anyone when they say it's just a small thing...I am totally stupid, I admit it), when I heard screaming.

Yes. Dog screaming. If you don't have an italian greyhound you may not know what I'm talking about. But it's almost like a howl, only it's louder, higher pitched and goes up and down like a child screaming and then gasping for more air to scream again.

Of course I ran for the door. He'd only been out there half an hour. Augustus was sitting by the door, and he looked ok until he screamed again and I shooed him inside. then he screamed again and I called for Hercules, who was also outside. He came sauntering around the corner like there was nothing wrong. So I ran to look at Auggie and he was whimpering. I picked him up and his right eye was full of blood!

I ran back to get Herc back inside, and then stuck Auggie in his crate. As I ran for the garage door I flipped open my phone and very calmly (I'm proud of being calm at that point...I felt like I might just flip out instead) called the vet and told them we were coming.

12 minutes later (I've timed it for just such an emergency, and it did take only 12 minutes...with just a touch of speeding...lol) we were there and the vet saw us. She said it looked bad, but she cleaned it and deteremined it was a scratch outside his eye and big bruise over his eye. Her guess was that Herc did it, as it didn't look like a scratch.

Well, $56, and one tube of ointment later, and we were on our way home, thank goodness. I felt much better and was taking my time so that Augustus didn't feel like mommy was still tense. When out of nowhere, this total asshole pulls out in front of me. I was in the left lane, going about 10mi under the limit, when this guy in a little evil white Honda pulls out from the left turn lane right in front of me. he didn't even look, just pulled out, halfway into my lane, and then I guess he saw me coming because he stopped. I slammed on my brakes so hard the car shook.

In shock I looked at the f***** and he just looked at me and then went ahead of me...like I'd freakin' stopped just for him.

This happened within 20 feet of a stoplight, so by the time the f***** pulled out, the light had turned red anyways, so it didn't do any good for him to cut me off, make me slam on my brakes, and nearly slam my puppy's cage into the dash (I was holding onto it with my arm, like any good mommy protecting the passenger in that seat).

As I sat at the light behind this asshole I felt this wave of adrenaline-induced nausea come over me. I rolled the window down to throw up (didn't want to puke in my car), but thank goodness breakfast had long been digested and nothing came out.

It was totally horrible, and as the guy went through the light, and then slowed to turn left into the grocery store (yes, he nearly killed me and Augustus to get to the freakin' grocery store!) I left my window down, stuck out my arm and flipped him off. It made me feel a bit better.

Oh, it was all so dramatic. But now I'm feeling better since I was able to rant and rave and share it all with you. :)

Augustus, btw, is fine. He's napping right now. I'll go back to the sewing.

tired
Mood:  a-ok
Topic: quilting
The puppy is wearing me out. He's fun, but it's outside every hour, watch him like a hawk, play when I can get his attention, and then try to also accomplish my regular stuff! I need a nap :)

Here's a pic of him with Hercules. I took this last night, which is why he is sitting quietly...he was ready for bed :)

And becuase I don't discriminate amongst my pets...here's one of Caesar...he just had his hair done on Tuesday and he's lookin' fine!

I am trying to get some work done in between all the chaos, but it's slow going. I want to enter the SPUN small art quilt show, and when I realized that this appealed to me, I decided to enter more than just the one quilt I had finished (actually it was done last year when I thought I'd do the journal quilt thing, but I didn't, so it's been sitting finished in my storage area). The $25 fee lets you enter up to 3 quilts, so I've been working on number 2. I don't know that I'll do a third, but this has been a great oppotunity for me to try some experiments that I'd been thinking of, and it forces me to sit down and actually produce something (I need some sort of deadline to spur me to work).

Here's a pic of what I have so far. It's quilted (lightly) and today I want to add the binding. I am also planning on a tiny bit of beading, then it's done. The "lines" in the center are actually yarns that I crocheted into a chain, some of the yarn was dyed by me, the others are ones that I picked up just because I couldn't resist the color or texture!

I don't have a name for it yet, but I really do like it. It's all about texture and color and simple lines. It was a happy accident, as I started it as a "fix" over some reverse applique that just didn't work out, but I couldn't throw out the whole fat quarter I'd started on (liked the dark blue color). I added a "chiffon sandwhic" (a la Maggie Grey), which I then heated with a gun and then stitched like crazy.

Here's a close up of some of the stitching:

I'll be glad to have it done so I can get to work on my next project...but it's been fun to do!

puppy frenzy
I love him. I really really do. But today he is driving me crazy! He doesn't want to go potty outside, but he wants to play around out there. I try to bring him in and he's insanely crazy in here...biting kitties, biting me, running every which way.

Makes it impossible to clean the house. Oh, and I tried putting him outside. He just threw his body against the door once he realized I wouldn't open it. I could only stand that for about 30 minutes before i let him back in.

Now he's sitting in my lap, quietly. I'm afraid to get up to finish the house cleaning for fear of what trouble he'll get into. And I still have to go to the grocery store this afternoon. I'm wiped out. This many pets is a lot of work. But I love them. Most of the time. :O LOL

I hope I can do some sewing tomorrow, or I'll go insane.

Auggie Doggie
Mood:  incredulous
Topic: musings
Here he is!

This is Augustus. If you've been keeping up with my pets, he makes for pet number 8 (OMG, am I insane?). 3rd dog. Yes, his name is part of our theme...Hercules, Caesar, Augustus. Some people get it, some don't. LOL

He's adorable, and loves to be with me. I drove to Abilene at midnight to pick him up and we got home at 4am. It was quite an adventure, and one I hope never to repeat. TX roads are not my favorite, though I did see some interesting towns...Blanket (yes, that's real), Rising Star (pop. 623) and Early.

The cats don't mind him too much, there hasn't been any hissing so far. Herc loves him, Caesar is a bit unsure, though they're all trying to make it work.

Tomorrow he's got his vet appointment. His eyes are oozing some stuff, but he also needs a check up. He's 11 weeks old, and he smells like a puppy! Isn't that weird? Definitely different from adult dog smell.

Oh, btw, this is the only pic out of 10 that you can see him in. The rest are a blur, as he doesn't slow down!

blah blah weekend
Mood:  not sure
Topic: musings
Here's a picture of the typical weeknight in our house...Will chillin with Herc:

And another picture of a pet having things her way in mommy's basket of wonderunder and interfacing:

Doesn't she look like she's having wicked thoughts? This is Nimmie, btw.



This is what it's like around here on a Saturday night at 10:30:

Exciting! But I love my pets, so I'm happy.

Speaking of pets, I am waiting and waiting to hear from the woman with my puppy! I've paid her and am trying to set up a day to drive 4 hours to pick him up. She said she'd contact me on Thursday with the day that she could take off work to meet me.

Well, Thursday night I get a message saying that her boss didn't make the schedule, but she'd definitely let me know Friday. Friday came and went, so I emailed early this (Saturday) morning. No reply. I emailed again about 11:30 pm (about the same time I"ve recieved email from her in the past), again no reply.

Now I'm worried, as I went ahead and paid her on good faith basis, since I'd already bought a dog from her previously, and she seemed genuinely sorry about her previous spotty communication. I hope *hope* hope I didn't make a mistake. It was a lot of money. That kind of money would buy me a lot of fabric! I did paypal, so at least I think I have a way of recourse if it doesn't workout.

In the meantime I did some work on the fabric dyeing. The new piece of lime didn't come out so lime. It dried too yellow, again. And I was mad! I got out my dye-na-flow paint and painted it a lime, scrunched it up and threw salt on it. Now I've got lime and lots of pattern. It's not what I wanted, but I think it will work, considering that I will cover most of it with other fabrics.

And for kicks today I made a tiny little quilt from a gift given to me yesterday by a friend who came over to try on a skirt I made for her. She said it was a Christmas ornament, but when she saw it she thought of me. I thought I'd just find a little corner to hang it, but it was too small, so I made a quiltlet for it out of my handdyes and a stamp I stamped (carved by me 2 months ago). The whole thing is very cute and it's now hanging in my hallway.

It goes with the theme of Greek/Roman pottery I have in my house. And the Greek Key is something I've got repeated in other places, too. Some people will see this and think, "what the hell is that?" and some people will look at it and say "I see how it matches everything else!".

Not such an exciting weekend around here, huh? Maybe tomorro I'll do something thrilling like go to Joann's to buy muslin to make yet another test jacket (it will be my 4th), or perhaps I can talk Will into taking me to the new and fabulous Petsmart. Fun stuff!

elusive lime
Mood:  a-ok
Topic: quilting
So I wanted lime for a background on my quilt for Changing Perspective. I used some Chartruese dye from Dharma, mixed it up and expected the nice lime-y color I saw in the catalog when I ordered it.

No. I have been betrayed by the word "chartruese"! I thought it was a fancy name for lime. It turns out that it's just very yellow yellow-green. Disappointing and just not what I had in mind, though it looked ok with the other fabrics (which came out super lovely and stripey, thanks to the Robbi Joy Ecklow pole dyeing technique...not to be confused with pole dancing...LOL).

I tried to overdye this hideous yellow yellow-green with a dash of very watered down turquoise. It was ok, except for these totally weird areas that stayed very light, and very uneven. I did't expect that as I mixed up the soda ash solution I added and continued to mush it around periodically.

So now I've got this icky yellow green, that's less yellow than before, but it's got odd light spots on it (and they're big and right in the middle of the yardage). I think it is a good candidate for some discharge. And I might use my new wooden batik tjap from Dharma. I got it for Christmas and haven't used it.

I think I'll discharge, then overdye with some red or brown, to get some earth tone. Then I want to do stamping or stencilling and finish it off with some foiling. But I don't have time for any of this now. It will have to wait until summer.

And summer will be here before I know it. Just this morning Kay said she'd be starting her pre-comp diet in Feb. I couldn't believe it! After thinking about it I realized that the comp is May 6, and to get at least 10 weeks of dieting (I just can't do 12, I'm a wuss) I have to start after valentine's day. That's just a month away!

It will be painfull each day, but if I've got my other work, then hopefully it will go fast. But in the meantime I've got big stuff to get going, one of which is the garment for the Bernina University to represent my local dealer's store. And that is June 28-July 2. I've got to come up with something totally wonderful and stunning. At least I'll know that I get to go out there and model it, which is exciting. I'll still be in good shape from the competition, thank goodness.

It's scary to already be thinking so many months in advance and feeling that little bit of panic that I have to get started now or it won't all get done!

But thinking of the here and now, hopefully by tomorrow I'll have a lovely new piece of actual lime fabric. I think I figured out a new recipe. I'll post a pic of all the colors together, as they are super-duper yummy! And on Monday or Tuesday I'm hauling myself up to Abilene to get the new puppy!