Angry Birds

There's this app called Angry Birds.  Have you heard of it?  Chris is obsessed.  So there's these pigs that stole and fried some bird eggs.  This makes the birds angry. The whole game is about attacking the pigs. Not overly complicated, see.

Chris' favorite character is the bomb bird.   I feel like this says a lot about him.

For our two year anniversary, in addition to some garden clogs and a head lamp (so he can garden in the dark), I made him an angry bird.  It looks like the crafts project that it is.

Edited to add:  This would have a home on www.regretsy.com

The good word

My breath was stanking up a storm while I was at Hobby Lobby (the South's answer to Michael's Arts & Crafts) when I spied these mints:

I KID YOU NOT.  Of course I had to buy them.  Didn't you see on the cover?  It comes with a free passage from the scriptures.  Because I'm a little slow and take pictures literally, I was expecting like a mini fold-out bible-looking thing or maybe an inside cover coated with tiny little words of God.  No.  This is what they meant:

Oh fine.  But what a conversation starter.

Jello Shots!

I shared this blog post from Clockwork Lemon with Chris and he was psyched.  She used a petit-four pan as a jello mold.  We own the same pan! But you know what she was missing?  ALCOHOL.  Woo-hoo, we're classing up the joint.  Chris made some for a backyard BBQ.  Not as appropriate as pasta salad, but perhaps more welcome.

Ta Da!  I took these pics with Chris's fancy SLR, but have not yet mastered depth of field.

The flavors were rum & coke, orange vodka creamsicle, lemon vodka, fresh blueberry puree with rum,  sake with gummi bears, and strawberry with vodka cream.  Delicious.  Chris had made these before for a birthday party so he actually already had all these recipes.

Chilling in the fridge.  To create layers, he had to chill then pour then chill again.

We also made regular ol' jello shots in these little sample cups.  Chris layered these too.  Because they came with lids, they were fast and easy to stack on top of each other.  The molds are pretty but they're not quick.

Jello shot cups with the first layer of flavor.  Note the tupperware full of complete shots in the back.

Sake jello shots!  Chris floats a gummi bear in the middle.  It looks like the Japanese flag (sorta) this way.

Inevitably, there is leftover jello.  Chris poured whatever was left in layers in a regular bowl and chopped them up.
This was very tasty.

Making jello shots requires a lot of fridge space. By the end, our fridge mostly held jello and beer.  What did I tell you?  Classy.

Oh, and here's an attempt at artsy fartsiness.  While Chris was busy working, I was kind of hanging around, sampling, and, as a result, getting increasingly tipsy.  Those things sneak up on you.

Camera Bag

Needed-- ok, really more like wanted-- a new durable tote bag to lug a small number of books and such around campus.  I saw a cool bag on How About Orange and decided to replicate the bag there.  The original was attractive for its minimalism, but I had to compromise with sturdier fabrics and thicker straps.   As my mechanical guide, I referred to Simplicity's free online tutorial to get a sense of how to cut the fabric, where to attach straps, and fitting in the lining.  Had to adjust the dimensions and, crap, use math for that.

The finished product:

Measurements: 12x10x4.  Enough for my macbook and books.

The Process:

Cheap fabric:  Duck cloth (beige canvas, but way thicker) 1/2 yard, 1/4 yard blue upholstery fabric, dark blue fabric I didn't end up using, and 1/2 yd of cheap yellow cotton for lining.  I liked the brighter blue as a touch of Marc Jacobs-esque whimsy.

Sewed camera by cutting out shape, tracing lines I wanted in pencil and then stitching it in with white fabric.  Had to hand-stitch the lettering though.  I used this anti-fraying liquid around the edge to prevent unraveling.

One side done!  Backed the blue handles in duck cloth since I didn't think it'd be sturdy enough to survive my abuse.

From the backside!  You can see I didn't sew the handles all the way to the top.  That's cause I can't attach the lining easily without a bit of gap there.

With attached lining.  Added pockets to the lining to keep track of wallets, keys, etc.

One more for good measure!

Procrastination = new apron

Maybe I didn't need an apron (so much to do), but after looking at Anthropologie's aprons, I suddenly craved one.  Imagine, a frilly pretty girly way of hiding the fact that you spill everything on yourself always?  I need an apron for life.

So I took an old summer dress that I like to say was falling apart but really was way too tight to zip up anymore and a pair of khaki's I don't wear and made me an apron.  Figured khaki was good because it was made of firmer stuff than the filmsy summer dress.

Here's the result of an afternoon successfully avoiding my other work:

Khakis

 Original Dress

Khakis + Dress = Apron

Back of Apron