I'm not actually dead (an update in photos)

Contrary to popular belief, I did not die. I simply got incredibly lazy busy with life. I got a new job, I went back to school, I cured cancer, I saved a third-world country. You know, the usual. Takes up so much time.

I've also been working on a lot of projects, surprisingly. I've been getting huge boxes of fabric from my mother, courtesy of my dead grandmother's estate. It's the ultimate estate sale, but I don't have to pay anything. (Though it takes my mom $20 a box to ship them to me, God bless her.)

Here's what I've been up to!



I've been taking all my tiny scraps and making crazy blocks. They came in handy when we found ourselves broke at Christmastime and needed quick presents. I stuck a couple of these together, whacking the sides to make perfect squares, then sewed on a quick border and sashing. Instant placemats for the mom-in-law! I felt so accomplished, and I'm pretty sure she liked them, though I did preface her opening of the bag with "Look, these were an experiment, and you're the guinea pig. I'm sorry."



The rolls of paper on the left are little patterns traced onto fusible web from this book, which was a present from my aunt one Christmas a few years back.



I finally took all of my reproduction Aunt Gracie prints and cut them into nice little squares. I'm going to stick these together with some white squares for some lovely bright nine-patches. It will no doubt make a very lovely lap quilt.



I've been drawing out different blocks that I like and looking at the pieces and how they come together. I need to figure out what to do with the ridiculous amounts of fabric I've inherited. It's quite shameful, how much I'm getting, and me with no earthly clue how to store it or what to sew it into. But when my aunt asked me what I wanted from the estate, I just said "Give me all the fabric you have! It ships well and it will satisfy my collector's OCD."



A small sample of some of the pieces I've gotten cut out from various scraps and pieces. There are exactly 1,213 triangles in that box, every single one cut out by hand without the benefit of cutting mat or ruler, while seated in front of the television and watching seasons of X-Files. I'm up to season three already.



My little work box with all that I need to cut out the rest of my triangles, along with my most favoritest pincushion in the world, a beautiful gift from Monica Magness. See that roll of pink fabric? My grandmother seemed to have an affinity for taking old pants and shirts and cutting them into ridiculously shaped pieces, then rolling them up in little bundles and rubber-banding them for some unknown purpose. I think I know where some of my mother's crazy came from.



The other thing taking up my time (besides my new job) is my Anatomy and Physiology II class. Wait, you ask me why I'm taking it again? Did I fail? No, I did not. I got a B. This is unacceptable to me. I am taking it again. And we get fresh cats this semester, so I've been really excited about dissections. I've heard such horror stories about mold and bugs infesting the leftovers from A&P I.



Finally, there is the husband. Such a wonderful, interesting man. Our friends and relations fondly remember the recent Pork Chop Incident in which Dane attempted to cook a pork chop, failed to put it under the broiler, got extremely angry, and threw the offending chop across the kitchen! I thought that was the end of his kitchen-related tantrums, but he tried to make pancakes several weeks later, with similar results. (He was able to aim the flying batter into the sink, at least.) Our friend Skylar responded by then making his own delicious pancakes and taunting Dane with photos of them posted to Facebook.

Other than that, business as usual. I've been getting a lot done, so I really can't complain. I just haven't put blogging at the top of my list. Y'all can beat me with flexible bamboo sticks later. For now, I have to go to bed.

Macroverse

I'm feeling remarkably better. I treated myself to a facial today and it was ever so lovely...

Psychology test tomorrow (and yes, I know I really need to be in bed right now...) and I always feel better after tests because I always seem to ace them no matter how much I feel that I'm slacking, and then I can breathe a temporary sigh of relief.

I was slightly miffed over the weekend when I discovered that someone had sabotaged one of my Unknowns. The cover had been taken off my dish and it was contaminated by whatever random bacteria was floating in the air. I had to regrow a plate, but I checked things today and they're coming along fine. I already figured out one of the two organisms. The Gram negative has yet to reveal itself to me.

I also sold some stuff at a garage sale that Tanya's mom was holding, and I made $80, which I hadn't expected. I plan on using the extra money to finally buy some needle-felting materials. I also got a sunburn at that garage sale because my pesky translucent skin is very.... irritable.

Here is a lovely picture of a planet. Or is it... You tell me.

Turning wheels

I was asked what the tattoo on my ankle is, so I took a photo to share. You can see how deathly pale I am; if you pay attention to the lower left corner, you can even see some veins. I believe the term used to describe me is "translucent".



I also had an idea and was wondering who, if anyone, would want to get involved. Would there be any interest in a Scrap Exchange? I have a large amount of scraps that I like to use for various things, but getting some added variety can be a bit difficult. So I was thinking of organizing an exchange of scraps with anyone else out there who wants to share. If enough of y'all show some excitement about the idea, I'll do something official, like a banner and a fancy post and everything.

Freedom is the ability to fill your sewing room with as much crap as possible

Lots of news and fun stuff from the last week or so. I'll try to include a little bit of everything. I should break in the new blog layout with a nice long entry, after all.

Last Saturday, we went down to Lake Jackson, an area of Texas near Galveston, for a Ron Paul rally. Tanya came with us and we got to hear Ron speak, which was unbelievably awesome. There were tons of people there supporting him. He had a lot of very insightful and inspiring things to say, and I managed to capture the whole speech on video with my nifty camera. I'll be transcribing the speech if anyone's interested. If you'd like to actually see the speech, I would suggest doing a search online for the Lake Jackson Congressional Rally, as the quality of my video isn't very good. Lots of shoulders and picture-jiggling.



After the rally, we drove down to the beach, which was just 10 miles away, and I got to see the ocean for the first time since age 2. Completely amazing and very beautiful, even with the overcast sky. (And yes, the picture in my header is from that trip. That's me wading in the sand and collecting seashells.)



Tanya was quite freaked by the seagulls flipping out over the food we brought for them. They swarmed into a cloud of beaks and feathers that I have to agree was pretty intimidating.

So, rest of the week. Psych test was Thursday, and I did awesome! So I'm pretty happy about that. Grade came back from the Microbiology test, and that was a total A, and Sociology wasn't too bad either.



I got a whole giant box of fabric in the mail, courtesy of my dead grandmother. There's a lot of really awesome prints, and this photo doesn't nearly show all of the kick ass-ness of this fabric. When my mom got all of the fabric from the estate, she called to ask what types of prints I wanted, to which I replied "Just give me half of anything cotton. I guarantee I will use it at some point in my life." So she sent this giant box stuffed to the gills with tons of old fabric and, oddly enough, she included my violin from when I was in high school. My mother's weird.



I also finished the chameleon foundation block for a quilt I've been working on for some time. It's called Escaping Bugs and it's a Bottle Quilt Co. pattern. (I would link to their webpage, but the site was shut down after the passing of the owner.)

I've been saving up different bug fabrics for a very long time, and I had the majority of them stuffed into a basket with the pattern since before I moved to Texas. They sat in a box or the closet or just hidden somewhere for the last four years, and I was almost convinced I'd left them back in Reno. But I finally started on this quilt a few months ago. (I ended up having enough bug fabric for three quilts, so I sent some pre-cut blocks to my sister and aunt.) Now that my chameleon block is finished, I just have to finish the Sticky-Tongued Frog and then put the top together.

Last bit of news: I bought Dane a Nintendo Wii for Valentine's Day, officially making me the most amazing wife in the world.

And I close this post with a challenge! I want to see some artistic representations of this photo from my beach trip:



Use any medium, make it any size, add any elements, do whatever. I have plans for this picture, and I'd love to see what others can do with it!