Number one from two years ago

Better late than never.

Unable to commit to a series of four-hour night classes, (who wants to go to school for four hours after working a full day?), Pratt finally offered something more my speed. That is, a one-night only four-hour class as part of their mini-class series--Spring into Art!--that runs one week in April. (Check that out, Seattle, they have glass-blowing and metal bending and screen printing, and all kinds of coolness for such reasonable prices.)

We spent four hours drawing gourds and driftwood with charcoal on big, porous paper taped to paint-splattered easels while KEXP played in the background, and the teacher flipped through a series of sketches and drawings by the masters for reference.

Gesture drawing, contour, cross-contour--over and over and over--wiping each rendition away with a heavily-soiled chamois, clearing the canvas for more. Charcoal is a mess. But it's so forgiving, and so palpable. Don't like what you drew? Draw over it with more pressure. Or, smudge it into submission with your hand. Or, failing all of that, erase it with the chamois. 

There was wine and leftover cheese from a lecture that had taken place down the hall. My hands were black with charcoal dust; my face sported a few smudges as well. (I was not alone in the wearing of charcoal like so much hasty rouge.)

It was still a loong day. But it was worth it.

Number 14 (now that Santa has come)

Remember when I bought that amazing book? (It was that glorious weekend I took Joe to Portland for his birthday and we stayed at this infamous and totally awesome hotel and saw Rick Huddle's one-man show Spent and stumbled upon a crowd of Santas like one has never seen before.)

And, of course, we went to Powell's, Portland's sprawling yet sultry book store.  And I found the book that gently led me one delicious step further than simple knitting...and into felting.

So I knit. And felted. And then, because I just can't leave well enough alone, some embroidery and beads and stuff too.  A fun little project that kept my fingers busy and will now (I assume) grace the Christmas trees of those I love the most.

Number 26, recession style

Define gourmet. I mean, it's my list, so I get to say what's what. And I think that beautiful French-styled plates and pairings counts as gourmet, even if there's a $12 hamburger on the menu. Even if.

Big thanks to my in-laws, who visited for a late Thanksgiving and an early Christmas (okay, they just visited to visit, but we ate a lot of good food and put up a Christmas tree) and were feeling adventurous enough to take us to the brand-new Toulous Petit on Queen Anne, a New Orleanian-styled bistro extraordinaire.  And the result? YUM.

Beautifully ambianced, this little gem is flanked with candles (much like its sister restaurant, Pesos); the booths feature works of art in and of themselves:  tables decorated with gorgeous multi-toned inlaid wood designs and perched upon all on 40,000 glass tiles.  The floor is covered in an additional 85,000 Italian mosaic tiles that beg you to notice them in their austere monochromatic glory.  Huge windows will open wide to the sidewalk in the summer (I'll be back) and in the mean time, the 5,000 pounds of hand-tinted deliciously tactile pink and green plaster fringing the walls practically hugs you the moment you walk inside.

The menu changes daily and is something like 8 or 13 pages of amazing choices. It would all be too over the top except that it's the kind of place you won't worry about showing up in jeans to. And you wouldn't even mind just popping in for a Sazerac and that $12 burger. But I dare you to try the foie gras. Or the fresh local oysters. Or the fried alligator, assuming it's on today's menu. Just sayin. 

29

Finally. It's here. The February Lady Sweater, which I completed a few months ago but never got around to photographing. Until today.

It's about time. Amy is one of those amazing women you know who outshines even the shiniest nickel. That's because Amy has something I don't: patience. Infinite patience. (And mad artistic skills. And a proper cheese slicer on hand at ALL times.)

How do I know? Because this yarn is not just any yarn. This is yarn that Amy retrieved by unraveling a thrift store sweater. Once unraveled, she washed and hung the yarn to dry (to un-kink it) and then wound it into these beautiful skeins fresh for the knitting.

(You can do this too. Just google it. Instructions abound. Send skeins to your less patient friends. They will love you forever.)

This yarn had been sitting in my stash for...I'd say a good few years. Like, for example, enough years for Amy to have TWO children, and thus not as much time for such tedious (but thrifty, eco-friendly, and AWESOME) projects. So it's been awhile. Which is why I finally put it on the list. Enough, already, Cupcake. Make a FREE sweater out of your free yarn.

And this sweater was born. The Lady Sweater rocks. If you are on ravelry (and you should be if you knit or crochet), you can see that the rest of the world agrees with the rocking-ness of this sweater. In fact, 6,449 other knitters have made this sweater and posted their completed projects on ravelry. Another 9,346 have it in the queue.

Maybe it's becuase the lace is so awesome. Or the pattern doesn't require ANY seaming (which I hate) or that it's just an awesome mid-weather cardigan with 3/4 sleeves that works almost all year on the west coast.

first shot

oops. the brownie is visible in the photo. but it's also kind of cute. kind of like a double exposure. other not so great shots here.

this is just me screwing around before I have the contraption...which the mister is currently making. god bless him and his exacto knife and his straight edge.

Number 5. Or one third of it.

Thank you, ebay.

and thank you to colleen, who kept the box her brownie came in. And left me a whole box of single-use, but still workable, flashbulbs that completely blind you but smell of old cameras in the most delicious and nostalgic way.

thank you to the mister, who took these photos of the photograph machine.

cross off numba six

You saw it here. Or maybe here.

Big thanks to Whip Up for featuring my tutorial on their site!

It's time for a new list

It's time. The new list is upon us. I'm officially 31, and have officially abandoned last year's list. The things that didn't get done were few and far between, and probably for the best. You don't always need to do everything you think you might need to do on a random day in January.

I'm actually pretty impressed with all the things I did accomplish--a new business, two new on-line stores, refreshed sense of community, baking skills, sewing and knitting projects, photobooth bliss, et cetera. It's not (maybe) that I was more successful last year than it is that I am more accountable to and aware of my successes.

So: here goes 2009.

1. take a drawing class. seriously. (any suggestions of where i should do this, oh blog-o-sphere?)

2. design some new patterns for tiny footprint. cupcake is gettin' bored ya'll. design some new designs for gavron. still bored.

3. figure out free motion machine embroidery. which looks so easy. but maybe isn't.  done.

4. visit foreign soil. (as in, not north america. as in, probably, Morrocco. And Spain, if we can swing it. cross your fingers for swinging it.)  done.

5. buy an old camera so I can take ttv photos. make a tubey thing to take ttv photos...then take some. work on it till they look good.  done and done.

6. post a tutorial on my blog. tutorializing what? i don't know yet. something good.  done.

7. go to the desert all spur-o-the-moment-like.

8. join the Cacaphony Society for another event and this time wear a better costume. (okay, so I already did this on New Year's Day...but I want to do it again. And, Santarchy 2009, you better watch out! This girl is a-comin')

9. build one of these. Use it for my etsy stuff. post that stuff. repeat. done. but then it took up too much room, and outdoor photos were so much better, so I recycled it.

10. it's time. to learn. to crochet. seriously. how can you still not know how?  half done.

11. find people to play games with. like cards. and dominoes. and board games. (as in, regular-like).

12. volunteer at KEXP again. and also somewhere else. done.

13. put skinny shelves around the house and fill them with wonderful three-dimensional handmade art and stuffs.

14. okay. so I bought this amazing book at powells. now i have to actually make something that's in it. done.

15. build a worm compost bin

16. begin a collection of candlesticks. begin a collection of taper candles. light candles. repeat.

17. simplify. simplify. (give away two things for every one thing i bring into my life; stop buying crap I don't need; stop saying yes when i really mean no.)  still doing.

18. visit some cows and help vaccinate them.

19. visit a local farm and meet some farmers.

20. visit the labyrinth at St. Paul's Episcopal Church and/or at Seattle First Baptist.

21. walk the reflexology path at Bastyr. done.

22. visit the lavender farms when they're in bloom (Mid-Late July-ish).

23. cultivate more clients for gavron (network? eek.)

24. do something scary. (sam says I can define this later)

25. do something that brings me hope (again, the defining comes later)

26. visit a new gourmet restaurant. (canlis? the gluten-free one in madrona?) done

27. find an old typewriter that still works and clickety clack on it. (give away two big things when i bring this one into the house, see number 17, above)

28. Learn some French. And some Morrocan Arabic. And refresh the tiny bit of Spanish still in my brain. done.

29. knit a sweater for myself out of that yarn that Amy recycled for me three years ago already!  done.

30. dinner party.

31. design, build, and sell my own softies.