Okay I can't actually think of a decent title for today's post. So I will lay out what has been on my mind in point form,

Travel.

• Really really really REALLY want to travel
• No-one to travel with.
• Not really inclined to travel overseas on what I guess will be the first of many travel experiences by myself (like Canada, I have been getting this intense desire to ski. Blame it on those student teachers, with their hilarious alcoholic fuelled SNOW adventures)
  
• Perth is somewhere I have never been, and by all accounts, appears like a good place to go.
  
• Perth tourism website found me a cheap, fun looking bike tour that included a visit to a winery that is cheap.
• Youth hostel is also cheap
• I figure if I save the way I am saving now, I will have money for cafes and fun there.
  
• There also happen to be online people I know in Perth, with whom I might politely intrude on their time for an hour or so and meet... PEOPLE

Artsy crafty pursuits

• Having a zillion and one ideas in head at the moment (for both Egypt block swap and pincushion swap and other embroidery things) That I'm seriously considering a visual diary. Just a small one, but something I can play with!
• cheap t-shirts and lovely embroidery, FOR ME!! like Lochers but without the language (I would wear my version to school) of, and make use of that wonderful art-deco iron on transfer book

Thats about it really. I AM getting closer to my target for the car, my uni exam is next week so I am planning to do some major research after that, CTP insurance, what kind of car, loans! This adult stuff is about to bite hard. ouch.

Good night everyone, hope this rain keeps pouring down!!! (but now while I am at work, the urge to jump out and dance in the rain is strong... damn acting like adult-ness!)

adios!

Its raining...rain?

Seriously guys, this is breaking news, actual physical rain is pouring as I speak! Given that the coast happens to be in the worst drought on record, this is right up there with alien invasions. Yikes.

On crafting news I have pics that I should have posted throughout the week, but well.. you know what procrastination is like...

so first things first, a less than perfect overview of the stuff I have added to the CQ square. See everything on the left? Thats new. Also some outlining on the flamingo, but that's mainly split stitching practice (SUCH a useful stitch!)



Now for a much clearer shot



This really is a sampler. See the stitches that kind of look like honeycomb? Called Cloud stitch... its a filler stitch and I really truly love it. Looks good, and I can see this popping up in future stitching. The stitch with the F.B. under it is fishbone stitch, and there are a few other stitches there too. The cause behind all this sampling? I just borrowed an amazing book from the library, with the very flash title 'crewel embroidery' I'm in love. All of the author's patterns involved hand dyed fabric, which look amazing, but I am definitely in love with the stitches. Including my failed attempt at 'tete de boeuf' which, if my ultra basic French is anything to go by, means said stitches are meant to look like cow heads (they do in the book, so freaking cute). I think this book will have to hit the list of 'books I want to buy when I am not saving for car' list. A list that grows daily. Alas.

anyway this is as exciting as I get... However this weekend I am starting on a pincushion for a pincushion swap, and start a CQ block for an Egyptian swap coming up down the track... I have ideas, but expect to see more cloud stitch.

anway adios for now...

To the people who said they were going to wear a blues Jersey tomorrow...

Mandy... I'm thinking of you... QUEENSLAND WON! ooh ya! 25points to 18... who won? We won....

Random bragging over rugby league, see why I love State of Origin?

A proper post tomorrow... promise??

adios!

If you head down to the op-shop today

In case it isn't immediately obvious, I love my local op-shop. I love this shop like some people like their pubs. The sense of familiarity, and the pleasant surprise of something new. However last weekend revealed a haul almost as impressive as a bookfest find. As it happens I love vintage knitting patterns. I am drawn in by the glamour or the outfits, the colour (or lackthereof) in the patterns, and just the vintage-y goodness out there. But of all the vintage goodness out there I've decided to collect patons patterns, based on their availability and their quality. Especially the 'tv knitting' series. Imagine my suprise when I see not two, three or four of these babies, but an absolute STACK of them just sitting in my favourite shop.
See? This is covering my bed in a rather high pile. But oh! what heaven!

Some of some choice picks from this haul include a jumper with a Kangaroo and something else on there (don't ask me what)

Proof that child humiliation is a long standing tradition with a powerful and proud history

and if this isn't an incentive to get fit, and get some fancy underwear, I don't know what is. This may be made on microscopic needles, but I want this baby BAD! Helloooo gym membership! Hello 3ply wool! Hello ouchy corsets....

Oh and this didn;t come from a patons book, but I had to have it for this pattern mainly, and a few other patterns...

also some supplies, very project spectrum-y. (pink, yellow and green) I love those yellow needles, although it occured to me that AFTER I got home that they don't have stoppers on the end. Any suggestions for making any on the cheap and quick?

And just to completely overload you with picture goodness... here is an earring holder I made myself with plastic canvas and a cheapo $3 photo frame. Sadly I didn't have tacks or nails to hold it in, but this is still bright and colourful and useful all the same.


adios!

Flat out like a lizard drinking

What a week! Yesterday it was just me at the library, and I tell you, I could've been organising troops to go into battle, whipping up a chocolate cheesecake and organising a surprise birthday and keep a smile on my face. Actually I was just supervising, making sure everyone went where they were supposed to and organising hot drinks for teachers, so slightly less busy than the scenario above. But not much. Also I have been getting a lift home from this really really lovely teacher who I work with. I've been getting home at 4pm. That just hacked a 2 hours out of my day... I'm still in shock when I look at the time when I get home (the cat gets a shock too lol)

Thank you to everyone who wrote me lovely comments! I swear every time I look at the comments and I want to sing 'I got comments, I got comments! I got comments hey hey hey!'. So party all round. Good karma and all that.

Anyway I've not done much craftiness. But I have plans for that saved bus fare... and it involves the op shop. Funness!

adios!!!

Whip it, whip it good!

Hey everyone! Hope you are going well! You know how I joined those yahoo! groups? Well I thought I had better actually do some embroidering. So here goes.

Timeline. Friday night, started about 10:30pm, finished 11:30pm



I made the pic rather small for the purpose of obscuring the rather large, *ahem* mistakes. I really didn't plan this block well, I went with the concept of spontaneity and just winged it. The only downside to this approach are the rather occasional bits of topstitching to keep things down.

secondly, this is what I achieved after a good sit down with the cat and Eurovision (Ukraine, you have just sold me a cd)




I inadvertently made the cat whilst watching 'Gentlemen prefer blondes' (still have the music in my head) and was practicing some split stitching. It was chance (or my psyche) that led to that shape. Sweet huh?

Just some practice with buttonhole stitching. This stitch is so versatile as anyone who has been here will testify.



Whipped buttonhole stitch. I quite like the short and long spikes. Sort of remind me of piano keys in a way. And of course those whipped stitches.

Also! Ive been tagged for a Meme by the lovely pixiefarts. I have to list seven random things about me. Now to get thinking....

1. When I created the nic 'librarylass' I envisioned a whole comic strip with comic characters as 'full stop boy' and 'Book Woman' and 'the evil colon of doom'. If its corny, I dig it.
2. Like the stereotype, I wear glasses, and sad to say, blind as a bat without them.
3. I am the biggest wimp when it comes to winter. I am always the first to be wearing a cardigan.
4. I have a million and one secret plans for when I get a car, and consequently, take over the world.
5. If people annoy me, I can hold up a suprisingly solid argument on controversial topics.
6. I have the noisiest, fattest cat around, Toby the burmese cat. But feel free to call him 'Tobi wan kanobi', Mi gato, 'brat cat'. He understands them all.
7. I want to go skydiving in New Zealand as a way of seeing the beautiful landscape. The travel is just not going to happen until point 4.

Now for the hard part. Tagging people. Okay, I tag Aussiepatches, Craft and Chaos, fitknit, Random Knits, My sis, Rose Red and Crumpart. I had a real struggle, thinking who I could harass, and who might or might not actually do this (versus having done it)


adios!

A very overdue update!

Hey!!!
Am on the sister's lappie at present, however she has given me her blessing for an update. So first things first. How I fought the beanie pattern and won. You know the book 'Hip to knit' by Judith Schwartz? Wonderful book, first book I bought (with my meagre budget, it was a real luxury!) and most of the patterns are wonderful. A lot of the patterns openly encourage you to seek out different fibres to change the look of a pattern. to date the only problem I have found in the book comes from a pattern that non knitting people want to wear. I'm talking the fat hats. I need to haul my camera up to Bris one day and show you my attempt (as a terrified newbie) following a pattern that didn't make sense (and no stitch markers!) making this hat. I assumed all problems stemmed from my newbieness (Yes and no). Anyway, bring on the Rockie music and see this baby finished! On my lovely sister (she claimed it during construction)


ACTION SHOT! If you look super duper closely, You can almost see the cable where I decided to change the cable different directions and then realised my mistake several rows up. Frogging this stuff is a nightmare. You might also like to observe in the action shot that the cables are on either side of the hat, which doesn't look half as nice as the shot below, where the cables are beautifully spaced.



Voila. This is how said beanie is supposed to look, albeit with tassles (on in sis's case, pom poms) on the edges.

In conclusion to the beanie pattern, it still needs tweaking (I need to figure out some maths-y way to get all the cables evenly apart AND leave room for a seam AND keep the moss stitch thing going.)

The next thing I want to show you is this absolutely freaking adorable book that I just got! (it was getting culled from the library, = free book = no budget breaker).

This cute book aims to teach young children how to use the library, but it was printed in the 60's so they used card catalogs then (ie didn't use computers)





I've made these pics bigger so you can see the detail! Oh, and Get the Librarian!


Will somebody PLEASE think of the children!


adios everyone! until next time!

Busy busy busy

Hey everyone! hope you are going well... I am le FLAT OUT!!! First things first, I NAILED THE ASSIGNMENT!! I hit a comfortable 1970 words. Not bad really. Also I knitted a beanie for my sis (which is a whole other story... tomorrow, when I can bothered uploading pics) and life is nice enjoying the view, and if 'the view' in this instance happens to be a Canadian student teacher, then you are I are definitely talking about the same thing.

Said Canadian student teacher is long slim, and... I have no sodding idea what his name is, sadly, these people get introduced to me and being a complete fish brain I am, instantly forget their name. GRR, Oh well.. lets hope cute Canadian student teacher tells me he is single and talk about travel. I love travel, not to mention 'wrong side of the road' iness.

anyway I am knackered, and I still haven't put together my bibliography. Rats.

adios

Motivation

Hey everyone just another procrastination station post. I'm nearly done (300 words till assignment completion w00t!)

As you all know by now, the assignment is digitisation and libraries and bla bla bla. However I came across this really funny study put out by Yahoo! and OMD (some marketing company in the U.S.) http://docs.yahoo.com/docs/pr/release1183.html if you want to read it. Imagine, how would you go if you knew you had to live life without the internet for two weeks? I'd loathe it, I mean I do uni online, but what about email? Or paying bills?

Classic reading.

Oh and I've joined some yahoo groups (while I was in the vicinity) to start motivating myself to start properly learning embroidery, crazy quilting, and for the hell of it, making bags (I have a few bag ideas in my mind, I've just not translated them into fabric yet. No better time than the present!

adios

The girl is bad for me.

Ms. S. (the family member who shall remain nameless) has arrived for a few days! While it is wonderful to see lots and lots of this lovely lass, when the old family dynamics come back into play, you know you are in trouble.

Firstly, thanks to no sleep, Ms. S's behaviour turns from 'respectable, busy 21 yo' to 'cranky, the world owes me everything and everyone else are bad nasty liar poo poo heads people. 5 year old.' Not good.

This comes at a time when I am rushed off my arse, trying to nail this assignment, preferably get all the words down before Tuesday. Fortunately, I have grown up since Ms.S. left home and know better than to bite when she verbally jabs me with an unprovoked barb. But the feelings are the same. I know Ms.S. is prone to explosions, resents the fact that anyone else in the natural world could possibly be under pressure (unless its Mum, but then we've all seen mum go through a lot lately) and naturally explodes when she finds her cds here. Bad habits die hard and I can feel myself going through some of the motions I've been through countless times during my 'black period'. Typified by a shocking self esteem. Years later and my self esteem is good. I am indeed happy with myself, and bugger you if you feel (and have the compulsion to say) otherwise.

Damn Ms.S. Get some sleep, (A doctor once told me that sleep gets rid of your mental garbage, and ever since I am a huge advocate of getting a good night's sleep, for your sake and everyone else's sake). Don't explode, and for crying out loud, grow up, lose the superiority complex (I am certainly not your lesser) and go home.

We've all got deadlines to meet.

adios.

p.s sorry about the rant, tried not to go over the top, but it does feel good to have a winge with people who I consider my equals. Equality is a good thing, unless its that fake sugar. Yuk. :P

The girl is bad for me.

Ms. S. (the family member who shall remain nameless) has arrived for a few days! While it is wonderful to see lots and lots of this lovely lass, when the old family dynamics come back into play, you know you are in trouble.

Firstly, thanks to no sleep, Ms. S's behaviour turns from 'respectable, busy 21 yo' to 'cranky, the world owes me everything and everyone else are bad nasty liar poo poo heads people. 5 year old.' Not good.

This comes at a time when I am rushed off my arse, trying to nail this assignment, preferably get all the words down before Tuesday. Fortunately, I have grown up since Ms.S. left home and know better than to bite when she verbally jabs me with an unprovoked barb. But the feelings are the same. I know Ms.S. is prone to explosions, resents the fact that anyone else in the natural world could possibly be under pressure (unless its Mum, but then we've all seen mum go through a lot lately) and naturally explodes when she finds her cds here. Bad habits die hard and I can feel myself going through some of the motions I've been through countless times during my 'black period'. Typified by a shocking self esteem. Years later and my self esteem is good. I am indeed happy with myself, and bugger you if you feel (and have the compulsion to say) otherwise.

Damn Ms.S. Get some sleep, (A doctor once told me that sleep gets rid of your mental garbage, and ever since I am a huge advocate of getting a good night's sleep, for your sake and everyone else's sake). Don't explode, and for crying out loud, grow up, lose the superiority complex (I am certainly not your lesser) and go home.

We've all got deadlines to meet.

adios.

p.s sorry about the rant, tried not to go over the top, but it does feel good to have a winge with people who I consider my equals. Equality is a good thing, unless its that fake sugar. Yuk. :P

Evidence

Today's evidence is brought to you by "Freeman's turtle soup extract. Made from real West Indian turtles!" (true ad, found in the timeless Mrs Beeton's book). Today's words are:
Codex (try saying that and not get fleeting images of The Da Vinci Code (or for humour, try reading the Va Dinci Cod, by A.R.R.Roberts))
Today's other word is: Googlisation (found in a research essay)

Onto the evidence!


Evidence of study


Evidence of capped broadband (GAH!)


Evidence of procrastination


Evidence of tea!


and finally, just some random things to kill your download speed.

Saint Exupery's 'The Little Prince' Quiz.

You are the pilot.
Take this quiz!








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Weird arse test. Thanks to crumpart

Some rather weird English bloke I met at the pirate party. If you squint he looks a bit like Ross Noble, who is also English (but easier to understand)

adios!

*enter expletive here*

I am about to be in the throes of my latest and quickest assignment. Quickest because I have two weeks to do a 2000 word essay that I realised I had the details the whole time (and NOT waiting on a lecturer to deliver them) my reaction? EXPLETIVE. The assignment is about digitisation and the future of libraries, or, will I have a job in twenty years? The answer is yes by the way. But yes in 2000 words would be better. Yikes.

Anyway I have decided on a good analogy about life, or more importantly, work. Work is like tea. You see there are different types of tea for pretty much every job, sleepytime, earl grey, a zillion different takes on chai. So that's the first part of the analogy. Got it? Great. Moving on.

Tea is a combination of a stack of things everyone needs to survive, and thus, work with, I mean who doesn't work with a few different fruits? I can easily name a prune, a grape, and the exotic ones you never knew existed. Also milk (can't find a meaning for this one, but allow it to be like you je ne sais qua (sp?) or your 'Godot' if you will.) And sugar, sweet sweet sugar which is the thing that makes your day bearable, and even pleasant (or super duper good, can't rule that one out) and water. No analogy for water either, go nuts trying though. How it works is this, you have your tea, now you CAN have too much tea, and you can have no tea (dole bludgers) but generally tea in moderate quantities has health benefits. See where I am going? NO? Neither do I but lets continue.

At the moment I have been enjoying my tea, everything is in the right balance, maybe a little short on the sugar but okay. Perhaps I needed the tea to be stronger, and actually do some work that isn't repairing (an occasionally fun but somewhat disappointing/frustrating task at times) and some more gutsy library stuff. Failing that, I wish I'd get paid to do this assignment. That would be good gutsy tea. (But no fruit, assignment work is a lonely task, alas)

So if you think that doesn't make sense, let me reassure you it made PERFECT sense in the midst of a Bowen therapy session (I go to a wonderful woman who does the BEST job! if you want her details, email me privately, I highly HIGHLY recommend her!).

Until next time