The state legislature is looking at substantial cuts to the mental health budget, meaning there's high likelihood I'll be losing my job before too long. So to make myself feel better, I've been photographic cute animals and other happy-making things. So here are some cute pet pictures! There are a lot of them so I put them behind a cut, but be sure to look because they are super cute!

( Read more )

Here's a teaser!

Finally, this is one of my favorite photos ever! look at the way the ears help keep her airborne!

1. How to make ( Pysanki )

2. That cats may have amazing healing powers: http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=why-do-cats-purr

3. Slow Lorises are my favorite ( Prosimians )

My husband just went outside and made a snow dinosaur. He is so funny, he gets these little fits of creativity every now and then, and then gets it out of his system, like one time he insisted I get him some clay, and he made a bunch of little cows, and then he was done. anyway, he made a dinosaur and now he's done for the next 6 months.

Why is there not one on every corner?

My mom went to one when she visited Portland, and came back raving about it (and laden with snacks and candy). I had to go to my agency's corporate office today for training, and one of my many bosses told me there was a Trader Joe's nearby and suggested I go. So I did, and man, I wanted to move in there! 3$ bottles of wine (for hubby, as I can't drink wine, as I'm sure everyone's tired of me whining about), organic eggs for the same price as grocery store eggs, FABULOUS frozen foods.... it was great! I got our groceries for the week, and it cost a little more than it would have at the regular grocery store, but it was all premium stuff. YUM!

I also had first aid training today. It was pretty fun -- well, it was mostly boring, but the group exercises (rolling your partner onto their side so they don't choke on their vomit, giving CPR to dummies -- mannequins, that is, not my co-workers) were pretty fun. I wanted to get all hammy and have fun with them but nobody else was really into that. Anyway, I learned some useful things and I sure hope I never have to use them!

It got really cold all of a sudden.
Tulio is really, really cute. Since he's been staying at home all day with the cats he's started taking much more of an interest in them than he ever has before -- he just gave Ursula a long and hilarious Spanglish* lecture about all the reasons why she needs to stay off the table, and pointed out all the really great toys and things we have for them on the floor. Anyway, I came home the other day and he had the heat CRANKED up (which is very unusual as he prefers to be cold) and it turns out that it had gotten so cold in the apartment that the cats were shivering and so he had tried to cover them up with towels but they had not appreciated that (ingrates) and had wiggled out from under them, so he turned the heat up because he was worried about them! Awwwww.....

Speaking of Tulio, when he moved up here he immediately began bellyaching about the lack of cable, and I got all attitudey and said "Well, I don't really watch TV so I don't care if we have cable or not, so if you want cable you're just going to have to get it yourself". And so he did. In fact, he got satellite. With exclusively Latin American programming. So, no America's Next Top Model, no Project Runway, no Ugly Betty, no Grey's Anatomy. That'll show me.

*He doesn't think the cats understand Spanish and always tries to talk to them in English. Which, whatever motivates him to learn more English is a good thing, I think.

I just started using Flickr, mostly because it's the only way to post pics on Ravelry -- I am embarrassed not to have any pictures there!
It's kind of slow -- does anyone know if there's any way to upload more than 6 pics at a time?
But anyway, I finally uploaded my photos of Alpaca Day!
I think if you click on this photo it will whisk you away to the set?
I will now put amusing captions below the photos.
Isn't that chubby baby alpaca the cutest thing EVER?

Remember the great benefit I posted about a while ago? probably not, so here's a reminder:

[quote]The Hipp Benefit was created to help pay for the mounting medical bills of a fellow crafter.

You may have heard about a great little indie shop called MYMY (http://mymy.us) which is owned and operated by Taryn Hipp.

If you keep up with her blog (http://users.livejournal.com/_mymy/529573.html) you may know that her sister, Jennifer and her niece, Annabelle, have both recently had stints in the hospital.

Jennifer is a single mother, working two jobs and pitching in at MYMY in her "free time" and like many other crafters, has minimal medical insurance.

All proceeds from this shop will go towards helping Jennifer & Annabelle Hipp pay off their hospital bills. Lots of incredible crafters have donated their amazing goods for a great cause. Take your time and buy something fabulous while helping a fellow crafter in need.[/quote]

so check it out because there are a lot of really awesome things donated by a lot of really talented crafters and it's for a really good cause!

http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5273479

but the REALLY exciting thing is that my birdies have been posted, so if you are interested in owning some of my felty creations, now is your chance! They are hard to photograph well, but I assure you that they are cute.

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=7200725

a sample of the other drool-worthy items there (and if you feel like buying me a gift, say a housewarming gift since I'm moving next week......)

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=7183206

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=7036366 (even though I already bought a monster pack, and a damn fine monster pack it was too. still, you can never have too many monsters).

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=7182721

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=7155383

These are the things that I made this weekend:

Yesterday I got in the mail this awesome bag of dyed locks from my friend Hollyeqq (http://www.hollyeqq.com/)
(I ganked the picture from her, btw)



So I did some needle-felting.

Using some white wool I already had, I first made a little bunny:



Then I spun some yarn so I could use the cool fiber samples Holly sent me along with the locks (but I haven't taken a photo of the yarn yet)

Then I let the potential of the locks speak to me, and I made a very awesome thing.

here it is!



It was supposed to be an owl. I'm not sure that's quite what it turned out to be, but I like it a lot nonetheless. It lives in the Magical Artificial Lemon Tree.

(It also apparently has camera-unfocusing juju)

I also finished the project I started a few weeks ago, recovering this chair. I wish I had a "before" picture -- it is a really nice Scandinavian-type chair that my mom's friend gave to us -- but she had let her dog sleep on it so it was stained and slobbery. Tulio agreed to go to the fabric store with me* and we picked out this fabric and I recovered all the cushions. Some swearing and bleeding was involved, but all in all we got a very nice chair for 15$ worth of fabric.

Yes, I KNOW the orchids are upside down. Actually, I suspect nobody but me would notice/care.



Check out those mitered corners, yo.

What do non-crafty people do on the weekends? and what do they do when someone gives them a nice-but-slobbery chair?

*This is HUGE.

everthing about this: Especially the drunken penguin bash up top.
http://mollychicken.blogs.com/my_weblog/2005/12/the_biennial_fe.html

I made an alpaca from a Fiber Trends pattern!
( Here he is: )

Edited to add: I thought there was something wrong with my camera because photos have been a bit blurry lately, but I just realized there was a fingerprint on the lens.

Dog drags Georgia woman to safety

By ELLIOTT MINOR
Associated Press
Published on: 02/04/07

Thomasville — A bruised and battered South Georgia woman credits a German shepherd with rescuing her after her car careened down an embankment, tossing her through the rear window and leaving her sprawled, cut and bleeding, on the vehicle's trunk.

Shannon Lorio, 36, said the dog, which has since been given the name "Hero," pulled her by her collar off the trunk and dragged her about 50 yards through briars to the edge of a highway and let her lean against him so that she could stand up and flag a passing motorist.
Elliott Minor/AP
(ENLARGE)
http://img.coxnewsweb.com/B/05/91/90/image_5090915.jpg
Kennel worker Harry Smith, 24, plays with Hero, a German shepherd credited with rescuing a woman from a car crash.


Officials of the Thomasville-Thomas County Humane Society, which runs the local animal shelter — now Hero's temporary home — were so impressed with the victim's account they have arranged to have Hero evaluated for search and rescue work.

"That dog is always going to have a special place in my heart," Lorio said Friday during a tearful reunion with the dog. "He's my hero."

Lorio, who still has scratches and bruises on her arms and legs, spent most of a night in the hospital, until she insisted on being released. She still walks with a limp. Cuts on her left elbow are held closed by more than 20 metal staples.

She had her first reunion with Hero on Thursday, when she arrived with her mother-in-law with gifts for the dog, including a large pillow, a stuffed animal and a bone almost as big as a rolling pin.

When Lorio returned Friday, she hugged and kissed Hero as he plopped down on the pillow and began crunching the bone.

"If he ever needs anything, I'll be there," she said, noting that she can't adopt Hero because she already has six dogs.

"If I did adopt him, he'd be treated like the king he is. That dog is always going to have a special place in my heart."

The crash occurred on the night of Jan. 26. Lorio, who has five children, said she lost control on a curve in a remote area and the car tumbled backward down an embankment in a heavily wooded area.

She was thrown backward, so that her torso was on the trunk and her feet were dangling over the rear seat.

She said she was not wearing a seat belt.

"I was bleeding from my face and my nose," she said. "All of a sudden, I felt a presence — a really huge presence. He was straddling me. I have watched too many horror movies about werewolves and vampires. I thought he was going to eat me."

Instead, the dog licked her face and locked his jaws on her shirt collar, she said.

He dragged her off the car and kept pulling until she was near the edge of a highway, said Lorio, a trim, 136-pound woman.

She leaned on the dog while summoning help and then collapsed in a semiconscious state, Lori said.

Because of all the publicity the dog has received, at least 50 people have offered to adopt the 2-year-old shepherd.

Chester is helping me unpack it and doing a little QC:




"What, no cashmere?" he says



Sorry, Chester. Just wool (although the green one is alpaca/wool/silk blend).

Good thing it's the weekend! Cause obviously I'm going to be busy!

these are my knitting goals for myself:

1. assuming my box o yarn ever gets to me, my next project will be to learn lace knitting and how to read a chart and I will make this scarf: http://www.interweave.com/knit/special_issues/gifts_preview.asp and i might make those pears too because they really are cute. and of course, I need more cute items hanging around and cluttering things up.

2. next I will learn to work with 2 colors. I thought that looked really too hard, but in my fabulous mitten that I made the other day, I had to knit in some waste yarn to pull out and make the thumb later, and it wasn't at all hard, and it's similar to the technique you'd use for color knitting. If I do start color knitting, I want to make something with a squirrel on it, maybe a hat. or a bag. because I have so few bags. here are some nice squirrel patterns I found, for future reference:
http://www.elliphantom.com/images/SquirrellySwedishMittens.pdf
http://www.helloyarn.com/wp/?p=274
http://www.knittinganyway.com/freethings/Charts/squirrel.htm
aaaannnnnnnnd.... the best ever:
I present to you........
the grab-ass squirrel chart!
http://stephieface.blogspot.com/2005/09/squirrels-squirrels-rock-my-world.html


while this is not color work, it came up while I was googling knit squirrel patterns, and I feel that I might need it.
http://www.tropicalyarns.com/index.cfm?PID=40&ProdID=688

and this is pure insiration:
http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/article.html?in_article_id=19957&in_page_id=2

I'm getting more adventurous in my knitting, recently I've tried several things that I found intimidating (namely cables, short rows, the scareyness of pulling out a bit of waste yarn and picking up those stitches, and knitting a thumb). I've made lots of cool things, like 1 mitten (the other is in the works, and I better hurry before winter goes away), an enormous headwarmer (that I felted last night and am right now kicking myself for not taking a photo first because it was so huge and ribbed it reminded me of a banana leaf), and this adorable sheep: http://www.knotanotherhat.com/productDetail.cfm?product_id=245 excet mine is EVEN MORE ADORABLE than the ones in the picture. I will have to post some photos.

edited to add: I would like to make this hat:
http://magknits.com/Nov06/patterns/fakeisle.htm

I realy really want to knit a cupcake. Recently I went to my friend's baby's 1st birthday and my friend's mom had made a knitted cupcake for the baby. it was adorable and sparkly and soft and I yanked it out of my friend's hand so I could get a better look at it. then I stuffed it in my pocket (just kidding, if I really had I wouldn't need to make this post).
So: I found this pattern http://www.craftzine.com/blog/archive/2006/08/knit_cupcake.html but I don't like the top of the cupcake, I want something a little...floofier.
so then I found this fabulous cupcake hat http://rsveverka.com/chileconyarne/?p=25 but it's too big -- i want a cupcake sized knit cupcake dammit! also, I am not evil enough to make that for any of the children of my acquaintance. perhaps when I have my own child I will feel differently.
I did find these crochet cupcake patterns http://thefuntimesguide.com/2005/12/sew_a_cupcake.php and fortunately, unlike so many yarn snobs, I am proficient in either technique (and in a total aside, what is up with the whole knit vs. crochet dichotomy? neither is better, or rather, they are both better at different things. knitting is faster, uses less yarn, and drapes better. crochet is easier to learn and is much more flexible, in terms of what you can do with it. Plus, they can complement each other well -- i.e. a knit garment with crochet trim. it's a false division, and useless.), however, I think a crocheted cupcake might be less squishy.
so this is where I am at in my quest for knitted baked goods.

From cute overload, of course.

A little googling informed me that these were really popular on crafty blogs a couple years ago. I guess something reaches internet passe-hood when it shows up in a Martha Stewart magazine (which is where I got the pattern from), but who cares, they're cute anyway!





here are some patterns:
http://www.thefabricofourlives.com/Lifestyle/SockToysDog/images/FromMarthaStewartKids_ScottieDog.jpg

http://www.tikaro.com/images/blog/sockdoginstructions.gif

http://snowflakes.lookandfeel.com/

also: BABY PANDA

http://www.zooatlanta.org/animals_giant_panda.htm

and

http://www.zooatlanta.org/animals_giant_panda_red_envelope.htm

yay! it's all stuff I like to look at!

http://www.tordboontje.com/

also, this is very cute:

http://www.puchicollective.com/sewing-patterns/pet-weiner-dog/





I am being underutilized at work today.

not only is this inherently funny, but it's entirely relevent to my personal life!
(why? you might ask -- well, my feet are always cold. so I have to warm them on Tulio. So therefore he is macaronis and I am a pajarito. somehow this is less funny typed out.)

http://www.fluffytails.ca/christmas.asp

http://www.mycathatesyou.com/cats/2006/10/34

http://www.stuffonmycat.com/

http://dailykitten.com/archives/601-Nyan.html

I seriously need to get another hobby.....