Sunday, July 31, 2005

Expos

This weekend marks the second in a row that I've been to a expo at the Blaisdell. Last weekend was the vintage/antique show and I tricked my sister into buying this vintage dress and bag of circle fabric things. I tried on the dress and it makes me look pregnant and very broad. It looks cute off though. If we weren't so camera shy I'd post a picture of me and my guy in our orange 70's outfits (he's got an orange 70's-esque aloha shirt).

I'm trying to figure out another use for these round fabric things, the lady selling them said they used to make rugs and maybe even quilts with them.

This past weekend we went to the wedding expo. Wow. I wanted to fly through the whole thing but halfway through I figured out (it took me that long to figure out) that I'd better get my money's worth and actually stop and look at things instead of just picking up brochures. So we went back and looked at a bunch of photographers' albums--I have to say I was most sucked in by people who had the gimmicky albums. I'm a sucker for gimmicks, the album I was intrigued with was almost like a popup book (pages with foldout panels) but no fun turning wheel things or pull tabs. I think that'd be even better. That's about it, lots of photographers, oh and we really liked the local winery so I think we might make our own wine for the wedding. Way to stay in budget.

Hodgepodge

Too lazy to go write a separate post for everything so BLAM! Some shots of the goods I bought on the trip, didn't get to upload everything--thanks Flickr! There are also some jewelry pieces I've done so far this summer. The two rings are going to my July birthday pals, the birdie pendant was an experiment--I've been wanted to combine fiber and metal into pieces, I'm still trying to figure out how I feel about the experiment. Dumdum that I am I've misplaced the pendant--d'oh!


I've been really into summer fruit this year so when I saw plums and nectarines on sale for super cheap I picked up a silly 2lb+ of each despite crazy looks from my guy (he does the face so often it's lost its meaning--teach him to use it so much!). Found a recipe for a tart at Frog Hollow Farm. It turned out not bad--I added cinnamon to the crust and divided the crust into 9 x 9 inch sq and six muffin tins. Had to make one and a half times the filling, guess I could have just done the square pan.

Tuesday, July 26, 2005

Curse you Flickr!!!!

Thought I'd be super smart and post all my trip purchases on Flickr. Stinkin' thing only allows for 20mb of uploading per month--what's that about?!!! Uploaded about 16 shots and I already reached my limit. Hehe, I guess I could have used a lower resolution for the pictures...and read the whole 20mb thing before I started uploading. Curses! Oh well.


This is a baby blanket I finished for for our new nephew--it took me fricking forever to sew two pieces of fabric together and add binding. WHY?!! Probably because of the super soft minkee fabric, it's oh so lovely, so soft and cuddly. But a stinker to work with. I remember promising myself not to use it again after finishing a quilt for a friend but my memory isn't that good and I forgot my promise to myself. Stupid. Well it's finished and not super hideous. Babies don't care right?

I also wanted to make him a silver baby spoon. I dragged my guy to Tiffany's to check out their baby spoons and saw that they have images on the handles--cute! Who'd have thunk it? Hehe, apparently not silly me. I liked this one but I'd rather have a motorcycle or Kikaida on the handle (the dad was/is a Kikaida fan and likes to ride/race motorcycles). I'll take a stab at a motorcycle spoon but when I think about it, what's the point of a silver baby spoon? So odd.

Monday, July 18, 2005

Vacation break

Haven't taken any shots of my booty yet...hehe, not that kind of booty, this is NOT that kind of blog! I have taken a bunch of not so good shots of a couple rings I made last week in class. How exciting, I just learned a new stone setting technique so guess how many same-same-ish rings I've since last week? Four. I'm kind of sick of making them but practice practice, and believe me I need the practice.

These two (same rings, different poses) are sapphires, the one on the right is light green set in a square-ish ring, the other is blue/violet set in a round ring. Hard to tell though.

Is it me or do the ring poses remind anyone of these guys. The pose, the almost identical look (okay, not identical but you know, the shirts, the smile, two eyes, a nose and hair, they could be third or fourth cousins at least!)...hmmmm, I shouldn't make fun, they might kick me off of Blogger and revoke my email account.

Thursday, July 14, 2005

The Great Northwest

After a sweltering good time in Chicago we headed home via Seattle/Vancouver/Portland. Ah lovely reliable overcast-cool weather, how I miss it! It was actually gorgeous on July 4th in Seattle--sunny and hot--the rest of the time it was typical northwest weather. Gray (not a bad thing to me since I actually didn't mind the gloom when I was at UW).

I gotta say we had just as much good food and fun in the northwest as we did in Chicago, maybe even more since we were in such good company! Big ol' hugs, kisses and thanks to all our fanstastical hosts--housing, dinner, bbq, tour guide--you guys rocked our world--WICKED AWESOME!!!

Unfortunately, being the lame-o picture taker I am, I missed out on a whole lot of potentially wacky shots with friends--HEH?! Yeah, I super suck. Some of the silly pictures I did manage to sneak in during our NW tour:


I've been wanting to try this candy for a while--ever since I saw it on Food TV, that show that Double Dare's host hosts...Mark Summers? Anyhoo, have I mentioned that I love regional snacks?! I tried to buy it when I was in Houston earlier this year but they only sold it in a big expensive pack of nostalgic candy so I passed. Found this at a rest stop right before the Canadian border. Oh, and fyi, if you're ever driving to Vancouver from Seattle I highly recommend the truck crossing border route, it was so quick and has a nice Duty Free shop coming back into the US--unlike the main border which can take longer to cross and I hear Duty Free is literally a shack/trailer.

Whoa, got a wee bit sidetracked...I only took one bite but it was enough. I'm not a super big fan of marshmallows to begin with (I'm dumb, I knew it was a marshmallow candy but I wanted to try it anyway), the marshmallow was on the firmer side, don't know if that's a good or bad thing. The grated coconut didn't do anything for me and I'm thinking there might have been a base of some sort but I can't really remember. Eh, it was okay, I can check it off my list, my life can go on now. Side note--are the eyes on the wrapper creepy or what? Reminds me of these eyes.


This shot I took in a convenient store in downtown Portland, I laughed out loud when I saw it. Didn't try it though, the free Monster energy drink they were handing out in Chicago put me off of energy drinks--tasted too much like my cough medicine. The boy on the other hand couldn't get enough of it, said it tasted like bubble gum. He even drank the diet version of Monster....daring!


Hehe, here's a requested picture--the mini doughnut machine at Pike's Place Market. We had to make a stop at Daily Dozen. How can anyone resist the allure of a fresh doughnut?! Actually I'm just as in love with the doughnut machine as I am with their doughnuts--I'm not saying they're the bestest ever cause I've had some duds from here (when I un-lucked out and got cold doughnuts, they should through people in jail for serving cold doughnuts!) but when doughnuts are fresh...watch out!!! We bought a bag of cinnamon sugar ones, my personal favorite but I guess there are only so many doughnuts (even fresh ones) a person can eat before feeling...blah. My limit was three or four, sad huh? The boy didn't think they were as good as they were before (I just stare at him crazy-like--can't say anything cause my mouth is stuffed with cinnamony cake doughnut goodness) so he didn't eat as many as I think he could have :) We had left over--ACK! The horror! All those doughy balls of heaven wasted...those are the times I wish I were a camel, store doughnuts in my fat hump and not look weird (poor camel, wonder what happened to its hump).

Tuesday, July 12, 2005

Starts with a "C" ends with an "o" and has "hicaaahg" in the middle

So part of the reason that I've been absent from posting is because we've been on vacation for the past two weeks....or rather I've been on vacation for the past two weeks, the boy was in a conference for a week and on vacation for a week. The conference was in Chicago--whipeee!!! LOVE that town, could they GIVE more food at restaurants? Hmmm....see where my priorities are.

Some of my favorite (and only) pictures taken in Chicago, what's wrong with me?!

Chocolate moussey raspberry deliciousness from Sweet Thang in Bucktown. In general I'm not down with the cakey bottom part--this was no different. But everything else above the cakey bottom--GET IN MY BELLEH! It was our pre-dinner dessert or our backwards dinner. Dessert first, dinner later.


On our way back to our hotel from the Taste of Chicago (giant bbq turkey leg, more bbq that you can shake a giant turkey leg at, and other lip smacking goodnesses) are these large fountain thingies in Millenium Park. So neat that the water shoots out of these electronic-y screen things. They change pictures but luckily I caught the man spitting on people just before it changed. Am I weird?--it grosses me out that people play in fountains but I guess in the people's defense it was really hot and mugcity when we were there.


I'm not sure when I took this, or where (I guess at Harry's Velvet Room--duh) but I thought it was purdy. It was probably on our way back to the hotel from the El.

Can't wait to go back next year (I'm sure my guy is itching to go too--right, I don't think he has such fond memories of Chicago being stuck in all those super fun seminars and all)--the food, the shopping, the art, what's not to like?!

Busted!

I was supposed to post this about a month ago but it slipped my mind....this is the original post:

So the other day I got a word lashing from my pal DP for posting about books instead of more interesting news--I'm engaged! Technically we've been engaged for almost a month now but the boy requested that I keep my big pie hole shut and not say anything until he finished taking his big exam (he'd been studying since the end of last year for this certification exam). He took that exam two weeks ago but I still had to sit on it until this weekend when we told our families the news. GAAAAAD! It was killing me at first--I LOVE gossip!

Anyhoo everyone asks how he asked--it wasn't a surprise because he told me in February that he was looking at rings. We picked it out together in late April and I bugged him to let me wear it around the house. It was too big (the ring, not the rock, the rock can never be too big :) kidding, it can, eight carats is just too big, six is doable though) so we got it resized (it's still too big but I'll live with it for now) and he asked me in early-mid May. In the kitchen. In front of the refrigerator. In our ratty home clothes. He asked, I said yes and we high fived! Woo-hoo!!!!


So it's been a month since we've told family and friends, the glow is wearing off and the crappy reality of planning a wedding is settling in!!! I figure I'll be one of the extremes--psycho bridezilla or unconcerned lazy bones. Makes me want to take the boy up on his original idea--lunch time wedding at city hall, whoever can get off is free to come, we'd maybe even spring for bentos in the park...maybe :)