All I do now is train, train train train for the triathlon.

Unfortunately, all this training means is that I’m overdoing it, I’ve managed to destroy my back. It surprised the hell out of me, I ran two miles, I swam my normal half mile and somehow at work my back just said “eek” and stopped being happy.

SO last night I … got to lie around a lot. Today I got to lie down some more. Finally realized that my most comfortable position is in my most generally uncomfortable chairs with a big chair on my lumbar.

BUT that means I got to finish my new vegetable bags! They’re made out of fat quarters and I’m loving them:

They’re dorky and they’re adorable and I love them! They aren’t meant for large shopping, they’re meant to replace the plastic vegetable bags that are overused and thrown away.

Side note, OH how I want Nachos.

To start my adventure in artichokes I will share the first thing I was told to do, cut off the tips of the leaves and the top of the plant. This was just about the easiest thing that I did in regards to this project, and seeing as I no longer seem to have kitchen sheers, that was still some doing.

 The plop! Into the pot. I covered it so that I would no longer look at it bouncing around and wonder what I should do to submerge it better. Please excuse the finger, I’m working on it.

 Prep time, the artichoke is boiling and it’s time to work the stuffing. After washing the mushrooms I trimmed their stems and yes, you see the cheese grater there for a reason. While artichoke’s may be new to me, I’m big on stuffing things and shredding the mushrooms was PERFECT! I also diced WAY too much garlic (if there is such a thing) and added a little EVOO to sauté it for a moment. When you don’t take the time to sauté your garlic it can leave you with this bitter tinge, even after you’ve put it into the oven for a while. Then toss the mushroom shavings, garlic, 1 roma tomato (diced) 1/4 C of breadcrumbs and 1/4 C garlic & herb feta into a bowl.

 Looks like our artichoke is done, the sites all told me to slide a knife in the stem and if it slides in easily then it’s good. Now we get tricky again, don’t listen to the instructions that tell you to take out the center (the purple part and the hairy part) as though it doesn’t suck because OMG was it rough. Luckily the way artichokes are built you can press them open to expand your work area and it just pops back into it’s shape!

 That’s all there is to it, though. the majority of your stuffing goes into the center of the artichoke but you can pull the leaves back to put stuffing behind each of those. As a huge cheese fan I put quite a bit of shredded cheese on top before sticking it in the oven (on 350°) for about 10-15 minutes.

There we have it, my beautiful and scrumptious, stuffed artichoke. Only problem is that once completed I realized, I have no idea how to properly eat an artichoke…here’s to experimenting!

Mission? Why yes I have one…well multiple.

But the newest is a mountain of octopi. I want them cute, and squishy, and multi-colored.

At one point I had about 40 multi-colored felt fish hanging from my bedroom ceiling and you know what? I miss that. With my ceiling fan that might prove itself difficult but I do want to start with a mountain of octopi. I hope it doesn’t prove itself that hard of a design…I know how to make a ball…I know how to make a tentacle…that should do it, right?

I’m also feeling a physical need for more art supplies. I want to crawl around on the floor, covered in pastels, ruining clothing while I make things swirl and intersect.

I want to have paint brushes sticking out of my mouth and accidentally go to work without realizing that there’s still smudges on my elbows.

More than want, I think that I need.

And my favorite, I want a pile of octopi. Friday after my Dr. Appointments I’m going to Joann’s for fabric for this. Probably felt or felt-ish to start. I don’t want to knit or crotchet them, I want them from fabric.

Then Saturday I’m heading downtown to wander fabric district and see if something screams at me that it needs to be my new skirt, yoga bag, shirt, or headbands. I also want to make a giant stack of fabric head bands.

….because I can.

So…I’ve lost it. But I think that’s ok

When we were kids my mom used to make all of our blankets/comforters. Hell, she still does but that’s besides the point.

They always consisted of pretty fabric, layered against other fabric, with batting in the center. Then throughout the comforter were these yarn ties that held the back and the front together.

Now she puts in thinner batting and creates these amazing designs with the fabric and the stitching.

SO the quilt that I’ve made has a lot of little squares, squares that somehow ended up a little off here and there (I’m buying a replacement self healing mat since I guess mine is more warped than I realized) and I just can’t get it completely flat.

Since she instructed me to get medium loft it’s squishy enough and I think the only way to really fix it is to keep it squishy with the yarn thingies like she used to use. So the borders will be quilted, they’re straight. And to keep the center parts from being all weird, I’m pretending that I did it on porpoise, and doing the little pully yarn things. It’s a bit of a cop out but it’s way too late to fix it completely.

So…I stretched all of my fabrics out of the floor and put a hundred pins through it all, then started to stitch

It felt good but I stopped to look and sure enough, the bottom was wrinkling a bit…shit. A bit too much and so I had to take out all of the quilting that I’d completed.

Breathe and start again.

What? It’s bunching again? Ok…out

Taking my time with the layout. There’s something wrong with the quilt top, it’s not a rectangle. Ok, I think the triangles are off. Take them out, they need to be recut

Am I discouraged? Why yes, yes I am. I may be taking all of the blocks apart to make sure that they’re all square.

Lots of work? Why yes, yes it is.

Worth it? Why yes, yes she is.

Talked to my mother…

Breathed…

I’m on the way!

I’m starting a new first quilt, well, started it last night.

I was staring at the fabric and very scared to start cutting, and my mother, oh how I love my mother, ordered me to suck it up and do it.

What did that start? It started that determination that I get where I just push through the night! Six hours later I went from

	To:
	And then magically:
There’s still a lot of work to be done before it’s completed,
	and my kitty was happy to help:

What things have I made this summer?

I made this:

All day Thursday I made jokes about how I’d been beating myself up in my sleep and that’s why I had a black eye
“Black eye? Az, I don’t see a black eye?”

Well, my eyelid sure felt bruised, so I stuck to the beating up story.

Friday morning, my Saturday and oh what a day! I wake up, I feel a little strange and Oh my gosh…my eyelid’s swollen! It’s HUGE! I look all broken and icky!

Call my doctor and get an appointment for eleven. By that point the swelling nearly goes down, so she’s like “I see a little swelling here” .. I should have taken a picture.

I’m taking a pile of allergy pills to try to get it down and cold compresses. Really I think they didn’t help at all and it’s just healing on it’s own with time.

So with that i spent much of my weekend on my back, in the no-so-happy way, but did manage time to make myself a new/fabulous skirt!

I called in sick on Sunday (and should have Monday) because of my eye issues (computer screen for 8 hours with a screwed up eye?) but I still managed to design and make this wonderful thing. I added two sets of ties on both sides to make sure the back got pulled up enough, and was concerned that it looked funny. I have now been assured that it looks FABULOUS andis my boss’s boss’s favorite part of teh skirt

The thing is, it’s not definitely that I haven’t been able to craft, but I haven’t felt like writing about it…HOW LAZY IS THAT?!

I actually got some new really awesome things created when I was sick. All I did was pull my big box of yarn out, and while I was bed bound I knitted these awesome neck warmers, and as soon as I was moving around I created these kinda broach-like things out of clay.
I’m pretty happy with how they turned out but of course, I still need more opinions. I also cranked out some more hair pieces: I’d like to get some better pictures and even found someone very willing to be my model for these and my tentacle earrings, but I want to make a large chunk of them first and I need to get some more sealant first.

Now, I need to go get dressed for more OT at work and figure out where I drunkenly took my earrings out at last night.

But I really do want opinions on these crafty-things so have at it!