forgetterings

i hate when i realize all that i've forgotten. i never did my mad tea party with all the others and a fanciful twist :( was looking foward to finding a bunch of mis-matched cups and things around on the cheap, but i never got around to looking, and then i completely forgot and i ended up planning over it.

also, i've been thinking about my art history today. i know it sounds silly, but i really call it that. since i was teeny tiny, i wanted to be an artist. a painter. but everyone said that artists don't make any money. so i stopped trying to want to be that and started looking for some other niche that i could aspire to fit right into. but i never really found one that other people approved of. everyone else wanted (and still wants) to be a doctor, a marine biologist, a teacher - something that is clear, something that is precise and that you go to school, get a degree, and get a job. but nothing i ever seemed to like worked into that pattern. i remember distinctly being very embarrassed and oh, maybe disillusioned (is that the word) when i found out that "the business" was hard to get far in. by that i mean show business. being an actress. that's the one thing that's been steady, and it's not practical. not one bit.

okay, okay, i'll stop complaining. i've done four responses for the dual credit english assignment, read about 2/3 rds of the way through, and marked about half way through. I wrote bits and pieces of an application essay today. it's the schreiner one that i'm starting with, and i'll be recycling it for several other schools and scholarships. and i've applied for quite a few scholarships already. we shall see how the chips fall.

and now some great parodies of a WWII eara poster:

from 3 Lambs Studio.
I highly recommend looking through
the photostream. every print is great,
and they sell many of them on etsy!



come now, you can't have really
thought that I was from
"across the pond", as they say?
ps - that one's from google.

ah well, i suppose that'll do. i'm going to drop off both fill rolls tomorrow at walgreens and then after i get some theatre hours done, i'll be back here to show 'em off. cross that they come out good!

- p.

michigan & world cup

curious. very curious.

everything is so flat and green. honestly! there's a few hills here and there, but they are so perfectly placed (in relation to roads, etc) that I can't help thinking they're man-made.

we're sitting in a hotel in a squat little town called Charlotte, which I've learned has emphasis on the second, not first, syllable. The old telly is on some random channel so we can watch the Portugal + Brazil game. It's definitely good so far and I'm caught up on who's who this year. Several yellow cards for each team in less than half an hour, and it's funny to see all the reactions ... it's quite good fun. Though, being Brazil, I think this is going to get rough once the timer reaches sixty.

Today, no earlier than three, we're to head over to the inn - notice I didn't have to specify which inn; that's Charlotte for you - and start getting all spiffied up for the wedding tonight. Last night I walked outside with my neice to the back of the hotel to see the lightening bugs down in the bushes. She had bug spray all over her, but I only had it on my legs. Needless to say, in less than five minutes of walking out and back into the hotel, I had 12 - yes, TWELVE mosquito bits on my arms. Two more on my forehead.

The worst bit is that I rarely get bitten down in Texas. I suppose these Michigan flyers thought my sweet tea blood something just to their liking.

I forgot my camera battery so I bought a couple 35mm. I'll post those when we get back.

-polexia.

Fill in the Blank Friday #5

look what I found in my drafts!
a FITBF from a couple weeks back.
and look, it's friday. HEY NOW!
no pictures here, though. sorry ;(

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it's monday - oops! i've nearly forgotten last friday's blanks. i don't remember what i was doing that day at the moment, but i do know my saturday and sunday have been FULL with shopping. shopping for others, shopping in new stores, shopping for Michigan this wednesday! oh my, an early morning on a plane for several hours and then we get to grand rapids :) that's one more state I can cross off the list!!

anywho, the mclinky is closed! but if you want to see more, go visit lauren over at the little things we do. she has a cute lil blog and many many past blanks to fill in ;)



1. The best thing about being in school was/is learning. there are other things about the school environment that are nice, but the absolute best thing is learning.

2. The worst thing about being in school was/is the requirements. japan has all these wicked geniuses coming out of it, and us westerners aren't so used to being the not-top-dog. so all the lil kiddies get to make up for the supposed lack of standards by taking a bunch of classes that most of us don't care about, and that are only useful in (also required) college classes. oh my, don't ever get me started in that rant again!

3. My favorite subject in school was/is history. you can get anything you want from it - english, math, science, ANYTHING! and if you really learn from it, you won't repeat your mistakes, and you can spot the mistakes of others as well. it's good when you have a really ignorant government.

4. One subject I wish I could have mastered/would like to master is French! I have absolutely fallen in love with this language, and I can't wait to study more of it in college.

5. I could never get tired of studying again, I go back to history.

6. The most memorable teacher I had was all of them. I'm not kidding. I've only been out of my school system for one year, and in that time, I realized that my district has outstanding teachers, and has a level of quality that is very rare. I still don't really care about sports (our football team sucks anyway, and will suck until the coach sticks around for more than a year) and our newspaper is pretty much unheard of ... But I value almost every teacher I've ever had. I remember their names and faces, and various good times in their classroom. All the way from kindergarten to this year just ended. Middle school is fuzzy, and I hated that place, but I still remember the names. I will be thanking my teachers specifically when I win that Tony award.

7. If I could choose between going to school for the rest of my life or working for the rest of my life, I'd choose working at school. I love school, but the frustration of not being able to choose my subject is so infuriating that I really am just exploding from the fact that it is still another year until I leave it behind. Teaching and inspiring others to love learning and the world as I do is on my bucket list.

Fill in the Blank Friday #4

oops! I've been doing so much crafting (mostly in my brain) that I've been out of touch with the calendar. okay, okay, truthfully, it's summer, and I don't care about the calendar, except when it goes by slow.

now, onward ye villian!




1. My dream vacation would be to travel the world, including my own country. There's so many places that I want to go experience for more than just a mere couple weeks, that I'll have to write down places on slips of paper and draw them out of a mason jar. note to self - that's a really good idea.

close to my idea, but you simply must click and read
the story behind this little jar. so sweet.

2. The best trip I've ever taken was STORY TIME: I took this crazy unorthodox trip when I was about seven. actually, more like ten or eleven. whatever... My dad and I needed to drive this car up to my sister in Boston. From Texas. My dad's friend is a semi big dude in this business and he was assigned to travel to all these random cities and do meetings. Boring details, etc, etc, long hours o driving and I end up several days late in St. Louis. I strongly remember my dad and his friend and I walking down to the arch. We've eaten, and we're walking back. It's dusk, that really good time that I'm creative and hyper and great. I'm running around ahead of my dad and his friend, around this courtyard thing with big squares of grass and sidewalk and no one notices me and I don't care and I can't see it but I know, behind me, that big huge silver arc is standing, guarding the west.

the arch

3. The most important items to take on a road trip are cameras (one disposable film, one digital), a notebook to scribble things down that you liked, and a road map. AAA doesn't make it worse, either ;)

4. The next trip I'm looking forward to is whatever is happening after I graduate college. I would love to take a month out and drive around on my own before college. Okay, that's not happening. I would like to do the tourist thing in my own town, though. Now that I have more traveling freedom, it's easier to see all the things that are fun in our town. You just have to look. Also, I'm supposed to go to Ireland next summer.

i find it curious that this the first interestingness picture
that pops up after searching flickr with "tourist" and that
it is in loas which i have felt connected to ever since
that silly country report project freshman year

5. If I had to pick one CD to listen to for a long road trip it would be my Old People playlist or From Under The Cork Tree. "old people" is a bunch of loud, fun songs that are great to blast when you want old people AWAY from you. From Under The Cork Tree is still the greatest album I've ever spent money on. It's perfect and I could listen to it over and over.

"old people" in brussels, i supose

6. The biggest disaster I've ever encountered while traveling was on my sophomore NOLA trip. This is more of a 'bad' memory than anything..... It was the last day in New Orleans, and the end of trip surprise thingy was a boat. Yes. We had dinner and a stupid dance party on a boat. Big whoop. you couldn't even tell you were on the boat, and it was too cold to stand outside and act all boaty and what not.
Anywho, I was stressed because my mom guilted me into buying these pants and they were cute but they weren't working for me that day. My hair was really kinky. The humidity was high (even for south texas) and my hair was frizzy and kinky and wasn't drying, either! So I just pulled my hair back into a pony tail, which looked bad, because all the other girls were dressed up. It was just terrible, and I felt terrible and I didn't want to go to a stupid dance party. It did suck, and my first friend at that school, and my last, talked to me the entire time. About fun things, like rock music :D my 'boyfriend' just danced to bad music and dragged me to the dance floor. I walked away, needless to say.

leaked photo of my hair that day.

7. My favorite traveling memory is ...curiously enough, I'm thinking about that day, and that day was good until that little part. Chris was super nice and I had a lot of fun talking to him. I suppose I actually kind of miss him, because he was my friend and the only one who stayed solid with me the whole year. Oh! and then this kid came over and did i-n-s-a-n-e magic tricks. Like, make you gasp in awe tricks. Cool.

Hm. I haven't thought about the good parts of that trip in a long time. However, when I went to super conference with UIL, I did see several isa kids walking back from the theatre conference: bella, randy, izzie, and I think zane too? randy was jumping ahead, no wonder I noticed him :o such a funny, sweet guy.

okay, i think i'm done rambling today. I need more posts, or they're all going to be long like this during the summer....

truly yours, p.

HUZZAH! the bunting tutorial.

well, here it is, folks. the bunting is done and will be wrapped nicely for summer. then, the weekend before that weekend in august, it will be taken out, lovingly ironed, folded up, and placed in a special pocket for a journey to it's new home - an unknown pretend locker space in the land of theatre geeks, showing it's face (or triangles) only when special day comes for a person meeting certain criteria.

aka, the bunting is for our theater club birthday celebrations. except, we're in a delicate spot at the moment and so, i'm not sure where bunting will spend it's days.

ON TO THE FEATURE PRESENTATION

This is the way I made my bunting. I read a bunch of tips/tutorials long before I did this, but I didn't follow specific instructions. Just the idea. So here's what I did.

Cutting Triangles. Okay, the the bunting itself is pretty simple once you get going. The hardest part (to me) is getting a template for the triangles. On graph paper, I sketched out a rectangle and it's diagonals. I erased off the bottom corners and messed with the angles until I got the triangle I wanted. it took a while to get it right, but it wasn't mathematically perfect. All it need to be is LOOK like it's a nice triangle.

To make a sturdy template, I cut out the paper one I drew, then traced that onto some cardstock and then cut that out. I can use it again when I make more bunting :D

Now's a good chance to think hard if you want a message on your bunting. "Happy birthday" uses 15 individual flags, including the space. Make sure you have enough fabric and remember that you need two pieces for one flag.

So after that, I spread out the fabric and started cutting. Then, I organized the triangles the way I wanted them. I made sure to stack them with the pretty side in, just like I had to sew them. That way, there was less room for mistakes.

By the way, I chose fabrics that don't necessarily go together, but ones that looked good next to one another. My blue plaid didn't look good next to the yellow circusy dots, but when I in added the green and pink prints, they were "linked" together.

Sewing the triangles. When the triangles are ready, take 'em over to the sewing machine (or your comfy chairthat you hand-sew in). I used a pin on each side of the triangle to keep it from going crazy, and also cut some slits after I sewed them up to help keep the shape nice and flat. I used a small, straight stitch about 1 cm from the edge. Also, I used a couple lonesome colors of thread. A light silver-grey for the bobbin and a pastel mint green for the top :)

Note - you don't need to sew the base (well, i mean the top, short edge) because it will be closed up later.

Once all that sewing is done, turn out your triangles. If you want extra crisp triangles, and I hope you do, then iron the flags flat. Are you ready to add on the message? If you don't want to, just skip past this part to the bias edging part.

Letteringness - There are many options for letters. I wanted a no-sew bit so that thread and stitches wouldn't show. and I didn't want much more weight because I wasn't sure (at this point) how nicely it was going to hang when it was done. So I opted for fabric paint and stencils.

I could have bought my own stencils, but I was picky and I wanted to try the freezer paper trick, anyway. It's really easy but you'll need some patience. Freezer paper is like a mesh of wax and parchment paper. Slick and shiny on one side, normal on the other. Make your stencils big enough, or you'll have this problem:

Note - for a stencil reference: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bellgirl/4593720296/ also, her blog is much better at explainging this process than I am! It's here: http://bellgirl.com.au/2009/07/tutorial-three-colour-freezer-paper.html

Carfully iron the stencils in place. The waxy other side will be a little sticky with the heat, and will stay nice and flat on the fabric. Beware though, these don't work more than one or two times, so be careful! Now, take the other stray pieces, like the middle of the 'A' and iron those on. SUPER CAREFULLY!

When they cool down, move them to a piece of cardboard and start sponging on that fabric paint. Follow any instructions that the paint might need. Other than that, peel off the stencils. I don't bother letting the paint dry first, since it isn't like regular wall paint. Isn't it fun?

Trim off any excess so that the triangle corners meet nice and neat:

Bias Edging The last step! Okay, check up on your triangles. See the un-sewn edge? That is going to go right inside your bias tape. Fold your tape in half, mark it with a pin, and then pin the middle. Space out and pin the rest of your triangles and MAKE SURE that they are in the right order! A couple inches out from your first triangle, start sewing to close the bias tape. Just keep going right over the triangles, giving yourself about 1/4 inch of room on the tape.

I used extra fold double wide or something whatever it was called. The great thing is: there is already a finished seam for you!

Light Blue for the inside of the bias that faces the fabric.
Dark Blue for the very inside that only touches itself.
Orange for the very top of the outside of the bias.
Orange is where you nestle the edge of the triangle.
Yellow for pretty outside bias tape happiness :)

Just keep sewing. Remove your pins as you near them. (my machine gets moody around those pins.) Sew ALL THE WAY DOWN THE BIAS. You could use a decorative stitch I suppose, But I just used my mis-matched thread from earlier and a plain, straight stitch.

Sew a few inches past the the last triangle, just like at the beginning. Feel free to stop there and knot the thread. Curious about how to knot the thread? Here's how I did it:

And that's pretty much it! Enjoy your new handmade bunting :D