Heads up!

It's getting to be Halloween time. So, I thought today I would pull out some of Jack's past costumes made from bicycle helmets. I came up with this idea many years ago and like the idea, because it is a lot of effect for the effort. Essentially, you get a great big head. And great big heads are awesome for costumes. The bicycle helmet works nicely, because it fits snugly with a chin strap. Plus, it has ventilation holes leading into a layer of Styrofoam, into which you can anchor things.

The drawbacks with this kind of costume are that the headpiece can become heavy if you load it up too much. So keep the building materials lightweight. The other drawback, is that the child's vision is obscured, so he will need a little extra supervision during treat-or-treating. The headpiece can become a bit cumbersome, so keep in mind your child's tolerance level.

This was a viper fish/angler fish. Probably a species not yet discovered.

I rigged this with little lights along the back, tail and into the hanging lure.

This was a Cyclops.
Here, you can see the underside. I can't think of many blogs that offer you a chance to look up a hairy Cylcops nose. The teeth are made of a modeling plastic (Fimo). Before baking, I inserted toothpicks into the tops of each tooth. I then stuck the toothpicks up into Styrofoam to anchor them. Alas, all that Halloween candy lead to some tooth loss for our Cyclops along the way and he only has two teeth remaining. The helmet is concealed with faux fur cut into shaggy strips.

And a dragon! The snout for this dragon and the nose for the Cyclops were made by carving pieces of Styrofoam with a paring knife and then moulding and glueing felt around the carving. On the dragon snout, I used a Sharpie pen to add shadow and detail. Dragons must eat less candy, because he still has all his teeth! Feathers add detail to the crown and expression to the eyes. The helmet is covered here in probably an old bed sheet spray painted and cut into strips.

So, that's the heads up!

Pregnancy of the Day!

(No, no, no. Heavens no. Don't get excited. Not me. Me? Llama. Just wait for it.)

We are back to school. And I do feel qualified to say "we" and include myself among the back-to-schoolers. I 'm stressing about correctly filled-out agenda books and papers correctly labeled and lists of supplies: Protractor, ruler, glue stick, two different colors of sticky notes, three different colors of highlighters, 100 notecards, six white mice and a pumpkin... Jack started a new school this year. And while it can't be the grooviest thing to be the new kid during the middle year of middle school, his "I hate school" comments can so far only be traced to the 50 problems of Algebra every night and the "Pregunta del diá" ("Mom, what does 'Pregunta del diá' mean?" It's a latinate language, honey, so: "Pregnancy of the day"...). Soy una experta de idioma! Me? Llama. Me llama mama. And I am proud of that boy.

And it's soccer season and my chance to don an obnoxious yellow shirt. Soy una árbitra! Well, I have a flag and a patch and the shirt, so I am entrusted with officiating and execution of the FIFA laws. Laws, not rules. Laaaaws. Well, assistant referee. For which certain Advanced referees are inclined to quiz me--out of the blue--thusly: "Nancy, if, during a goal kick, the ball is caught by a strange wind and does not go forward into the field of play, but goes directly backward, what is the call?" Seriously? What is the call? If the laws of physics are no longer to be relied upon? The call is 9-1-1, because I am on a field with 22 youngsters in the middle of a tornado. That's the call. "Nancy, name all the different kinds of restarts and how they are performed." And so it goes...

I submitted a Whip Up post and dear Kathreen posted it yesterday. Boy, I can tell I haven't written much lately, because, yeah, it's another brain dump. But go have a read, if you like. I've included a little free e-book at the end to make a newsboy cap. Like the one up there at the top of this post.

The article tries to explain how serious crafting can be honest résumé fodder. And I reveal that as much as I am a "business woman," I'm not in it for the money ('cause there ain't that much). I am richly rewarded, on the other hand, with feelings of contributing, accomplishment, community and family. I also have a bounty of richness in the friendships that I have formed. I recently had a little exchange with Lola Nova. Oh what treasures! I am not a huge fan of shopping. I look through a mall and think: There's nothing special here. There's nothing with a history or a patina of love and use. There's nothing here that anybody made for me. Quite a different story with things of a handmade nature, wouldn't you say?

Many of Lola Nova's treasures have quickly found their homes in our home and daily lives. It warms my heart to come across them. I will photograph them as I see them. Things like...

...this shopper!


(The Trader Joe dudes are tired of hearing that somebody made the bag for me. So what.)

...And this gnarly orange "Big Wednesday" poster for the Jack Habitat. Goes Perfect, no?

...And the Rock On Monkey! Like Rock On Monkey.

The handmade pencil case is off to school right now. I'll save that for another post. And the homemade marmalade? Well, at least one jar for sure won't be able to make it to the next post, because it has not lasted long enough to photograph...

Have a beautiful day!

We interrupt your summer for this commercial message.

Just a quickie. Just getting the word out. Won't take long.

I have not been sewing. Wait, I take that back: I did stitch six seams last week during Crafty Mama Lisa's Wednesday sew-along. Woo hoo! Six whole seams (topstitched,

too!). Anyway, I've watched a lot of Glee reruns. And I have been translating. Translating, translating, translating. Translating lends itself well to simultaneously watching Glee reruns. Sort of a Zen activity. Unless the garment is a complete mystery to me, I can basically look at it and get my head immediately into its construction..."Stitch bodice left and right pieces to the bodice back fabric right sides together at the shoulder seams. Press the seam allowances toward the front and topstitch from the garment right side...Repeat for the corresponding lining pieces..." This goes there and that goes there before that goes there so that can happen here... And so on and so on and so forth... Yes, Zen, but dry as toast!

Time to get back to sewing. So that you can get back to sewing, I do now have some new favorite Farbenmix sewing patterns translated into Englis

h.

So, my lovely retail partners, I have Fancy Frock WILLEMIENTJE and the Mini Mod Dress AMELIE ready to go! In English!

ZUCKA (skirt), ULJANA (skirt) and IZZY (about the cutest jacket I have seen in a loooong time) are coming up very shortly (mid September).

In other news, I've been asked to guest post on Whip

Up (love Whip Up, don't you?). Whip Up generously wrote a lovely review on our book and I never said thank you. Well, thank you, Whip Up gals! I appreciate every kind word out there. I think I'll prepare a freebook for that guest post. But is there anything you'd like to hear from me for this guest post? Any questions you'd have?

*crickets*

Yeah, I think a good freebook is a better idea, too.

I return you now to your regularly scheduled summer.

Sooo... Whaddup?

I'm in such a nesting mood, I keep checking my arms to see if I'm growing feather. After redoing Jack's room, it's only "fair" to see if Ebay and Craigslist don't have a few things for a new look for the Annatorium. All in the name of fairness.

Every room needs a statement piece. In the Jack Habitat, it is this chair. Or maybe the puffer fish.

For Anna's room, well, she doesn't really know exactly what statement she wants to make. Just less ORANGE. Much less orange, thank you very much. And "groovy". And "glamorous". And "not princess". So my head is heading Mid Century Florida, where my grandmother had a glamorous (in my opinion) condominium in Saint Petersburg. Think beach with a touch of The Kapok Tree Inn. My grandmother had money and my mother had great taste: When those two got together to redecorate, man, they would have done Dorothy Draper proud. I haven't the budget or the finesse to do what they did, but I'm priming wood nonetheless. Not sure how it will all come together, but have to start somewhere.

Part and parcel for particle board, it's time that the Ikea bed went before it collapses and the girl wakes up in a pile of sawdust. I picked up an "antique four-poster bed" on Craigslist. Antique it's not. And four-poster is more like canopy bed sans canopy. Do we hear the voice of buyer's remorse? Yeah, sure, but also the echo of "let's do whatever the heck we want with the bed-shaped mass of wood!" So, on with the primer today!

And then there's this for inspiration. The very best kind. More on that later

Have a great day,

Nancy

A peek!

Peek-a...

Boo!

You likey?

Then me makey sewing pattern!

Tell me whatcha think!

And please give the girl some props for letting me put hydrangea on her head.

Postcards from today

Manhattan Beach.

Big surprise: Milo likes food.

Let's get this straight, once and for all: Milo, you are not our cat. No. You belong to these fine people, who pay the phone bill belonging to this number on your tag. Go back to them. This is my house. My yard. My kids. My rules: No cats. So, go along home, now. Go, go, go away! Shoo. Yes, you. Go...

As anyone who has ever tried to have a heart-to-heart--a tête à tête, a tête à chat, a chat with a chat, a chat chat, cat chat--with a cat (or with a rock, for that matter) knows, a cat really doesn't care about your worldview. It's always only all about "me, me, me". Which a cat will state, in English, very clearly: "MEEeeee". A dog, on the other hand, may not understand you exactly, but a dog will work really hard to figure out what makes its human happy. A cat, on the other hand, works really hard to have a human, any human, figure out what makes it happy.

"Do you think cats like shrimp?"

Kids, really: Do we really need to test this hypothesis? Really? Shrimp are nature's potato chips for carnivores. Think about it: What meat-eater doesn't enjoy a curly little stomotopod treat? Even the giant blue whales like shrimp, better than anything else. I'd bet, if you put a shrimp in front of a Saharan sand cat, a creature, which in the course of its evolution likely hasn't seen any sea creature since the Saharan oceans receded, that creature would have no problem eating a shrimp. Even God can't seem to keep us away from shrimp: When He was still speaking directly to us, He called the very useful shrimp and its shellfish cousin an abomination. And "abomination" was probably about right: Back before the days of water treatment plants, water treatment consisted primarily of these very filter feeders. Ergo, whatever ill the water bore, would thus become food borne illness. And yet, we have Red Lobster $11.99 Shrimp Festivals. Go figure.

Too late: Shrimp/cat hypothesis is tested. And yes, by the way, cats do like shrimp. And this Milo Cat likes shrimp, very much, thank you very much.

And I think this test actually sealed the deal for Milo Cat. While he may not be our cat, we appear to be Milo Cat's shrimp-providing people. That's all that matters.

But we are not cat people!

Look, I have nothing against the smirky, silky, snarky felines, exactly. I just like to keep a healthy distance between me and anything that makes my eyes swell up and my sinuses run like leaky taps and my lungs constrict in asthma: Just a personal quirk. My house. My kids. My rules: No cats.

"MEEEeee".

I'm just not getting through to the petite puma. Not making any negotiating headway at all. Not as long as there is a possibility of more shrimp and a sunny/shady spot with comfy cushions to boot.

"Do cats like prosciutto?"

Do cats like $18-a-pound prosciutto? Uh-huh.

And since this cat is named Milo and since this whole post is about food and because this particular song seems to reflect Milo Cat's entire thought process, a little bit of another particular Milo and his similar thoughts on food. Just because.