14
Jan, 2009

tiny tidbits from a laptop refugee

my laptop’s video card fizzled out a few days ago, so i am beholden to my generous husband to share his computer with me so that i can post every once in awhile.  but i still wanted to share a few tiny happy things from the past few days (christmas reverie will be continued as soon as my computer is restored to me–or at least my hard drive), so here they are:

#1–this weekend, a very dear and long lost friend found me on facebook.  we haven’t spoken for about 16 years (which, coincidentally, was about as old as we were when we met) and each of us has, periodically, tried to find the other with little success, but this time she actually managed to find me!  we first met on a summer missions trip to england when we were in high school.  a large number of the rest of our team are also on facebook and our virtual reunion has been somewhat surreal and lots of fun.  some of these people i thought i’d never hear from again.  i was so thrilled when this friend found me.  she called me on the phone a few days later and we picked up right where we’d left off so many years ago.  hooray for the internet!

#2–did you know that lending at the library could go both ways?  a few days before christmas, a woman came to the library and asked for some good audiobook recommendations.  during our conversation, it became apparent that we liked a lot of the same types of books and she asked me if i’d ever heard the original radio recordings of the hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy and… i hadn’t.  a few days after the new year, this same woman came in and found me again at the reference desk (a somewhat rare occurence, usually) and said she’d brought me her own personal copies of the cd recordings of the original radio show of the hitchhiker’s guide.  she’d brought it so that i could have a chance to listen to it.  how nice was that?!  (and they are very funny recordings!)

#3–i have no photo for this, but it must be a good time in life for reunions with old friends, because it was less than a week ago that an old college roommate of mine that i’ve lost touch with called me and we talked for a few hours.  we could have probably talked all day, but i had to go to work.  it was wonderful to re-connect with her.

#4– about once a month, a group of friends here in town get together to watch very bizarre movies.  some of them are so weird that i just don’t get them, some are just strange enough that they irritate me, some feature quirky characters that i adore by the movie’s end, but almost never have we watched a movie that i’m tempted to own.  until this past weekend.  the movie of the month was “the fall.”  i’d watched a preview and then read a spoiler on imdb (on purpose) and so i was able to relax and just enjoy the visuals and not worry about what was going to happen at the end because i knew what was going to happen at the end.  and this movie is all about the visuals.  and the storytelling.  the plot line is completely secondary to the visuals, but basically it involves a man telling fantastical stories to a little girl while they’re both in a very drab hospital and the little girl helping to direct the story.  when the movie is in the storytelling part, the images that you’re watching are of the story–bright, vivid colors and crazy awesome costumes and the most amazing locations.  and here’s the kicker–i learned after watching the movie that these scenes were all shot on location.  no elaborate sets were built, no green screen or special effects–all of these amazing places actually exist somewhere in the world.  you’ll have to watch the movie to understand why this is such an incredible accomplishment.  they filmed in over 23 different countries.  after the movie was over, i experienced this strange sensation of satiation.  as though i’d just finished eating a rich piece of chocolate cake.  with my eyes.

#5–i finished my last two common threads quilt blocks, but haven’t had a chance to photograph one of them yet.  hopefully, i’ll get to that in the next day or two.  but if it takes me longer, we’ll blame my computer-less situation.

Posted in library stuff, stuff that makes me smile, trip down memory lane | 1 Comment
09
Jan, 2009

we interrupt this christmas retrospective…

to bring you a special report about a new craft love of mine. this is actually the second new craft love for me in the span of about 3 short weeks, so my brain is buzzing with possibilities, but i’ll tell you about the first of the two in another post. i just have to tell you a little bit about my adventures last night.
a few months ago, i learned that a colleague of mine has some experience with screen printing. i have been wanting to try screen printing for quite awhile, but had been unable to find any classes in the area, so when i heard about this hidden talent, i had to jump on it. the topic came up in a discussion of craft program exchanges (you do a craft program at my library, i’ll do one at yours) but i really just wanted to learn for myself (selfish, i know) so i asked this other librarian if she would be willing to teach me in exchange for some other craft that i could introduce her to. actually, i think i’d brainstormed it into a monthly craft club before i talked to her, but…. that’s a whole other thing.* what actually transpired for the first meeting of this “craft club” was three people in a room at this librarian’s library last night, playing with screen printing. it was helpful to her because she’s thinking of doing a printing program with teens this summer and we tried out a few different techniques (some worked, some didn’t) and helped her to come up with a list of necessary tools (besides the obvious screens, ink and squeegee things). but enough with the chit-chat…. wanna see pictures?

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this blue flower was my very first print.  i was still figuring out technique.  the brown flower was my first print with that color and i didn’t bother to rinse the screen in between (but i kind of like the rough look….)  here are more polished versions:

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i just love them!!!  the pattern is from this great book the librarian had found called “screen your stuff” by marion levy that is full of super cute printing ideas.  we also, from that book, got the idea for a printing method that turned into our hands-down favorite of the evening–contact paper.  i suppose that real screen printers “burn” images into the screens, but then that design is permanently on the screen.  there’s also this brown goo that you can paint onto screens to block  the places you don’t want ink to go through, but the one sample that we tried of that was exceedingly tedious and also had a tendency to bleed (maybe it wasn’t shaken well enough?) and you had to be careful to make sure you got enough of the goo on or the ink would go through anyway.  so, this book instructed the reader to go out and purchase special screen printing sticky paper (there was a more technical term, but i can’t be bothered to remember it since the librarian said she couldn’t find it anyway), but we decided to try using plain old contact paper.  well, actually, we didn’t have contact paper, so she just “borrowed” some clear book covering sticky paper and we used that.  it worked like a charm.  look at those clean, crisp lines!  and it worked beautifully over and over again, print after print.  i suppose that one downside is that you can’t really rinse the screens between colors because you’re likely to rinse off your contact paper, but that wasn’t a huge deal.  (hey!  i just found an online video tutorial of this process in case you’re interested!)

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one other technique that we tried out was from the “printing by hand” book and involved cutting a stencil from paper. as you can maybe see from the example above, it wasn’t quite as successful as the contact paper.  it’s possible that it didn’t work well because i used cardstock instead of typing weight paper and i’m not sure if i was supposed to tape it to the screen (i did), but… i do like this design (my own original!), i’ll just have to try it again with contact paper instead of cardstock.

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i tried out the technique on some loose pieces of muslin i’d gotten from my grandma when i went to visit her, and also on a couple of stained tea towels.

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(this design was inspired by the lotta prints book.)  tragically, i neglected to bring my camera with me, so i don’t have any process shots to share with you today, but i did take a few photos with someone else’s camera that was there and she said she’d e-mail them to me, so maybe i’ll post them as soon as they arrive in my inbox.

i love screen printing.  and now that i’ve done it with the help of someone who knows what they’re doing, i have a very clear idea of the tools that i need to do this on my own.  hooray!

*if you’re local to the happy stuff neighborhood and the idea of a monthly craft club curls your toes, contact me and i’ll fill you in on some of the details we’ve been tossing around for ideas.

Posted in crafty stuff, stuff that sparks a glow in my soul | 1 Comment
07
Jan, 2009

games galore (christmas, part iv)

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i think i played more games this christmas than i have ever played in that short of a stretch of time before in my life.  pictured above is one of the many new (for me) games that i learned–ticket to ride.  i’ve known about this game for awhile, but for some reason, i’ve been reluctant to try it, thinking it was going to be too complicated.  on the contrary, this was probably my favorite new game of the vacation.  i loved the relatively fast pace (you can only do one thing each turn, so, unless you’re realllllllly pensive (ahem, ed) turns come around quickly), i enjoyed thinking about different ways to build paths across the board, and well, of course i loved the cute little train pieces!

let’s see, i also played:

power grid (not a huge fan of this one.  maybe i needed to play it longer, but i managed to get through a whole game without really understanding what was going on.)

fluxx–special monty python edition (this was one of my christmas gifts to mr. happy stuff.  it’s a very fun game–the nonsensical nature of fluxx lends itself well to combining with the nonsensical nature of monty python–but best played with fans of monty python, especially the holy grail.)

yahtzee (wow.  old school flashback.  still love this game.  we even got to use score sheets that looked like they might have been printed in the 70’s.)

boggle (continuing the classic games streak–another personal favorite.)

in the car on the way home from washington d.c. i played spider solitaire and free cell solitaire with my mom on her laptop.  (haven’t played those in awhile!)

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i learned a domino variant called mexican train.  although i was vaguely uncomfortable with the name of this game (is it a slur?  are there other names for this same game?) the game play itself is quite easy to learn and fun to play.  (see “shuffling’ technique above)

five crowns.  this is one of my favorite games to play because it’s easy enough that you can chat about things other than the card game and still enjoy playing.

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hand and foot.  a big favorite card game at my in-law’s.  we’ve been known to play this game for 12 hours straight.  i had amazing luck at this game this visit.  i can’t remember ever, ever winning this game.  i’ve come close (the winner is the first to break 10,000 points.  i’ve occasionally broken 10,000 points, but someone else always broke it higher than me.) but this time…. oh. my. goodness.  i actually won two games in a row!!  the family kept teasing me that i should go buy lottery tickets.  the hand shown above is actually from an earlier game that i ended up losing, but this was the first hand and i actually created books out of every number that i had stacked up.  (that’s pretty well unheard of.)

baseball–a card game that i can’t seem to find a link for.  this one was taught to us by mr. h-s’s aunt and uncle and is played with skip bo cards (or at least, that’s what we used).  that was a fun one too, but had a lot of random rules–like wilds, 7’s and 11’s were good cards to have.  i kept wanting 3’s to also be good because they seemed to fit in with that pattern somehow, but… i didn’t have any luck convincing anyone else.

i probably forgot some…. (hey family–what did i miss?)

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i love this picture of mr. h-s’s family.  mr. happy stuff himself took this photo, so he’s the only one not pictured.  even his two year old nephew is there–sitting in that giant chair at the head of the table, playing animal dominoes.

i can’t think of a more fun way to relax and interact with a group of people than sitting around in our pajamas all day, playing games.  i love that this is growing into a family tradition on both sides of my family.

p.s. i’m playing with a new photo size format.  throw in your vote–are these too small?  do you like the other sizes i usually do better?  in the automatic choices, this is considered “medium” and the “large” is so big that it’s off the page and i have to manually re-size each photo.  so… this is faster, but they look sorta small to me.  your vote will help me decide!

Posted in stuff that makes me smile, winter | 4 Comments
06
Jan, 2009

cute kids (or christmas, part 3)

i am fortunate enough to have my best friend from college living in the same small (faraway) town as my sister, so whenever we go out to visit family, i often stay at my friend’s house and enjoy a little extra time to visit with her.  on this trip, i got to meet her new son.  on the morning that i photographed the library bags, there was some nice sunlight coming in through the windows, so i talked this little guy and his big sister into letting me shoot some pictures of them.

calm

smile

painting

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(this one’s kinda blurry, but it cracks me up that it looks like he’s winding up to start boxing his big sister.  with quite the sly grin. while she’s totally oblivious to the impending danger.)

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i also love this shot of their dog, anxiously waiting, hoping for a spill.

my poor nephews sort of got the short end of the photography stick this time as the lighting indoors at our families’ homes was so low and it was too cold for any outdoor photography.  but here are a few shots of them opening presents:peek

this is my sister’s child peeking though one of those rainbow viewers that i (i mean santa) put in his stocking.  my favorite christmas story about this boy was that the first present that he opened during the family gift exchange had been wrapped by my mother earlier that day in his bedroom.  she’d needed a little extra packing material, so she just grabbed whatever was nearby–a few of his crib blankets.  when he opened the box, the first thing he saw was the blanket which he promptly grabbed and toddled off to his bed where his parents (laughing at the absurdity of the situation) put him to bed for a two hour nap.  best. present. ever. –a nap!  thanks, grandma!  that was just what i needed!

he-shoots

this little guy is crazy for balls.  any kind, any size, any weight.  at 21 months, he’s an excellent dribbler and he can drop-kick balls amazingly far.  it’s no surprise, therefore, that his favorite gift of the year was a pop-up mini-basketball hoop thingy.  love that little mess of bed head.

tractor

on the other side of the family is my other nephew (nephew-in-law?) who loves toys that blink and make noise (he also loves eating vegetables and taking naps.  wow!  how’d his parents manage that?).  he got this tractor (great grandma apologized that it wasn’t a case brand, but she could only find john deere.  he didn’t seem to mind too much), a grill that lights up and when you place food on the grilling surface it makes crackling noises, and yet, i think the favorite toy of the year for him was this multi-compartment tunnel.  it was a big hit.  even without blinking lights.

tunnel

the final cutie of the trip was one i’d met only online until this visit.  her mom is a dear college friend of mine who has been living in england for the past 8 or 9 years but she was home for the holidays, so we drove a few hours one day to see them.  i’ll post more about that visit in one of the next installments of the christmas trip story.  there are many, many cuter pictures of her on the web somewhere, but i couldn’t get any really great shots as we arrived at their house around dusk and she was taking a nap and… well, maybe my goal for 2009 should be to get more friendly with my flash.  learn how to use it effectively.  anyone have any good (read:  simple and straightforward) recommendations, suggestions or tips on attractive camera flash use?  in the meantime, here’s a shot of her using the remote control to turn the christmas lights outside the house off and on.

imgp66071and i have to say that a not-quite-two-year-old with a british accent saying things like, “that’s lovely” and “cheerio!” and “toodleoo!”  is about the cutest thing ever.

Posted in autumn, photography, winter | 2 Comments
03
Jan, 2009

a trip to d.c.

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my dad’s birthday is a few days before christmas and this year he wanted to take a family trip to the smithsonian in washington d.c. for his birthday present.  we were happy to oblige.

the day was bitterly cold and windy, but we managed to make it from our parked car to a chinese restaurant my sister and her husband remembered from a visit to d.c. more than 5 years ago.

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the guy making noodles in the window was the key landmark in their memory.  it certainly was tasty (and cheap!).  i was thrilled to get to eat yummy hot and sour soup, eggrolls and sweet and sour pork–some of my very favorite foods that i don’t get too often.

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then, we braved the cold again to make our way to the smithsonian museum of natural history.  the dinosaur at the top of the post was there, as were these shells (i love the blue background)

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and these diamonds cut into alphabet letters!  (be still my librarian heart.)

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then, we made our way over to the art museum.  here’s a detail of a jasper johns piece that i liked.

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i was also excited to see a chuck close painting.  (that’s my dad admiring the painting.   poor guy.  his arm is broken.  but i think he had a good time anyway.)

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but i think i was most excited to see an andy goldsworthy sculpture!

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we finally left when the museums closed and took a gamble on a restaurant we’d noticed while driving around to find parking earlier.

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the restaurant was “oyamel” and was high end mexican–sort of like tapas, but mexican, not spanish.  (the photo above is a portion of the beautiful metal butterfly mobile hanging from the ceiling.)  the gamble paid off.

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the food was absolutely scrumptious.  they made a fantastic bowl of guacamole right at the table.

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and they brought the chips in these fancy cone baskets.

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one of my dishes was sopes with squash and tomato crema and pepitas and cilantro.

sadly, at about this point in the meal, the food became too delicious for me to take any time out to photograph it, so you’ll just have to use your imagination.  my mother got some amazing chilaquiles, my brother-in-law got some fantastic albondigas (meatballs), and then, towards the end of the meal, the tacos arrived (all of the food just showed up whenever it was ready, spread out over about 45 minutes or so).  oh, the tacos.  oh my goodness.  if i had it to do all over again, i might just order tacos.  the chicken taco with avocado, the pork bbq… so incredibly flavorful, all with homemade fresh corn tortillas…. if i hadn’t been so full, i would have ordered a whole plateful.

but of course, we had to save room for dessert.  there were four desserts and six of us, so… we just got one of each and shared them around the table.  i think each dessert had at least one person who chose it as their favorite.  you can see the menu on their website if you want to drool.

it was an excellent family adventure and i wouldn’t be at all surprised if we repeated it again in the future.

(oh, and by the way, i edited yesterday’s post a little late–be sure not to miss my impromptu cd review at the end!)

Posted in fun stuff, reviews, yum | 3 Comments
02
Jan, 2009

slowly unpacking

whew.  we made it back from our epic holiday journey a few days ago and although the suitcases and boxes of presents have all been unpacked and put away and the laundry has even been washed, the unpacking of the over 700 photos we took has been slooooooowwww….  we had such a nice time and i have so many happy moments to share with you, but if i try to do it all in one post, i’ll never get through it, so…. how about a slow trickle?  i’ll start with photos of the library bags i made for my nephews and filled with books, a movie and a music cd*.

first, i found a use for that cute japanese linen tape from good-ness:

and bag no. 2, featuring some super cute japanese robot fabric that i’d bought in minneapolis:

i was very happy with the way they turned out and i hope that my nephews enjoy them too!

*in case you’re curious–this year’s kids’ music compilation included the following songs:
. Can I Get There From Here? —Nat Hussey: Papa Goose
. Country Girl And Her Sisters Three —Nat Hussey Papa Goose
. Miss Mary Mack (Traditional) —Johnny Bregar Hootenanny
. Blue Dog —Johnny Bregar Hootenanny
. Polly Wolly Doodle —Johnny Bregar Stomp Yer Feet!
. If You’re Happy and You Know It —Johnny Bregar Stomp Yer Feet!
. Blackberry Pie —Johnny Bregar Hootenanny
.Sweet Potato Pie —Nat Hussey Papa Goose
.9 Lb Hammer —Johnny Bregar Stomp Yer Feet!
.Take This Hammer— Jon Langford *
.Welcome Table —Dan Zanes Catch that Train!
.Walk the World, Now Children —Tom Chapin Some Assembly Req.
.Don’t Fence Me In —Johnny Bregar Hootenanny
.Worried Man Blues —Chris Walz *
.Sweet Pea —Amos Lee Supply & Demand
.You Are My Sunshine —Johnny Bregar Stomp Yer Feet!
.Miracle —Renee & Jeremy It’s a Big World
.Two Thumbs Up —Johnny Bregar Dragonfly
.Sweep Away —Nat Hussey Papa Goose
.Early —Yurtfolk Anyone Can Sing
*Old Town School of Folk Music, Vol. 1

i’ve blogged before about nat hussey, but you might notice from the list above that i found one other new favorite (relatively obscure) children’s music artist this year–johnny bregar.  i wanted to blog about him earlier, but i was waiting for his third cd to come out.  see, i first listened to his music when i saw the artwork for his (then unreleased) third cd posted on zooglobble.  the artwork was so attractive that even after i went to look up his first two albums and saw their tragic artwork, i still gave them a fair shot and… i have to say that i like the music on his earlier cd’s better than his newest release.  maybe you’ll feel differently, but i am a huge fan of the hootenanny album and dragonfly is only fair to middlin’ for me.  either way, johnny bregar is definitely worth a listen.  you can hear generous samples of all of his music (and most of the rest of the songs listed above) at cdbaby.

Posted in crafty stuff, reviews | 3 Comments
16
Dec, 2008

i found two more


6. an unexpected gift of homemade bread.
7. oranges from our last csa box that still have the leaves on them. beautiful.

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment
16
Dec, 2008

digging out

i feel like i’ve been digging out from under a giant load of stuff from this semester but today i finally broke through and had a productive day.  i made granola, cooked up and froze a bunch of black beans and ground beef*, i vaccuumed the salt pellets out of the carpets, went shopping (with a friend!  hi, lemony thickets!) for the rest of the christmas presents i still needed to buy, mailed some packages, and finished writing and submitting my chapter for the 2010 summer library program manual.  yesterday, i finished quilting this quilt, and as soon as the binding is done, i’ll take pictures and show you the whole thing.  we also got the house tidied last night.  mr. happy stuff’s company is moving to a different office and things that they were throwing away (perfectly useful things!) keep coming home and landing in our living room.  they finally all migrated down into neat stacks in the basement last night and i think mr. h-s and i can both breathe a little easier.  since last i wrote, i also finished up the last paper for my class this semester and that is a huge load off of my could-do list.  there was also a bit of an adventure here this evening when i accidentally locked myself in the guest bedroom.  and the lock broke.  and i couldn’t get the door open.  it took the better part of an hour, plus mr. happy stuff handing me two screwdrivers and a mallet through our second story window before we just finally had to destroy the wood near the door handle and pull the whole apparatus out.  we tried removing the bolts from the hinges, but that didn’t work.  oh, and halfway through the whole escapade, there was a moment of panic when mr. h-s couldn’t find out most trepidatious kitty and thought she’d gone outside (in this extremely cold weather) to go exploring and he couldn’t find her.  luckily, she was just hiding inside the whole time.

hmmm…. this post has gone on a wild rambling tour and not said much of anything.  let’s bring the focus back to some happy stuff….

1.  i’m very happy to have some big things (huge things!) marked off of my to-do list.

2.  i was very excited to receive these beautiful white tulips from my sister as a surprise (thanks!).

3.  i love the egg nog that the milk delivery people brought us last week.  it’s rich, thick and perfect.  the kitties are in love with it too.

4.  i’ve had amazingly good luck lately at the dig-n-save, finding real clothes when i’m shopping for random craft supplies–sweaters, pants, shirts… it’s incredible!  why is it that i can never find anything that i’m actually looking for there?  it’s like those “magic eye” puzzles…. you just have to unfocus your search and you can find so many great things!

5.  i can’t believe it, but i have a whole week of work with no programs at all. weird.  but kind of … relaxing.  maybe i’ll wear a skirt tomorrow to celebrate.**  if it’s not too cold.

*have i ever told you my trick of pre-cooking a bunch of ground beef with onions and garlic and then freezing it in casserole and soup-sized portions?  it makes taco salad in 7 minutes a reality.  and the black beans?  i’ve started cooking them in the crock-pot and freezing them for later use as well.

**wearing skirts + children sitting on the floor at eye level with your knees = a bad idea.

Posted in Uncategorized | 5 Comments
04
Dec, 2008

peanuts n’ oranges

i love salted in the shell peanuts.  i don’t really eat them very often, but when i do get a chance to eat them, i love how they taste and i love how they take forever to eat so you don’t eat very many (at least, not as many as you might if they were already shelled).  eating shelled peanuts and oranges (or clementines) always reminds me of an old church tradition from my childhood.  my mother has a different memory of this, i’m sure, but i have vivid memories of getting together every year, right around thanksgiving with our church and another “sister” church from a nearby town.  we’d set up tables in long rows (or maybe it was in one big square?) and then set the tables with candles in glass star-shaped candle holders and scatter nuts in their shells and nutcrackers and nutpicks and apples and oranges (and maybe fancy hard candies too?) across all of the tables.  then, we’d all gather around the tables for a big hymn sing.  i loved to sing hymns in this big group of people who obviously knew and loved most of the songs.  i loved to goof off with the other kids at the table who invariably began seeing what they could burn in the candle flames or what interesting things they could do with the melted wax.  and i loved the smell of orange peels and the taste of salt on my fingers.

and has anyone ever showed you that santa claus is inside peanuts?  if you look closely, you can see his old-fashioned hat and beard.

congratulations to rebekah for correctly identifying the inspiration quilt from earlier this week!  i’ll try to post full photos of the (as yet unquilted) top sometime this weekend.

Posted in autumn, trip down memory lane, yum | 3 Comments
03
Dec, 2008

peace

snowing this morning

i’m sipping a cup of hot tea

quietly smiling

Posted in Uncategorized | 4 Comments