(Crafty) Nerd Alert

Here's some crafty/geeky stuff I working on! Some of it is really cute, and I wanted to share it. Let's go in order of completion, shall we?

First up: this is a cross-stitch I'm working on of Audrey Hepburn's Holly Golightly character from Breakfast at Tiffany's. I just started working on it, which is why there's been so little progress. I found the pattern in the Craftster forums (an excellent place to go for ideas and inspiration, I might add). I'm doing the piece in various shades of blue, and if it turns out well it'll be a Christmas gift for a friend of mine. She loves Audrey, and already has a painting of her hanging in her daughter's room. Fingers crossed!

This hat is another project I'm working on for someone else, and I need to get it finished relatively soon. It's going to be a viking beanie (I still need to crochet and stuff the horns on the sides) for my friend Casey. Dragon*Con is coming up, and this year I'm going to be in the parade! A whole group of us are, actually, and we'll be representing the Periodic Table. (There's a Facebook group if anyone else is going and doesn't have a parade costume yet - we still have elements available!) Casey's going as "Thorium," so I talked her into dressing like Thor by offering to crochet her a viking helmet. I found this pattern on etsy, the home of awesome stuff.

Next up is the only thing I'm currently working on for myself. Anyone else a Doctor Who fan? I recently fell in love with the newest incarnation (thank you, Netflix streaming video!) starring David Tennant. I haven't been able to catch up with the older series (yet), but I decided to go ahead and make this anyway. It's a scarf based on the one worn by Tom Baker during the 12th season of the original Who series. The pattern is available online if you'd like to give it a go as well. I've been working on this thing off-and-on for MONTHS. It's an easy stitch, so I usually pick it up and knit a few rows while I'm watching TV. You can't really tell from the picture, but it's already longer than I am tall (5'5") and it's probably one-third to one-half finished. I was hoping to have it done in time for Dragon*Con, but I really doubt that'll happen. Next year, maybe...

This little guy is another Who-inspired creation. He's an adipose baby, which if you watch the show you know is basically an anthropomorphic blob of fat. But isn't he cute? He's a birthday gift for a friend of mine. I bought enough fabric to make 4 or 5 (I think), which is good because I've already started making another one for my BFF and one to keep for myself. I got the pattern for him from the Crafty Tardis livejournal community. I'm pretty sure you have to be a member to see the pattern posts, but it's well worth joining if you're interested in this kind of stuff. Next I might make a sonic screwdriver out of Sculpy! Or just buy one from ThinkGeek when they get some back in stock.

Last, but not least, we have The Nerdiest Thing I Have Ever Made. Srsly. I saw this in an episode of Futurama a few years ago and always thought it was a funny/geeky take on the "Home Sweet Home" sampler. My friend Jay recently bought a house, and seeing as we met in a computer class back in 6th or 7th grade, I thought this was pretty much the best housewarming gift I could make for him.

Your turn! Do you have any craft projects you'd like to share or patterns you think I'd like? Post 'em in the comments.

New York and Dewey's Knit-a-long

Casey came over tonight to plan our upcoming New York trip. We purchased our plane tickets, made reservations at a seemingly-nice hotel, bought tickets to Coraline for almost half off, and got most of the week planned out. Coney Island! Strawberry Fields! Sardi's! We are really excited!

Also, I finished the Coraline-themed octopus/squid/kitty thing and gave it to her. I owe Casey, as the "Gryffindor Lion" I started for her last year is languishing in WIP-Hades. It turned out pretty cute!

I made the button eye out of Sculpey. It was my first time using it, and I loved how easy it was. I'm going to try a mini-version next.

Original post
Pattern

Dewey's Knit-A-Long Update

I finished one of the projects I started in honor of Dewey, and now I'm working on another.

First up, I finished the shawl I was making for my mom. Here's the completed product, modeled by my lovely roommate Tiff:

I really liked the pattern on this one, because it was so unusual. Mom's birthday is March 15th, and this is one of her gifts from me. She asked for a shawl after I made her a scarf for Christmas, so I think she'll like it. If I have the time, I'm going to try to make a pin or broach to go with it.

And for my next project: Did anyone else watching the Coraline movie fall absolutely in love with that little octopus/kitty/squid toy in her "other" bedroom? Because I did, and I immediately began thinking of ways to make one for myself. Luckily, so did another crafty blogger, and she posted her pattern here. This is what I've got so far:

Isn't it cute? I mean, considering it's only 3/4 finished and all...

Weekly Geeks: Passions

This week's Weekly Geeks challenge is:

#1. What are you passionate about besides reading and blogging? For example, are you crafty (knitting, woodworking, scrapbooking, model building)? Do you cook? Into gaming (computer or board)? Sports (player or spectator)? Photography? Maybe you like geocaching, rock climbing? Or love attending events like renaissance fairs, concerts? Music? Dancing? You get the idea.

Tell us why you're passionate about it. Post photos of what you've made or of yourself doing whatever it is you love doing.

#2. Get us involved. Link to tutorials, recipes, Youtube videos, websites, fan sites, etc, anything that will help us learn more about your interest or how to do your hobby. Maybe you'd like to link to another hobbyist whose work you admire or tell us about a book or magazine related to your interest.

#3. Visit other Weekly Geeks. Link in your post to other Geeks who've peaked your interest in their passion. Or maybe you might find a fellow afincionado among us, link to them.

I have quite a few interests that I'm passionate about, other than reading and blogging. I enjoy a good video game: I have a Wii, DS, GameBoy Color, PS1, PS2, and Sega Genesis. I'm currently playing Final Fantasy XII on the PS1, Okami on the Wii, Kingdom Hearts on the PS2, and bunch of random strategy, puzzle, action-adventure, and RPGs on the other systems.

Some video game sites of interest (to me, and hopefully to you):
GameFaqs - a great place to go for walkthrus and cheat codes. I post (very infrequently) as jessidee on the boards.
Penny Arcade - a hilarious comic series geared to gamers
Kotaku - a blog about games with great reviews

My next big passion is crafts. I scrapbook, cross stitch, knit, and crochet. I post my completed and works-in-progress on Ravelry - my username is jessidee on there, too, if anyone would like to friend me. Which brings me to...

The Dewey's Book Reading Challenge Knit-a-long Mini-Challenge! Whew, that's a long name. Anyway, here are the projects that I've started this year in honor of Dewey:



This is a hat-in-progress. It will eventually have i-cords and kitty ears. :) I'm excited about this one, because it's my first time using double-ended needles and knitting in the round. I had to frog it a few times, but it's coming along nicely now.



This is a shawl I'm crocheting by request for my mom.

And here are a few works-in-progress that are still hanging around from last year:



This is an amiguri (crocheted stuffed animal) lion that I'm making for my friend Casey. She's a big Harry Potter fan, and she wanted a "Gryffindor Lion." I've actually gotten more done since I took this picture, but I still haven't gotten it all put together.



This is a star-shaped baby blanket I started crocheting when I found out that one of my coworkers was pregnant. She's already had the baby, so I decided that who ever is closest to giving birth by the time I actually finish, gets it. I'm usually not this bad about completing projects, but I keep putting this one down in favor of other projects.

My flickr account is exclusively devoted to my knit-and-crochet projects (and my yarn!), because that's the photo organizer that Ravelry uses. Other fun crafty sites:

Cthulhu Crochet and Cousins and Geek Central Station both feature geeky amigurumi projects, usually with patterns or links for purchasing. I especially love the Firefly-related posts.
Modern Cottage - recipes (another one of my passions!) and general craftiness
Not Martha - as in Stewart. But I like their ideas and tips much better.
The Mario Scarf Blog - If you haven't heard of Cassie Smith, you really need to check this out. She's knitting the first world of Mario as one long, continuous scarf. It's pretty much the most amazing thing I've ever seen.

So, what are your passions? I'll be visiting other WGs and posting about what I discover throughout the week

Dewey's Books Mini-Challenge: Dewey's Knit-a-Long

Robin is sponsoring the second mini-challenge for the Dewey's Books Reading Challenge: Dewey's Knit-a-Long! From the challenge blog:

Now that the holiday season is over, it’s time for new projects! Help celebrate Dewey’s love of books AND of knitting! This is a mini-challenge for those of us that are honoring her memory by reading the books she talked about on her blog, and who also share her love of knitting! How about dedicating at least one of your 2009 knitting (or other handwork!) projects to Dewey’s memory? Perhaps you would like to knit or crochet some things for a local charity? Or if you’ve never learned to knit, maybe it’s time to learn! (Come on, Chris!)

* Leave a comment on this post to sign up for Dewey’s Knit-A-Long by the end of January, and I will randomly pick one of your names and send you a free scarf pattern, some beautiful NORO yarn, and some bamboo knitting needles for the project.

* Post about your projects on your own blog as you finish them, (or post updates on your progress!), include photos, and then leave a comment on this post each time. I will update this blog throughout the next few months with links to your project updates, with reviews of knitting books, and with interesting and helpful knitting information.

* Please put one of the Knit-A-Long buttons on your sidebar with a link to this post for easy access.

* A drawing will also be held at the end of February, March, and April for more prizes: patterns, yarn (I have some Malabrigo for you sock knitters!), and knitting books!

* You don’t have to finish your project in that time. Just post about what you have on the needles and about your progress! But please keep us updated!

* If you prefer another type of handwork other than knitting…we welcome you, too! Please just make a note of that when you sign up here so that if your name is chosen for a prize, I can adjust it to your preferred handwork materials!

Visit the mini-challenge page for more info and to sign up. I'm not sure what I'll be knitting (or crocheting) yet, but I would like to try my hand at a pair of socks...

Happy Turkey Day!

Hope everyone is having a great Thanksgiving! And for those of you outside the U.S., I hope you're having a great Thursday! :)

I was in charge of the cranberry sauce; here's my recipe:

1 (12 oz.) bag of fresh cranberries
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup orange juice (I prefer the pulpless kind)

Put all the ingredients in a medium pot and heat over medium-high heat until it starts bubbling and the berries start to burst open. Stir and continue heating until the berries are all split and it turns a lovely reddish color. Take the pot off the burner and let cool, then put in a covered dish and chill until it's time to serve. Yummy!

Bonus links:
Neil Gaiman's cranberry sauce recipe.
Dietribes: Cranberries
Crochet holiday pie hats! (I am so making one of these for next year!)

The Sunday Salon - 28 September 2008

Hello, fellow Saloners! This hasn't been the most productive week for me, reading-wise, and I'm pretty sure today won't be much different. I'm terribly far behind in my grading, and my goal for the day is to get caught up with all my school stuff. I have to give my principal an updated list of my failing students, which means I have to go through a mountainous pile of tests, quizzes, short stories, and daily work that has been patiently waiting for my attention for the past two weeks. Yikes. After I finish grading, I may get some pleasure reading done - we'll see.

I do have some updates from my last Weekly Geeks post, though (I'm not participating in this week's theme, because I haven't really read any books from 2008, sadly). First, my TBR/Currently Reading pile:
Sadly, some of these books have been sitting by my bed for months. I plan on really digging in during the 24 Hour Read-a-Thon, which I am FINALLY able to participate in.

Next, my "Free Books!" box that I will be dropping off at Curves tomorrow evening:
All of these books are registered on BookCrossing and a lot of them are also part of the 2008 Movie/TV Books Release Challenge.

And now, my newest Ravelry project:
In case you can't tell, it's a star-shaped afghan. I started it as a gift for a coworker, but she's already gone on maternity leave and it's nowhere near finished, so who knows who will actually get it. It's my first time using this pattern, so it's not exactly perfect, but I think it's cute.

Lastly: this isn't actually a project of mine, but I thought it was interesting - Book-spines turned into stories (found on BoingBoing).

Have a great Sunday, and Happy Reading!

The Dark Knight

Being the geekette that I am, of course I went to the midnight showing of The Dark Knight last night. I actually made it a comic book movie night and saw Hellboy 2 beforehand. (It was awesome too, for the record.) But DK was just...amazing. It was nearly 3 hours long! And so much stuff happened. The biggest surprise I'm not even gonna mention, because I wasn't spoiled for this movie and I don't think anyone else should be, either. Christian Bale was hard core, and Michael Caine was great for comic relief, but Heath Ledger totally owned this movie. He was just so perfect as the Joker: creepy and scary and frackin' insane.

One thing I was disappointed about - no Harry Potter teaser. But we did get this:

which is just as good.

Anyone else see it? What did you think? Did you have nightmares?

I've gotten a little obsessed with amigurumi over the past few months; I made the cutest little penguin for Ashley, and now I've got my crochet hooks set on something slightly more difficult. Watching Hellboy 2, all I could think was, how awesome would it be to make an amigurumi Hellboy? With, like, a Sculpey rock hand and Big Baby?

More DK links for your entertainment:
Does Batman Have Insurance?, from Best Week Ever
"Dark Knight" Dogma, from MTV

Cunning, ain't it?

I finally got around to adding the pompom ball up top. Yay! This one's for Fran, but I'll be making more for Dragon*Con later. My next project is an amigurumi penguin for Ashley, who's moving into the apartment complex this weekend.