Twin Peaks-Inspired Office Teaser Post

Here are some pictures of my home office redo.  If you follow me on Twitter, you may have already seen these.  When I have time to take pictures with a real camera, I'll post them and some how-to links.

Messy Storage Problem

Katrina & Remo help me measure

Storage Solution

Posters

That gum you like is going to come back in style.

Stay tuned for better pictures and some instructions!

7.27 Scott Pilgrim WIP

Tamara Chen wears a white shirt and her legs are obscured by Stacy Pilgrim's head and Kim Pine's legs. So I've already finished all the work on Tamara and moved on to Kim Pine, starting with her bright red hair.

Next week will be a full project shot. A quick review of the last full project shot shows that we haven't had one of those since I was working on Stephen Stills' shirt, which was about two and a half characters ago, three if you count that green bunny looking thing at Stephen's feet.

Here's Kim's hair so far!

"Caviar" Nails Tutorial

After having read a blog post about nail trends, I was very curious about the "caviar" nail look.  I looked for the kit at Sephora, and found this.  But, as I didn't want to spend $25 on what would definitely be a special occasion look, I decided to find out if I could recreate this with things I already had on hand.

Supplies needed:

Clear base coat
Fingernail polish in a color of your choice (DO NOT use quick-drying polish!)
Microbeads to match or coordinate with above nail color  (You should be able to get these at any craft store for less than $3 a small bottle, or you can buy a set of 12 colors on Amazon for $20.00 or less.)
Glitter tray to catch the extra beads (or fold up the edges of a clean sheet of paper)
Orange/cuticle stick
Clear top coat

I had all of the above already at home, so I spent literally no money on this experiment!

Step 1 - Apply clear base coat, let dry.

Step 2 - Apply generous coat of color polish.  IMMEDIATELY sprinkle the microbeads over the wet nail, being sure to cover all of the nail surface.  (Alternately, you could use a damp paint brush to apply beads in the area you want them to go.)  Make sure to hold your fingers over the glitter tray while doing this to minimize mess and capture any beads that don't make it on to your nails.

Step 3 - With an orange stick, gently pat or press the beads down into the wet polish.  You want to end up with one layer of beads only.  You will want to work fairly quickly here, as the polish will soon start to become tacky.

Step 4 - LET THIS DRY.  Let dry according to the directions on your polish, or as long as you can possibly stand it.  Otherwise the next step will ruin all your careful patting and pushing from Step 3.

Step 5 - Apply one or two coats of clear top coat, making sure to let dry after each one.

And there you have it, a high-fashion look for pennies.

Anyone know why I did only this nail red?  There's a reason!

This was my very first try and I didn't wait long enough after Step 3, hence the missing beads at the top.  I'm sure someone with more patience and nail know-how can do it much, much better than this, but I still like it.  So far, the beads aren't moving so I'm hopeful this lasts more than a day or two!

Let me know if you try this out, and what you think of it!

7.19 Scott Pilgrim WIP

Tamara Chen's hair is done and I've moved on to her face.

I have nothing else to say, other than I'll be much more excited to be stitching Kim Pine next.

Umbrella Wall

I am the worst kind of procrastinator.  I gathered all my supplies and let them sit on the kitchen table for weeks afraid this project would eat up an entire day.  Of course, once I sucked it up and had the four year old handing me the umbrellas, I was done inside of two hours.

Supplies:

• Wire cutters: Before I started I thought that scissors would be enough to take off the tiny wood poles.  Be ye not as dumb as me: it wasn't easy cutting them with the wire cutters.
• Poster putty: Found at JoAnn's. I was mildly peeved when I struck out at Michael's so I went overboard when I did find it.  One package was more than enough for the box of umbrellas I used.
• Drink umbrellas: Found at a local party supply store.  A friend suggested I check liquor stores after I had difficulty locating these online.  The downside to buying these by the gross was the lack of variety in a box.  I ended up with a lot of pink and yellow.

My plan was to cover the entire three foot area from the ceiling down on a hallway wall, but once I got underway I realized that this required more umbrellas and effort than I was willing to put forward.  My plan then shifted to not putting two umbrellas of the same color next to each other.  Logically, I should have snipped all the wooden poles off before getting underway, but these umbrellas would not stay open.  The only way to stop them from closing was to apply the putty to back and stick it to the wall; therefore, each umbrella was prepped immediately before it was applied to the wall.

My laziness worked out in my favor since the tiny people seem to think that this is their Chinese dragon.  A big concern was that the putty would not hold once the summer heat and humidity arrived, but only one umbrella has fallen and it was promptly reattached without even replacing the putty.

7.13 Scott Pilgrim WIP

I've got time to post an update while I wait for the CFLs near my Xbox to warm up so the Kinect can see me properly, so here we go!

I finished Michael Comeau since we last spoke, so you'll only see edges of him from now on. The upside is I believe we're 3 weeks away from a full project shot again, so you'll see the completed Michael Comeau then!

I'm on to the next character, and SC contributor Heather believes that it's Tamara Chen. I'd have to agree with her. I'm only a few rows into her hair so far.

7.6 Scott Pilgrim WIP

Just 5 days after the last update, I bring you a new one. After adding in Michael's mouth and glasses, he's much less creepy looking. There's just a little bit more to do on his ear and the fill in on his arm, followed by his hair and then onto the mystery person next to him!

To spin or not to spin...

I've been thinking about learning to spin for a while. I've watched the Knit Picks tutorial several times, looked up stuff online and obsessively drooled over the spinning of other knitters. With my last order from Knit Picks I bit the bullet and bought three things of roving along with their drop spindle. It was on sale and I figured it was the perfect opportunity to learn without feeling like I was wasting a lot of money.

Knit Picks Wool of the Andes roving in Amethyst Heather

It's gorgeous and soft and I'm really desperate to learn. And also scared. I hate not being good at stuff, even stuff I've never done. But no matter what, I'm going to try it out this weekend. Wish me luck!
(On a side note, I figured out the timer on my camera and can now take WAY better pictures of stuff! No more blurry, non-flash photos for me!)

This post originally appeared on my personal blog over at hayiaf.com, feel free to check out my other posts there!

Painting Progress!

Took advantage of the nice weather yesterday and did some more work on the mask I picture in my previous post.

It changed a little as the afternoon went on, but I worked on it until I was happy and couldn't think of anywhere else to go.

The heart was a must. First idea I had when I started doing the black. 

7.1 Scott Pilgrim WIP

Welcome to July, everyone!

I didn't get as much done over the last 10 days as I would have liked, but that's what happens when you go see Foo Fighters in concert!

In any case, Michael's left hand is filled in and the middle of his face is taken care of. The pattern I'm using blanked out on his left arm, but I was able to figure it out pixel by pixel using an image of the box set art. I'll finish what's clear on the pattern first the finish up Michael's left arm.

Speaking of the image of the box set art, does anyone know who the character between Michael and Kim Pine is? I've been scouring my books and can't figure it out.

Here's my progress!