Blog love (Amanda's old blog)

I almost forgot! I wanted to tell you about this hilarious blog I discovered a few weeks ago. It's about fashion, but she talks about a lot of other stuff. She's insanely funny - I've been reading her archives and laughing out loud constantly (my roommates are about ready to kill me, no joke).

Anyway, her name is Winona and her blog is called Daddy Likey, and I kinda want to marry her. She's a lot like me: chatty, opinionated, loves loud/funky accessories, overuses hyperbole and nags her boyfriend and the other men in her life about girly things like fashion. Seriously, she needs to be my new best friend (ironically [or not-so-ironically], that's something she would say).

While we're at it, here's a list of the other blogs I frequent. I highly recommend them all!

The tag line for Cake Wrecks really explains it all: "when professional cakes go horribly, hilariously wrong." People send in photos of cakes they ordered that turned out terribly for one reason or another, and Jen makes fun of them. And damn, is she funny.

Then there's the ever-lovely Princess Lasertron whom I have gushed about enough already, but in case you're (as Daddy Likey would say) new to this blog and/or have amnesia, I'll remind you: She makes hand embroidered felt-and-button bouquets.

I just discovered Solanah over at Vixen Vintage a few weeks ago. I'm in love with her etsy shop, I'm constantly checking it to see if she has new stuff. She wears and sells all vintage clothing, jewelry and makeup. She looks fantastic and classic, and her shop has a wonderful selection.

I check The Fug Girls' blog intermittantly. I discovered them through Daddy Likey. It's good for a laugh when you're bored - they make fun of celebrities' poor fashion sense. And while I love making fun of celebrities and looking at godawful fashion, it's just not a daily-checker for me. It's one of those blogs that's best when you save it up and read a bunch of entries at once. I feel they're funnier that way.

And of course, the ever-helpful JustBento is my favorite food blog. Maki posts useful Japanese cooking tips as well as recipes and general information about Bento equipment, style, philosophy, health information, budget-friendly bentos, vegetarian-bentos... you name it, she's got it. She's fantastic. This is definitely a daily-check blog for me. I still haven't finished reading the archives. I'm savoring them. At least that's what I tell myself.

So that's my blog love for today. Back to knitting...

I'm REALLY sorry (Amanda's old blog)

It's been almost 2 weeks. I'm a horrible blogger, I'm sorry. These are those moments when I remind myself that I have like, 5 readers, and I talk to you all regularly anyway. So it's cool.

I have been crafting, but I don't currently have photos. I just wanted to check in and give you a little update on what I've been up to lately. My roommates are getting married on Saturday, so like 90% of the stuff I'm doing this week is related to their wedding. Which tells you how totally not-busy I am lately, because I have like 2 responsibilities for their wedding.

So, my latest crafts. Well, I handed off the button bouquet to Val. She's making felt flowers to go with. I'm working on the forwards-H print for their thank-you cards. I made one mistake, but I'm planning on incorporating it into the design. I hope it turns out well. I've really learned on this print that I need to go more slowly. I really rush my block prints - they're more time consuming than I give them credit for.

I'm also knitting a baby blanket for my stepsister Carly. She's having a baby shower the first weekend of June, so I've been knitting up a storm - blankets take surprisingly long (I don't know why I expect all crafts to be quick).
My other stepsister, Beth, got married last week. I brought Brandon and we had a lot of fun. He met my entire stepfamily and a lot of close family friends, which was great and sort of hilarious (one of my dad's childhood buddies threatened Brandon no less than 3 times: "You be good to her or you'll have me to answer to." It was pretty much the funniest thing ever). There are photos on the photographer's website.

I'm also doing a lot of cooking this week. I made a huge pot of cabbage soup yesterday. That should last us most of the week. I'm also making cookies for the dessert table at my roommates wedding, which means I'm baking a batch of cookies pretty much every day this week. It's really hard to make enough - not because weddings are big, but because Eric (the groom) keeps eating the cookie dough. I'm about ready to kill him. I think I should make some banana muffins to fend him off.


My other roommate Hal has been getting into bread baking lately. I think he has taken pictures of some of his projects - I'll see if I can get him to lend me the photos. So far everything he's baked has turned out wonderfully. No word yet on whether he has solar hands, though.

Again, sorry for the radio silence. I'll try to be more diligent from here on out. And hopefully I'll get some photos at the wedding this weekend!

A rookie mistake (Amanda's old blog)

Hello! Sorry it's been so long. Life has been too hectic for crafting. But I did start a knitting project today. I hope to have photos of that later.

I'm just checking in really quickly and uploading some photos for Val to check out.

You know that "H" block print I was doing for her thank-you notes? Well, I made that same rookie mistake I keep making. Yeah, I carved it backwards. You see, when you do a block print, the image should be backwards in the linoleum so it prints frontwards. But it looks so pretty frontwards, I keep carving it that way. I REALLY need to work on that.

But I decided to do a test print anyway, just in case this style isn't what Val wants. So I have some photos. If Val likes them, I will re-carve it (properly) and re-print it. And then I can be done with that hard linoleum block I hate so much. I'm using the soft stuff from now on.

Here are the three prints I did:


Yeah. I know. Backwards H. It's a bit disorienting.


So, there are a few areas I want to touch up. Namely the curve at the bottom - it's not smooth enough, it looks more like an ink droplet. Also the right side (which SHOULD be the left side) is too thick. I could still fix that on this one, actually. And that bottom rectangular part didn't turn out as uniform as I would have liked.

I really think I can fix all these things on a second try. I'm really proud of this print - except for the backwards part, of course.



Ta-ta fa na!

Picnic! (Amanda's old blog)

Just a quick update. I did some work today on the "H" block print for Val's thank-you cards, but I haven't done a test print yet, so I don't have any photos to share.

Brandon and I went on a picnic last night. It was very romantic. I decided to pack a picnic bento. I made a batch of onigiri and some carrot salad, and Brandon made a noodle concoction that turned out marvelous. Here's the setup:


At the top is some salad with salami and a slightly vinegar-y soy-sauce based dressing.
Bottom left are 2 onigiri held in place with raw green beans.
The green bento has 2 more onigiri set on top of my favorite spicy-soy carrot salad, with more raw green beans. Then some vanilla yogurt with pieces of banana.
The open spot was designated for Brandon's noodle dish.


He boiled the noodles (duh), then sauteed them with orange marmalade and a touch of soy sauce. They turned out great. I added unsalted sunflower seeds because I add them to everything in my bentos. Theye make everything so pretty, with so little effort!

Then there's always the 'extra stuff:'


I use Kashi bars instead of granola for crumbling into my yogurt. It's my favorite bento trick: it stays crunchy, and you can just throw them in your backpack separately instead of wasting a container. They are more expensive, however. But they are also flavorful. I like the honey-oat ones.
I packed the other half of the banana in a ziplock. There's our napkin and silverware. The tiny blue container has fresh nori to wrap around the onigiri. It was SO MUCH BETTER with fresh, crunchy nori. I can't believe I ever packed the nori on the onigiri itself. Soggy, fishy and gross. Although it's great for making little faces when I'm packing a kyaraben.
Then that bottom container has a piece of bean bread from Kim's oriental shop down on Westnedge. If your'e asking why there's only half a piece, you obviously don't know me very well.



I packed two water bottles and some V8 for beverages. Everything was super yummy.


I wore my black shawl and put my hair semi-up. I was very comfy.


It was lovely and romantic. We went to East campus and sat behind East Hall. You can see the whole city from there. We sat until it got dark out, then the city looked lovely with all their lights on. It was a lot of fun. We were both stuffed by the end.

That's it for now. Just thought I would share my latest bento project. More crafts coming soon!

SUCH a busy weekend... (Amanda's old blog)

But before I dive into my weekend update, some photos from graduation day!

My mom and brother and grandparents came over early for breakfast. I bought bagels and other breakfast food the day before. It was a good way to start the day.

We were all a bit sleepy, but I swear we were having fun!

I curled my hair, it turned out great, especially with the cap on!

I love that necklace.

Here's one of my closest friends, Todd. I sat with him at the ceremony, it made it a lot more fun.

It was rather windy.

Here's my brother Max!

My mom tells me I need to learn to stand properly when wearing heels. I see what she means now. Feet together, one slightly forward, throw your weight back on the back one. Got it.

And my lovely grandparents.



It was a long day, but I'm glad I walked. It helps give a definite end, and mark the occasion.

And as soon as I was done with school, it was time for crafting!
This weekend was Val's bridal shower. I made some cute bingo cards. This was one of the paper crafts I was telling you about last week:


The guests filled in the squares with gifts they thought she might receive, and played as she opened them.
I snipped the corners a la BSG (Battlestar Galactica) and Val noticed! That made me happy.

I also finished up that necklace for her. This is a picture of me modeling it at an early stage. After this was taken, we adjusted the length of a couple of the strands - the big orange button hung in the middle, instead of at the bottom. It was really the focal point of the necklace.


Not a very good picture of me - and obviously my Star of David necklace isn't part of it.
I really have to give all the credit to my mom, she did all the real work on that necklace. Val got a lot of compliments on it at the shower. We're going to fix it up again and probably give it back to val, as much as it pains me (I'm in LOVE with that big orange button!)

It was a crazy weekend, I was crafting during all my free time this weekend (which I didn't have much of). My mom's couch was sort of craft-central:

In case you can't read the labels, on the far left is the purse I bought to match my bridesmaid dress, the notepad on the couch where I should be is a stack of bingo cards I was coloring, the laptop is turned to a bridesmaid blog with etiquette advice (how to interact with the bride's family at the shower), the pile of red buttons is the necklace I made to go with Val's dress for the shower, the tin tray next to it has extra buttons, the little white vases are the centerpieces for the shower (also Val's clue last week) and the notepad on the wicker basket is my to-do list for the weekend.

It was pretty crazy. Unfortunately, I don't have pictures from the shower yet, but hopefully I will be receiving them soon. I'll tell you more about it when I have some photos to share.

My last project I'm working on lately is a block print for Val's wedding (can you sense a theme?), it's an "H" to go on their thank-you cards. I've only just started carving:


The block I'm using is too large, and it has a wood backing, so I'm only using half of it.
It's such an intricate design, I'm so afraid to get started, so I was lazy and just did all the background first, which I usually do last.



I love making that woodgrain-like texture in the background flow with the design. It really makes the design breath. Unfortunately, this is yet another print where they don't want the background texture to appear, so I had to carve deep to eliminate it. But I still like to make flow-y lines, even if it's just for me.
I know it's technically not a paper craft, but it involves paper. Or will eventually, when I finish it.

Hopefully soon I'll have updates about that block print- it's probably the most difficult design I've done yet. We'll see how it goes.

For now, I'm going to go play with the rats (I missed them so much this weekend!) and get to bed. I'm exhausted. And the rats are bored:


Mom! Please play with us!





Goodnight. ^_^

Busy weekend and upcoming crafty week (Amanda's old blog)

My graduation weekend was busy busy busy! But I don't have any photos back from my parents yet, so I'm gonna go ahead and save that for another entry. I do have one photo, however. And that is of the lovely roses my mom brought me:


When I was in high school, I composed a string duet, then we played it at an orchestra concert at school. My mom bought me some of the most lovely salmon-colored roses. Ever since it has been her goal to find a similar color. These are really really close. And anyway, they're lovely in their own right.

Alright. So. What crafts am I up to this week? A lot. Most of them have to do with Val's wedding or bridal shower. Today I'm going to show you the button crafts. I'm reserving paper crafts for later in the week.

Firstly I want to show you a project I've been working on for a while. A few months ago, Val and I were talking about bouquet options, and we decided it might be fun if we make a button bouquet (a la Princess Lasertron) for the rehearsal. Shortly thereafter, my mom started collecting buttons en masse, and she set aside a baggy full of green and blue buttons for Val's bouquet (green and blue are Val's wedding colors). Well, I've been working on it for a while - it still needs to be cleaned up a bit, and I still might add a few more flowers, but here are some photos of what I have so far:


Most of them are pretty quirky looking


There are a lot lower down on the stems, as well. Sort of like leaves.


Trying to show you as many as I can at once. Not really working that well. That one on the left with four layers is my absolute favorite.


Everyone who sees the bouquet is immediately drawn to this rose button. Unfortunately, it flops over. I need to fix that somehow.


It's a fun little project. We still don't know if Val is going to make white felt flowers to put them in with, or if I'll just buy some white fresh flowers and arrange them that way. We'll see. We've got a month to figure it out, and it's sort of a tiny detail... since it's just for the rehearsal. It's mostly a fun project to keep me busy.

I have another button craft that's a bit more urgent. Val has her outfit for the bridal shower this weekend all worked out, but she's missing a necklace. She said she needs a bright red necklace with big, chunky beads. I suggested buttons instead. So I went to the antique shop and bought some! This weekend I'll grab some more from my mom's stash and mix them in. Val found a Martha Stewart pattern for button necklaces, I'm going to use it as a reference.

I went to the craft store and got some red thread on clearance. I'll double or triple it up for the necklace so it's strong. I forgot to check the website before I left for the store, and now I see that there is such a thing as 'beading string.' I'll look into it. In the meantime, I have some very pretty red thread that I got super cheap! The antique shop was having a sale, too. I'm such a good little shopper!


Everything all lined up.


Some of the buttons have some very cool patterns. I'm pretty excited for how this necklace will turn out.

So, those are my button crafts this week. I'm also working on a block print for Val, but I didn't get any pictures of it today. I'll take some pictures when it's farther along and do a paper crafts entry. Unfortunately, since some of my crafts have to do with Val's bridal shower, and Val reads this blog, I kind of have to wait until next week to show them to you.

But for now, I'll tease Val a bit by posting a teaser photo:


Ooooh, what could it be? Curiosity!


See you in a few days with a graduation update. I hope you're having a lovely week!

A Quick Project (Amanda's old blog)

I had a long day on campus today - I had my hardest exam at 8AM (genetics!) and then my neuro exam in the afternoon, which had enough content to count as 2 exams on its own. I spent the time in between on campus, studying.

So, this evening I had a bit of a studying break. My last exam is on Thursday at 8AM. So I did some cleaning, trimmed the rats' claws, and took a much-needed nap. And I also did one quick craft!

I don't remember where I got the idea. I just remember that at my mom's graduation, people decorated the tops of their caps with their initials so their parents could find them, or they put something pertaining to their area of study. So I thought it would be fun to put a brain on my cap. I decided a white-out pen was probably the best material.

It took probably less than an hour to do. I just jumped online, did a google image search for 'brain' and found the least complicated image (no shadows or labels). I used some trace paper and a soft pencil to transfer the image onto my graduation cap, and then went over it with the white-out pen and VOILA!


Now my parents will be able to find me in the crowd!

Obviously, there will be a tassel over it, but it still looks pretty cool, even with the tassel.


Just a few more days, and then I'll have a bachelor's degree! After that, I've got a long to-do list for this blog. Lots of crafts coming up. I'm really excited to share them with you guys. I hope you're pumped!

Back to studying so I can rock the socks off my last ever final exam in undergrad!