Atropa Belladonna~ Raven (a.k.a. Nightshade)'s Weblog ~
These are the ARCHIVES of May 2007. For more archives, visit the Archives page. For the current Weblog entries, check the Main page.
Atropa Belladonna| Thurs, May 3, 2007 (10:55am) This morning, I thought I'd get a little costuming work done, so I went downstairs to the sewing area... and decided to take on a monumental project. Not a sewing project, per se, though it did involve a lot of thread, a needle, a pair of scissors, and a stitch ripper. I vacuumed the sewing area. And how, one might ask, does this project involve needles, scissors, and a stitch ripper? Well, I vacuumed up a lot of loose threads. It had been getting so bad that Lady Myke and I couldn't lay out cloth to cut without getting bits of thread and stray strands of fabric stuck to our projects. All these loose threads got brushed up by the vacuum powerhead, and many got stuck in the bristles, or wrapped around the axis of the brush. So, halfway through the project, I had to stop and pull threads out of the vacuum. Some were so tangled, I ended up using he scissors to get them loose. Then I finished vacuuming, and did it over again. Only this time, they'd gotten so tightly wound that I couldnt' get a scissors in there. I needed to use a stitch ripper to undo the tangles. And, in the center of one very messy tangle, I found: a sewing needle. Still on a thread. No wonder the vacuum brush was having trouble near the end. I guess I should be happy that the vacuum found the stray needle, and not our toes. Now, I have a clean floor, and it's begging for cloth to be laid out on it, for cutting. Myke and I should get some good work done tonight! |
| Fri, May 4, 2007 (11:10am) with edit for clasp detail at 11:30am Passing on a greeting here, from Myrna... (Smirking) - Silly Star Wars geeks. Anyway.. last night, Lady Myke and I got some more cloaking done. I stayed up late after she left, and got a clasp sewn onto my most recent project, so now I have pics to post. Please note that, yes, my hair really does look like a blurry mess when I am working on cloaks - hoods do terrible things to hairstyles, and after midnight I turn into a pumpkin and no longer care whether my hair is straight.    The cloak has 2 options for clasping. On the left, the cloak is done up with some overlap, and only 1 stripe of trim is readily visible down the front. In the center pic, the cloak is clasped directly at the midline, and both lines of trim are visible down the front. Clasp detail is on the right. The cloak is lined with polar fleece to keep it nice and warm on those chilly SCA camping events. There's also a hidden pocket on the inside of the cloak, for easy storage of keys, wallet, and ventolin inhalers (as needed). |
| Mon, May 7, 2007 (2:30pm) Okay... registration for GenCon events goes Live today. I'm sitting at my computer, waiting for 4:00 PST to roll 'round (3pm local), so I can register for True Dungeon. Only 35 more minutes of stressful anticipation. It's not as bad as waiting for Housing to open (what a mess that was) because I already know that I will get to GenCon, and I will have a place to sleep when I get there, and somehow or another, I will go on some True Dungeon runs. It's just a little stressful trying to register for the runs I want, versus going with a bunch of strangers at some odd hour which conflicts with everything else I want to do. The GenCon server hasn't crashed yet, so we're doing better than some years. Maybe this will all go smoothly for a change. In other news, we are looking for a new therapist for Connor, again. His current therapist had to resign for personal reasons (and I wish her well in her future endeavors - she was a very good therapist) but I am not looking forward to the next few weeks of me being full-time Mom AND therapist again. Especially because one of our excellent Respite sitters is leaving/left to move to Saskatchewan today. Well, Good Luck to Jenn &Mary of Baby Jail. May your trip go well, and may you settle into your new life comfortably. But not so comfortably that you forget to come back, okay? (sigh) 30 more minutes to go. Time creeps at its petty pace, and all that. |
| Mon, May 7, 2007 (3:05pm) Arg. I suck at time zones. 4:00 PST is 5:00 local. That's TWO MORE HOURS of frustrated anticipation. Arg. I'm going for a walk. And I'm going to think about sewing, and cloaks, and pretty trims. Thanx, Dazzy. |
| Tues, May 8, 2007 (2:50pm) Yay! Got True Dungeon Tix yesterday (after only 20 gruelling minutes of trying) and the rest of the group I run with - Dungeon Delvers Anonymous - also managed to get us tix for the slots we wanted. Only 1 minor conflict between events for me, which has since been resolved. Monday evening was 7th Sea, and I told our DM I was in the mood for a fight. He set it up so my character could challenge her evil Step-Father to a duel, but I ended up derailing the plot, and getting into a major arguement with my character's mother, laying into her for not divorcing the jerk years ago. So I got into a verbal fight with her, instead of a physical one with my step-father. In the end, my mom faced the man who had mistreated us for so many years, and demanded her divorce. Stepfather responded by sending a swordsman to duel over it. Looks like I'll get my (physical) fight next week. In other news: PayPal Sux. I spent a quarter hour on the phone with them (and on hold, as the call got escalated a couple times) trying to figure out why my Credit Card said a PayPal payment had gone through, but my PayPal account showed no transactions having gone through. In the end, they figured out the problem was, in fact, on their end, and apologized for the inconvenience, and assured me that the transaction would be resolved sometime in the next 24 - 72 hours. Arg. (Luckily this is the only Major problem I've had with them. So, really, they suck less than a lot of other institutions I've had to deal with in the past. And they admitted their error in the end, which is better than some.) But this means an order of pretty trims will be on its way soon, and Lady Myke and I will have many more happy hours sewing together. |
| Wed, May 9, 2007 (4:20pm) Myke and I had a productive night last night: She put the finishing touches on a children's bog coat which we'd made earlier, finished an unlined brown cloak, and made progress on a blue wool cloak she's working on. I finished the hems on a loose panne velour gown which I'd been making for Myke (she won't fit most of last year's garb due to this year's pregnancy), finished sewing the clasp on a red panne velour cloak, and cut out a green wool cloak. So, between the 2 of us, that's a couple projects finished off, 2 more cloaks made, and another 2 in the works. I think I might start a tally (like I had running last year) of how many cloaks we've completed, just for this month. Here's pics of the 2 finished cloaks. Neither are particularly fabulous, but I do like the way Myke's cloak looks with its brown and white trim. The trim on the red cloak is black, btw, but the color didn't photograph well... or maybe Photoshop gave it that greenish edge. I'm not sure.   Cloak Count for May: 4 cloaks finished (Child's cloak made by Myke early in the month, Red & Black cloak by me, Brown unlined by Myke, Red Panne Velour by me.) |
| Thurs, May 10, 2007 (1:45pm) Pirates of the Carribean 3: World's End The following is a public service announcement, from Davyd: Pirates of the Caribean 3 comes out on the 25th, and we're intending to dress up and swarm the place again. Last time we had something on the order of 20 people, so let's drag everyone out one more time. I know I'll be there in full Pirate dress. If anyone needs help with Pirate Garb, lemme know! |
| Sun, May 13, 2007 (10:45am) Happy Birthday, Imoto-chan! Hey, this day is extra-special for my sister. Not only is it her birthday, it's her first time on the receiving end of Mother's Day. Congrats! This past Thursday was one of the more entertaining evenings I've had in a while. I got to watch the Fire Department put out a garage fire behind our favorite pizza place on Whyte Ave! Just as we (meaning some of the LRPS crowd) were geting ready to leave, our waitress came by the table asking if any of us knew the guy who lived across the alley (some of us do have friends scattered around the Whyte Ave. area) None of us knew him, so she said "If we can't get a hold of him, I guess we'll have to call the Fire Department ourselves, then." Apparently some of the other servers had been smoking behind the restaurant and saw smoke coming out of the garage. They knocked on the guy's door, but got no answer. When they went back to check on the garage again, they saw flames inside, and decided they'd better do something about it. Not wanting to be in the way when the Fire Engines came, we all decided to go home. I wanted to get out as quick as possible, because my vehicle was parked in the alley behind the restaurant, and it would be dificult to leave once FireTrucks were in the alley. So, I ducked out the back door (saying bye to a couple servers I knew who were still out there smoking) and headed towards my van. I knew I was in trouble when I heard the sirens coming already, and I could see the flash of lights turning the corner even before I reached the van. By the time my hand was on the door, a big pump truck pulled into the alley, up to the garage, and stopped. Firemen jumped out and started swarming about, doing those things firemen do. I had no choice but to watch, at that point. The Firetruck was parked directly behind my van. (It did pull forward a little while later, to get closer to the fiery garage, but at that point the Fire Chief had come along and put emergency pylons at the alley entrance and exits, so even if I pulled out of my parking spot, I couldn't get out of the alley.) I got to see men with axes pulling down rafters, and guys with ladders going up to the top of the garage roof, checking for hot spots which would indicate fire in the insulation, and then getting out the chainsaws to cut an improvised sun-roof in the garage. Burnt timbers and blackened tools were pulled out of the garage, and dumped in a pile in the alley. Everything smelled of smoke and grime and the awful stench of burnt insulation. The firefighters running back and forth were wearing O2 tanks and respirators to protect their lungs. I wish I'd been smart enough to pull myself away from the scene, and hang out in the restaurant 'til it was over. But it's really hard to pull yourself away from a fire, you know? So I stayed and watched until the Fire Chief removed some of the orange pylons, and there was a place for me to escape the alley. Then I quickly got out of their way, and drove home. My throat was sore, and I reeked like smoke. So I took a shower, and a couple ibuprofen, and went to bed... at nearly 2am. The sore throat has lingered through the weekend, and just recently started to get worse. I seem to be coming down with the bug which our boys caught last week. Grr. Compromised throat and lack of sleep are just asking for an infection to happen, aren't they? Well, it's Mother's Day and the kids let me sleep in the morning, and Shades even brought me breakfast in bed. So the day is looking up. I htink I'll just take it easy and see if I can kick this bug. And maybe get a little sewing done in the afternoon. |
| Wed, May 16, 2007 (10:15am) A Connor Report Jase and the Con-man walk to school with me every day to pick up Kalen around 3:30 when she's done her classes. Usually I walk hand-in-hand with the boys, to keep them from dashing into traffic, or lagging behind, or running too far ahead. Jase has been wanting more freedom, though, and frequently lets go of my hand to investigate dandelions, adjust the velcro on his shoe, or run up ahead. When Jase runs up ahead, it's not too much of a problem. He'll stop if I call his name. Connor, however, does not have great listening skills. Last year I spent a lot of time chasing him down, or pulling him out of harm's way, if I chose to let him walk independantly. Yesterday, I decided to try it again. It's been a year, after all, and he has grown up a lot in that time. He knows the way to the school, and he mostly sticks to the path. He almost never bolts into traffic anymore. Plus there were a lot of kids on the road (school had just let out) and the cars were all driving pretty cautiously. I figured the risk level was low. For a little while, Connor walked beside me, as if he expected me to take his hand again. Then he wandered up ahead a bit. Then he ran! I called to him once he was 4 meters away... and he stopped! He waited for me to catch up, and took my hand again without any fuss. So I did it again. I let go, and he sped up, and got 3 or 4 meters ahead (almost to the corner of the road) and I called "Connor! Come back!" And he did! He came all the way back, took my hand, and held it while we crossed the road together. We played this game a few more times, and 3 out of 5 times, he stopped or came back when called. On the other occassions, he had either gotten too far ahead to hear me (I think) or there was a dog vying for his attention... and that's a tough situation to get any kid's attention in. But, wow! He's listening! He's following directions! This is pretty cool stuff. I suspect we'll be trying this a few more times before school is out. Maybe he doesn't need to be held quite so close, quite so often. That would be good, I think. Very good. |
| Wed, May 16, 2007 (1:35pm) Lady Myke and I made excellent progress with our cloaking, again. I finished a nice deep green wool cloak on the weekend, and last night Myke put the finishing touches on her wool cloak - which she insists is blue, but I think most people would call black - and both turned out very well.   (Keltie models my green cloak with black trim, left, and Myke's blue(?) cloak with tan and blue trim, right.) Myke also finished the cloak which she she'd been making for her husband (over the past month or so, between many other projects). I'm told it looks fabulous, and am hoping she'll bring it by so we can take a pic of it, sometime. She says she wants to do a little adjustment to the neck, first, but hopefully she'll do that at my place, so I can snap a shot before El Heffe gets his hands on it, and refuses to release the cloak ever again. And while Myke was sewing, I did a bit of work on pinning the neck of a cloak I'm making for our friend Delilah. Hopefully it'll be done before we go to Pirates of the Carribean in a bit over a week. I also cut the pattern for a red wool cloak (size small) and red wool bog coat. Bah - I am so fed up with working in wool. If the cloaks didn't look so good when they were done, I wouldn't touch the stuff. I think when this batch is done, I will stick to Cotton for a while. Cloak Count for May: That's 6 cloaks Myke and I have made for the shop this month. We're hoping to have the count at 10 by the end of May, and then take a break for June. |
| Wed, May 23, 2007 (2:05pm) Wow - it's amazing how a 4-day weekend eats into your computer time! Not everyone had a 4-day weekend, I realize. But the Catholic School system, in its wisdom, decided that last Friday ought to be a PD day. And Monday was Victoria Dy, and therefore a Stat holiday. The kids had a 4-day weekend. I had 2 extra days to deal with all the kids, over the usual weekend busy-ness. I coped with this situation in my usual way: by making it even busier! Friday we went swimming with the kids in the morning, went to the mall for lunch at the Food Court (Connor is supposed to be working on his Community Outing skills) and then we went to the Library in the afternoon. The kids were exhausted at teh end of the day, but very happy! Sat and Sun were usual weekend days for us, with Shades taking care of the kids while I worked shifts at the clinic, and me watching the kids in the evening, while he went out gaming Saturday eve. Sunday evening, however, we packed. (By 'we', I mean that I made packing lists, and Shades got everything together. He's absolutely awesome, ya know?) And then, Monday - oh, we had fun. We took the kids on a daytrip to Drumheller! We visited the Royal Tyrell Museum and saw dinosaurs, and dinosaur skeletons, and played with the interactive exhibits, and ate in the cafeteria and then went back for more dinosaurs! Dinosaurs! Everywhere! And other cool prehistoric critters. And bones, and more skeletons, and gigantic dioramic recreations! And more dinosaurs! The kids loved it. And honestly, I think the grown-ups had fun too. We went to Reptile World as well, while we were in town, and the kids got to see live crocodiles and snakes and lizards and tortoises and an alligator, and they even got to hold and/or pet a very nice python. It was pretty cool. And a wee bit exhausting, keeping up with kids who were wired on the excitement. We had been planning a hike through the Hoodoos, but changed our plans due to the rain. Instead, we headed home a bit early, and the kids all got baths before bed. They didn't settle terribly well (too much time forced to sit still in the car makes for less-than-sleepy kids) but I think they slept well once they finally did settle. As for Shades and me, he went to a Martial Arts BBQ, and I stayed home for Monday night gaming, which turned out to be a really good session. On Tuesday, Myke and I did some costuming again, and I also got pics of a couple items I had finished up on the weekend. So, for your amusement, here's photos of our latest projects. Photos of Drumheller may be posted later this week.     From left to right, we have a very nicely trimmed red wool cloak which I made for the shop, the green wool cloak Myke made for her husband (much thanks to fabulous Mr. Lang for his assistance modelling the cloak), a rust colored bog coat I finally put the trim on (it's more of a hooded robe than a bog coat, really, and I didn't have anyone large enough to model it, so you get a pic of it semi-folded. Again, note the lovely trim), and a red wool bog coat (made with the traditional pattern) which I just finished last night. Myke and I are really pleased with the recent batch of cloaks and bog coats we've made for the shop. Last year, we didn't do much in the way of trims & embellishment, but this year's line-up is looking really sharp. Cloak Count for May: 8 cloaks! (The hooded bog coat doesn't count as I'd actually finished it in April and it just needed trim added.) We're gonna hit out goal of 10 before month's end! Woohoo! |
| Thurs, May 24, 2007 (12:05pm) Pirates 3 - Revised plans! City Center Theater (DownTown) Friday, 8:30pm Many thanks to Davyd for his footwork (fingerwork?) getting this all worked out via many emails and investigative work on theater schedules. Remember we're going in garb! Anyone who doesn't have pirate gear to wear, contact one of the fabulous babes in this group, and I'm sure we can set ya up. If you don't come in garb, well, we'll still love ya, but we'll also make fun of ya scurvy land-lubbers! YarHar!!! |
Sat, May 26, 2007 (9:55am) 
 Lots of fun. Lots of piratey goodness. Lots of reminders to self never to sit for 3 hours in a corset to watch movies, ever again. |
| Tues, May 29, 2007 (9:25am) Last Saturday, I walked into my bathroom to find a scene out of Calvin and Hobbbes. There were bubbles everywhere! Looks like Jasen got a hold of the kids' (extra lathery!) shampoo and emptied 2/3 or the bottle into the toilet, the sink, and the bathtub (where Connor was having a bath, and more than happy to add some turbulence to the water in order to see the bubbles billow). I am so glad the shampoo was mildly scented, but even so the smell of mango was overwhelming, walking into the small, enclosed, humid, room. The kids thought it was hilarious as mom tried to find a safe place to stand, pick up a slimy, bubble coated baby and initiate damage control. In the end, I just threw towels down on the floor to make a safe place to step, and tossed the wee one in the tub - clothes and all. It took half an hour to get the bubble problem under control. It took 2 emptyings and refillings of the bathtub to rinse the shampoo residue off both boys (after Jasen had been stripped of his clothing, yes.) It was a day and a half before our bathroom stopped smelling of mango. Blogfodder, I tell ya. Absolute blogfodder.  On the happy front, Myke and I hit our goal of 10 cloaks last Thursday. She put the finishing touches on a very nice gothy black cloak, and I had finished a neat silver-and-gold one, earlier in the day. Not really silver and gold, more grey and ochre, but the tones compliment eachother quite well, and the overall effect is very rich. It's a big, warm, cloak - the sort that will make a person (or two!) happy on a cold SCA camping event.Myke's cloak is tall and thin, and made of the softest black wool, lined with black cotton twill, embellished with black woven trim. The picture won't do it justice (black-on-black doesn't photgraph well) but the effect is very subtle and quite pretty. (Sorry - I didn't get a picture of my cloak.) Tonight, Myke will probably finish her black bog coat, and I hope to do the hemming and trimming on the black cloak I've been working on. Maybe, if there's anough time, I'll also get the black full-circle cloak done tonight. It's only going to be a single layer (no lining) so that goes fast. Then again, it's yards and yards of hemming. That goes not-so-fast. We'll see. If I get bored working on cloaks, though, I have another project to invest energy in: landscaping! Shades and I decided that, this summer, we're going to get the freaking landscaping done. (I think we made that decisoon last summer, too.) But last year at least we started on it, and got a lot of work done. This year we hope to finish it. The terracing by our front walk looks very nice, now that it's got gravel in it, and some plants growing in the flower bed. There's still a bunch more gravel to move, and then we want to deal with the area under the balcony. My project, however, is going to be running a 2 foot wide strip of pavers next to the driveway, to act as a sort of sidewalk, so people don't have to walk o nthe grass when we've got both vehicles parked on the driveway. Of course, in order to park 2 vehicles on the driveway, we'd have to move some landscaping materials, first. And the best way to move them, is to do some landscaping, and use them up. Better get on it then, eh? |
| Thurs, May 31, 2007 (9:45am) And yet more pictures... I am sore. One of the least fun things about landscaping is cutting through the grass to put in new features. You'd think it would be simple - place the shovel where you want to dig, step on it, cut into the sod, remove the sod, move on to the next spot. But with me, I get stuck on the "cut into the sod" step. When I stand on the shovel, all of my weight - a full 135 pounds of it - is insufficient to actually cut through the grass. I need to jump up and down on the shovel to get it to break the surface of the lawn. Do you know how tricky it is to jump on a shovel which isn't actually planted in anything? It's like a pogo stick, with no springs, and without the nice flat bouncing-foot at the bottom. And sometimes, that doesn't even work. I have to tip the shovel sideways a bit, so one corner will get all my weight, and manage to break through the grass. But jumping on a slanted pogostick is even harder. Then the shovel slips sideways, the shaft whacks my kneecap, I make a less-than-graceful recovery, The concept of renting a sod-cutter from Home Depot is looking particularly appealing. But I've managed to get half of it cut by hand so far (see here!) so I'll probably stick with it, and finish the rest. When it's done, and the rest of the digging and filling with roadcrush and sand, and all the levelling is done and everything, this is where a 2 foot wide strip of pavers will be set next to the driveway. It will look good, I think. I hope. (BTW - does anyone need some sod?) The fun bit of lanscaping I did yesterday was to plant flowers and assorted bedding plants along the terraced retaining wall which Shades finished earlier this week. It looks really good! Shades' work, I mean. The plants look good, too, but that pales in comparison to the year and a half of effort which went into building that retaining wall.   Many thanks to Kalen for her help selecting bedding plants, planting some of them, and for taking one of the photos above. |
