Party this evening! My boyfriend's company Holiday party is this evening. Unlike in past years, they are having it after work (instead of 0n a Saturday) & it's going to be hors-d-oeurves instead a meal. There probably won't even be a bar. However, and this is the part that I'm looking forward to, it will be at the NC Museum of History. You know, the one with the Roanoke Exhibit, involving material from the British History Museum. Many of which have not seen North American soil since the 16th century. Yeah, that museum. So I wore my holiday vest today, since it's a holiday party.

books: I started reading the 3rd Sisters Grimm book.

tatting: I'm on the 5th point of the white/silver snowflake. Too bad I've no thread left on the shuttle. I'll have to reload it to finish the 5th point & to do the 6th one. I found some variegated green to do Jane's tree. It's 4-ply so I will have to separate it 1st. I might have time during the bus ride this evening.

Gaming: We started a new story arc in Mutants and Masterminds last night. I'm not sure where this one is going. It might be a short one. We got started late (Chris & Rosemary were late due to an accident blocking their route) so we had to stop in mid-battle. Chris's character, Wraith, is missing two of his duplicates but that's part of the next story arc. Last night we were fighting Crimson Katana, the woman (3rd generation) who wields the wakizashi made from the skull of the Human Tank (her grandfather forged the blade after killing The Human Tank). The previous Lady Celtic (Rosemary's character is the current one) was married to the Human Tank so she is really upset about that blade. A bunch of ninjas, some samurai type and a mage have joined the fight & it suddenly looks like Crimson Katana wasn't the bad guy, until someone or something took possession of her. Guess we'll find out during the next game session.

clothes: black ~slippers & socks & slacks, same black belt & silver clip watch, dark green turtleneck, holiday vest, moss agate bead bracelet, onyx ring (black stone at least), floral band, hematite band, emerald & gold earrings & pendant, and braided hair. Holiday vest: It's a bolero vest that I made years ago with silk ribbon embroidery & beads (poinsettias & mistletoe) on tone on tone white mistletoe calico, reversible with green marked with tiny gold dots.

I received an odd compliment today. One of my co-workers commented on my vest (asking if I had made it). When I told her that it was a thrift shop find, she said, "You always coordinate your colors so well, I don't know how you do it." I finally learned to accept a compliment so I just nodded & say thank you. But WTH? Yesterday I wore a dark purple turtleneck, a deep plum & tan tapestry vest, black slacks, etc, with amethyst pendant & purple Czech bead earrings. Today it's navy slacks, light blue turtleneck & Williamsburg blue and cream tapestry vest. Okay, they are the same color family & they do coordinate. But it's still an odd complement.

books: Sisters Grimm 2, And Able, Swimming without a Net, and Royal Mess. My Amazon order arrived & I've done a lot of reading. I've re-read one book by Maggie Shayne, The Brands Who Came for Christmas.

tatting: I've been working on an edging before sleep. The thread's only broken once. Not bad for old thread. I've given up on the last round of the latest snowflake. I screwed up the 2nd chain and decided that it looked fine without the last round and cut it off. I've started repeating one of the snowflakes but with a silver filament. I also found some variegated green to do Jane's tree.

other crafts: tried to use that odd cotton string/thread on the loom in a loose lattice knit. It didn't work. I need to read the directions again.

clothes: I've mostly covered this already but add in braided hair, Celtic knot earrings, ring & pendant, flower band, navy loafers and socks.

We used the Tivo for the first time last night. We saved a couple shows. I'll watch at least one of them tonight.

tv: we watched an episode from the 1st season of Bones, an old Mission Impossible episode & part of a Superman cartoon.

books: I finished Sisters Grimm. It's an excellent book. It uses a many of the traditional fairy tale characters, in a novel way. I think I'll get the next book. I started Willing and re-reading Making Money.

crafts: I finished the headband but this time it has more orange in it. That's not very flattering next to my face. I have some lovely ribbon yarn, I think I'll make a lattice scarf from it.

clothes: black suede shoes; black jeans; same belt, watch & hematite band; onyx earrings & pendant; braided silver ring & matching pair of bracelets; black short-sleeved sweater & braided hair.

I stayed up too late last night. The game (the 2nd one) ended at 9:30 but I still didn't get to sleep until late.

It's cool and rainy today. It's almost stereotypical fall weather. I'm not complaining about the rain. After all, I have an umbrella & a warm coat.

books: I finished re-reading Ready by Lucy Monroe. I started reading The Sisters Grimm by Michael Buckley. But I'll probably go back & re-read Willing by Monroe before I finish it.

clothes: black ankle boots/shoes, black jeans, same black belt & silver clip watch, brown/black Vorkosigan polo, 3 women pendant, fem power ring, same hematite band, & butterfly earrings. My hair is braided simply because I didn't feel like doing anything else to it.

Did a little straightening but absolutely no shopping. I did not even leave the house on Friday or Saturday. Today I left to get lunch & to go eat supper.

Tatting: worked on an edging from the old thread that I'd bought. The thread broke on the second big ring (doing a variant of the hen & chicks) and I had to do a rejoin.

other crafts: I have started another ear scarf on the knitting loom. This one I think I will manage to finish off without it binding me. I think that if I crochet it, I won't have the same problem. I have now finished 3 hot pads and the cotton loops have arrived to do more.

Today we played a game of Witch Hunter and a quick game of Blackmoor. The Witch Hunter was massive fun and apparently my character is the collector of 'bad' things. The Blackmoor was entertaining in a completely different fashion.

I have learned something. If you leave your shirt wrapped around a bag of scented candles (not such that the candles melt), the next time that you wear the shirt you will get a blast of scent every time that you move. It's nice but a little overwhelming at times.

By the way, green tea with pomegranate is absolutely delicious, hot or cold. I think that it's Celestial Seasoning brand but I won't swear to it.

BTW, how many ways can you say the same thing? Over and over? Ye gods, drive it into the ground. Yes, I'm complaining about someone.

We did it. We finally got TiVo. It's a used box because I didn't set it to record conversational Italian. Now comes the set up. Programming which shows to record and which channels are favorite, etc.

books: I re-read Demon of Undoing & Star King.

Tatting: I started making an edging with some of that size 10 that I picked up. It's a hen & chicks variant, at least until the thread broke. I've also started another snowflake.

clothes: leggings & then jeans; plus purple angel/moon t-shirt.

Quickie post to day: lots to do.

Read 3rd bok in Immortal Series & the 4th. Finished reading Moon Fever anthology.

Finished another snowflake.

Lunch with Dad at Maggiano's Little Italy. Not cheap but very good & lots of food. I ate leftovers for breakfast & lunch today. I have more to eat. Supper with Chris & his family, I ate lightly there. I had to.

Dad & I looked over old pictures. I could almost start telling my my grandmother's siblings apart. The photos dated back to 1906 (great-grandmother). I think that the most recent photo was 1970-ish. Wait, no, I lie. There were some pictures from Dad's birthday party in 2002.

clothes: jeans & t-shirt. Yesterday it was long-sleeved Carolina Panthers & today it's blue with flag & wolf.

Sorry for the lack of post yesterday, I was still tired & I had a lot of work to catch up.

Gaming: Chris's game Monday night. We found the cabbage thieves. And judging by their reaction to our inquiries: they've already used it to poison their weapons. It's a bar brawl, with dire wolves (okay, singular dire wolf; that would be my Druid, Kelis).

I sent the notes from the Witch Hunter game, that she ran, to Paige. She replied that they were pretty funny. I tried to write them more from Solange-Marie's point of view, rather than just generic notes.

tatting: I screwed up that snowflake. Luckily it was only the last point, really. I had to cut it off & start again. End result: a less than attractive snowflake, in my opinion anyway. I'll know more once I finish it.

Other crafts: I used that metal frame from Harrisville to make a couple potholders. I bought the frame & starting loops from Spin Blessing. They were great. They shipped quickly & without any problems. I think that I'll give them to my neighbors, along with my mini-calzone recipe.

Tired me. I slept about 10 hours & staggered around when I got up this morning. We dawdled around a bit but still got out by the time Chris had wanted to. He had a massage appointment at 1 pm and I would not enjoy idling around waiting for him. He dropped me off and I did a little cleaning this afternoon and read, etc.

I still napped for an hour in the car. I started a 4th snowflake. I have started the 3rd point when we got home.

I re-read the 2nd book of the Sharing Knife. I also read a little bit of the Witch Hunter rule book.

I watched a few of the Falcon movies on TCM. They are pretty entertaining.

clothes: black tennis shoes & jeans, black belt, same watch, dragon pendant & rings, chain mail earring with grey roses, ponytail & black t-shirt with "stained glass" knight & dragon fight.

We finally finished playing about midnight or so last night. My character almost died but it was a great game. And frankly, my character is so ineffective in combat that it's much better for someone else to be awake and her to be down.

We got to bed about 2 am and got to the con again this morning in time for our game of Order of Underworld Travellers. It's a painful adventure. It really, really is. Reed is going to be in a pissy mood for some time to come.

The second adventure of Sunday & the last one of the con, we're playing the 7th Witch Hunter adventure. Rosemary & I ended up at one table & Chris is at another.

I've been too busy gaming, taking notes, etc to read or to tat.

clothes: black tennis shoes, blue jeans, black belt, grey Siege of Yorktown t-shirt, Celtic knot earrings, flower band, hematite earrings, ~rope band, knot pendant & ponytail held by bronze jewelry clip.

Today it's Mace. We played an intro LG game this morning. I played my Greyhawk Ruins character for the 2nd time. Her name is a little complex so I use the nickname Kash. The GM & the other players appreciate that. It's her last non-Ruins game.

This afternoon we played the core special. It's basically a 2-rounder game that we played in one round. We played out Cattails & there was another one at the table. It was an APL 14 table and we pretty much took the table. The other CatTail went negative but I had Delay Death prepped & saved "her". I got to use one of my Blessed Relief cards. We finished up about an hour after the round was supposed to finish, but then again we started late.

We sat around while Chris & Rosemary updated their characters; they both leveled. We sat around and socialized while we did so and finally headed for supper & to walk Duncan almost about the same time that the evening round started. As we were leaving, someone commented that a second table of Witch Hunter had been formed. We were three of the players. So we had to hurry to our hotel, Rosemary walked Duncan while Chris got food from McD's and I changed character stuff.

We got to the game about half an hour after the game was scheduled to start. But that's okay. They knew that we were coming & were waiting for us. Again, Witch Hunter is lots of fun.

We are starting to have some running gags. M'sieur Rumor is guilty of much and Louis really likes his clothes. Katherine is charming and Richard is, well, English.

tatting: I have made a couple snowflakes & given one away.

books: I've read a couple tatting patterns & that's pretty much it. Other than some game stuff.

clothes: black suede shoes, blue jeans, grey Gran March t-shirt over long-sleeved burgundy t-shirt, same watch, Celtic triangle pendant, Celtic earrings & ring, flower band, ~rope ring, braided hair with Celtic hair elastic at top.

It's chilly & windy, getting cold. The games have been fun. The grilled chicken sandwich at Bojangles was dry.

I'm playing my second game of Witch Hunter and it's lots of fun. It's the second adventure and we have had some great lines. Louis mourns the death of the only tailor in town. And that she did not leave him a set of clothes. Or at least a recommendation of another tailor.

We pulled a good one on Paige. She was originally going to be running tonight's game. After we played our 1st game, we got the idea of asking her, 'what happened after the 1st fight. She looked a little puzzled, 'oh there's the whole half of the mod.' We led her to believe that our entire party died, aka a TPK. She was utterly horrified and started half-sputtering, does the campaign coordinator know? Has anyone told the author? etc. We finally admitted that we were yanking her chain. She took it in good part, we got her good.

Just in time for my trip to MACE. Yeah, I get further proof that I am definitely female & I am not breeding. Bring on the cramps. I knew it was coming, it's not like this is really a surprise; but still.

I'm only working half a day today. I'm leaving at noon to go to Mace. I'm looking forward to it, even though it's been so long since I signed up, that I don't remember what games I'm playing.

Mutants & Masterminds game: We finally wound up Totem's storyline. She has a very resentful, younger half-brother who's agreed to start his training & become her successor. We finished up the fight with pigeon Totem flying back into our reality, taking human form, calling up Isis for new magic to teleport to the Coyote/Anubis mask (used a Hero Point to stunt of her Magic Power). She reached the lodge where Jason, her younger brother, and the notables of the tribe were doing a ritual to talk to Coyote and find out what he intended for Jason. Jason came out of the lodge, wearing the mask & carrying a tomahawk, still really resentful. Coyote is perhaps, not the most comfortable person to reveal one's destiny.

They teleported back to the gate (using Totem's last Hero Point) and back through it. Totem became a pigeon again (I had some really good rolls with the acrobatic bluff, causing Eyekiller to destroy some of his own demons) and Jason snuck by everybody, thanks to both his own gifts & the mask. He got a Wraith duplicate to take him to Eyekiller's fetish. He destroyed it & ended the Eyekiller threat & closed the gate. The Wraith duplicate managed to throw him through it before it closed. Lady Celtic found the key phrase to help Jason deal with his new life: chicks dig it when you save the world. Hey, he's a 15-year-old boy.

tatting: I almost finished the first snowflake. I have one more point to go. I had to finish packing this morning so I had no time to tat before work. And then it was too durn cold to tat while waiting for the bus.

Letters: I plan to mail them today.

clothes: black suede shoes, black jeans, black belt (yes, the Celtic one), same clip watch, same hematite band, ~rope band, silver feather charm & quartz chip earrings, feather-carved quartz point pendant on long silver chain, braided hair & burgundy turtleneck.

Rain, we have RAIN! Okay, so the temperature dropped the rest of the day. Surprisingly, the incoming pressure front did not give me a migraine. I am very pleasantly surprised, and pleased. On the other hand, I don't know whether to blame the weather, my dash down the hill to catch the bus yesterday, or just my own ill-health for the way my knees have been aching for the past day. Last night was agony. Today, it only hurts.

book: I read a little bit of Almost a Princess but didn't have time or hands for much reading (balancing a jacket, an umbrella & the book made it difficult while waiting for the bus).

tatting: I finally got the shuttles loaded but I had to pack last night & didn't get any tatting done. I got a little bit done tonight. I am about halfway through one snowflake from Sunderman's book.

gaming: My registration for Regulatorcon still isn't showing up. *sigh*

The rain cleared by lunch but it had gotten cold & windy. So when Julie came to meet me for lunch, we stayed in the building.

clothes: black tank top (covered when I buttoned shirt), black Origins shirt, black slacks, black belt, same watch, same hematite band, hair in a ponytail/bun with black/brown hairsticks, Celtic knot earrings & ring, flower band, triskele in triangle pendant, & black half-boots.

Breaking: 130,000 acres of land saved in Tennessee!

The Nature Conservancy has completed the largest conservation transaction in Tennessee since the creation of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in the 1930s... to protect nearly 130,000 acres of majestic hardwood forests, mountains and streams, now also open to the public for recreation.

read more | digg story

Food! Oh, yum. Chris had the greatest idea for supper. Brown some meat (doesn't really matter what kind, as long as it's ground). Cook some peas and some mashed potatoes. Pile some of the meat in the bottom of a bowl, add peas, add a little cheese, and top with mashed potatoes. There are some spices involved, too. It's a simple version of shepherd's pie, one of my favorite dishes.

Gaming: My registration for Regulatorcon hasn't gone through yet. Until it does, I can't register for games. Apparently, I'm not alone in that. That's some comfort.

Tomorrow night is Mutants & Masterminds. I'll have to see how I'm getting there.

Pictures! I have pictures. This one is the top of the pendant for my Fair Entry That Almost Was.
You can see the tatted ring very clearly. There are actually 2 rings on this bauble, but of course you can only see one clearly at a time.







This is the 2nd necklace. You can just barely see the blue/gold flash on the black beads. I have more drop beads than round ones. That limited just how long the necklace could be. This is a fairly close up shot of the main component of the necklace.






This is more of an overview of the necklace. The area where I changed over from small rings to large rings to beads is more visible in this shot.





Last, but not least, the site of the pendant. I made the chain a little longer than the chains with the drop beads.

Morning Music soundtrack: Here With Me (Dido), Second Nature (Clannad), Out of the Gene Pool (Jeff Foxworthy), Happy Now? (No Doubt), You Thought (The Go-Gos), Time Will Crawl, The Rum Tum Tugger,& ending with Deep in the Heart of Texas (Gene Autry).

books: I finished Wild Magic last night & brought More Than Honor to read today. I wasn't in the mood for the 3rd story so I finished it a little sooner than I expected (at lunch). Although I did entertain myself imagining a fictional occurrence in which Commander Leary from the RCN series, Emperor Roger McClintock, Admiral Honor Harrington & Imperial Auditor Lord Vorkosigan meet. Since the science of their various star travels are mutually incompatible, it's obviously impossible in any of the world settings.

computer games: I started a new game of Tradewinds 2 (warning, pop-up). I've unlocked one captain, I wonder how to unlock the other one.

tv: I started to watch Dr Who but I wasn't up to it. I really don't like the flashback-style of tv show. I then watched a little Perry Mason, then flipped around. I couldn't settle on anything & finally turned it off.

tatting: I finished the snowflake using the vintage thread. It's a little large (ie larger than a fingernail, even my thumbnail, for such a simple pattern) but it still looks pretty good. I need to clip the loose threads.

I spent some time downloading my camera's contents & then editing the pictures. I put a load of laundry into the machine but the jeans hadn't finished drying by the time I went to bed. That's what I get for having some jeans that demand 'tumble dry on low'. For supper, I had the other sweet potato that I bought at the dining hall farmer's market. I baked it much better this time. With my oven, an hour is better than 45 minutes.

clothes: navy loafers, socks & slacks; same watch & hematite band; light blue 2005 NCAA men's basketball champs polo; lapis bead earrings; lapis ring; blue stone & white bead necklace (still without pendant); & loose hair (thought about braiding but no time to find an elastic).

Tatting Photos!

Since Friendster, where I usually post my tatting progress, says that I don't have enough disk space for any more photos. I'll put them here. All my latest!

Here is the silver snowflake that I made from Kreinik very fine silver braid. It's a very simple snowflake. I don't remember where I got the pattern.

Below is the same snowflake with the label of the thread visible .









Bookmarks:
I made some bookmarks for Nordic Needles literacy project. This is the last one that I started, Floral. Most of these are by Kersti. She has such lovely patterns.










This is the the completed bookmark.


This is the 1st one that I started: Stumpy, also by Kersti.









This one I did twice, making 2 different lengths of 'stem.'

Could have been a really crappy evening: One of my PMS symptoms showed yesterday (it's why I bought Creation in Death after work) and as a result I was trying to catch the 6:40 bus (last one). At 7 pm, it still hadn't arrived but two of my neighbors had. One of them had parked at the mall (bus at 7 pm goes there), so we all took the bus to the mall & she took us home. Thank goodness. Although, as we were turning into the complex, we saw what would have been our bus, pass us. I still didn't get home until almost 7:30 pm.

site of the day: Random acts of kindness

books: I finished Creation in Death at lunch today. Wow, it's good.

store of the day: blooming teas

tatting: didn't get anything done but finally got the pictures downloaded from my camera.

And finally, here is the pendant to my almost entry.







tv: Finally watched the end of Sky High. Since it's a Disney movie, Disney channel didn't edit it nearly as much as the last time that I tried to watch it (don't remember which channel). It's an enjoyable movie but it really seems like a 1980's film. Odd that.

To do:

1. laundry
2. all LG characters ready
3. plan what to pack
4. clean up some
5. ask about Regulator con (need to take 2.5 days vacation to go)
6. tat snowflakes (aunts, parents, bro's family, co-workers)
7. finish necklace
8. write letters (1 down, 8 to go)

clothes: black sequined flats, black knee-highs, black slacks, usual black belt & silver watch, moonstone earrings & ring, tri-moon moonstone pendant, flower band, hematite band, green Harrington Steading polo, & hair worn loose (washed this morning).

site of the day: Want to do a good deed for only a few seconds of time (depending on how fast your internet connection is)? Download a text file. Read the information given about why, it will explain better than I can.


Weekend trip: Drove the 3 hours to see my Mom, Aunt & Uncle. It should have been just over two hours but I didn't have the new & improved directions. And I took the wrong highway. Luckily, I saw a road that I recognized & it was pretty much one way at that point (the other way involved a security checkpoint & I knew I didn't need to go that way) so I took it. Of course, my aunt & uncle live at the other end of that road.

We worked on some mending for me and I altered a nightgown for mom (the sleeves were too wide & too long). I finally completed the credit card bag that I've had cut out for months (you cut up a credit card to make the bag closure). I used a scrap of the floral denim that I used for that jumper years ago and a scrap of quilted fabric from a panel Christmas tree skirt, also from years ago. Even though the bag was barely wide enough for the closure, it turned out very well. Mom & Aunt Shirley were very impressed with the idea. If you need to make a larger opening, you can cut the plastic from a bottle instead. The bag I made is almost long enough to hold my glasses which means that it's plenty long enough to hold a shuttle.

I made a haversack for Chris, his Christmas present. I just need to clean up some threads & to work on a closure for it. It's a very easy bag to make but I need to make adjustment if I ever make one again. I sewed the strap into place the length of the bag. Stress will not tear that strap off. There's an "x" at the bottom of the strap plus 3 lines of seam to hold the strap in place. Thanks to the length of the fabric, there's even an interior pocket, I doubled the fabric for the bottom, with a single width for the flap. Imagine: 60" X 18" fabric rectangle. Fold it lengthwise but double, about 2/3 or 4/5. Now fold the doubled fabric in half; that's the body of the bag. The single layer is the flap. Leaving the flap open, sew up the sides of the doubled fabric to make the bag.

After supper (frozen lasagna), I was wiped out so I took a 2 hour plus nap. I woke up in time to go to bed. Mom & I talked for a little while & then went to sleep.
On the way home on Sunday, I managed to miss a turn & went out of my way again. Luckily, as soon as I crossed into the wrong county I recognized that, stopped, pulled out a map & figured out how to get back on track. With all the detours, I had to put more gas in the car. The lowest that I saw was $3.089 a gallon. That's just ridiculous.

Chris ran a zero round on Saturday. He told me a little about it after I got home. He had received one of his belated birthday presents this weekend, too (it had been on back order).

I took a nap & then we watched one of his other birthday presents; Transformers DVD. That really is a good movie. It looks like they had planned to make the army guy the lead but then changed to the young guy. It's something you may not notice the first time that you see it. Friday night we watched another of his birthday presents; Ghost Rider DVD.

books: I finished Light in Shadow (not Light & Shadow) but I've started writing letters & have not had time for more reading (shocking, I know).

sight of the day: young man with the right half of his hair in an afro & the other half in small braids or twists, a la Coolio, but shorter. Either hairstyle is fine, together? Um, not so fine.

clothes: I started Saturday wearing a turtleneck but it was too warm in Aunt Shirley's basement, so I changed to a t-shirt. T-shirt & then turtleneck on Sunday, blue jeans both days. I wore tennis shoes when I went out but slippers the rest of the time. Butterfly earrings, flower fairy pendant, flower ring, ~rope ring, & a ponytail. Too bad the ponytail caused horrendous rats nests in my hair, right where the ponytail hit my shirt collar.

I really wished my mom would stop smoking. My hair reeks.

Today I'm wearing black shoes, jeans & belt, same watch & hematite ring, sage green rayon shirt (Mom fixed the cuff), triskele posts, triskele in triangle pendant, Celtic knot ring, black stone ring & loose hair (after I got the tangles out, I just didn't feel like doing anything else to it).