Stitchin' status

I have been in a huge funk, so forgive me for not posting. Depression can go either way: it can be a great inspiration and outlet or it can be creativity killer. In my case, I haven't been doing much of anything, which has elicited feelings of deeper depression, guilt, restlessness, etc. The cure? MORE COWBELL! I mean, MORE STITCHING!

So let's not concentrate on what hasn't been done, and see what HAS been done.

I did get a book review completed for Connie G over at About.com for a book entitled "Blackwork." You can read it here. It's definitely for a more advanced stitcher but I am looking forward to using some of the stitch patterns to create some of Connie's patterns in the future. You can't perfect a technique if you never even try, right? Here is a great example of someone taking blackwork stitches and putting them to use in a contemporary image of a bird. (Sorry to link that instead of inserting an image, but I don't want to use this person's image without permission first!) I think this is really well done and would love to be able to do something similar, maybe in a flower pattern.

I've also had a few sales, mostly Bruce Campbell related and the latest one was purchased from a person in Turkey. Thankfully, shipping to Turkey isn't as bad as I had imagined. I am pretty excited that one of my pieces is on its way across the globe. There are Ash fans everywhere! We're like the plague.

And finally, I created a pattern inspired by one of my other favorite B movies, "Dead Alive." Click here for the pattern.

And the video clip:



So while that may not be a ton of accomplishments, in the world of Emo Bex, it is a good start. I'm still finishing work on a stitch-for-hire project and have signed up for another Phat Quarter swap on Flickr as well as a project for the folks at Mr. X Stitch.

If you are still reading my blog, thank you for sticking with me. I promise to stay in better touch from here on out.

Tschus!

Sunday Smorgasbord

It has been a very productive week! I've managed to crank out a few pieces of stitchery for people. I feel very fortunate to have a steady stream of orders as it makes me feel productive and useful. My self-esteem needed a boost, quite frankly. The tough part of this is that I'm at the end of the month before my next RA shot and my hands are hurting from stitching so much. But I am not going to complain about this!!

So while I'm stitching, I'm also watching a ton of movies and tv shows on Netflix. It helps to pass the time. I'm mainly watching episodes of Bones. Once in a while I get a hankering for a bad horror movie. Ron and I ran across The Human Centipede which we started watching last month but I shut it off after 30 minutes. How f*cking disturbing!!! Has anyone seen this? Right now I'm exhausted from a workout and a pain pill so I told Ron if ever we are to finish this movie, now is the time. Who the hell thinks up this stuff? I really hope this guy dies a horrible death in the end. Wow.

So in viewing this, um, film I have run across some hilarious interpretations on Etsy.

Funny shit but an extremely messed up movie.

We also watched Wolfman the other night. I don't recommend it. It was extremely long and del Toro's acting wasn't very good. Maybe I'm just more of a zombie girl though.

I finally caught Congo which, as you should know, contains about 5 minutes of my beloved Bruce Campbell. I had to see the whole thing though. It wasn't as bad as it could have been although the lead actor's hair was quite distracting. We also gave Zombie Strippers a try. John Hawkes was in it. Wtf? I didn't even see him. Maybe if we had been able to watch the whole thing, we would have caught his performance. But not even Robert Englund and Jenna Jameson could compel us to watch more than 15 minutes of this train wreck. Christ, at least Traci Lords is in some funny movies.

My blogging skills suck today. I think I'm too out of it to think straight let alone be witty and creative. So I'll close this with a photo of my LMAO bookmark. Did your ass really fall off because you laughed so hard? Really? If so, maybe it looked like this.



Have a groovy Sunday. Tschus!

Vee Dee

I've managed to get a few things stitched up.  I seem to have a little creative burst and here is what I have finished so far:







I have some more ideas and some are already in patterns. The above zombie valentines are doing fairly well. They take a lot longer to make then I thought but I like them. Hopefully I can keep up the momentum. Sometimes stitching all day means I don't get anything done around the house and the joints don't always care for it.

The weather is finally freezing and there is a bit of snow here and there. I took a couple photos around town in the last week or so. I've been fighting bronchitis and some aches and pains. It hasn't been much fun but it could be worse. I'll try to take some photos tomorrow when I drive up to The Plaza.



Sometimes I do get up and watch the sun rise.



Gas tanks?



We think those are natural gas derricks.




Tschus.

December re-cap

The end is nigh.  End of the year, anyways.  I hope everyone had a lovely holiday.   We really didn't do much as money is tight and family were unable to be with us. But it was a very nice Christmas and the first in our new house!

The last few weeks I've had an influx on orders through my Etsy site. I had a stroke of luck when someone received one of my pieces through her secret santa. She was so happy that she shared it on Reddit and I got orders from that. Thankfully due to those orders and some subversive ornaments I sold, I was able to order a low-priced sewing machine. Next up, geek pillows! (Once I figure out how to run a sewing machine.)


Tschus!

Catching up

Here are images of the last three projects I worked on.  I have some ideas of things I need and want to do soon.  Some of them involve Christmas presents.  I better get started on those!  November will probably go very quickly.


Come Get Some tote bag feature the almighty Bruce Campbell!



The first of the 1898 Antikamnia Calendar series.



This was a piece done to recognize domestic abuse.  Yes, it's a personal story.  No, not going to blog about it.  However you can check out Craftster if you want to know more about the piece.  Enough said on that.

Rowdy is shrieking at me to go outside so I'm cutting off the blog for now. 

Things to do to pass (waste) time

We hit the jackpot this weekend at Game Co.  It's like Game Stop only more vintage, and they pay a lot more for your games.  We got a nice credit with them and picked up several used games.  I was pretty geeked to find two Evil Dead games on XBox:



I haven't played A Fistful of Boomstick yet but I did play Regeneration for over an hour today.  It is HILARIOUS.  Ted Raimi does the voice of your midget Deadite sidekick and Bruce does Ash's voice, of course.  There are a lot of catchy one-liners and general hilarity.  The best part?  You can lock on your enemies and punt the Deadite to attack them.  I love it!    Since having an XBox is relatively new to me, I didn't pay much attention to these games before.  I now have all the ED games but not all the games with Bruce's voice.  Which is ok, as I'm not sure how much of a geek I want to allow myself to be.  Here is a link to the games: http://www.bruce-campbell.com/group.asp?grp=49

Crap, I just noticed this as well: http://www.bruce-campbell.com/pilot.asp?pg=action_figure It's a BC action figure.  Crap....$60?  I may be a geek,  but I'm a cheap geek.  Damn.

The other thing I did this weekend was finish up a book called Shadow of the Wind.  It is one of the best novels I have read since The Historian.  The author, Carlos Ruiz Zafón, writes very descriptively.  The setting is 1940's and 1950's Barcelona, set in the aftermath of Spain's civil war.  It's a mystery and very well woven.  I'm sure I could have figured out some of the twists and turns if I had let myself think about it, but I really enjoy just letting a story take me along.  I can't write a good review on it but you can find some great reviews on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Shadow-Wind-Carlos-Ruiz-Zafon/dp/1594200106  Apparently The Angel's Game is a prequel that just came out in English only a year ago.  I'll have to grab that up soon.



Long story short, read it.  I was dubious at first but I went from summer beach reading to this book.  You have to get your brain in the right mode to really let the story suck you in.   If you read it, let me know what you think!  I should really join a book club but am too damn lazy.

I also finished another cross stitch but will have to wait to unveil it until after I send it.  I made it for a swap for a photo group I participate in on Flickr called Phat Quarter.  After the recipient receives the piece, I'll post photos of it.  It's actually very lovely if I do say so myself!  I also finished an embroidery not long ago that is for a breast cancer awareness challenge on Craftster.  It's another photograph-to-embroidery piece:



This photo has over 12,000 hit on Flickr, but that's probably only because my boobs are partially showing.  I hate that pervs are looking at it but the photo has done some good.  I've had some people contact me to ask about the reconstructive part of mastectomies.  I personally feel better having talked to someone who has gone through this before me, no matter what it is.  So I keep the damn picture up for others to find, in case anyone else has questions.  The contest on Craftster starts in a couple weeks and I'm eager to sumbit this.

Rowdy is shrieking/whining for his supper so I better go.  Dogs do not like to wait for their supper!  Tschus!

Creativity keeps the Devil at bay

I've been keeping calm and distracted from work by doing more stitching.  It's been a nice way to keep my sense of humor alive.  Here are my two latest:





I'm going to finally cave and set up an Etsy shop.  More on that later.


I leave you with a photo my friend Summer sent me the other day.  It sums up my feelings from the past two weeks PERFECTLY:



Have a good Saturday!