Dr. Horrible & stop stitching about touching yourself

Hey folks! Thought I'd post over here for old time's sake. I've been posting over at Mr X Stitch and that along with Emergency Pants has been keeping me pretty busy. Not too busy to stitch, though!
I did a couple of Dr. Horrible stitches:


And this one - Emergency Pants listeners will know who sent me the link that inspired this stitch:

Thanks for looking, and please be sure to make your way over to Mr X Stitch to see all kinds of great stuff. Mr X and I also started a flickr group, Phat Quarter - please join and post your stitchy stuff there!

Craftster Challenge, Tighten Up, and Working for the Man

Hey everybody! I know, it's been awhile. How've you been? You look awesome, by the way. Have you been working out?

I just thought I'd drop a quick note about some of the stuff I'm been doing lately. I entered the Craft-a-Song challenge over at Craftster. Check out the post here. The song I decided to craft is Hell by the Squirrel Nut Zippers. Check it out:


I also made a stitch for a co-worker who's been out ill for over a month. He's a super cool guy and I really miss him. You can see the explanation of this stitch on my flickr post, as well as Merlin Mann calling me sweet and the elusive You Look Nice Today favorite trifecta. Yes, I am a nerd. Anyway, I really hope he likes this stitch, and I hope he's back soon.


I'm also posting over at MrXStitch, both the Craftster Pick of the Week on Sundays and whatever strikes me as awesome on Mondays. MrX is having a contest this week - if you comment on any of the posts you could win this recycled stitch he made:



You can see more about the piece here. So if you haven't already, come on over and check out the site. I'm really enjoying being a part of it!

See you next time - stay awesome!

Balls + Cross Stitch = Romance

It happened by accident. Seriously. I mean, not the first one... but the second one, that was a surprise. But I guess it makes sense that ball-related stitches would come in pairs.

The first one is pretty self-explanatory, I think. It just makes sense:

Then I saw the youtube video for the new Flight of the Conchords song SugaLumps and I had to make something from it. When I heard the line "All the ladies, they hustle to ruffle my truffle" I knew I had a winner. Mostly because "Honies try all kinds of tomfoolery to steal a feel of my family jewelry" was WAY too long.


I didn't realize this before, but apparently balls are quite romantic. Some lucky lady is getting the first stitch for Valentine's Day. Other fun Valentine's sales from my etsy shop: the masturbation blackwork sold within an hour of being listed. The First of May sampler sold as well. Sometimes I'm kind of sad to see them go, but if it means that I'm going to help someone express themselves to their partner, it's worth it. It's a public service. It's my way of helping people say, "Hey. You and I both know I'm really dorky, incredibly weird, and also perverted. Thanks for sleeping with me anyway."

Happy Valentine's Day! Also, if you didn't already know it, you can catch me posting over at MrXStitch's site now, too. Come and check it out, won't you? Thank you!

You can almost smell the beer

My husband Jim and I have very different tastes when it comes to music. Jim loves Gackt, Muse, X-Japan and Malice Mizer. I love Richard Cheese, They Might Be Giants, Ben Folds and the Violent Femmes. One thing we agree on is Pat McCurdy, a local guy who sings at bars and festivals in Illinois and Wisconsin. He's playing somewhere almost every night.

I did a couple of stitches recently inspired by two of our favorite songs. The first one, I Like You Best, starts off sweet and then changes midstream. It goes from "Let's sit beneath a shady tree and read romantic poetry" to "I promise not to break your heart, I'll wheel you home in a shopping cart." I kind of made this one to even out a really mushy stitch I made for Jim recently. Depending on his mood he can decide which one to display on his desk. :)

The second one has been on my mind for awhile. I always thought it would make a great subversive stitch, but I wasn't sure how I wanted it to look. It's based on my absolute favorite song by Pat, I Like Everything. I really wanted to try doing some more blackwork, so I thought this would be a good chance to do it.

I'm happy with how it turned out, but my Catholic schoolgirl childhood has made this stitch the most embarrassing of all my creations. Well, next to this one.

Selfish Stitching - I thought

I had two gigantic weeks off over Christmas and New Years, and it was awesome. I got my Omaha fix the week of Christmas, thank goodness, and then the next week there was absolutely NOTHING on our schedule. I've been working incredibly hard this year, and when the time came to relax...

I decided I wanted to stitch my ass off.

I would stitch whatever came into my head first without any concern about whether or not anyone else would find it amusing. I was thinking of it as Selfish Stitching - stuff only I would get a kick out of.

I started with a quote from You Look Nice Today - not a surprise, it's my favorite podcast and obsession of the moment. Hubby Jim and I listened to several episodes while driving through Iowa, including the episodes guest starring Jonathan Coulton and John Hodgman.

*nerdgasm*

Ahem.

Anyway, the quote comes from the end of each episode when Scott Simpson read a plug for Hodgman's new book, More Information Than You Require:

"Go buy a copy. Ostentatiously read it in front of your friends and co-workers. "What's that?" they'll ask. "Nothing. Nothing _you'd_ be interested in," you'll say. Then show them the dog poop you have in your other hand. "This is probably something _you'd_ be interested in. You look more like a dog poop person to me."



Then, I did a REALLY selfish stitch, this one from my own podcast - Emergency Pants. My co-host Shane asked this question:



There was a funny story after that, but this question is what I remember the most.

Last but not least is a quote from the Stars and Tartan podcast. I only recently started listening to it, but I LOVE IT. It's no wonder, considering that in episode 4 Derek called a mean neighbor this name:



It was a fun week. And when it was all said and done, the stitching wasn't selfish after all - lots of people seemed to find some amusement in them. Maybe I should just stitch whatever comes into my head more often.

Big Boys

Oh yeah, my blog. Where I should post stuff 'n junk. ^_^

I finished a couple of large projects, so what the heck - wanna see?

The first one is old news, both the stitch and the subject. I'm not rubbing it in or anything, it's my Mom's Christmas present.



The pattern for this is available at Subversive Cross Stitch and I highly recommend it.

I also put some recent ebay goodies to good use. I bought some sampler pattern books from the 70's and 80's, kept what I liked, tossed what I didn't, threw in a Jonathan Coulton song and this came out:



If you haven't heard the song First of May, check it out at JoCo's site. You can listen to it for free on his Downloads page.

I think my fingers need some time to recover. Maybe I'll take a break... We'll see how long that lasts. :)

Homesick

I have a confession to make. I really, really, REALLY miss Omaha, Nebraska. One would think that the Chicago area would provide enough distractions that I would forget about Omaha and move on with my life, but not living there has created a hole in my soul that I've never figured out how to patch up.

I've been picking at the scab recently by joining this flickr group. Pictures by waitingline and BoomerangThang specifically have been particularly wonderful and heartwrenching. While you're there, check out BoomerangThang's super cool retro house and photos from a zombie walk in Benson. I'll be at my desk, daydreaming about Homer's Records and Tapes and the Bemis Center for the Arts. Oh, and LaCasa's pizza. YUM.