RIP, blog entries back to November. I probably won’t miss you.

So there was some kind of catastrophe with the servers that our websites are on this weekend and nothing from the past few months could be restored. This doesn’t concern me too much – I tried to fix the links that had been added/deleted in that time, and at some point I will add the little “what I’m listening to” box back into the sidebar. Mikey lost a whole bunch of stuff, and his email and all of his band pages are on those servers, too. Oops. If I cared about eternally preserving these entries I would write them in a notebook, not put them on the interwebs.

Anyway, not a lot happened in my absence. I made some new things and listed them for sale in my shop. Some necklaces a few days ago (the housewife is my favorite) and some more fun plastic earrings this afternoon (more beads in the mail today!):

I’ve also been making lots of stuff for Danielle’s show and trying to figure out how to display what. Maggie made TEN bags and fifty cards and is getting those in the mail, which I can’t WAIT to see. I’ll be way more confident with MAGGIE’S goods on my table! I’ve been getting stuff from Etsy-ers left and right, and Etsy as a whole is sending me some promotional stuff from their press team. So far the people coming the furthest to this show are from Wisconsin and South Carolina. Not FROM those places… they’re WV boys… you know what I mean. I’m really excited / sad / nervous / excited / sad / nervous.

It snowed a whole bunch and Paisley LOVES it. Photos under the cut of frozen campus (I forget which one… they all run together. I know it’s not Mikey’s) and of her playing. I found a remote corner with big drifts and no people/streets so I could take off her leash and let her run. At first she freaked out and pressed herself against my legs, scared of her new freedom and the weird fluffy white stuff. Then she RAN… it was the most adorable clumsiness I have ever witnessed. She kept falling and grunting and rolling and flailing around. By the time we got home she was soaked and shivering and still wanting more.

What else. My tonsils are swollen. I probably shouldn’t have them… this happens every year. I’ve watched six episodes of season two of LOST in the past few days, and finally caught last Wednesday’s episode online just before they removed it from the site for copyright infringement. It’s on at seven again this week, and sometimes I have to work until seven or after. I think this means that I will finally have to learn how to program a vcr to tape something for me. I’ve never in my life had something worth taping. I need to talk to someone on the phone. Last night I called Meggan & Angie, who weren’t home, my parents’ house, which was busy, and Jess, who was out somewhere (but Dustin was watching Lost - I’m so proud!). I gave up and watched Lost, too.

I got most of our taxes done today and Mikey has to do his fafsa tonight. Bills are paid, letters are waiting to be mailed out, the floor is swept. I love getting things DONE. I hate my JOB. It keeps me from getting things DONE.

The dog and the laundry still need washed. Eh.

Ok, photos. Then eating cereal and then boiling old vinyl records. Nothing good, I promise.

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I ran some errands for awhile this afternoon and discovered a good fabric store in the underground about four minutes from my work. Woo! I bought a few things to make earrings and put them together when I got home & uploaded them to Etsy.

Penguins, as well as sailboats and some bluegray shell earrings.

I also spied these backpacks in a luggage store window while I was down there, and of course I want the little one:

I’ve never listened to this Snow Patrol band, but I downloaded this song because Rufus Wainwright’s sister sings on it. At least I think it’s his sister, but maybe I’m making that up. It’s so pretty. Now I want the rest of the album.

I find the map and draw a straight line
over rivers, farms, and state lines
the distance from A to where you’d B
it’s only finger-lengths that I see
I touch the place where I’d find your face
my fingers in creases of distant dark places
I hang my coat up in the first bar
there is no peace that I’ve felt so far…

listening: Snow Patrol – Set the Fire to the Third Bar

More new things @ stick in the mud.

There is a cat or child or some creature upstairs that plays with a pingpong ball at all hours of the day. When I hear it bouncing quietly along the floor, I feel so sorry for whoever lives downstairs from us and has to hear our holy terrors ripping around all night long and slamming into things and jumping onto their ball track from an elevated surface and skidding four feet across the floor. The walls here are very thick, the floor/ceiling is not.  Sorry, downstairs.

Canadian thanksgiving is next Monday, and my grandma sent us a card (I hope everyone has grandmas like this). I’m going to make her homemade noodles (sans chicken broth) for dinner, becuase the Maxwells have NEVER had homemade noodles. I kept trying to explain the concept of a homemade noodle… and Drew just stares at me…. “what, like pasta?”. I told Erin this today, because I’m still in disbelief…. “WHAT?! that’s a SIN!”. It is, m’dear. Lucky for them, salvation lies in ME. Anyone else out there never had homemade noodles or even heard of them? I’m so ethnocentric. Not that Drew & Kathy are of a different ethnicity than I am… unless being from Phoenix counts.

New stuff.

& more.

Mosaic tiles from the dollar store downstairs. They are a huge pain to poke holes in, but I have enough done to make 10 or 15 more pairs of another design whenever I can find jump rings… I haven’t found a good craft store within walking / subwaying distance.

More @ Etsy.

Last batch of jewelry on Etsy before I pack it up. I might try to sew a few more things, but all of the jewelry making stuff is getting packed tightly away so I’m not tempted. The next time I make earrings and things (necklaces soon!), it will be at my brand new craft table instead of on the floor… my spine will be very grateful.

These and more:

(Halloween is coming!)

(Several similar tile earrings in other colors are up – I love these. Most of what I have online I don’t make doubles of for myself, but I have kept 3 or 4 pairs of these.)

Listening: Way to Blue : An Introduction to Nick Drake
Reading: The Mermaid Chair

New stuff. Earrings made from buttons & other things, wallets, and a couple of bracelets.

Just uploaded some new things to Etsy. Some wallets & earrings.

Before I did that, we went to Toronto.

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Lots of new stuff… bags and earrings galore!

Dishtowels reborn.

Salvaged father-in-law junk.

Former ugly vintage necklace.

The largest meat-eating dinosaur.

More @ Etsy.

Mikey and I are leaving for Toronto on Sunday morning to take care of some business, see our apartment, eat some Ethiopian food, drink beer with John, and then return with brand new visas in our wallets and photos in our camera. It’s too late to request mix cds for the drive, but if you’d like to make us some for the actual move – and I know you do! – inquire within for our mailing address.

Listening: The Shins : Chutes Too Narrow
Reading: Heal Your Headache

Lots of new stuff. I’m actually SEWING now! Two bags from dishtowels. I also have a stack of sixties looking fruit print dishtowels to make the same kind of bags, and a bunch of other new fabric to make different things. Jeah, unemployment! There are a few things in this photo that aren’t up yet, but this is all from the past couple of days:

Two bags, some bracelets, and more than 30 pairs of earrings.

Listening: Billy Bragg & Wilco : Mermaid Avenue
Reading: worm composting stuff