April 14-15, 2010
Freely available wifi is apparently not something that Scotland likes to do, and we were desperate to watch Lost, so we went to the first place we found, called the Haggis Cafe. We had some lunch while we (ahem) buffered an entire episode so we could watch it back at the hotel. The cafe had enclosed rooftop seating, and this gull stood outside the open door for at least half an hour, yelling loudly and trying to figure out how to get inside to steal food from all the people without them noticing.
April 13th does not exist.
We had a comically terrible day when we stopped over in Manchester. Everything went wrong and awful things kept happening around us, until during the worst dinner in memory we just started laughing and couldn't stop. Eventually we took a couple of Dramamine apiece just to be able to go to sleep at 9pm so we could get the hell out of town at 7 the next morning. Does not exist.
April 10-11, 2010
This page has a lot of words. What's up with all the baked beans, England? I don't understand. But I love your mushrooms.
April 8-9, 2010
I got that Stan Rogers song stuck in my head when we saw the ravens that live at the Tower of London. I spent a bit of time writing the lyrics around the edge only to realize later that I got them wrong.
The travel sketchbook
Back in school, my department had little gift exchanges at the end of each semester. One time, my teacher pulled my name, and she got me a tiny handmade sketchbook. I use it exclusively as a travel notebook, just so I can keep a lot of really great memories all in one place, and it will take me a while to fill it.
April 7-8.
Click for big!
So for the month of April..
I last posted on the 2nd of April, and we got married on the 3rd! There are a ton of pictures on Bill's site, such as
AIR GUITAR oh god.
We left for our honeymoon in the UK on the 6th. We stayed in London for six days, did a night in Manchester, and moved on to Edinburgh We were only supposed to be in Edinburgh for about three days, but we got trapped by the Icelandic Smoke Monster, and had an extra five and a half days tacked on. Various tourist photos and whatnot can also be found on Bill's site. We got home finally on the 21st. It was the longest vacation I've had probably ever!
Modifications
I decided to consult some of them thar wedding magazines and blogs for some ideas. With clothes in general, I'm really into layering, asymmetry, and interesting details - the patchy, lacy Anthropologie aesthetic fills out the inside of my brain. (In practice, I wear a basic v or scoop tees with tank tops under them. BORING.) After some sketching and consideration, I decided I wanted to find a dress that was slightly shorter, and add length to it with some new pieces.
The company who made my dress allows you to order extra fabric in any color. So I chose to have the dress made in a turquoise, and ordered extra fabrics in aqua and a pale lime green.
When I was shopping for shoes, I was really looking for a shoe with a scalloped edge.. And I had an epiphany! YES! I should make two scalloped hems for the dress. And I did.
the dress, the dress, the dress
My wedding dress is a Saison Blanche bridesmaid dress. I was all, "I want a me dress, but I don't want to have to make it - that's just too much pressure!" Instead, I thought I should get something that I liked, but could modify in some small way to make it truly me.
This is what it looks like to start. Cookie Monster is very excited.
up and away..
Schmancy Olympic Challenge: I am done!
Kristen - the challenge commissioner! - pointed out that the whole idea behind this challenge was to have fun. Lately - at least since I've been out of school - giggling is my primary goal when I'm making something (this could be good, it could be bad, whatever). So here is the TEAM LINUS bobsleigh.
Heading down a mountain! Even though bobsleds run in tracks!
This is wool and wool blend felt, a little peltex in the runners and the bottom of the sled, a bit of polyester stuffing, and lots and lots of thread! I stitched everything by hand, and mostly tried to match thread colors and stuff, but not very hard. Almost everything was improvised - I sketched to start with, but I didn't make any paper patterns. I did make a sample hamster out of acrylic felt, but it wasn't really a pattern. Just more of a.. go at it with scissors method. I just wanted to make sure it would work first, before I cut into my more expensive and much nicer wool felt 
The improvisational nature of the whole thing means that there are stitches EVERYWHERE. In my life I've always made little slapdash mockups before doing big projects, but I secretly love the little mockup way more than the large, polished project. While making this, I treated it like it was a mockup for a larger, nicer piece, but didn't really intend to make that larger nicer piece. I wanted to keep it in the LA DI DAAHhhhahahah world.
I think, anyway, that the embroidery is kind of nice. It's so tiny!
Hamsters without helmets:
I would have constructed the hamsters differently if I had done it over again. In this version, I sewed their bodies together in white felt before I even thought about how to make their markings. That was a mistake! I had to choose between some kind of stitchwork, or cutting patches of the color and trying to make them fit over the body. If I had sewed the markings and their faces on before construction, I think they might look a little bit nicer.
Overall, I'm pretty happy with this, because it was fun! And little felt animals have been my true love since I was twelve years old!