Harva-Contest Mania

First, a big big big huge thank you to anyone who voted for Harv's Packers/Penske commercial. You are awesomer than awesome. Sadly, he didn't win. A big bummer. If you ask me, it was a very poorly run contest, with little to no promotion and a three month window in which you could vote. It seems fairly certain that the prize went to not the best spot but to the person who could get the most friends to vote everyday. Harv's pretty modest and not the type to shamelessly self-promote to the extent that was probably necessary to win.
Oh well. He's already got big plans for next year.
One contest does not a mania make and so I will now share with you what prevented me from making a single handmade gift this year.


The Bushman World Ukulele Video Contest!
I found out about this contest about three weeks before I had to leave town for Christmas, decided to enter 2 weeks before and only started animating 1 week before. Yipes. It was tight. But I designed the video in a way so that I could probably (I hoped) get it done. It's all cutout paper and fabric shot on a down shooter (a multiplaned table with the camera suspended above). I started animating on a Saturday, finished the following Friday night (while working full time, bear in mind), took a red-eye to Connecticut the next night and finished all of the compositing/editing (computer stuff) once we were there. It was nuts.
Of course I had some super helpers all along the way. Buddy Systems (Harv's studio) was very awesome to let me shoot there and use their resources. Linnea and Kelsey, two Buddy interns, helped a ton. Among other things, Linnea drew the puppet and Kelsey cut out all of the hills and trees. Jenny Towner did the track reading and lip synch, Eric Towner advised me on post production matters and Harv did all of the lighting and camera work. Nick Mariana sacrificed some of his band's rehearsal time to help me record the song and Alex Kamer lent his baritone uke skills to the mix. Ethan Marak saved my deadline with some last minute advice. Plus, he gave me "permission to not be amazing". And last but not least, Tennessee Reid Norton got me hooked on the ukulele two months ago and I've been obsessed ever since.
Thank you all so much, you're all the best best best!

So, wish me luck! Thankfully, this contest is not determined by internet voting. The winners are announced on Monday.
Here's a handful of behind the scenes pictures.

Make a young boy's dreams come true!

Okay, not so young but you can help him just the same! My husband Harv is a finalist in a commercial contest for Penske Trucks and the Green Bay Packers. The winner gets to watch the last home game of the year from a box suite with 17 of their favorite Packer fans. Now, I should mention that at least 40% of Harv's brain is devoted to the Packers at any given time, much more so the closer it is to Sunday. With this contest going on, it's probably up to more like 80 or 85.

So if you're ever in the mood for some cute stop-motion, hop on over and cast your vote. The voting lasts for a loooooo-oooonnnnnggg time and you can vote everyday so don't be shy!
The contest is here, Harv is commercial number 5. Thanks for listening, you all are the sweetest!

Kroquasian!

Harv and I went to a party recently called Kroquasian. It was an Asian themed croquet party. Sounds strange, I know, but let me tell you: greatest party ever!

All of the guest were in "anything goes" Asian costumes and the hosts decorated like mother truckers, with lanterns galore, a giant homemade gong, a pagoda bar and an incredible custom croquet course.

Also...Singapore Slings. Oh goodness, those are good.

We've never been costume people but we gave our all for this party and had so much fun. I made a "Lady Harvatine Style" Kimono and Harv went as a Roaring-20's-Socialite-Panda-from-Long-Island. "The Great Pands-by", if you will, complete with bamboo croquet mallet (its long in case he gets hungry and needs a snack).

The kimono was made from an altered Butterick (I think) costume pattern. I shortened the hem considerably and the sleeves slightly, and added the patchwork panels at the bottom of the sleeves. Harv's costume was entirely thrifted with the exception of ears, a tail and a pair of women's argyle socks from Target.
You can see some more photos here.

What is up.

What is up around here? A lot of nothing, perhaps too much. But also some gardening. Enough to make me so sore that I have to walk straight legged everytime I sit for 5 minutes because my calves are so unbelievably tight. I don't even know how that happened. It's good though. I don't exercise at all so every little bit counts. And is felt. For days afterward.

I'll bet you can guess what I haven't been doing. Crafting! Yes, it's true. I have roughly one month of hiatus left which may seem like a lot to you but I know how fast it is going to go by. My fear is that I'll go back to work feeling like I squandered my time off on hours of surfing the internet and too many episodes of "What Not To Wear".

So I'm blogging outside right now. It's pretty amazing what a difference it makes to poke around the internet from your newly degrossified and beflowered backyard rather than your your much loved but far too dark living room. Look at me, enjoying the great outdoors.

So because I have absolutely nothing crafty to share with you I'm sharing the fruits of my gardening labor. So far I've cleaned out the entire backyard (there was a lot to clean, logs, moldy lemons, garbage from the previous tenants), chainsawed a huge pile of logs and a nasty old picnic table and benches, planted one of the garden beds back there, planted a bougainvillea with a trellis to cover part of the hideous back of our house, put up some reed fence over the old ugly chain link fence at the back of the yard and planted the nice big garden bed in front of the house.

There's more that I want to do but the yard is still so enjoyable at this point. It has gone from a spider infested garbage heap to quite a pleasant place to "chillax". You can see a few more pictures here.

Stuff.

Lots of non-crafty things have been holding my attention lately.
Taking care of this guy.

Visiting the LA county fair.

Just a little bit of sewing.

This is just a little sneaky peek. I'll share more soon!

It's Over

Harv's chance of one day becoming an American Idol is officially ZERO. Yes that's right, as of today he's thirty years old! It's nice being married to an older man and I'm excited to spend the next two and a half years in my twenties while he braves the next decade and makes sure it's safe. He's quite a guy.Happy birthday Bee, love Liz.

Recent Acquisitions

Exciting...
More exciting...
Most, best, super exciting!
Is this some kind of joke? I really don't understand how I could be so lucky as to get a beautiful quilt that I absolutely love and suits my tastes so perfectly not once, but twice! I really am blown away. The quilt is from fabulous Maritza.
Poking around on the internet recently, I saw this quilt that would be mine, and I read Maritza's unsure ponderings over whether its recipient would like it or not. She didn't know if it suited my tastes and I didn't give too many specifics about what I wanted. (I believe all I said was "no batiks, no novelty prints") Then I read something that Ashley of Dogged said here. That she was having the same dilemma as Maritza and wanted to come up with something her partner would like without a lot to go on. I realized that this situation felt very familiar.

I have never been one to make Christmas lists and when people ask me what I want for my birthday my usual response is "Oh, I don't know...surprise me!" Of course I don't really mean that, not exactly. I do want a surprise but I want a surprise that says "The giver of this gift has put so much thought into this that they have picked out the exact perfect gift that you didn't even know you wanted but now that you have it you can't imagine living without it!" That is my dream gift.

I know that's not very fair to you gift givers out there. I think my mom especially hates it. My sister Leigh has been known to buy her own gifts and get reimbursed later. And I am far from the perfect gift giver that I would like to be. I am a bit of a procrastinator. But I try! I'm sure you will agree that giving the perfect, thoughtful, surprise gift is even better than receiving one.

So anyway, I don't know Maritza any better than I knew Lynn last time around but I am pleased as punch that she sat down and created this truly beautiful, perfect little surprise just for me. I can't tell you how much I love it. I can't imagine receiving a better quilt.

And I couldn't let you go without sharing the rest of the treats Maritza gave me.
Some fabric covered buttons and a pack of the plain buttons that I can cover myself.
And one of her pocket squirrels! I love this little guy! So cute and you really can't go wrong when you're using this fabric.

Thank you again Maritza! You're great!

Star Wars (Really?)

More coasters.
I woke up tres early this morning to make these before work. Today is one of our co-workers' birthdays and the thrill of actually giving someone a gift on their real live actual birthday was so exciting that I just had to get this done. So imagine my disappointment when I arrived at the studio this morning and overheard that he was not coming in today! Luckily, the birthday boy lives less than a block from the studio so I'm going to stick the package in his mail slot at lunch.
The coasters are made out of more pieces of a "vintage" Empire Strikes Back bed sheet that I used to make this quilt for Harv. I threw in a bunch of scrap cotton and scrap batting and voila. This one is my favorite.
So, while we're on the subject of Star Wars...I am getting to know my audience here and there is a dramatic difference in the amount of interest that exists for my most awesome crafts and pretty much everything else (less awesome crafts, reasons for not crafting, work, house, most everything else). This is understandable of course but it is not going to prevent me from updating you all on certain happenings, especially the big work stuff. I spend way too much time animating for it not to seep into this blog every once in a while!
I would therefore like to insist that you watch the "Robot Chicken Star Wars" Special. It is airing on Sunday, June 17 at 10pm (maybe earlier if you're central, I'm not sure) on Cartoon Network. For those of you who don't know, my husband Harv and I are both stop-motion animators working at a studio that produces two shows for Cartoon Network's Adult Swim, Robot Chicken and Moral Orel. Last fall we produced an officially Lucasfilm sanctioned half hour special (which is a really big deal as all original official Star Wars content in the past has been created from within Lucasfilm except for one guy who wrote some novels (nerds, I'm sorry if I didn't quite word that information correctly)) and it is honestly very cool. And I'm not a big Star Wars nerd like many of the people around here, yet still, I think it's funny. I know that you all are mostly not Star Wars nerds either but I'm pretty sure that some of you at least have an inkling of Star Wars nerdiness...or you're just married to a Star Wars nerd. So watch! And look out for the Ponda Baba sketch as it was animated almost exclusively by me. (Ponda Baba's the guy who has tusks on his face that, I'm sorry, look like balls. Or an ass if you want to be a little less graphic. Here's a picture of him. Look for this guy.)

The Truth

Oh Internet, I'm so sorry! I feel as though I have abandoned you and I can tell that you are fast losing interest in my non-craftiness. Well I haven't been completely honest with you. I am working again and that is a huge crafting deterrent but that's only half of my problem. The other half is this:
The day before I returned to work I decided (unwisely) to embark on a craft room overhaul. Why did I do this? I really don't know. I guess I just wanted my little clubhouse to be a little more cozy and inspirational, not merely functional. But let's be honest. It was barely even functional. It was a big mess.
Here is what it looked like, moments before I took everything out of the room and put it all everywhere, in every room of the house, in every space I could possibly put things. Shortly after, the nightmare started.
You see, this is not our house. We rent it for a very reasonable amount of money from a man who is cheap yet lazy so he doesn't really mind if we do things to the house at our expense as long as we don't destroy it. So painting seemed like no big deal. And it would have been no big deal, except for the fact that the people who lived here before us (who are our friends and still have some of their stuff in our yard by the way) did not use this room as a craft room. It was their "tiki room" and their tiki decor included sheets of bamboo hot glued to the concrete walls. I know! It's ridiculous! So when they removed the bamboo, they also removed huge chunks of paint and left globs of glue in many a spot. In addition to that mess, the trim had been painted over roughly 50 times and was barely recognizable as its original shape.
So what did I do? I decided to remove the paint. Oh what a mistake that was. Well, maybe not a mistake, just something that I really wish that I hadn't done. Here's a bit of wisdom for you: paint removal is A LOT OF WORK. I really did not want to do a lot of work. I still do not but guess what! I'm not done yet! And I'm such a doofus that I started the removal process in such a way that it was impossible for me to not follow through with it. Yes, Internet, mistakes have been made, Ladies have shown themselves to be capable of great stupidity but at least all of the paint has been removed.
The room is primed and partially painted. The only thing I did this past weekend was work on the room. Seriously. I am really hoping that this Saturday will bring the end of the painting and I can have all of Sunday to put everything back in and get things really nice and organized and maybe even work on something. We shall see.
I miss crafting so much and I might miss my room even more! I don't know what to do without my little craft room. It's my default place to go when I don't have anything to do. I can do whatever I want in there and it doesn't affect Harv or our frequent visitors. *Sigh* Soon it shall be returned to me!

Spring Sack

Well, old mister so-and-so says that I shouldn't share any pictures of the puppets I am working on until the film is done. That is ok, it will be worth the wait. I have been making some super cute little costumes here.
I finished one puppet yesterday and before diving into the second one I took a little break to make something that I can show you.
A sweet little springtime purse, made with the fabric that adorns my living room wall. A couple of years ago I told Harv the importance of changing purses with the changing seasons and he has since been very comically aware of whether I am carrying an appropriate purse or not.
I made this similar bag about a month ago to use when we went to Europe. I made it from Butterick pattern 4944. It is a great big bag, perfect of for carrying all of your sightseeing necessities without looking like a dopey tourist with a big backpack or (gasp!) a fanny pack. When I travel I try to look and act as much like I would in the city where I live as possible. The big purse is a must. The only change I made to the pattern was I lengthened the strap so that I could where it across my chest. The pattern has a really short strap that just goes over one shoulder.
I loved this pattern. It was so easy to make and I really like the look of it. The new bag is much smaller. I wanted an everyday purse and I know that if I have a large bag to carry around with me I will fill it up and I don't need to be lugging around 15 pounds of Advil, paperbacks and tampons. I was going to scan the original pattern into the computer and resize it but I decided that it was simple enough that I could just draw a new one myself. It was very easy and there was only a tiny bit of arithmetic that made my brain hurt. (Have I mentioned that math and arithmetic are different? Not all math majors are good at arithmetic. Please don't judge me!) I used the actual pattern pieces for the closure strap, the handle and the two side tabs, just shortening the closure strap.
I also changed the inside pocket. The one in the pattern is way too shallow and your stuff just falls out but it is easy enough to make your own.
So with a back-to-school purse and back-to-school hair(greatest haircut of my life, by the way, but kind of flat in this picture...haven't washed it yet, don't tell) I am hopefully ready to go back to school (work) on Monday!

PS Buy this! It just came out on Tuesday and is so funny and wonderful. The episode called "Love" has my best animation on this DVD. Watch it!

No news.

Hi internet, sorry I've been such a pokey poster lately. I have been working on some puppets pretty much non-stop for the last 5 or 6 days. They are for a friend and I'm not sure how much I can devulge here at this time. I will find out though because there is some super cute mini costuming going on that I think you would like.
I don't have time to post much of anything right now as I am running out the door to get my hair chopped! Yeeps! I have only had trims since mid-2003. It's pretty long and I feel like a change. Harv doesn't know that I made an appointment for today though. Double yeeps! Quelle suprise!
Ok I have to go but before I do I want to give you something pretty to look at, even though I didn't make it.Isn't that amazing? Very inspirational. Read a little more here. It makes me want to stop all of this puppet nonsense and get back to my darling.

Rainy day blues

As you may have guessed, most of my interests and activities take place indoors. I love to be outside but there is just so much sewing and crocheting and internetting to be done indoors. Living in Southern California we don't get many days that force us to stay inside. I don't like that! I need a little balance in my weather. I need days that tell me it's ok to sit inside watching a movie in my pajamas. Too much sunshine makes me feel like a bum, like I should be outside ALL day and I just don't do that!
I grew up in Connecticut where we have four very distinct seasons. I miss it so much! The seasons help you to measure time passing. They refresh and renew your spirit as well as nature. Spring can really only be fully appreciated after suffering through a cold and blustery winter. Rainy days give you the perfect excuse to snuggle up with someone soft and not feel like you're wasting your time. Too much sun makes me feel like a bad person for holing up in my craft room and watching Arrested Development.
I don't want you to think that I'm complaining. The weather here is great. I miss the snow and seasons of New England but I always say that if we're going to give all that up at least we're giving it up for beautiful year round sunshine.
The point is, I've been waiting for a rainy day. Today it is raining. There is nothing I want to do more than sit on the couch, watch DVDs and work on this all day.
But I have to go out! Outside! In the rain! Hiatus is slipping through my fingers like drops of rain on my bone dry lawn. Oh well, perhaps the rain will continue tomorrow. Sad.

Adventure

Well internet, have I told you about this?
I didn't think so. Long story very short, our friend Eric needed an old Winnebago and Harv thought it would be fun to go in on it with him. It's a 1972 Winnebago in decent condition with awesome 70's shag carpet and panelling.
It's awesome. I have many dreams of retro 70's curtains and cushion covers for the benches and front seats.
It's like a house that I can decorate in a way that I would never ever want to decorate my actual house. Like a themed decorating challenge. And it will be a challenge because I want to be very authentic, not hokey at all and the three of us owners (me, Harv and Eric) only experienced about 2 years, 5 months of the '70's between us. It will also be difficult because because I have visions of pom-pommed curtains and granny squares on the bed but I know that I need to keep the cuteness level at about a four or five, to be fair to the two gentlemen.
So we invested in the RV, we had it fixed up, it was given a clean bill of health. Yesterday the three of us set off on our very first adventure in the beast: camping on the coast, about 40 miles north of LA. Eric's sister Jenny was following us in her car because she wanted to come but could not stay the night. Thank goodness for that.
We set off on our merry way,
Eric driving, Harv rocking out and me happily rippling away in the back, all of us dreaming of the beer and hot dogs we would be enjoying by the campfire that night.
We were about ten miles from our campsite when we got a call from Jenny, saying the RV was on fire. Yes, there were flames coming out of the general vicinity of the back right wheel. So naturally, we pulled over, naturally, we had no fire extinguisher and managed to extinguish the (not so large) fire with bottled water.
Well folks, the adventure was over. Actually it wasn't entirely over until at least three hours later when we all managed to cram ourselves and our camping gear (you know, pillows, board games, more pillows) into Jenny's car and leave our sad little Winnebago to return home in defeat.
I won't bore you with the automotive details, mostly because I don't want to bore myself. There is still hope though and my decorating dreams may still come to fruition. I will keep you abreast.
Anyway, we came home. We still got to eat our wieners and drink our beer and we still got to build a campfire and we even got to share it with those non-campers among us.

Goings On

Remember this? I have just been plugging away at it over here, taking full advantage of the full days I can spend sewing right now.
Also, listening to a little of this and having MAJOR high school English flashbacks. I'm pretty sure I never actually finished reading it back then. So maybe the ending will be a surprise.
And last, we let the cats out in the backyard for a little bit on Easter and they have not gotten over it yet. We have been dealing with a lot of whiny Stabone and a lot of this:
You can just see in her face, she really thinks I'm going to open that door.

It's beginning to look a lot like Easter

As promised, I dove right into bunny making the other day. Here are our two new friends:
I heart Hillary Lang and all of her wonderful creations. I can't wait for these sweet babies to come to my house.
In addition to the buns, I bought some pussy willows at the farmer's market today and put together a little Easter "tree".
All of the decorations on it are new purchases I made on our trip.
I bought the little wooden ornaments in Munich.
The eggs (three real and one felted) I bought in Salzburg. The real eggs are from this AMAZING shop that has thousands of handpainted eggs. It was wonderful. I have a real soft spot for painted eggs. I used to make pysanky, Ukranian Easter eggs. I haven't made any in a little while but I think I might try to replenish my dye supplies this week and make some before Easter. If we hadn't been away I think that I might have tried to make some to sell in my Etsy shop. You can see some of the eggs I've made in the past here at the long neglected Harvatine.com.
One last thing:
Don't ever say that I'm not one to hop on the band wagon. It's every blogger's favorite, no-knead bread! I used the recipe found here. So so tasty and so so easy. The biggest baking dish that I had was 2.5 qts but it worked out fine. I've never made bread before and I am very happy with the experience. We're going to some friends' house for dinner soon and it's all I can do to keep from eating the whole loaf!

See You Soon!

Well internet, we're off. Harv and I are going to Europe with his parents for about a week and a half. Oh, how I will miss you!

I'm leaving you with these nerdy his and hers passport holders that I made for Harv and I. Don't worry, we'll wear these under our shirts.
See you soon!

A reason to get out of bed.

As you may or may not know, Harv and I are both stop-motion animators. You could say that we are currently unemployed or you could say what we say which is "we are on hiatus." This is true. We finished "Moral Orel" season 2 at the beginning of February and are going back to work on "Robot Chicken" season three at the end of April.
This is a long break. Harv gets a little antsy, not making money but we are good savers and I always remind him how lucky we are to have this time off. I don't think that there are many people our age who have the luxury of taking all of this time to do whatever we want, together no less! I am extremely grateful to have the freedom to work on anything that my little heart desires all day if I want to!
That being said, it is easy to get into little ruts when you don't have any structure in your day. Certain things tend to squash my motivation and productivity. For example, mess. I am not a neat person and mess is an inevitable byproduct of my crafting. It doesn't bother me at first but the larger the mess grows the less I am motivated to craft and the less space there is for me to craft even if I were motivated. Here is a good visual aid to help you grasp this concept. There are times when I need something really great to inspire me, make me clean up the mess or at least work on something in the other room.
This morning at about 9:15, me and Lilly were still in bed when Harv came in with a great big box. I gasped, "Is that for me?!" It was.
I have been rippling away here without nearly enough colors (note the repetition!), waiting with baited breath for this order to arrive. What more do you need to make you leap out of bed than a box full of happy colored wool from Knit Picks? Not much...not much.

Some Good Things

1. Finished listening to my first book at Librivox, "Northanger Abbey" by Jane Austen. Very funny and sweet. I highly recommend Librivox. It is such a wonderful site!
2. Made vomacka for dinner last night. I believe it is pronounced voh-MACH-ka. Ate this soup at a restaurant in Minnesota that we always go to when we visit Harv's best friend and his wife. I think it is the only restaurant in their very small farm town. A lot of the people there are of Czech descent and this is a Czech recipe. I have been thinking about this soup ever since I first tried it over a year ago and finally made it last night. It is a creamy vegetable soup, flavored with dill. SO GOOD!
3. Rediscovered this Denyse Schmidt quilt along group on flickr that I joined a while ago but forgot about. *sigh* I just love Denyse Schmidt, a lot.
4. Finished the Empire Strikes Back quilt! Happy Valentine's Day Harv! Tomorrow being March, I finished just in time. It's handy not working. Putting the quilt in the washing machine right now. I will put a picture up soon!
   

Progress

We don't have cable. Which means we don't have Tivo and we don't get HBO and we've never seen an episode of "Project Runway". These are all things that I know I would enjoy if I had access to them but I don't. It is my personal belief that, although I love it, tv sucks my life away. I simply cannpt resist things like "30 Minute Meals" and crappy MTV documentaries like "Made" (is that still on?). There is just too much I want to be doing with my time to waste it channel surfing all day. Watching too much tv makes me sick to my stomach and a little depressed.
So we decided a couple of years ago that we weren't going to pay to hae our lives sucked and we went off the cable. We're a rabbit ears family now. Rather than slobbing on the couch flipping through 100 channels for an hour, switching between three different shows that we are only aguely interested in, we have a handful of shows that we make a point to watch each week, things that we really want to see. Other than that there are some throw away shows that are entertaining while I'm crafting but don't take my attention away from the task at hand. The great thing about only having 7 or 8 channels (in English, there are about 12 more in Spanish and I think Japanese) is your done channel surfing in about 30 seconds. Then you're either watching something you like or the tv's off.
Now, all of this being said, I really do like to be entertained while I am crafting. While we're working and I only have the weekends to make stuff I listen to NPR non-stop. But now we're on hiatus and I have a lot of time to be entertained while I'm sewing. So, we've put our pinky toes into the pool of 21st century entertainment and joined Netflix! I spent a wonderful Sunday watching "Anne of Green Gables" (sigh) and working on this:
Harv's very very belated Valentine's gift. It's an Empire Strikes Back quilt, made out of a vintage sheet that we bought at the Rose Bowl flea market a couple of weeks ago.
So along with this discovery I made at this lovely blog, I am going to be up to my eyeballs in craft inducive entertainment. Perhaps this quilt could even be finished before March!

...and boy are my arms tired!

Tuesday, February 13 was my birthday. It was a very great birthday. Harv and I had stayed up very very late the night before playing games (my new favorite), singing karaoke and drinking wine and "Kokoszka Sunrises" with friends so we slept in verrrrry late. We then had a delicious lunch at The Inn of the Seventh Ray in Topanga Canyon, went home for a little gifting and then took the Metro (my first time!) to see "Wicked" in Hollywood! Harv gave me some fun treats that he got at the Bazaar Bizarre way back in December and...a Nintendo Wii! Wii is right! That is exactly what you say when you are playing it.
Does this have anything to do with crafting? Yes, of course! This system is so fun, it is life-sucking, dangerously fun. It is so fun that once you start playing you don't want to stop to do anything else, even MAKE STUFF!
However! All is not lost. For me at least, the Wii has a sort of built in mechnism that prevents me from playing my life away: you actually have to move around and exercise! I do not workout (please ignore the fact that I have a gym membership) and I think that I am pretty high on the weak and puny spectrum so I physically cannot play the Wii more than I should. For example, Harv and I spent a very romantic day yesterday playing Wii tennis and shooting rabid bunnies with plungers and I cannot ever express how sore I am today! Every inch of my arms plus my shoulders and my upper back are on fire!
So, it seems I have no choice but to work on the extra-special valentine's quilt I am making for Harv. (Late, of course...I think he's okay with it.)