the dragon age

Yay! I'm excited about this year! Probably because it's the year of the dragon and I've always had a real love for dragons. My family used to celebrate each Chinese new year with some homemade (or take-out) Chinese food, but we haven't done it for years. So this year I'm doing a little pulled pork dinner (maybe with some noodles -- the longer the better -- for long life). Do you ever do anything special for Chinese new year?

I found some interesting links for new year traditions (I always love reading my horoscope):

{superstitions}

{horoscopes}

And some super cute stuff related to dragons!

{dragon pillows}

{dragon cards}

{dragon cookies}

{dragon dinnerware}

{dragon ring}

{asian print apron}

Gong Hai Fat Choy!

DIY: recovering a chair seat

It is -44 -42 C today, so to decrease my stir-crazies (because I have barely breathed in any fresh air this week), I finally recovered 

this chair

which had a huge rip in the corner of the fabric

but I really loved the fabric because I thought it was original and I just couldn't part with it.

But I had to part with it because this chair is hard as a rock. It was time to put some padding on it. And hell. It's -42. I opened the curtains at 10 to keep the window-cold out just a little bit longer. What else am I supposed to do? Vacuum or something? Pssh. (yeah ok, I vacuumed a bit.)

So get on your full body long johns, brew some tea, and read what I did:

First, I had to rip off that SOB fabric. It was a nightmare. So, like, I start pondering, "Am I so desperate for stuff to do that I really need to fix this chair right now?" I made some tea. I came back ready for round 2 of swearing.

Then I marked out the size of the seat on a new piece of foam. I randomly found this brand new piece at the thrift store for $1.99 (it was still in the plastic bag). I'm sure you can find this stuff at any fabric store, though. This is also proof that I've been meaning to get on this task for quite a while now.

I traced it. Boom. Chair seat outline. If your foam has a definite top and bottom, make sure you've lined up the seat so the foam sits on it properly, but like, don't stress about it. I wish I hadn't stressed about this so much (you'll see why later). Then I used plain ol' scissors to cut it, but a sharp serrated knife would have worked just as well, too.

I added some batting to soften out the foam (mine has that egg carton look on top -- foreshadowing. I'm doing it) and because what the hell, I've got some. Then I figured out (read: eyeballed) how much vinyl I'd need. It's like wrapping a present (which I'm not really that great at anyway). Or half wrapping a present as you're not going to cover the bottom of the seat with fabric.

I started by stapling the large edges by pulling the fabric as tight as I could and stapling it down. I really wanted to have a nice neat line of staples along the edge, but the wood was like cement over there and no amount of pushing and hammering (or constant swearing) could get a staple into it. Oh well. Put them in further. No big whoop. No one's going to see it.

To get a nice corner, I trimmed some of the extra fabric (not too much! I just cut enough to help with folding. Always opt for too little than too much). Then I pulled the middle corner tab up towards the centre, pulled it tight, and stapled it in. After the middle point is stapled in place, the corners are really easy to fold neatly in so you can staple the whole mess down (one corner at a time, please). There are a lot of ways to do chair corners, so if this isn't working for you, just do it the best you can so it looks neat from the top. Now trim off the rest of the excess fabric.

 This seat just sits on top of the frame (no screws required -- shouldn't they be required?), so all I had to do was place the seat back on the chair frame, and voila! It's like getting a brand new chair! Pretty easy, right?

Now here's the part I kind of regret. Since the foam had texture, for some reason I can't explain, I figured it should face up. But despite the batting, I can still see the bumpy egg carton texture. So if I were going to do this again (and I'll be doing it again for the chair I'm sitting on right now -- but that's for some other -42 day), I would make sure that bumpy foam was facing down so the top was smooth. Not that it's a big deal, mind you. It's not terrible (especially since this chair lives in my craft room), but I would prefer it to be smooth. It's just something to think about if you're using egg carton foam, too. Anyway thanks to that egg carton foam, the chair is super squishy and soft now so I can finally do proper crafts in comfort.

Way back when I got this chair, mom spent forever and a half stripping it down to its natural colour which is why I haven't painted it. Now I'm wondering if I should or is that just the sitr-crazies talking. Thoughts?

getting back

I'm finding it incredibly hard to get back into blogging. I don't know why I'm feeling this way, but I'm finding it really hard to feel any excitement or desire to write a post. It's not that I'm not working on projects and stuff that would be great for the blog (or that I'm not taking pictures with the intention of using them for posts). It's just that every time I sit down to actually blog it out, I find myself writing and deleting and rewriting and deleting again and then I load pictures only to delete them and then I try putting them into a different format and then I delete them yet again. So, needless to say, this last week has been incredibly frustrating for me. Maybe what I need to do is just post something -- anything -- and it'll help me move back into things.

Let's try that, then, by posting a few of the pictures I took with my good camera before and during Christmas (which was a terribly sad amount -- or a large amount of the same picture at different angles so... pretty blah anyway).

These are the bird ornaments (well, two of them) that I made for the ornament swap I involved myself in this year. They're made from air drying clay with a little swirly dip-dye technique. I might make more birds or other clay items, because I really loved working with that medium and the outcome was pretty great. If I do, I'll maybe do a tutorial for you.

As a finale to Idle Husband's advent calendar, I walked over to Tim Horton's for some of their Christmas themed goodies. They ran out of the gingerbread doughnuts (sad), so I got the gingersnap cookie along with the chocolate candy cane doughnut and candy cane white hot chocolates. Everything was very good, though I thought the cookie was a little under-cooked towards the middle. I think I was a little tougher on them just because I was bummed about buying this cookie when I can easily make gingersnaps myself (and I'll never in a million years make my own doughnuts).

I was really sad not to see any Christmas flowers on my cactus this year, so I moved her to an even cooler room and almost two weeks later, she started putting out buds and then, boom! Flowers. She obviously likes her new spot (the craft room) a lot better. Despite what you'd initially think, a cooler room makes cacti (and succulents) so much happier!

Have any of you fellow bloggers ever felt this way? How did you break out of your blogging funk?

friday fixations

{demetri martin} We saw his show last night and it was awesome! And then it got awesomer with an encore. Demetri Martin rocks forever.

{netflix} For the past three days, I've been watching random netflix tv shows (did I mention Idle Husband's still on vacay? No? Well, it should be noted, then, that I'm still on vacay). Here are the ones (in no particular order) that have succeeded in capturing my attention past one show: The IT Crowd, The Big C, Breaking Bad, Sherlock, Life Unexpected, and Community (please tell me it gets better. We're at the point where we ditched it the first time we tried watching it). We also watched and really enjoyed Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog (not really a tv show, more like a shortish movie). We tried watching that one before but didn't like the singing, though I think we just hated it cuz we had to sit in front of YouTube to see it. I don't know about you, but any time shows are on the computer, I lose all interest. For some reason, in my mind, shows on the computer should be less than a minute long. Also why isn't Portlandia on netflix Canada! Argh! And we found volume 6 of Futurama and bought season 1 of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia on Apple tv so we're getting our (no repeats!) fix of those great shows, too.

{sewing} I'm really thinking hard about taking a sewing class this year. If only to learn how to make a proper pair of curtains and an infinite amount of skirts. And maybe how to add zippers. And maybe how to make bags or pillows. Or a shower curtain (we still don't have proper shower curtains. Just those $1.99 liners).

{today's levitation} This makes me so sad! but it's such a great picture, I just keep staring at it.

{creature comfort's free printable calendar page} Last year, I put together little paper craft calendars for the office each month. This year, the paper crafts are still coming but I really hated January's design so instead of making it, I decided to convert this calendar into a miniature. I reduced the size by half, printed it and cut it out so I could fold it into a little stand . I think it looks super cute and it's much prettier and easier than the paper craft one(s) (if they design a good one for February, I might flip-flop between these two. We'll see how motivated I'm feeling). (And yes, that is a lava lamp on our desk.)

recap and resolutions

most popular posts of the year

{how to idly clean jewelry} This is one of those tips/tricks that's handy at any time of year so it's no wonder people visited it the most often.

{diy wrapped feather gel pens} Initially, I didn't think this was a really awesome DIY, but then I noticed it getting a lot of exposure on a number of different platforms, so its popularity really surprised me in the end. I did enjoy putting together a bird-themed package (which these were a part of) for my cousin, but (sadly) I think the whole thing has since been lost in the mail.

{peanut butter s'mores bars} This is kind of a no brainer. Chocolate, peanut butter, marshmallows, graham cracker -- I mean, who can argue with that? (I could really go for a piece of the original butterscotch type, though.)

{blog update} Wow. I had no clue this managed to sneak into the top five most popular posts. I thank you all for your support regarding my endeavors and I'm (really!) planning on doing more in-real-life stuff regarding this in the new year.

{earring storage ideas} This post was popular because of the title, I think. Those are strong google search terms. BUT I did have those little jewelry frames hanging up for a whole year so it was definitely a popular post for me, too.

my favourite posts

{blog update} Obviously, this one's pretty important to me. I was so nervous? scared? anxious? about the reaction to this, but I was pleasantly pleased with the overall result. It made (makes) me feel like I could do it for real.

{tzatziki} Getting the parent's proper recipe was the best thing that ever happened. I am literally making this at least once a week as we can't sit down to a single meal without it and I always bring a tub when visiting mom (she says she'd like to "take a bath in it"). I've since revised the process to be super fast. I use the food processor for the grating and found this amazing technique for peeling multiple cloves of garlic (and yes, it really does work! I use two smaller bowls -- easier clean-up -- and you must shake for longer than 2 seconds).

{alberta aviation museum vs weed bouquets} Speaking of Greek stuff, these two posts remind me of Idle Husband's parents' visit, so they're both really important to me. I miss having little weed arrangements in the house a lot and the pictures I got from the aviation museum are some of my favourites from this year.

{early morning storm} I can't believe how lucky I was to wake up to this storm. It was so exciting and looking back at all my photographs, it still blows my mind that they're real.

{abraham lake} I loved this trip. It's a place I frequented growing up, so it holds a lot of meaning for me. It was really great sharing it with Idle Husband and I hope we go back again this summer.

resolutions

I don't like to make a big deal out of resolutions only because they can end up making you feel worse than you did before if you realize you haven't accomplished a single goal. That being said, there are a few things I'd like to try to work on:

{take more pictures} Since moving, I haven't felt the desire to take my camera out. Actually, since getting my new camera, I haven't felt the desire to take pictures outside of the house. Why? Well, it's more expensive, has a larger LCD screen, and it's bigger and heavier than my old one. I guess I just didn't want to risk it getting hurt and I felt self-conscious about what other people would think if I were to pull out such a camera to photograph seemingly random things. But that's a terrible way to live, right? Cameras should be used and I shouldn't let what I think other people think determine my actions. Besides, since getting two photographs blown up into posters, I've had a real desire to see more of my art in our house.

{step outside my comfort zone at least once a month} I really love habit. Like, really really love habit. I get so comfortable in routine that the minute it's thrown off even if just for a week, I get really frazzled and stressed out (like, crying into a burger in public stressed out). But the only way to grow and evolve as a person is to try new things. Take different steps. Go in the opposite direction as normal. When I think back to how I got to where I am now, everything that lead me on this path was from a direct and deliberate change in pattern and routine. Those changes didn't kill me, they made my life better, and it's time to start doing more of that now.

{eat in season} Sometimes, I have this dumb thought that even if it's January and I want a tomato in my salad, I should be able to have a damn tomato in my salad, it's 2012. I never really stop to think about how tomatoes are even available in January (because they shouldn't be sitting in our grocery stores at all at this time of year). So while this past year I made a conscious effort to purchase more Canadian produce (I'm so glad they've started putting the origin of food items on the tags), I think I could do even more by eating what's in season. I love to have my salads with every meal, but that doesn't meant they can't be made with shaved brussel sprouts or cabbage and carrots instead of (small but expensive) lettuce and (not-so-tasty/rotting in two days and expensive) tomatoes. This sort of thing is a little tougher in a winter climate (i.e. everything is out of season after October), but I found this chart that'll at least help me find the cheaper, better tasting produce throughout the year (also: canned stuff).

{rethink eating habits} While we're on the subject, I need to stop worrying so much about feeding us. Isn't that a weird thing to say? I've just been in wife mode for so long that the desire to feed has turned into more of an emotional thing than a sustenance thing. In other words, I don't feel like I'm pulling my weight around here if I'm not baking or cooking something at every meal juncture. So if I can't decide what to make or I don't feel like making anything one day, I feel very much like a failure and I get really frustrated, annoyed, and upset about it. I think it would help if I concentrated more on feeding us when we're actually hungry. The benefit to being just the two of us is that we don't need to have a set schedule for when to eat. What we really should be doing is eating when we're actually hungry not just because, "oh hey! it's 5 I have to make dinner" when we're not at all hungry in the slightest and would be just fine with a light snack closer to 7. This is an issue that's plagued me my whole life (I'm a giver and this is one of the best ways I know how to give) so it's definitely something I have to work hard at.

I feel like 2012 is going to be an exciting year full of good changes! What about you? Do you make resolutions?