a is for

LOOK MA - i finished a cross-stitch! the orginal came from a book of samplers, but i tweaked it a tad bit. when i fucked up and added extra height to the top-bit, i added a quote

"anarchism is the great liberator from the phantoms that have held him captive"

- emma goldman

not too shabby.

WIP wednesday

look at all the progress i've made since monday.
this photo was taken an hour or two ago,
and i'm even farther now!

hotdiggity.

monday, methlab monday

today i had: a cup of iced coffee at work,
came home and had a vault,
then made a pot of kona coffee,
went to a meeting completely pressed,
and afterwards had another vault.

midway through all this madness i came up with and started a new cross-stitch pattern!
i've almost finished the first line (3 letters to go!) and then there's probably a million stitches left.
hopefully i can keep plugging away and won't lose steam like i did on my last 3 projects.

there's gonna have to be a lot more caffeine in my future either way! onward christian soldiers!

mostly handmade christmas

i did handmade gifts for most of my family: an embroidery for my mom, a bookmark for my grandma, and shown in pieces above, a handstitched tractor plush for my grandpa. i worked on most of these while watching Dexter on netflix. i'm horribly addicted! overall each episode is pretty mundane, but the last 2 minutes of each show always ends in epic cliffhangers. i started season 3 last night, i'm so glad i don't have to wait each week like everyone else! i often watch an episode and the first 10 minutes of the next before going to bed, that way i don't have to be left in suspense, haha.

cross stitching on black fabric is like working with an itty-bitty litebrite. case in point:

slow & steady

wins the race.

current craftanigans

i assure you, on some universe this makes sense.

a methlab revisited..

it's been a while since i've been able to partake in a methlab monday. partly due to craftivities being moved to wednesday night hardtimes and partly due to sheer laziness. today, however, was a new day, in fact, it was my only day off this week. the only day where i don't have to be at work, a meeting, or a work meeting all week. so it was decided that today would be an all day craft-a-thon. i got up around noon (sleeping in is awesome) and ran and bought some toilet paper. made a few texts to get the crew together and by 3:30 the gang was all here!

after a short span of chit-chatting, we started to get our craft-on. while i didn't actually accomplish a granny square or anything of the crocheted manner, i did manage to get my slipstitch to look good. i continued to craft after some of my friends left, and then more came back and i continued to craft! at this point i switched to xstitching to continue working on my very botched edition of this pattern.

remember this project?

almost done with it. the bottom corner has been unfinished for acouple of weeks now.. i'll get around to it someday. not much crafting happing here at the deadbird hornhaus with me working everyday this week except tisdag. one more day then i'm free til torsdag.

also tonight is the final mnrg derby bout (championships) tonight. GOOOOO DAGGERDOLLS.  SKATE! FIGHT! DIE!

live, love, lawl.

a test stitch for my live, love, lawl xstitch. there's a lot of things wrong with it that i notice, but nobody else probably does, ahhh well, & somethings to fix for round 2, but first i have some other projects in mind before i try this one again. :)

{LLL} sneak peak

 

sneak peak of what i've been stitching for the past few days.

very basic xstitchiness with a color scheme i'm quite proud of... should be done with within the next few days and then i'd like to try my hand at a portrait series in honor of Women's History Month.

recently my bloggg has gotten more visitors thanks to a post on MrxStitch! which in turn doubled the number of downloads of my Feminist Cross Stitch Pattern. A wonderful downloader / fellow xstitcher, Ann, sent me in the above image of her rendition of the pattern. She also said that she's gonna teach her sister to xstitch using this same pattern!

it's a great way to learn to stitch and get the feminist talk going. my plan is to invite over some art circle friends in the future and start talking about issues that concern us, & this is a good introduction project.

tonight i'm going to not craft (boo!), but organize my basement into a more efficient art studio (yay!).

So yeah, Thanks again Ann for sending in your work, and a big thanks for the Shout Out on MrxStitch! i'm a big fan! & if you downloaded the pattern and made something rad, send me an email at collateralxdamage (at) gmail (dot) com!

"this is what a feminist crafts like" e-pattern!

my very first xstitch pattern, THIS IS WHAT A FEMINIST CRAFTS LIKE. available for download { here }

much thanks to KnitPro for pattern-making help.

if you use this pattern please email me at collateralxdamage (at) gmail (dot) com i would love to see how they turn out. i'll upload mine once i finish it. :)

working on my first pattern for a sassy feminist patch. once i complete it, i'll upload it for your enjoyment/use. here's a sneak peak:

today was the first day of classes at the university of minnesota and my first (official) day as a college dropout. how does one spend their time when they don't have to go to class? get up early as fuck, drink way to much coffee, and protest General Mills & Cargill! today i was proud to be part of a 42 person caravan of twincities activists to take part in the bannering of general mills headquarters with the Rainforest Action Network. While GM preaches sustainability and transparency, they are currently in cahoots with Cargill in destroying rainforests by using palm oil. findout more at www.theproblemwithpalmoil.org.

 

 

aerial shot: 

{ photos via tcindymedia }

this monday i worked on canning jars of haus paint (don't ask) & i almost finished another cross stitch!

pattern via { radicalxstitch }

P.S.
are any of you out there in blogland crafty with blogspot layouts? i need help with mine. on my macbook pro (13") my blog looks like this:

however,  on my roommate's 15" it looks more like this hot mess...

i'd prefer that it would like more like mine on all computers ;) any help would be appreciated.

back to the xstitching!

last night halfway through a grey's anatomy marathon (we watched the entire season 5 on dvd) i started my very first cross stitch. i picked up a tiny little kit at joanne's a while back, but never got around to it with the holidaze rush. i did most of it last night, and finished up the last bit this morning. i'm definitely looking forward to doing more xstitch in the future.