Celebrating 8 Years Together

My husband I spent this past weekend celebrating our 8th wedding anniversary and it was a perfect mix of activities and lazy nothingness. We both took a couple days off work so we had a four day weekend together. Initially we didn't have anything planned, just the time off but as things got closer we made a rough list of things we wanted to do. Nothing really had a specific day or time that it needed to happen.

First of all we spent most of Saturday running errands and doing a bit of cleaning to get it out of the way so the rest of our time was clear. We did our grocery shopping and picked up a stack of DVDs we had on hold at the library for later plans. One thing that we meant to do but didn't was to buy pumpkins to carve later in the weekend. We specifically had an idea for using a white pumpkin but because we couldn't find any at our grocery store it got dropped of the list. Then that night we attended a Halloween Party hosted in part by my sister-in-law, Bev, where we dressed as Superboy and Wondergirl.

 (You can see how I made our costumes in last week's post.)

Then we spent all day Sunday reliving our childhood, by staying in our PJs and watching old cartoons. Admittedly a lot of the cartoons we ended up with are more from our teen years but that doesn't really matter, we worked with what the library had. We ate cereal, Honey Nut Cheerios and Boo Berry. For lunch we had dinosaur shaped chicken nuggets with mac and cheese. In the evening we had talked about ordering pizza and calling it a slumber party and getting old movies but never decided what movies would be best. So we just kept watching cartoons and ordered chinese instead of pizza because its something we did a lot while we were dating. We also snacked on pizza rolls and Little Debbie cakes at various points of the day. It was pretty awesome.

Gotta Love the Library

Monday we decide to go out and see The Last Witch Hunter because it seemed interesting and has some connections to DnD but also because it was showing at Cinetopia and I wanted a chance to try the Living Room seating. That ended up not working out for us because they lost power just before we arrived to buy tickets. We went to a later showing at Ward Parkway shopping center but had time to kill before the movie started. Since we ended up wandering around in Target for part of that time we bought another couple of Lego Minifigures and some Star Wars Micromachine blind packs. I hope to be able to use the micromachines in a terrarium like those I linked in the last post.

Tuesday was the actual day of our anniversary and we went down to Union Station to see the Da Vinci exhibit. It was very cool. It talks a bunch about his notebooks and the kind of things he drew and studied, how his studies of birds and flight lead to plans for flying machines and that kind of thing. 

Then it has recreations of a bunch of his inventions alongside the sketches from his notebooks. Most of the machines/ inventions can be touch and tried out but not all. At least for my husband and I some of the ones that sounded like the most fun to try were the ones that said Do Not Touch but that's alright. We seemed to be the only ones really interested in playing with the machines anyways. 

 There is everything from models of his plans for diving suits, to simple pulleys, to crazy war machines like the scythed cart.

We didn't get a picture of this one but they had a small scale replica and a full scale model of a different version.

After that there is section discussing his anatomical studies and how it related to his art. Following that there are reproductions of some of his paintings. Several of them discuss how he used the golden ratio in his work. It was really interesting but they didn't have an explanation of what the golden ratio is until the very end. I already knew a bit about it but if you didn't the pictures of the paintings divided up with red lines to show the ratio or spiral don't really mean much. The final little bit talks about some of his less known interests which included cooking, planning theme parties and weddings, and stage production. For an interesting read you can check out Da Vinci's Kitchen which uses notes for parties and grocery lists from his notebooks along with general cooking history to create recipes that Da Vinci may have eaten.

Overall we had a great time and got an awesome photo of me looking much to excited to be in a Da Vinci tank. It was also fun to look at replicas of things that come up in Assassin's Creed like the pyramid shaped parachutes, and they have a kid's room with blocks to build your own ideal city or flying machine. They have a basic paper gyrocopter plus paper and tape with a sort of wind tunnel where you can try it out. 

The final part of our day was supposed to be a nice dinner out but it turns out that my husband broke a tooth over the weekend and was in too much pain so we had dinner at home. I'm appreciate him hanging in as long as he did although I wish he'd agreed to go to the dentist sooner. He had it pulled Wednesday afternoon and is already feeling much better. And as a side note we had the greatest misty fall weather just perfect as far as we were concerned.

Taken using the Instaweather app

Here's to many more great years and fun times!

Librocubicularist October 2015

I'm posting book reviews a little bit out of order this month because this weekend is our 8 year wedding anniversary. So this was easy to write and schedule ahead of time so we could enjoy the weekend together uninterrupted. I also apologize because for some reason I haven't actually finished many books this month so I had only a few to choose from for the reviews.

                   

Emerald Green by Kerstin Gier
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
This is Young Adult series about time travel. Gwen unexpectedly inherits a time travel gene and becomes part of a secret society. Unfortunately there is evidence of a spy in the organization and as the newest member she's a suspect so they refuse to actually tell her any of the secrets. Through various conversations with her ancestors while in the past and some sneaking around in her current time she is able to piece things together to find and stop the villain.
The time travel aspect of it for the most part is handled well. For one thing they are limited to traveling into the past there is no traveling forward. The secret society they are part of has kept records for years about who traveled to the past and why so for the most part they just blindly follow the plan. Since there is no risk of the travelers running into themselves the books never mention what might happen. You would think that with all of their actions recorded in history it would be hard to work against the system but towards the end of the series it discusses how they were able to go back and somewhat change the past. The entire thing does get a little bit confusing though. The entire trilogy takes place over just about 3 weeks in our time and their meetings in the past don't happen in order. For example at one point they go to party in the past where she talks to a Count. For her this is their second meeting but for the Count (who can also travel in time) its the third and he mentions that they have a conversation tomorrow. Gwen does later travel to that next day but for her it's about a week later in time. So it gets to be difficult to keep track of who know what information about the plot at what time.
Overall I really enjoyed these while I was reading them. However after the finale where the final secret is revealed I did end up with some questions. It's very hard to explain without giving spoilers but let me say that most of my questions or issues revolve around the device they use called a Chronograph. Where did it originally come from? When it reveals the Final Secret, did it somehow create it or was it just always hidden inside? Does this mean they can go back slightly in time and reproduced it multiple times?
One other thing that kind of bothered me is the fact that Gwen can see and talk to ghosts but it is almost a side note. She is supposed to have the magic of the raven and throughout the books even people who know that she sees ghosts still are trying to figure out what her magic is.


10-Minute Hairstyles by André Märtens

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


I grabbed this off of the new shelf at the library, excited, hoping to find some quick easy everyday hairstyles that I could throw together before work. I ended up being disappointed. It says it has 50 styles. To start with there are some that just don't work for my hair, either wrong length or hair type. After that there are some that I just didn't really like. I didn't do an actual count so I don't know how many are left after that but those leftover fit in two categories; those I already know how to do, and those that will definitely take me more than 10 minutes. Several involve french braids which I'm just no good at but might be able to do if I had lots more practice. The rest mostly involve a curling iron and I don't know about you but anything that requires me to curl all of my hair with a curling iron is not a 10 minute hairstyle. I'm not saying it can't be done just not by me... Anyways one of them even says in the last step to let everything cool for a least 10 minutes. If the final step takes 10 minutes by itself then the entire thing cannot take just 10 minutes.


Modern Terrarium Studio: Design + Build Custom Landscapes with Succulents, Air Plants + More by Megan George

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Lately I've been seeing a lot of terrariums on pinterest using old action figures or toy dinosaurs and I checked this out thinking it might be a good starting point for making something like that. It has a lot of good information about choosing plants and adding accessories. It also seems to have good information on caring for the whole thing once you get it all put together.The only thing missing in my opinion is a good set of references as to where to buy the plants because it doesn't strike me something you can pick up just anywhere, like say the garden center at Home Depot. Maybe I'm wrong though, it's not something I've looked into yet.

Here are some examples of what I'm thinking of making. You can also see more examples here and here.

Check back on Thursday to see more about our celebrations this weekend including a visit to Union Station to check out the Da Vinci exhibit.

Super Halloween Costumes

My husband is a big fan of the Conner Kent Superboy comics and has been saying for a long time that he wishes he could find a good Superboy shirt that would fit him. I've mentioned that I could make one but for various reasons have never gotten around to it. So when we needed to come up with costumes this year on a low budget and somewhat short notice I knew it was time.

We are going to our party as Superboy Conner Kent and Wonder Girl Cassie Sandsmark, shown below.

All I needed to do was make a couple of t-shirts for us to wear with jeans and boots that we already own. I also have a lasso and am planning to make cuffs for Wonder Girl.

Superboy

It was really easy to do the Superboy shirt. You can easily find the logo online to use as a template you just need to leave a few connecting bridges. 

Mine was a little difficult because for some reason our printer didn't want to cooperate so I had to fill in some parts.

Transfer the design to freezer paper to use as a stencil and iron it in place. Then just fill it in using red fabric paint. WARNING: It will take a lot of layers of paint to fully cover the black shirt. This photo is after three coats.

Add an extra layer of paint to fill in the connecting points and then you're done.

Wonder Girl

For the Wonder Girl shirt I had to make my own stencil. The first thing I did was try on my shirt and mark the area where I wanted the design to be. 

I measured the space and marked the center. Then after that I measured to each side of the center to mark where the side of the W should be. It actually took me several tries to find the right measurements. My first attempt looked more like a Charlie Brown stripe than Wonder Woman W's.

For my final version I adjusted the height and move the bottom points closer to the center. 

The shirt is 20 Inches across and I marked the center and 3 inches to each side of center, at 7, 10, and 13 inches. At the tallest point the design is 6 inches high. I made each stripe about 1 inch wide and left a half inch in between. On the outer and center line make a mark at 1 inch, 1.5, and 2.5 inches from the top. Mark the two middle lines at 1, 1.5, and 2.5 inches from the bottom. To finish the design connect all the points.

Then iron on the template and paint it with gold paint.

It's not quite finished because I still need to add the stripes on the arms. I didn't make it part of the template because I wasn't sure where the sleeve would sit when the shirt was actually one. I'll have to have someone help me mark the spot.

I bought about 3 yards of gold cord to use as a lasso but I haven't quite decided how to attach it to my belt yet. I have today off and am going to try to finish the sleeves and make cuff bracelets. I will be sure to post an update when I finish.

Update October 25th

For the stripes on the sleeves I cut another stencil. I had my Mom help me mark the sleeves for placement and lined the stencil up as closely as possible with those tape marks.

Then I just filled it in the fabric paint, flipped the shirt over, checked that the stencil lined up with the other side and painted that side too.

Wonder Girl Cuffs

To make the cuffs for Wonder Girl I used a couple of empty Pringles cans that I cut down.

First carefully cut off the bottom of the can using an exacto knife. Then mark a straight line down the side and cut the can open.

This should let it open enough to fit your hand through. Check how it fits on your arm and decide how long you want the cuff to be.

My arms are small and actually fit inside without needing to cut the side open. I decided to fit the cuffs to my arm where the top lip of the can could close around my arm. I positioned it there and made a note of much extended past my wrist. As you can see from the pictures I did all the fitting with my bare arm and in retrospect I should have tried it with the shirt to be sure everything would fit with the long sleeves. It all turned out alright but its just something to keep in mind.

I used an elastic hairband to mark the line so I could the length down easily.

After that test the fit on your arm again. Hold the sides in so that it fits close around your arm and make a mark so you can trim the side down.

After that I punched a few holes in each edge so that I could add laces to hold them tight to my wrists. Then I added a quick coat of silver spray paint to cover the front side. The logo on the can shows a bit but not as badly as it seems from this picture. I only needed them to last for a few hours so I wasn't overly concerned but you could use multiple coats or start with a coat of primer.

I laced them by pushing the ribbon in through the bottom two holes, up along the inside of the cuffs and out the top two holes. Put them on, pull the laces tight, and tie the ribbon at the top. Unless you're really good at tying one handed you will need someone to tie the end for you.

Here's a few pictures of us before we headed out to the party last night.

Workplace Woes

I took a break from pretty much everything this past weekend. Saturday, on my way to work, I had a customer run into me as a came around the corner. I'm sure it was an accident, it was a high school aged girl and for whatever reason she was running down an aisle, and hit me as I came out of a side aisle. I got knocked sideways into a shelf and really I'm fine but my hand got a bit scraped up and my side hurts still. I don't have any bruising or anything so we're pretty sure everything is fine but decided it would be better to take things easy for a while.

This is my hand a full day later and it actually doesn't look so bad in this picture. Right after it happened I was afraid it was going to end up bruised but thankfully it didn't. There was a layer of skin that got scraped off but but only a tiny scratch that actually bleed.

Meanwhile I have everything ready to start work on our Halloween costumes. I'm not going to say what they are but here are our supplies... People who know us well might be able to make a good guess but I hope to have everything finished to show you on Thursday.

We also stopped while we were out running errands and picked up a few of the current Lego minifigures. I was hoping to get either a gargoyle or a banshee but we ended up with two plant monsters and a zombie pirate. Zombie pirate is pretty cool and I'm okay with the plant monster as well I just wish we hadn't gotten two of them.

So anyways... Hopefully I will be feeling all better by Friday because my husband and I have time off to celebrate our anniversary. We also have a Halloween party and were going to work on get our house decorated for the holiday this weekend.

Fairy Tail Erza Hairbow

Since we have been invited to a Halloween party next week I've been trying to come up with costume ideas. And I have a plan. Hopefully an inexpensive and easy plan. But it's a plan that required me to buy gold fabric paint which is also the last thing I needed to finish my Erza hairbow. If you are interested in seeing the other Fairy Tail bows I made you can see them in these posts.

Natsu Dragneel

Lucy Heartfillia

This cosplay hairbow is based on the character of Erza Scarlet from Fairy Tail. 

Materials:

Dark Blue Fabric
Silver Metallic Fabric
Matching Thread
Red Fabric Paint
Gold Fabric Paint
Freezer Paper
Hair Barrette

Step One: Cut Fabric

From the blue fabric cut two pieces 3.5 by 6 inches. From the silver fabric cut a piece 9 by 3 and also a 3 by 3.

Step Two: Paint

I used the freezer paper to make a stencil of the Fairy Tail logo and painted it using the red paint. After that dried I added the gold details. Be sure to keep the design on one half and leave room for sewing seams on the edges. Wait for everything to dry completely.

Step Three: Sew

Sew the blue pieces together, leaving an opening near the center on one long side. Turn it right side out and sew the opening closed. Fold the silver fabric in half, with the design on the inside. Sew the edges leaving an opening. Turn right side out and stitch closed. Also fold the 3 by 3 silver piece in half and sew one side. Turn it right side out and iron flat. Be careful when you iron and use a pressing cloth. I didn't and ended up smudging the paint a bit when I ironed it.

Step Four: Assemble Bow

Layer the silver on top of the blue and wrap the small silver piece around the center and sew closed. Then sew the whole thing onto your barrette.

I have to admit that this one isn't actually completely finished. It took longer for the paint to dry then I expected. I also couldn't decide if I wanted the center to be silver or blue... Maybe you can help me decide? Check out the picture below to see it with the blue.