etsy

floppy kittens, etsy sale

It quite suddenly decided to be proper summer around here. In the last week of July. The Kitten Flop Barometer is at Very High Flop.

(Or should that be Very Low Flop, since the floppiness is very low to the ground? Though Bucket is flopped on the table in front of the fan, while Tessa is flopped by my feet on top of a pile of papers that need to be shredded. The Kitten Flop Barometer is not a precise device.)

I seem to be in the middle of all sorts of things which involves a lot of thinking and waiting and not necessarily a lot of interesting blog fodder. Also, it’s hot, which is demotivating.

Things I am waiting for in the mail:

  • BPAL order including bottles of Belle Vinu, Imp & Lawn Gnome
  • DVD of Watchmen
  • New bank card, to replace the unfortunately compromised one.
  • Notice from the bank about all that fun bank fraud stuff. It’s like a money adventure, but not as fun as shopping. When all this is done I am totally buying new shoes.

And of course, I’m keeping an eye on my my e-mail inbox for agent responses. It’s been pretty quiet lately on that front.

I’m writing bits of all sorts of things. I have two big works in progress plus a fairy tale for my writing group and I’m pondering the queens for the tarot deck.

Also, I’m having a sale on original art over on Etsy. Breakdown of ridiculously low prices is over on the art blog. Here, have a very pretty widget to click and go check stuff out:

By erin, ago

knights & orchids

On Saturday we went to see Harry Potter & the Half-Blood Prince, which was enjoyable for about an hour and a half and then boring and badly paced for the last hour. And when the credits started I immediately turned to the boy and said “Today we have learned that a good director can elevate a mediocre screenplay to something decent but cannot salvage a final scene as horrible as that one.” Really. Love the direction, love the look of everything, love Luna, love Alan Rickman, Daniel Radcliffe has some brilliant comic timing, but that screenplay was awful.

On Sunday we found out someone has been using my debit card to go on a spending spree in the UK. Bright side: some card monitoring place called to alert me, plus froze the card for me. According to the bank I need to go fill out fraud paperwork. There’s some confusion at this point as to what charges went through and what didn’t, but it’s several hundred dollars, at least. Joy.

In better news, I finished the Phantomwise Tarot Knights today. They’re up in the gallery on phantomwise.com. They were rather difficult, but I’m pleased with how they came out. Only 8 cards left, which is just crazy. Since I started in October of 2006 I’m thinking they’re going to end up finished almost exactly at the 3 year mark.

In other news I’m toying with multiple writing projects in hopes of finishing a draft of something by the end of the year, I just got these bracelets from Bullfinch & Barbury on Etsy and I’m in love with them, Tessa is in love with the huge cardboard box, and I’m going to go make dinner now.

In closing, here is a photo of the gorgeous orchid the boy got from his office, apparently they raffle off the old flowers when they replace them and he got this one. We’re trying not to kill it.

By erin, ago

miscellany with hat box (sans hat)

I changed my blog layout. I looked at WordPress layouts until my eyes hurt, and I settled on this one. I like it a lot, though I’m still adjusting to it. I was getting sick of the dark background, and I’ve been craving change lately the way you’d normally crave sugar or salt or caffeine.

Also, I bought a hat box. Or rather, a hat box-esque piece of vintage luggage. I had been eyeing it for a couple weeks and thought of an extra good use for it, so I decided to go ahead and get it. Pictures when it arrives, of course. Though I really need to stop looking through vintage luggage on Etsy, my Etsy addiction was bad enough already.

My photopaintings started the week with promises that they would be done by Friday and they are lying liars. Mostly I’m just waffling over the best way to handle a certain aspect, and once I figure that out they won’t take long at all, but the days are going by and I am continuing to waffle. Ah well.

In other news, LOST is awesome beyond all awesomeness this season and Bucket has fallen in love with the foam lounge chair. These things are actually related as I had to kick Bucket off the chair to watch LOST last night. She was not pleased.

By erin, ago

i *heart* friday the 13ths

Two Friday the 13ths in a row! They are one of my favorite types of day. I got married on a Friday the 13th, which probably adds to the fondness, but I liked them before that, too.

I’m wearing BPAL‘s latest 13 blend today, too.

A sweet, comforting base of dark chocolate and brown sugar with thirteen herbs of good fortune, including nutmeg, Tonka, allspice, star anise, Jamaican and African gingers, devil’s shoestring, lucky hand root, and thyme.

It’s a dry, spicy, gingery scent on me with just a little bit of sugar sweet kicking around the edges. Very different from my only other 13 from BPAL, the original white chocolatey version that I wore for my wedding.

Mostly layering paint on a custom painting today that keeps wanting to be darker. I like it better today than I did yesterday, so I think it was right about the dark. Going to let it dry and see how I feel about it after that.

Tessa just jumped in front of the computer, so I assume that means she says hello.

This is my new tea mug that I promised pictures of, on my desk with my statue of Thoth hanging out in the background:

It’s from khphillips on Etsy. (This mug, link has additional angles.) I’ve had my eye on this style of his for ages, I love the tones and the decals, but this is the first one I’ve actually purchased. It’s even lovelier in person. I’m tempted to start collecting them, replace my mass-produced mugs with unique pieces of usable art.

Getting Indian food for dinner, nom nom tandoori salmon. Mulling things over more than editing, I tend to switch back and forth from painter to writer and back again. Today is a painting day.

By erin, ago