Friday, February 29, 2008

No seriously, don't warn the tadpoles!

I have frog fear. Serious, undeniable, petrifying frog fear. The technical term is Ranidaphobia. When I see a frog, by entire body tenses up and I just break down.

Last year, my roommate Christie didn't realize how serious this fear was and brought a frog home. She told me she had a "present" for me and when she pulled the slimy little green monster from behind her back to show me, I screamed (loudly) and began to sob uncontrollably. My roommate Kristen, who was standing in my room at the time, quickly shut my door and just hugged me until I calmed down. Needless to say, Christie felt awful. But none of my roommates has tried to pull that one on me again.

I've had this fear since I was little. During the summers, when I was staying with my grandparents, Mamaw would take me to my Aunt's house (which was only about 2 miles away) to swim in her pool. This is where it started.

Every time I went swimming, there were dead frogs in the pool, waiting to be fished out with the net. If there was a frog anywhere in the pool, dead or alive, I wouldn't get in. One day, I was swimming and a live frog got tangled in my hair. That was the deal breaker. The frogs have been my enemies ever since.

So today, when I was in class and learned that one of my art history professors has an upcoming show called The Frog Story, in which she used frogs that went belly-up in her pool, I knew it could not be good. To the right is a sample of her work. My professor is very talented and I'm sure that to someone that doesn't have frog fear, this would be wonderful. But in my case, this is the stuff of nightmares.

Mi Corazón Cosido


This is what I'm working on right now. I'm pretty sure it's going to be more of an art project than craft. I have an old suitcase I bought from Goodwill about a year and a half ago that I want to turn into some type of art piece. I thought a big red heart would be beautiful as its centerpiece. And if that doesn't work out, then I'll make it into a big tote bag. Everybody loves a tote with a big anatomically correct heart on it!

It's nowhere near finished, but the outline is done, and I've just started the massive filling-in process. All the little gray pencil lines will be red someday... it's going to take a while. What's done here is about 3.5 hours worth of work... not counting the very long time it took me to find the perfect image (Thanks, Google!) and resize it, print it, and trace it onto my fabric. The entire heart will be embroidered in the same color red.

Please excuse the shoddy picture (and my purple sheets) ... it's not like I have any experience with a camera (sarcasm). You can click on the picture to enlarge it, if you'd like.

I think the reaction of most of the people I've shown it to so far has been either silence, followed by changing the subject or "oh... that's interesting." And really, I'm okay with that.

As far as the title for this post... "heart" just sounds so much better in Spanish.

Thursday, February 28, 2008

Woot!

My art history professor told me that I have "an eye" for art history. It made me feel all tingly inside.

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Old Blogs

In case you wanted to know, my previous blog was here, at my myspace page.

And before that, it was at LiveJoural.

But now it's here. Where you are now. Good for you.

I'm a Nerd: Welcome to the Land of Katie

I had every intention of writing a really good first post for my new blog. It's just not going to happen. I think the best thing is just to dive right in.

Here are a few crafts that I've made recently:

This is a crochet hook case I made for myself. My crochet hooks are so happy in there that I haven't crocheted a thing since.





I embroidered this for a bag that I gave as a Christmas/ New Year's gift. His bushy little owl eyebrows are just so cute.


And this is my most marvelous creation to date. My wonderful Doctor Who bag. It's bigger on the inside.

The front, with TARDIS:


A close up of the embroidery. It's a little bit wonky. It's fatter in some places. You can't really tell from the picture, but I actually stitched the words "Police Box" where they're supposed to go. I tried really hard.

Here's the back. It's a Dalek. A little gold, exterminating Dalek. This is my favorite part of the whole bag.

A close up of the little booger. Ain't he cute? He' s even got a little plunger. And look! He says "Exterminate!" Enough for today, I'm going to bed.