Waiting, waiting, waiting....

Waiting to move on; waiting to do a tour; waiting for other people to get their shit together. My life has been on hold for a bit. I've decided to take a mulligan for most of June.

My original plan was to do two creations every day this month, and post regularly. But, I was sick the first week - or, more precisely, having vertigo problems for several days. I also wanted to get a regular exercise program started.

But life, as we say, got in the way. I've been creating, but there's also been a fair amount of destruction going on as well. The biggest, scariest change: my husband and I are separating. For reals this time. I'm moving out on Wednesday, to stay with my dad and stepmom temporarily. Eventually, he'll find an apartment (and I need to find another job, for the additional expenses we'll have), and I'll move back to the house. I'm hoping we can keep the kids at the house, and we take turns staying with them. I want things to stay as stable as possible for the kids. I don't have much else to say at this point.

One positive aspect of this situation: I'm finally going to start an Etsy shop, selling off my vintage collection, and getting some of my design ideas created and on the market. I don't expect much moolah from this at first, but hopefully there will be some additional income coming in.

The rest of the destruction has been happening in the yard. I've been uprooting weird saplings that have been allowed to grow for a while. I was cutting them back every year, but they just sprouted anew, so I finally removed the "root of the problem".

six, count 'em, six different roots/stumps

they're outta here!

Next up - some gathering of supplies for more yard happenings.

I'm kind of a big deal

There's been more destruction than creation going on lately - in the garden and in my personal life. More on that later.

Here are my two latest shows; my costumes are mentioned in both reviews. This doesn't happen often, and to happen twice in two weeks - yeah, I'm gonna toot my own horn.

http://www.startribune.com/entertainment/stageandarts/158160835.html

http://www.startribune.com/entertainment/stageandarts/154491505.html

Feed the soul and the body

At 11:15 p.m. last night, I created an Angus & Spinach burger served on multigrain bread. Then I created a Windsor & diet cola.

After a long day of show laundry, show alterations, show repairs, and a dress rehearsal - they were fantastic. The end.

One person's garbage.....

I keep forgetting to take photos. Or, I'm not good at keeping the camera handy to take photos. Or something.

So you'll just have to trust me that I'm creating. Sunday evening, when I got home from a second long weekend of tech rehearsals, this time for "Laughter on the 23rd Floor", I found that J. needed some serious help finishing a 3-D art project. She's been "working" on this for several weeks, slowly collecting trash and recyclables and planning - kind of. I did alot of the planning with her, making suggestions, helping her think outside the box - or inside the box, in this case.

The assignment was to make an additive sculpture out of trash. Additive sculpture is pretty self-explanatory, you put things together to create the object, adding to the shape. (As opposed to subtractive sculpture, such as carving stone away to create the shape). We brainstormed about what she should make; she finally decided to make a refrigerator, with food items inside. A cardboard box, empty jars and boxes, paper bags, spray paint, milk jug handles - she did a great job with the individual elements! She made a loaf of bread in a pan, by painting the lower part of a strawberry container silver and covering the top with a brown lunch bag. She made a spray cheese can out of the empty spray paint can and making a new label for it. She made refrigerator magnets out of bottle caps and newspaper ads. She even made a phone list to put on the fridge!

Where did I come into this? I'm the owner/operator of the hot glue gun in our house. I attached the handles and the interior shelves. We used drinking straws as supports for the cardboard shelves. It was a strangely relaxing way to spend my evening, after spending the last 12 or so days inside of theaters. But, we didn't take photos, and I don't think she gets to bring this project home - I'll find out tomorrow at the Art Extravaganza at her school.

"An Absolute Turkey" has been getting wonderful reviews; one reviewer even commented on my costumes!

Next up, another pregnancy pad, an altered maternity dress, and MEAT FEAST. Stay tuned!

Coming Clean

I actually cooked dinner several times in the last week and a half. Well, mostly the week of 5/14-5/18. Then I went into a very long tech rehearsal process for a silly French farce. (scroll down to "Opening May 25th!" That's the show I worked on).

I made a pork stir fry (J. told me afterward she prefers Schwan's stir fry, wah wah). Just some pork loin strips, cut up vegetables, and a mixture of soy sauce, olive oil, white wine vinegar, garlic powder, onion powder, curry powder, maybe some other spices (I left out red pepper flakes, the kids don't like their food too spicy).

Another night I made barbeque meatballs; while I started with a commercial barbeque sauce, I jazzed it up with some yellow mustard, spices, a little hot sauce - just enough to take away the oversweet processed taste.  I should just make my own barbeque sauce - and tomato sauce for that matter. Then I could make all sorts of flavor variations. I'll have to try some experimenting this summer.

J.'s birthday party was last Saturday, and she wanted a heart shaped cake. Friday night's creation - a chocolate cake, cut into a heart shape, and whipped pink frosting. Then J. decorated it with M&Ms. I had a tour, then a 10-hour tech rehearsal/costume parade, so I missed her party - and forgot to take pictures beforehand, and nobody (cough*her dad*cough) bothered to take pictures at the party. Ah, well.

There have been a few more costume creations in the past week, as well, for the French farce, An Absolute Turkey (this is the English translation of the title Le Dindon). Matching red lace corset tops kept me busy for a couple of days - including tear-away black satin bows that the two leading ladies pull off of each other's tops.

And then - the rains came. Massive amounts of rain in the last few days here in Minnesota. Mother Nature saved all the snow that didn't fall this past winter, and dumped it in water form all over us. I no longer live by a lake, I live in a lake! Flooded basement! Especially my costume storage area! Lots of wet vac action! Hauling out soggy cardboar! (only a couple of things got ruined, most of my costume stock is in plastic tubs, for this very reason.) And one almost-ruined picture of my son, C. - the cardboard backing in the frame got wet (yes, it was in a cardboard box with other pictures that we still haven't put on the walls!), but I got the photo out and dried off.

So, not so many creations lately, just a lot of clean-up. I'm glad I did the massive organizing in March, the flood damage could have been much worse.

And now, another show starts tech rehearsals! Today!

I knit so I don't kill (not really)

I finished a scarf last night.

I can't count the scarf itself as my daily creation, because I've been working on it for almost a year. It's a lovely scarf, with an interesting triangle pattern; and I'm sure I'll get plenty of compliments on it. But just getting it finished was becoming a chore.

It's the last triangle, the end triangle, that I'm counting as my creation; I had to frog the last bit of knitting twice; I thought I didn't have enough yarn to finish the scarf; I tried to add a different yarn for the end, but it looked horrible. I biked into town to our local yarn shoppe (it's a fancy yarn shop!) for one more ball of yarn - but they're closed on Sundays. So off in the car to a larger craft store for the yarn, and found something to approximate the yarn I was already using.

(The large craft store is close to my mom's home; I already had plans with her, so I thought I could shop first - the shopping wasn't the difficult part, the waiting over 5 minutes in the checkout line was. I guess 31 other people had decided they HAD TO get their project supplies right before me, and there was only one cashier. Bah.)

When I got home last night, I recounted the number of large triangles I had already knitted, and discovered I had made one too many. That was it. I had enough yarn after all. But I had to frog most of hte last large triangle, so I could redo it as the end triangle and cast off the final stitches.

Note: Frogging is a knitting term that means to remove stitches, especially a large amount, either to take a project apart, or to redo a section (usually when there's an error or dropped stitch.) It's a bitch to deal with, but a necessary evil to fix a mistake.

And now I have a large ball of yarn for another project. Yay.

birthday girl

J.'s birthday was on Friday, so I created a birthday bouquet for her.

She particularly likes the orange one.