Gotta See It All

In case you haven’t noticed… I’ve gotten VERY in to cross stitch lately. Right now, I’m working in a call center and the two things we’re allowed to do in our stations are 1)read or 2)craft. You can only read for so many hours before the words start doing weird tribal dances across the page (yes, I speak from experience) so instead… I do this!

A very good friend of mine has a stuffed Pikachu that she takes on trips with her and snaps his picture with all the sights. So, when she saw this pattern she FREAKED and I knew she had to have it. Not just Pika, but Pika who’s gotta see it all!

Took me probably around 8 hours, but honestly I don’t really time it because I do stitches in between calls.

Pattern is free here.

A Pink Christmas

Maybe it’s all the time I’ve been spending at my very pink pole studio, but I decided this year, my first in Florida, I was going to have a very pink Christmas since I couldn’t have a white one.

I was planning on getting all my shopping done at IKEA this year, but all their stuff was red and white – totally cute but really going to clash with my pink Christmas tree that I’ve had for years.

I got these awesome handblown glass owls at Target, and the wreathes from Amazon and Michaels. The outdoor one had some hideous white lights on a white string that I had to pull off but with the shipping cost it wasn’t worth returning, so I improvised.

I think the overall effect is glorious but apparently to the non-glitter initiated it’s (as one person posted on my Facebook pics) gaudy and hideous. I’m strangely ok with that.

T.A.R.D.I.S. Shoes!

Guess what I’m doing in January, no really, go ahead… guess….

Nope!

I’m going to TIME LORD FEST! Ahhhh! And I’m dressing up as the T.A.R.D.I.S! Double Ahhhh!

And I’m not going to make the same mistake I made when I did an Emma Frost cosplay and decided to wear 7″ heels for hours on end. Don’t get me wrong, it was awesome, I just don’t want to do it again anytime soon (read: until PAX East).

The comfiest shoes I own are an old, broken in pair of Toms with a hole in the toe. But… T.A.R.D.I.Ses (Tardi?) don’t wear Toms, so I fixed the hole and painted them to match.

Ta-da! I’m so so proud of how they came out! Totally freehanded from a reference photo.I was really nervous to do the lettering and really afraid that they wouldn’t be somewhat symmetrical.

Turns out acrylic paint is SUPER forgiving. I used some blue paint that I already had that was “metallic”. The end effect is really cool but I wouldn’t recommend it because it took 4-5 coats to get this color. For comparison, the standard white acrylic paint only took two.

Emma Frost Cosplay

Ok, so if you’re my friend IRL you’re probably sick to death of hearing about my halloween costume. You’re probably very excited that the holiday is over so it can go in a drawer and you don’t have to listen to me talk about the benefits of PVC versus latex. This is why we have the internet, I have a whole new audience of people to bore!

 

I cheated and bought the boots and cape but everything else was either handmade or altered. I added garters to the shorts, sewed the top and arm bands (which, sadly, you can’t see well) and painted and crafted the belt. Oh, and I went to an outdoor party in Ohio and FROZE MY WHITE ASS OFF. But before that, my pole studio in Florida had a party, so I had to make a few alterations.

 

I’m flying!!

 

It’s incredibly hard to make a costume that both looks good, leaves the necessary skin available for pole and doesn’t fall off while you’re hanging upside down in an inverted crucifix. As an added bonus, it’s somewhat canon thanks to X-Men Origins. Though I’m sure she was much less worried about her clothes staying on…

Image Credit: http://www.comicbookresources.com/prev_img.php?pid=5273&pg=2

 

And now, sadly, Emma goes back in the cosplay drawer – but only until PAX East. Only 4 more months until PAX!

Magical Valentines

 

Remember those little cardboard valentines we used to give as kids? I couldn’t help but notice they looked like Magic cards. So… my valentines for this year are some basic lands! I painted happy little owls on them, and replaced the symbol with a heart. What do you think?

Squadron Llama… Resolves?

 

Sorry about the camera pic, I’ll try to get some scans of these guys later.

Playing 7-person Commander last night, people were busting out random creature types from “elf” to “weird”, but there was a depressing lack of llamas. A little googling proves there is no llama creature type in all of Magic. Sad day. So… Squadron Llama!

 

They’re simple and cartoonish, but they make me smile, and it’ll make finding the other squadron hawks in my deck once the first one gets out to bring his buddies way easier 😛

Pacifism

These have to be my favorite alters to date.

Pacifism is such a fun card, once it’s on the table it’s usually there for the rest of the game, so I wanted to pretty mine up a bit. The gold on both cards is a metallic acrylic paint that catches the light (hard to show on the scans :/).

Kithkin are Creepy Little Buggers

I should start this post with a confession… short people scare me. So Kithkins REALLY scare me.

I think their squished little faces and tiny bodies are disturbing. Unfortunately, some of them also do really well in my decks. So what’s a girl to do? Cover those suckers!

Here’s my first attempt ever at painting a person. I like the hair, I hate the face. Whatever, still better than the little hobbit wannabe.

Na Na Na Na Batman!

This set was my first experiment with alters (instead of just extending art). I’m happy with out they came out, though you can see the paintbrush lines pretty clearly. I bow to artists who can make acrylic do amazing things, because I’m not one of them (yet)!

From this project I learned that you need to alter cards people will actually use in their decks. Pretty cards do you no good if you can’t play with them. I wanted to experiment on cheap cards first in case I messed up, but as I get better I hope to move on to playable cards.

You probably notice that while there’s lots of other characters, there’s no actual Batman in this set. I ran out of time before Christmas and sort of gave up on finishing it. I still like them though 🙂

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Myr Binder

I was trying to stay on budget when I bought binders and pages for all my cards. These ugly navy blue binders were $1, and the next best were $6, so… ugly blue binders it is. Being an art kid at heart, I just couldn’t leave them ugly and blue, so I started painting and somehow ended up with a Myr themed binder for my artifact cards. What do you think?