Thing-a-day.com

A friend of mine lives up on top of this hill in Solana Beach, looking out over San Elijo Lagoon.

Today I really made Space and time (The appartment was getting a bit difficult to get around in).

So this is a make up entry.

After oxydizing the first tip on my new weller I decided it was time to build a new soldering iron timer (and one for my glue gun as well). This is a bench junk project. It is mostly from scores at Wackey Willies (RIP 2007). I had a 4 channel Solid State Relay board with 3 channels populated and a small pile of outlets (I have plans for most of them :). The transformer for the digital power supply is from an old clock radio. At present the buttons turn on the Soldering Iron and Hot Glue Gun and it stays on for about 10 minutes (The arduino doesnt support the RTC crystal that all of the x8 family has attached to Timer 2).

The big button on the right turns everything off. There is a front pannel which I will program to give some status (the leds on the board are two burried to really use for on off status at a glance). Also there is a set of buttons on the panel (currently unwired) to allow for timing adjustment and other future planned functions.

I would also plan use this to adjust the temperature on the iron.

 I made my first ever coin purse today.  It was an experience, one that I definitely learned a lot from.  For starters, I didn’t really have a pattern or any idea of what I was doing.  I wanted to see if I could make something with just the memory of what it’s supposed to look like and use what I had.  I cut out four squares and sewed them together, the outsides and the insides reversed so that when I reversed them they’d be correct.  That part wasn’t that hard, but because I was using vinyl, I didn’t want to poke holes through the vinyl to keep it all aligned.  I figured out too late that I should have used the binder clips I used yesterday to make the vinyl gift card.  Oh well, you live you learn.  The inner lining is a bit airy among other issues like not having a proper cover for the snaps I bought.  I ended up sewing a part of the flower material from the inner lining to cover it up.  In the end, I wouldn’t call this a success nor a failure.  Just a learning experience, one that was both fun and frustrating.

When I saw that one of this week’s themes is “Little people”, I was instantly reminded of the Fisher Price Little People that I played with as a kid. They were made of wood back then, and I no longer have them, so I drew them with markers. Then I decided that they deserved more adventure than just being placed in little plastic cars, so I sent them to Chilean Patagonia via a photo I took there in 2001. Two of them seem to like it, but the other one is never satisfied.

i saw some dudes that looked like this at the zoo the other day

I haven’t touched the piano for over 5 months, so I decided my accomplishment for today was to get a little practice time in and make some music! I’m working on some songs by Joe Hisaishi. I’ll spare you my terrible playing, but if you want to hear the songs I’m practicing - here are some nice videos on YouTube.
Path of the Wind, from Totoro This one is played by the man himself.
Silence, from Etude~A Wish To The Moon (A Hisaishi Solo Piano Album) This one is played by a very talented Hisaishi fan. This is one of my most favorite songs. My favorite part starts around 2:45. I can only play the first quarter of this song, but I want to be able to play the entire thing someday. Sooo pretty.

this is the only one I have in my house

I liked the fridge cling-ons that I made last night so much, I decided to do it again today.  This time I used some images from an old Life magazine.  These were much easier to rub off than yesterday’s images.  I kind of want to decorate every smooth surface in my home with these little images.  Yesterday’s project and instructions can be found here.

I’ve had this glass etching stuff lying around forever, but never could figure it out. Tonight I tried something different - I read the instructions. Wow. This could not be easier. Since it was already 10 pm, I decided this, this will be today’s thing.

Putting the stencil on the glass was the tricky part for me (shut up) but look!

Yes, it is really difficult to try and take a picture of a clear thing, I realize this now. And yes, that is a smudge of misplaced etching goo accident down to the right of the dragonfly. Overall, I’ll call it a success.

gates

More info on these at my blog.

I had a long day today. Bad things just kept happening (first I fell on the ice while carrying our daughter, then our kitchen sink faucet broke, the replacement faucet was broken, the second replacement faucet was also broken, our daughter fell inside and busted her lip, we broke one of our favorite bowls…etc). ugh. I wasn’t feeling inspired so I just started drawing a linear design on my latest duck egg. It looks a little like basket-weaving. Tomorrow I hope to finish the main wax design and add more colors.

I love making wreaths, obviously, so I decided to get a jump on St. Patrick’s Day when I saw these glitter glasses in the dollar section at Target today.

Tonight was the premier of the new Knight Rider. Since my husband is a Knight Rider fan, we curled up in front of the tube to watch it. While it was on, I began and got about 60% finished with a scarf that I’d been meaning to make for a while. I’m calling it a “Reversal” because the picture on the pattern was in white with blue accents; I’m making it in a blueish color with whiteish accents. Here’s what I was able to accomplish this fine evening:

Originally uploaded by mloco

I made one of these a couple of months ago and love it. It’s a knitted cup cozie with a pocket for your hand. What’s really nice about it is that your hot coffee or in my case hot tea, makes it a thermal pocket - perfect for those winter mornings. I’ve been prototyping this for my Etsy shop this weekend. It’s another one of those things that I’ve been meaning to fine tune, and never got around to it. The idea came about while I was bouncing around ideas with a friend. She said to make a knitted handle, and for a few days I couldn’t figure out what she meant by that, because just a knitted handle (like a mug handle) wouldn’t be able to support the weight of a drink. I finally came up with a pocket on a cup cozie so you have something to hold onto if your cup didn’t have a handle on it. The pre-warmed pocket from the beverage was an added bonus. Knitting this takes longer than I’d like, so I’ve been playing around with fabrics as well. Hopefully this week I’ll have something up. This one looks a little short, and I’m thinking of eliminating the bottom section…

Glycerin soap. The blue is pearl-ex blue-green pigment which Jacquard says can be used for soap. The Chinese motif molds came from an Asian ethnic grocery store. I don’t know what the original intention was, but the molds made for some beautiful soaps. I didn’t get the pouring down until the last mold set (of course). There are a couple of soaps not show because they didn’t come out of the mold right - the blue got left behind.

If anyone wants to tell me what the Chinese characters are on the soap at bottom right, I’d appreciate it.

Woah, I am sorry. I did the flying thing again today, except in reverse. I missed a few days but I promise I was drawing, I just haven’t had time to scan or post. My spring semester starts tomorrow and it’s hectic getting everything in order. It’ll be even worse in this coming week, but I will try to be on top of things!

Just a random queer sketchbook page today. Things will be more rushed from here on out, unless I cheat and post my assignments as things-a-day, haa.

[media: sumigrip .7 mechanical pencil in cachet sketchbook.]

Click here!

Today I made two books - I am quite proud of them as they are a bit more difficult than the accordion books I have previously tried. The one with the smaller spine was even more challenging because I had to figure out measurements for the paper (I could only find book tape that was 2″ which I actually like better). I am having fun exploring all the Japanese paper, too.

And one of them together:

I made a couple of mistakes - with the first one, I did not put enough glue up to the spine and thus the page was too loose. On the second one, I am not sure what I did but there are a couple of (basically imperceptible) wrinkles in the paper. Lessons are good.

I think they are gorgeous and will become gifts for my Mum and my aunt, I think. Next step is using book cloth, not book tape, which means gluing. Then, I hear there is a book stabbing class coming up soon… baby steps with these book things.

Tomorrow will either be another smaller book or a solar print type of photography. I also made some visual and mental space by cleaning and organizing after 2 weeks of creating.

I will work more on my Magritte book on my computer this week while I am traveling without all my supplies and stuff.

Today I made turkey chili for the first time.  A friend made this for me last week and her chili was SO tasty that I wanted to make it for my husband.  I have to confess that hers was better, but still today’s chili was enjoyed by the both of us.