Nameless kitten

So, despite my deep desire to own a dog, I got another cat. I would really, REALLY love to have a dog, but right now I can't really afford one, and I'm not really fit enough to walk one. Plus, I was offered this beautiful little ball of fluff..



He is a 7 and a half week old little ball of fluff. Except that he has a vagina, so he's not actually a he. He's also currently nameless. I had some ideas, but none of them really fit him. And he hasn't provided me with one of his own yet, like Smudge did. I'm sure it'll come to me.

Please forgive the bad pictures: I haven't had him during a daytime yet, and the lighting in my apartment is atrocious.





She's only been here a few hours so far, and has been isolated to the bedroom. She came in, looked around, ate a lot, then fell asleep. Slap bang in the middle of the bed, leaving me with just the edges. But she woke up about half an hour ago and has been running around squeaking at everything, including me any time I move. She doesn't appear to have developed a meow yet, just a squeak.

Smudge has been given reign of the living room. I went in to see her earlier, and make sure she knows I still love her. She had a sniff around the house, but didn't go anywhere near the bedroom. I don't think the dozy beast has even cottoned on that there's another animal in the house. She'll figure it out eventually.

Pets on YouTube

I posted a video of Smudge on YouTube



And one of Toby. Toby is an 8 week old Westie, and he belongs to a family friend.

Knittaversary

So, Tuesday 26th October was my 2 year Knittaversary. I wrote about it last year. This year, in keeping with the tradition I started with my Crochetaversary, I've made a video. This is every completed knitted project I've ever made. Reasonably impressive. :-)

Crochetaversary

Today I realised that I have been crocheting for exactly one year and one day. To celebrate I made a little slideshow of all my work. This doesn't include a completed christmas present, or the four pieces I'm currently working on.

Quite possibly the cutest thing I've ever seen...

A video of funnies

I found this on blaugh and it made me giggle on an otherwise gloomy day. Especially the puppy in the second to last clip.

New Thing # 46

Date:- 1st December 2009
New Thing:- Post a video on Youtube

Unlike my dear friend Charlotte, I am not a vlogger. I much prefer the written word. But, for one of my new things I decided to post a video on YouTube. First challenge - I had no idea what to post. All of my initial ideas are not suitable for Youtube. I thought about doing a photo montage or something, but that seemed a little like a cop out. I thought about actually doing a vlog - as in, speaking to the camera - but that idea kinda terrifies me. So I came up with this...



As you can see, that is not a video I have simply uploaded to my blog. I am on YouTube. Admittedly, the video is pathetic. But it's there!

It kind of ignited a little spark in me. Years and years ago I did the first year of an Higher National Diploma in Media and Photography. I made a music video with my partner that I was very proud of. I have it on DVD, but I don't know how to get it on the interwebs. Making this - very short, very silly, very pointless - video made me want to make more. I'll think about it, but I'll let you know if I ever do.

A stitching advancement

A loonnnng time ago I decided I wanted to crochet. My dear friend Cayden taught me how. You can read about it all here, it was one of my New Things. It did not end well.

I can chain. I can chain forever and ever and ever. It's finger-knitting with a hook. But whenever I try the next step I end up with a big knot of yarn that I can't help but think would have been put to much better use as a knitted project.

Since then I've had another attempt or two, but never getting any further, so I usually forget about it. Until I go looking for knitting patterns and inevitably run across some amigurumi patterns.

This is an amigurumi...



And so is this...



And so are all these...





On the internet, and floating around the stitching circles within which I find myself at home, there are a million zillion patterns for little amigurumi dudes. And you can't flipping knit one!!

So I had another go at crocheting. This time I tried a youtube video...



And, after a few disastrous knots and a few yards of wasted yarn, I finally got the hang of it. I managed to make... well a ball. And today I made another ball. And now I have a body type thing.



Once I get a chance to find a yarn store here, I'll get some eyes and other notions and maybe by the end of next week my double ball thing will actually be some kind of amigurumi. My first crocheted project!

Of course, having learned from a video I now have no idea how to read a pattern. For this I appealed to the aforementioned Cayden and he found me a cute little pattern that says everything long hand. So that's my next step. I've done a bit of revision/research, and I think I might be able to handle a simple pattern with the shorthand version. We'll see I guess.

I am a multi-talented stitcher! I knit. I embroider. I crochet! And, after purchasing some delicious fabrics from Walmart the other day, I plan to become a seamstress as well. Watch this space.

--

UPDATE: Whilst searching for images of amigurumi to show you, I found this. I don't know if I'll ever be able to find a pattern, or if I'll ever be good enough to make it, but I WANT IT!!!

Where I'm Staying

Here's a couple of pictures and a quick video tour of my room...

New Thing # 25

Date:- August 21st 2009
New Thing:- make bread from scratch

My dad was always baking when I was younger, and Jen has recently become addicted to it. I've made cakes before, but I've never made bread. So I dug out one of my mother's recipe books, recruited by glamorous assistant Michaela...



...and laid out my ingredients for my customary 'before' picture.



I knew it wouldn't be easy, but I didn't quite anticipate the waiting. Once we'd sifted all the flour...




...and mixed it all up...



...we pounded it to death.



(Not sure if this'll work, but here's a video of Michaela taking some frustrations out on the bread.)



And after we'd done all that, we had to put it in the airing cupboard and let it settle. Then we got to pound it a bit more, and then put it in tins. We couldn't find any bread tins so we made square bread...



Cue another trip to the airing cupboard and another wait for it to rise. Mine rose okay, but Michaela's was a little wonky...



Into the oven, more waiting, and out of the oven.

Here's the dangerous part. I picked the tin up with the tea towel except that when I turned it over to tip the bread out, the tea towel slipped and I didn't realise. Cue me dropping the tin, shrieking and rushing to the cold tap. I spent most of the evening with my pinky finger in the freezer, then in a glass of ice. It was fine while it was cold, but hurt when the cold wore off. Not a big injury. This morning it was fine, no pain and just a little bit of shiny skin.

The bread looked good though...



Tasted good too. I sliced it up while it was still warm enough to melt the butter. Was scrummy yummy delicious. Not sure if I'll do it again though.

A bit of cute video humor for you...

Addicted to lols, part 2

I have had a total of two hours sleep since I woke up at stoopid o'clock this morning. And have I used the rest of the time to be productive and get stuff done? Have I buggery. I've looked at the entire back archives of this website. During my hours and hours of giggling and wasting time, I have bookmarked about six more sites to look up, and decided to subject you to watching some very funny videos. Be warned though, they are geeky. If you aren't a geek, you may not appreciate the full humour.

This one is a nice little piece about a revolutionary new piece of software called "Paint"...



This one is the reason I don't use Macs...



What if websites were people?...

Damn, I can't get the embedding to work, but follow this link. It's worth it. Very funny.

What if fonts were people?...

Watch Font Conference on CollegeHumor

If you're a Twitterer, here's a little warning video for you...

More linkage.

This is quite cool. Very clever...

One more link.

This one reminded me of GKL so much, mainly because of the era, but it's very clever and so true too...



This one is the reason I haven't owned a personal printer in about five years...

Another link.

There, viral video torture over.

post-its galore!

addicted to lols

I've always liked Lolz. It started with lolcatz and moved on to loldogz and lolcelebs and growing with each new comic or site I'm referred to. I've recently discovered, thanks to N's phone, a new site called laffles. Now, I like to save the lols that really make me laugh, for future enjoyment, you know. But on Laffles you can't save them, so we were googling other instances of the same pictures. Which only led to more lols sites. Then I realised that on some of these new sites people were posting pictures from OTHER sites. It's a never ending cycle. I currently have (including quote sites and blogs) over 40 sites that I check for updates on a daily basis. Can you say addicted?

But they're funny. They cheer me up. And here's a brilliant example. It's just cute at first, but around the 0.50 mark it gets absolutely hilarious and had me giggling for ten minutes. I want that cat.

Cutest video ever

A bit of an experiment

Every week I get an email that tells me the week's top five viral videos. This week I wanted to share one with the world and wondered if I could stick it in my blog. Then I thought about photos as well. I've discovered the functions for adding video and photos, and there's an embedding thing I've found. I'm going to test it:



That should, in theory, be the video. And this.....


Should be the latest Lolpet I downloaded. It describes my current mood perfectly.

So, to publish and to see if it worked.