Getting off Track

The quickest way to get off track with dieting and exercise is to have a sick child. My youngest step-daughter was sick last week, so three am nights did not make for early morning walks. She is all better now, but I have been completely thrown off my of my P90X schedule. I am trying to catch up, but will be skipping a few days. Today will be KenpoX, before Boardwalk Empire tonight.

I have been trying to enjoy the world of salads lately, but that has not been working out as well as I planned. My will power is not there when it comes to choosing between a salad and a chili cheese hot dog. I am a sad panda.

On a completely different note, I have a few new craft projects to show off! A close fried of mine had a baby girl on Friday, and I brought her two handmade baby presents. One was a knitted, pink and purple, circular baby blanket, and the other an embroidered picture of Alice from one of the original illustrations. My dear friend, The Frazzled Crafter, helped me to frame up the embroidery, since I am totally lost when it comes to those things. Apparently, cutting computer paper for a matte is just not done.

I am very proud with how Alice turned out, and she will be beautiful hanging over a little girl's crib! This is one of the largest embroidery pieces I have ever done, and I think she pulled together nicely. Another friend helped me with creating the image, since my drawing skills are fairly null and void (I once had my stick figures redrawn for me, true story). She was embroidered onto raw linen using cotton threads from my stash. She was originally going to grace my own wall, or possibly my empty etsy shop, but now she will forever be part of my friend's new little girl's life. I think Alice would prefer it this way. I'm not against making more, mind you, I really enjoyed stitching her up while watching TV.

I have been having the urge to pursue more embroidery projects recently, ones that involve using plain wooden hoops as frames, but I need to buy the frames. And come up with ideas. Embroidery is just a great relaxer for me, and doesn't require nearly as much conscious thought on my part as knitting does!

With Halloween, my most favorite of all holidays, right around the corner I am beginning to draw up concept ideas for this years costume. My friends and I often go with a group theme, and this year it will be The Tick. The Frazzled Crafter is going to be our big blue superhero, while I shall be joining in as her hyper intelligent, though not as brave, sidekick Arthur. We will also have a Chairface Chippendale (my husband), as well as a Bat Manuel. While sketching out preliminary ideas, I have decided to make the entire costume out of xxx-large men's white t-shirts for budgetary reasons, as well as comfort. I found a great tutorial online for reconstructing a large t-shirt into a fitted one that I will be using to create the dress. I am pretty excited to get started on this project, and will post pictures are I progress.

I will be testing out this tutorial first, reconstructing a few shirts that are just too big for me to see how it works before venturing into my costume. Test pieces are important!

Well, that is all. There is a Saints game on, fingers are crossed for THREE DAT!