New Projects Galore and new tools review!

I have several projects in the getting started and mostly finished category and it is about time I shared them with you. All three projects will have multiple posts associated with them. I do want to create a library of projects and information and I think it is important to keep each project in its own set of posts; therefore, you’ll get see the start of them throughout this week and into next week. Here's a little sneak peek of what's coming!

Be sure to come back over the next few weeks to see the details of all of these guys including the pattern artists names and where to get your own copies of the patterns!

I haven’t mentioned it yet, but you should know that I have a tool problem. I love them, like an addict would. I swear, I honestly think I have picked projects in the past for no other reason than they require a new tool! I’ve had quite a list of little tools or gadgets that I’ve wanted to pick up for a while now. For some reason, last week, I went nutso and bought five of them! Once I decided I wasn’t going to live another minute without them, I went to Jo-Ann to see which ones I could pick up. Boy was my heart heavy when none, I mean NONE, of them were on sale.

As disappointed as I was, I still desperately wanted to leave with something! I spotted a reasonably priced pair of quilting gloves and decided they were going home with me. Life seemed to slow me down and it was the next day before I started to work on the project that needed quilting. I wanted to practice fairly small free motion patterns and went right to work, forgetting about my gloves just that quickly. As I was working on my quilting, I noticed I was having some trouble moving the fabric around as smoothly as I wanted to. If only I could get a better grip on the top of the fabric….

Lightbulb! I have new gloves!

Let me just tell you – even my low end cheapie gloves made a night and day difference on my ability to move around that fabric. I should have known, I've seen and heard the professionals talk about and use them - probably because they work! I don’t know why I was so pig headed about trying them out, but now I’m so glad I did. Now, I wouldn’t even attempt to quilt without them! If it is something you have been thinking about – go get them! Today!

 I found the other tools on amazon prime for a good price and went ahead and ordered those. They should be here tomorrow and I'm pretty darn excited. I'm not free for studio time until Wednesday, so it is going to be very hard to let that box of fun sit there until then! I have no idea if the other purchases will be as successful as this one, but I will certainly tell you if they are (or if they are really bad). Do you have any "go-to" tools that I can't live without? I'd love to hear about them!


Linking up with Let's Get Acquainted. 

The Sunday Geekery: Chris Hardwick and "Fabric-con"

This week, I acquired tickets to two events and I'm honestly not sure which one is more exciting! No, I'm lying. Now that I've read my own descriptions, I'm positive I know which one is more exciting. I bet you can guess too!

Fabric-CON

Ok, ok, it isn't fabric-CON.  It is the   Original Sewing & Quilt Expo. I'm a nerd - I don't go to or understand an "expo". I do; however, understand a "con". Thus I have dubbed this event fabric-CON. Why you ask? I have no intention of going lightly. There will be no Saturday afternoon browsing or light small talk. Nope, I'm going all in! You got it - three days of panels (classes in the expo world), hardcore shopping (I'm looking into an embroidery machine), and as much networking as I can do (yeah, I love new readers THAT much). I'm going to go to everything from basic apparel sewing to hand bead embellishments with fabric dying, working with leather, and accessories from fabric in between. If my con experience has taught me anything - I'm going to be completely and totally overwhelmed and exhausted. I will leave with so much inspiration that I might just have to sleep for a day or two to free my mind. I wouldn't have it any other way. I'm ultra excited!

They have several of them around the country, I'll be attending the one closest to home in Raleigh June 20 - 22. If you're local and will be there - let me know when, I would love to chat you! If you're not local, be sure to follow me, I will blogging away over that weekend or soon after. I expect it to be packed with tons of new information, product reviews, class reviews, and inspiration of all sorts.

Chris Hardwick!

I think it is safe to call Chris Hardwick the nerd king. He's managed to create himself quite an empire appealing to those us of that like nerd stuff! He's a stand-up comedian and one the lead voice of all things NERDIST. He is performing stand up in Durham (in November, how will I wait that long?!) and I've got some tickets. Of course, I'm cheap, the tickets aren't great. I simply refuse to pay $100+ for two people to see a stand up show, but they are at least in the house. I will most certainly have opinions on the show, be sure to check November (so... far... away...) Sunday Geekery for the review!





There's so many other things from this week I want to share with you - but I will try to stay focused and save them for another day. It's so hard... What is happening in your geekery? Have an events coming that you are excited about?

A little spring for your day!

Roughly this time last year, I was very much into making polymer eggs. They were fun little projects that could be finished fairly quickly and it gave me an opportunity to try all kinds of techniques. I'll be showing all of the eggs in the future. For now, I want to show you my favorite, Spring Swing.

I used a chicken egg for this! To start, I blew out the chicken egg (you can find TONS of tutorials on google if you dont know how that works). Then, I rinsed the egg and baked it at 200 degrees to dry out the inside of the egg and strengthen the shell. I used an extruder to create the long blue and green snakes of clay that I turned into spirals. After I covered the egg with the spirals and made the tree I baked it. Once it was baked and cooled, I broke out a bit of the exposed egg then soaked everything in a bath of plain white vinegar. About six hours later - the egg had magically disappeared! I did have to do a little bit of scraping to clean out some of the shell and membrane that had been left behind.  When the egg was no more, all that was left was to hang the little polymer swing and this one was done!

As I mentioned, it was over a year ago when I made this, so I dont have any pictures of the process along the way. If you're interested in more details, let me know! I'll see if I can get a post together for you.

Thanks for stopping by! I love to hear what you think, please do leave comments if you have them!

A little fashion emergency!

I so WANT to show you all a new project, but the fact is, there isn’t one to show. Well, not one I’m ready to show. I have put a lot of hours into something including a few blog posts in the can; however, I hit a snag - I’m just not interested at the moment. This is just how I work – it took me a long time to accept it, but it’s true. In the past, I would have forged on and forced myself to finish which would ultimately result in cut corners and a piece I wasn’t totally happy with because it was forced. Now – I just put it away. Maybe I’ll finish it, maybe I won’t. The point is I don’t stress over it. This is supposed to be what I do for fun and expression, not something that generates guilt, pressure, or frustration.

What I will show you is a little fashion emergency fix from this morning! I have a necklace that I bought from a very talented artist out of Wilmington, NC, Natasha Caine of Empire Jewelery. (I dont see any web presence for her or I would link you!)

I put it on this morning and it was hanging about three inches lower than I wanted on the shortest jump ring. I thought I was just going to add a jump ring in the chain to get the correct length only to discover the chain was way too small for the jump ring! Grrrrr! I went through my little box of jump rings, wire, and eyelets to discover NONE of them would fit. I didn’t want to damage the necklace or permanently change the length and nearly gave up on it. Then one last bit of inspiration- beading wire! Awwwww yeah… it slipped right through the chain and with a little creative bending and folding, I had a hook eye. Woot! Suedre wins! I’ll wont be able to put my hair up today without exposing my little “fix” but well worth it to wear it!

Have you had any early morning fashion emergencies that you creatively fixed up? Staples perhaps? I’d love to hear about it! Also, I have some exciting news about upcoming events – look for it on Sunday in The Sunday Geekery!

Linked in with Really Random Thursday.

A contest! Sweet Contrary @ Stitched in Color

Well, now, what an interesting project. The gist is to create a mosaic from fabrics at Lark Cottons that fits the described theme of Sweet Contrary as described at Stitched in Color. I figured why not try it, if nothing else - it's good shopping time! Here's what I came up with.

It is quite a mix of fabrics no? The question is - what was I thinking when I created this combination. Honestly, it wasn't that scientific. I knew I wanted a fair amount of white poking around in there to pop some of the other colors.I wanted to stay between yellow - orange on the warm side and blue - purple on the cool side. There's a few other colors hiding in there, but certainly not the star of the fabrics. Then it was just a matter of browsing what was available and picking the ones I loved. It isn't surprising what I ended up with - a little bit of kitschy a lot of mod. I'm pretty sure the contest worked for Lark Cottons - there's a good chance I'll be picking up a few of these!

Want to buy one too? Here they are with direct links if you like any of them as much as I do! (FYI - the links are just me showing you something I like, I get nothing if you click them!)

	Parisville, Eye Drops Mist
	Comma, Swinging Mustard
	Fairy Tale Friends, Magic Beans Aqua
	2wenty-thr3e, Tiles Pavement
	Folklorica, Cartas Marcadas Bright
	Beauty is You, Scalloped Orange

	Tufted Tweets, Itty Bitty Chairs
	Flea Market Fancy, Flower and Dot Turquoise
	Comma, Asteriks Chalk Mustard
	Marmalade, Fleur De Lis Cream
	Comma, Swinging Slate
	Terrain, Seed Pod Stream

Good luck to me! :) Thanks to Michelle @Squeek Crafts for sharing her entry which inspired mine!

Now - I would like to see your mosaic! Link back in the comments and I'll take a look at it for sure.

Yep, I do that too is moving to TheBoredZombie.com

Here we go - I'm working on moving this blog to its own domain name. Blogger and my hosting company both seem to think it is going to be easy-peasy, but I expect trouble. Guess that is the software tester in me! Hopefully it will be all sorted by later today or early tomorrow. Wish me luck!

Update - SUCCESS!

Suedrescreations.blogspot.com is now TheBoredZombie.com! I've owned that domain for several years now. It's pretty cool to be actually using it! Old links should redirect to the new domain. As far as I can tell, everything is working and accessable. If you see any problems, let me know - I'll get them fixed up ASAP.

The Sunday Geekery: SCIENCE! Weird and Actual.

Another weekend at the Carolina Theater! This week was the Evolution of the Groovy Movie Film Series. While I would have liked to have seen them all, sometimes you have to make choices. This time, it was Little Shop of Horrors, Directors Cut and Weird Science.

Little Shop of Horrors - Watch it again!

What a fun movie! Do-wop and dark comedy - does it get any better? This screening was the director's cut which more closely aligns with the stage production. Apparently, it didn’t screen well with tests audiences so it was switched to happier ending we all know and love. In this version, Audrey II wins - everybody dies! Now, let's bear in mind that I love kitschy monster movies. The idea that there would be building size Audrey II's terrorizing NYC with that silly Audrey II laugh is a fun one that makes me smile; however, in the film it doesn't deliver. I don't think that Seymour feeding Audrey to Audrey II kills it nor does Seymour himself being eaten. Where it falls down is going from a character driven story to a disjointed monster movie full of chaos without any build up. It is like someone slapped five minutes of a different movie on the end of this one. I think, for this adaptation, the hint of Audrey IIs taking over the world in the newlywed's garden is enough. Point taken - it isn’t over and the movie keeps a solid flow.

Weird Science – Watch it again!

Oh weird Science. How I love thee. I know a lot of my love for this movie is nostalgia, but I can’t help but enjoy it every time I see it. This movie is the beginning of my RDJ crush. Most people forget he was in this film, but I remember every scene! WARNING – Universal is planning on a remake. From the news I’ve read, it is hard to tell if is something I want to get behind. There are only a few details that indicate it may be a bit more raunchy in the vein of movies like the Hangover. I’m going to reserve judgment, but I find hard to believe they will do better than this one – maybe it will just be different.

Actual Science!

My daughter and one of the girls from her class have decided to enter the Science fair. We spent a few hours this weekend making Elephant Toothpaste with different concentrations of hydrogen peroxide.

The project was lot of fun and I think the girls learned something. You all won’t be surprised, my favorite part was decorating the display board. My daughter’s friend decorated the letters we cut out for the title with little elephants! I was so impressed with her. She figured out a way to bend every elephant in every letter without any repeats. She was totally into it and it was fun to watch her process and see just where she would go with it. I think the 'h' is my favorite!

Looks like I might be double inspired this week. I love the elephant letters and I’d really like to have a little Audrey II on my bookshelf. When I get through my current projects, I might just make one!

What's in your geekery this week?

Photo: Fork'in Egg

I wanted to show this picture first because it is one of my very favorites.

I used a blown out egg that I poked four holes into, just big enough for the fork prongs. I created the yellow and blue pattern in photoshop and printed it on a plain piece of typing paper. The trickiest part was getting the fork without a reflection. I had to change the composition quite a bit to get that flat grey color. I also put a black piece of paper off camera to refelct on the right side of the fork and pop it bit from the background. It took a ton of tries to get everything just right, but I'm so glad I did. I still love this image months later!

The Profile Picture DRAMA!

The profile picture I've been using is 2 years and 30 pounds ago. I want to make sure this blog tells my story in the most honest way possible, so I thought it time to take a new photo.

There are a few problems. I cant do outside pictures. My eyes are super sensitive to the sunlight and all outside pictures are big giant sunglasses or Squinty mcSuedre. Which means, no natural light for me! I didnt want to make a big to-do about it by dragging out camera equipment and lights, a candid Windows phone pic was really all I needed and exactly what I wanted. It started off as I expected. Sitting right by myself in my studio I was an awkward mess, scared to death of the evil camera as I've been my whole life. I got frustrated - decided to act silly and ended up with some pictures that made me laugh out loud when I looked back at them. I couldn't not share them with you!

It's all hand!	A head with no body	I just did something really evil!
Heeeeeerrree's Suedre!	No, nothing is funny.	Really, not funny.
Getting verrrry sleepy	It's a fly!	Winner!!

So, what do you think? Did I pick the right one? Do you have photo anxiety when it comes to taking pictures of yourself?

The Mushroom House Square

I'm very fortunate to have been invited to a quilting bee in our area. Sadly, I have yet to make it - April is going to be my month! Anyway, the talented ladies in the bee are working on a charity quilt where each quilter makes a 12" house square. I figured, if I can't seem to get there, I could at least contribute! Here's my square:

Every time I look at it, the lyric "One of these things is not like the others" pops right into my head. They have all made these beautiful traditional style houses and here I come with big old mushroom. I started to not bring it to the bee organizer because it is so different from the others in both color and style. I took it anyway, ready to have her give it back. She was beyond gracious and thankful. I even gave her an out to not keep it, and she held on to it. Phew!

Here it is coming together:
First I need to draw the pattern. I absolutely love this site: Free Online Graph Paper. There are generators for all kinds of graph patterns and you can control the size of the grids on all of them. In this case, I wanted a 12"x12" grid broken into 1" squares. As a bonus, I had it add in some extra fine lines at 1/2" to help round out the corners.

Obviously, I'm not going to get a 12x12 grid with 1 inch squares from my inkjet so I printed one with .5" squares for planning and several pages of the 1" squares. A little tape and scissor action and I have exactly what I need.

Now I just draw my mushroom on the bigger grid and trace out the house and roof pieces on some fusible web.

Time to make a background. I picked out some whimsical fabrics in my collection and quickly realized it was a nighttime mushroom. (Look at that - Ta-Dot! Is useful again with the ground layer!)

I thought it would be extra neat to make the door and window have a "glow" effect as if there were lights on inside. To that end, I got a little creative with my fabric layering.

The whole sandwich from bottom up:

• Super Solvy Stabilizer
• Sky/Ground square fabric
• White cotton (to hide the background fabric)
• Plain layer of yellow tulle
• layer of yellow tulle with the house fused to it
• Super Solvy Stabilizer

I always try to work from the middle out whenever I can, so I hooped it with room to reach the center window and door. I realize I have a lot to say about hooping! Look for it in a future post.

Now it is ready to embroider. There's a million ways I could do this, but I'm hyper focused on practicing a thick zig zag border type stitch. I think this is something that has potential and with enough practice, I can make the lines nice and smooth with consistent stitching.

After finishing the window, curve of the door and creating a new line across the bottom of the door, I can uphoop the project and cut as much of the extra layers of fabric out as possible. In this case - I cut the white cotton and bottom layer of tulle as close to the door and window stitching as possible.

You can't quite see the light effect yet for the remaining layer of super solvy and tulle, but it is starting to take shape. Now it is back to the zig zag until I make it all the way around the house.

All done! Now I get to remove the super solvy and cut out that last layer of tulle, yay! lights!

The top of the house goes on the same way, but it's fabric sandwich is much smaller - no tulle, no white cotton.

Once the mushroom top was on, all that was left was adding a few borders and calling it done! I did edit myself a TON on this one. I think it looks a little plain (could use some fabric changes or other appliques), but plain is good for the whole project.

I hope to make it to the bee this month and I hope the rest of the bee is as accepting as Ginny and likes it, even if it is non-traditional. I think it's pretty cute for sure!


Linking up with Freshy Pieced!
Linking up with Fiber Artist Journey!
Linking up with Free Motion Quilting Project!

Copycat! Autumn Faerie Treasure Jar

About a year ago, I came across a site, Poly Clay Play, that sells polymer clay supplies and some project files. I saw the Autumn Faerie Treasure Jar by Lori Jarrett. I thought it would be fun to try to make so I bought the instructions and went for it.

Want the instructions? Get them here!

I really enjoyed this project. The instructions were clear, full of photos and didn't require a lot of specialized tools (I used a rock from the landscaping for texture rather than the texture plates suggested). Lori goes through each step and does not assume or take for granted the readers prior experience. I did this three or four times with different colors and techniques until I finally realized it was pretty great as Lori had it and I made it with just a few adjustments for supplies I had on hand. I was also less aggressive with the final paint wash, though I think the darker colors would have been fine too. To me, this project is all about texture. Each piece of the jar gets a slightly different texture treatment that creates a cohesive and fun to view jar.

I also want to encourage you to check out Poly Clay Play. Whenever possible, I go out of my way to support smaller businesses and stay out of the big box stores. Trish is an excellent, communicative business owner that followed through with every promise she made. She even followed through when I wasn't expecting it. I was impressed enough that a year later, I'm telling you to go buy form her when you can. Another bonus - They keep a record of all of your purchases - which means - when you lose your PDF like I did, you can go right back, log in, and grab another copy. Thanks a million Trish - I promise when I'm back in the polymer clay market I'll be stopping by!

I don't have a lot of additional projects that I can say were directly inspired by this tutorial. (too much time at the sewing machine and not enough time with clay!) This project was my introduction into pearl-ex powders. I love the finish it creates and they are quite fun to work with. I had a good groupon and bought a set of 32 that are a great size for working with polymer. At the moment, I only have one sample of where I've used the pearl-ex, but there will be more in the future!

The floor tiles are shiny IRL, they look like the inside of a clam shell.

The Sunday Geekery: Room 237 and The Shining

It can't be all crafting all time! I'm looking forward to sharing all kinds of geekery. You could expect anything from movies to tech tips and everything in between. I so hope you'll come by on Sundays and check it out and share you geekery with me!

This week I had the pleasure of attending a screening of Room 237 and The Shining at the Carolina Theater.

Room 237 Recommendation - RENT
Room 237 is a documentary that allows five people to share their theories of hidden messages and themes in Stanley Kubrick's The Shining. Their ideas are pretty far out there. The most plausible of the bunch being The Shining offers irrefutable proof  that Kubrick was a key player in faking the moon landing footage. Yeah - the most plausible. I wouldn't say it is terrible, it certainly generates conversation and some of the ideas are interesting and amusing. I will say I wish it was a different movie. I think I would have liked it far better if had spent a little more time on the nuts. As it is, we never see the speakers faces and have to draw all of their enthusiasm and passion from their recorded voices, that at times, seem to be attempting to convince themselves more than me.

Maybe Kubrick is a genius that has managed to hide all sorts of deep and meaningful secret messages that a select few have been able decode. Then again - maybe it is a film with some continuity errors. Either way - I give Room 237 a MEH. I'm glad I checked it out, but I don't find it groundbreaking, overly interesting or unique.

The Shining Recommendation - SEE IT AGAIN!
Wow, The Shining. It has to be one of the most terrifying movies ever made. Stephen King has been vocal about his displeasure with Kubrick's adaptation of his film. One of his issues is that Kubrick does not play up the supernatural aspect affecting Jack and thus doesn't make Jack a sympathetic character. Mr. King, I love you, but  I respectfully disagree. Sure, your dad being possessed and chasing you down with an ax is scary; however, your dad chasing you down with an ax because he WANTS TO is absolutely horrifying to the core!

Maybe the Room 237 nuts are right, maybe there is some subtext to the movie us "normal people" can't see. Well - call me normal then. I like the film as a horror/suspense that uses all the horror/suspense tricks we love in a different way. I had not seen it in several years and I forgot just how good it was. If you're local, it is playing all week at Carolina, go! go! go! If you're not - rent it and watch it again!


So tell me - what going on in your geekery??