I *heart* yogurt

But I really hate paying for yogurt. that stuff is EXPENSIVE, y'all. And most typical yogurt either has WAY too much sugar in it, which i'm trying to avoid because i discovered that too much sugar gives me migraines that are terrible, or it contains aspertame or some other kind of fake sweetener in it, which i'm trying to avoid.

So i was bumming around the internets today (i do this a lot) and found several recipes for home-made yogurt. except most of them are really complicated and require things like candy thermometers and coolers and sound super duper complex. I think that takes too much effort, and also equipment i don't own and don't wanna buy.

Then i found a recipe to make yogurt in the crockpot. It takes two ingredients and a crockpot. I have a crockpot. I also have one of the two ingredients needed to make the yogurt: milk. all i need to do is get my hands on some plain yogurt and i'll be good to go!

So that's gonna be my experiment next week. I'm really excited about it!

UFO's

No, not the alien kind. Although that would be cool too. I'm talking unfinished objects here, folks. The kind where i start a crochet or knitting project and then get distracted and move on to something different. This happens more often than i'd care to admit. I've got UFO's all over my living room:

A slouchy hat: This is for winter. I started it last winter. I haven't finished it yet.

An alpaca wool Scarf: Again, i started it last winter. then i ran out of yarn. Then hobby lobby ran out of the yarn i needed and didn't restock until spring. by then i didn't need the scarf anymore.

A sock: I really do plan on making two socks. I got halfway through the first one...and there it sits.

A 3-foot Dinosaur: He's camouflage. He's gonna be really cool when i finish him. But he's also 140 stitches around at the biggest point, which is where i am now, and it takes FOREVER to complete a round.

An olive green Platypus: Platypus' are cool.

Dan's Birthday gift: This one i am actually making progress on, since i only have a month to finish it, and i'm determined...but once again...not done yet.

A Striped prayer shawl: This was started as an attempt to practice a new technique. I have since employed said technique on Dan's birthday gift and have abandoned the shawl to UFO status. It's cool because the prayer shawl ministry doesn't meet again till September.

A lap blanket: also started as a prayer shawl ministry project. Also have until September to finish it.

Tom Baker's Scarf: I'm knitting this one, y'all. To be authentic. I'm about a foot into it and have something like fourteen feet to go. I've since cannibalized the yarn i bought for the scarf to make animals. I'm going to replace said yarn on a skein by skein basis as i need the colors. SOMEDAY, i will finish this stupid scarf so i can become one of the elite; a proud owner of a handmade DR. Who scarf.

And I've been commissioned to make a blue triceratops for a three year old's birthday. That isn't until the end of October though. So i haven't started it yet. I'm already contemplating yarn color choices, however.

On the plus side; I've got something like...25 granny squares to send to charity for Crochet a rainbow, I've made...18ish animals to send to Little Hands of Hope, and I do occasionally sell an animal here or there. Plus I've made a HUGE dent in my yarn stash, which, for the record, wasn't that ridiculous to begin with. However, all typed out...my list is kinda crazy. I need to get on that.

why are titles so hard to come up with, anyway?

Dan's gone this week; he left at the crack of dark for NM with the high schoolers for their missions trip. They're driving and it's going to be a long trip, although they split it up over two days. I think he's gonna be in for a bit of culture shock when he gets there. Plus a shock over the weather. I don't think he's ever experienced heat without humidity.

I'm here this week, keeping myself busy. I just learned a cool new crochet technique called Afghan stitch and i'm using it to make a prayer shawl for the ministry i'm involved in. I'm really excited about how it's going to turn out. I'm also working on a stuffed dinosaur that's going to supposedly be about 3 feet long when i finish him. That's gigantic. In fact, that's only two feet shorter than I am. I dunno what i'm going to do with him when i finish him though. I'll burn that bridge when I come to it, LOL.

The weather here has taken a turn for the strange, again; the last couple days it's only been in the mid 70's after about a week of 90+ weather. If it stays like this all summer it'll be totally fine. I think everyone here overreacts about how hot it gets. AND they don't have anything like the humidity in MD.

Last weekend my parents were here and we had a good visit. We all went to Independence, MO and saw where the Oregon Trail had started. We've been to the other end, in OR, so we figured we'd hit up this end. It was nice, there was a cute little museum dedicated to the start of the trail and the various places the trails went. Then we drove around a bit and saw some other things, like this funky building that is the world headquarters for some type of LDS church, and the house Harry S Truman lived in, and a woman driving a horse and buggy while talking on her cell phone. That was pretty funny.

I'm teaching the 4-6 year old class Sunday school this summer, so today i made playdoh. Green, if you're wondering. It took me all of forty-five seconds on my stove. That's probably the only thing my stove has ever done in a way that was better than the recipe called for.

And as a final thought, the spell checker in Google chrome just informed me that schoolers should in fact say schooners. Yeah, right.

Animals

I figured I should post some pictures of some of the things i've been crocheting lately. Well, maybe not should, but I'm going to anyway.

Elephant

Monkey

Pony

Lion

Walrus

I've got several more but blogger only lets me upload so many pictures....but they're all along the same basic lines.

randomness, because it's late.

You know, it never ceases to amuse me to hit account on this site and have it tell me I'm only managing one blog. I barely keep up with this one. I don't really think I could handle two or more blogs.

Anyway; onto my topic. Wait, I don't have a topic. Well, that might be problematic. Maybe I'll just ramble about my camera. I'm now the proud owner of a pretty Nikon DSLR. Which I use on auto. because, honestly, I have read the manual. and digital photography for dummies. and about a million tutorials online for switching the camera to manual, and adjusting the ISO, and the Aperture, and the....S....Shutter speed, maybe? I don't remember right now. But all those things you're supposed to be able to do to take gorgeously delicious pictures.

And then i close whatever I'm reading, and promptly forget all my newly obtained knowledge. Like which of those three things an f-stop relates to. and which way the numbers are supposed to go. Seriously, I've got the lingo down. I just don't know how to put them together to take a pretty picture. And, hey, the camera has an auto setting for a reason, right?

It's HOT here. Which, I know, was bound to happen sooner or later. Personally, I was rooting for later. Like, in July later. Two months of summer? perfect. I can probably deal with that. Five months of summer? Thanks, I'll pass. I'm definitely more of a cold weather kind of person.

I just put new music on my iPod. Seven whole songs worth. Five of which were from the free section of iTunes. I've found some of my favorite music that way. And a lot of music that wasn't worth the time it took to download. Also a couple of Mumford and Sons songs. Hopefully they live up to the hype. If not...well, they're English. at the very least they'll have awesome accents.

I've been crocheting. Like, a Lot. I'll have to take pictures of the adorable doll I made. Seriously, she's so cute you'll want to keep her forever. plus, she has a ridiculous amount of hair. I'm not even kidding. I got a normal ponytail holder around her hair twice. For reference, I can get a normal ponytail holder around my hair...like...five times. Granted, my hair isn't made out of yarn. I've also made several animals (I actually have people pay me to make them. Which is awesome, because I'm pretty much getting paid to do what i do anyway.) And I've made several shawls in the last month for the church's prayer shawl ministry. That will be on hiatus over the summer, which is awesome, because making something that resembles a blanket in July when it's 105 degrees outside and almost as hot in your house is not pleasant.

Right. I'm gonna stop spewing words out of my fingers now and go curl up with my book. Incarceron, if you're curious. It's kinda Victorian, kinda post-apocalypse, and completely exciting. Plus, I haven't read it before. So I don't know how it's going to end. Well, I do, but only because I read the back of the book first. But I don't know how it's going to get to it's conclusion. That makes it all the more exciting.

my table

Ok, this is that table i showed ya'll yesterday. After gleefully dismantling The Time Machine (ok, not really; it felt wrong to be tearing apart a book). I decoupaged the pages randomly to the table.

That's a closeup of the pages. The mod podge dried clear, and kinda shinyish.

Then I trimmed off all the excess. I still need to sand down the edges (because you can only cut so much with scissors), and seal it so i don't have to worry about it gettting wet. Ignore the mess around the table. I haven't cleaned up the extra pages yet. And yes, those are my feet. :)

See this table? I'm working on it to make it better. I'm hoping to cover up the hole in it and make it interesting before I bury it under all my kitchen appliances I don't have room for in my kitchen. I'll probably have it done tomorrowish so stay tuned!

Hair toys and other stuff.

I made myself a bunch of pretty headbands last week out of ribbon, and felt, and taffeta, and satin. here's what I learned:

Felt melts like nylon when you burn it. Probably because it's made out of about the same stuff.

Taffeta burns REALLY fast. If you're not careful, you will burn your fingers. I may or may not have learned this firsthand.

Satin burns much slower, and more controlled. It still turns out really pretty though.

Hot glue makes a good gripper thing if you put it on the bottom side of a headband.

Hobby Lobby is the coolest store ever. (it is. Really.)

I've moved on to new projects now. My sister in law sent me some pretty pictures for me to hang on my wall and i've been trying to come up with a creative way to do that without having to put holes in the wall.

I think i'm going to buy cheap wooden plaques from hobby lobby (i love them. I really do.) and paint them, then modge podge the photos to the plaques. I can use the magic velcro things dan discovered to hang the plaques on my wall and i don't have to use a nail. Plus, they'll be nice and durable and easy to move, and i won't have to worry about breaking the glass in a picture frame. And also, picture frames are expensive.

I inherited a bunch of furniture from Beka this weekend, including a second coffee table. It's got a hole in it (walmart's fault, not hers), so i think i'm gonna fill the hole with a piece of cardboard and buy an old book from a thrift store, and cover the top of the table with the pages from the book and again modge podge. I've found several similar tutorials for this on the internets and I really like the look. Plus, its a book. So when i get bored, i can read the table. :)

After that, I just might try my hand at stripping and refinishing furniture. Because I can, and it would be fun. I think. It's at least worth a try, right?

I'm feeling crafty...

No, not that kind of crafty. The kind of crafty that requires me to whip out my glue gun and some fabric and create something awesome.

Oh, wait. I don't own a glue gun. Or fabric, for that matter.

Hmmm...I should work on that. I found a tutorial online today for an absolutely adorable fabric flower headband thingy. I think it's cute. And i wants one.

On the other hand, I bought myself a couple scarves to dye and tie in my hair. that i am really excited about. I just need to get kool-aid.

spring cleaning

I'm in the process of spring cleaning; a much needed process in my house. Today, the living room. I vacuumed the WHOLE thing (dan came out and asked me why the couch was blocking the front door...i told him i was rearranging the furniture and i liked it that way). We are moving around our movie bookshelves so that i can FINALLY get the gerbils OFF the floor and up where they can see and i can see them. They're way fun to watch as they dig tunnels and try to escape their cages.

Next to tackle? the KITCHEN! (DUN DUN DUN)