I’m torn between giving this 4 or 5 stars. In the end, I’m super happy with these. That said, I did do some heavy modifications on them.
My rock collection is small samples. My shelves are 2 inches deep and about 3 inches high. So my display samples are small. These were the smallest stands I could find. I love the super clean clinical look. It doesn’t take away from the stone at all. I like that adjustable arms can be moved to hold different stones. I love the clean look. I don’t want to just set a rock on the shelf. I want it displayed and labeled. I want a clean organized collection. Not just a pile of rocks.
So I thought these would be perfect. They almost were. Hence my considering 4 stars. If I were to use them as is, the only issue I have is the insanely tight fit in the base. One, I couldn’t get all the way in. I pushed on the top peg only and it pushed through the others. So then I pushed down on the lower pegs and that was enough to tear the thin metal wrapping them together. Not noticeable displayed on the shelf, but disappointing. It’s still just not fully inserted.
Now, another fact is that I heavily tweaked these. I need my specimens plus the stand to be around 3 inches. The stand actually holds the specimens a decent height off the shelf. I can’t measure this for you as I’ve already altered mine. I used my Dremel with a metal cutting wheel to take the height off the bottom (Dremels are magic). This allows the lower pegs to sit closer to the acrylic base.
This made me happy for some of my specimens, but wasn’t working for displaying the smaller slices and stones. They wanted to lay down because the arms are over 2 inches long. Time to get out the pliers. I was able to bend the back peg forward according to each stones need to display it exactly as I wanted (see picture). It’s a thick peg so it did require a bit of force.
Now they’re perfect! I added a tiny label to the acrylic and these look great on my shelves! Here are the 4 I ordered and tweaked (see picture). I’m very happy with the final result. I will buy again, but they need modification. I was also very disappointed in the one that tore the metal wrap when I tried to get it in the base. So I’m knocking it down the 4 stars.
So yesterday, I posted about how my car was 10 and needed a cleaning. Well, this weekend is my long weekend and my Friday plans I was excited about got damned, so I can clean my car! I looked up the weather. Nice. I’m gonna do this. I’ll clean the inside too! So I’ve got outside car stuff, I wanted to get the Armor All wipes for the inside. I don’t like bottled cleaners — wipes are so convenient. So I go to Amazon.
I find what I need and put it in my cart. We’re checking out — when’s this gonna arrive? NEXT TUESDAY? What the fuck? Six days? SIX DAYS? On a prime item!? Are you kidding me? You also have raised your prime cost multiple times and now put commercials in my shit. Not cool, Amazon.
So if I don’t wash my car this weekend, it aint getting done. So I figure — Walmart pickup. I get everything in my cart for pickup. I’ll grab it tomorrow cause I gotta go into the office. Then it’s like Walmart turned into a shiny demon … in the middle of the road. AND HE SAID
“Want this delivered?
For free?
Today?”
That’s right, bitches. Walmart plus is free for the first month with free same day delivery. If you choose to keep it, it’s only $13 a month after that. Oh AND it comes with Paramount+. Wait, don’t you already pay a hundred dollars a year for Paramount+? “hisssssssssssss.”
And here’s my shit. On my counter.
That’s right. I even added some heavy cat litter and frozen pizzas. Got here in a few hours — only that long because I didn’t give a fuck so chose a time that it said was a “slow time.”
And this is the license plate frame I’m gonna go with:
So yeah, Amazon is going down. You know I’m always way behind on trends so if I’m here — they’re done for. And have you seen all the articles and videos about how Amazon is just filled with drop shippers and fake Chinese knock offs now? You don’t see quality name brands on Amazon anymore. They’ve made it nearly impossible to sell on their platform for legitimate businesses and they don’t care. They want you to buy the cheap Chinese junk. And most of what you see is “Sponsored” shit that doesn’t even match your search inquiry well.
Dammit. I hate Walmart AND Amazon. But I need convenient and FAST. Amazon Prime and Walmart+ prove that people will pay more for the speed. Can I get Home Depot in on this?
Also, I had the “End of the World” music video mixed up in my head with the “Bad Day” video which I always found funny. So BONUS TRACK:
It’s been an absolute fucking shit show of a week in the C household so it’s appropriate too.
So Lumalee is my next project. He has two mushrooms with him. I bought Premiere Parfait Chunky Yarn ($4 US) for these Nintendo projects. And I special ordered the green from Istanbul. Why? Well, it’s damn hard to find baby blanket yarn in bright colors. So I asked the lady I bought the Mario and Luigi patterns from what green she used for her Luigi. Well, in Europe, Himalaya Dolphin Baby is the big cheap chenille yarn. USA doesn’t seem to have it. We have the Premiere Parfait. But we don’t have a bright green! So yes, I ordered this from Europe. It was $2 (US) a skein but shipping was going to be $50 for all the colors I needed. I was like, I can’t pay more for shipping than for the yarn! The seller said they just charge by the gram, sorry. So I ONLY ordered 4 skeins of this “grass green.”
They arrive vacuum packed which was funny. I wasn’t sure what the package was and thought my yarn hadn’t been delivered. Look at this:
This shit compacts. They also threw in some evil eyes. Thanks?
So yeah. I needed to see what crochet hook to use. Some people say 5mm and some say 4mm. I did this mushroom in a 5mm. I’m gonna go with that.
I will also note, the Himalaya Dolphin is WAY BETTER than the Chunky Parfait. They look the same, but working with them is very different. The Dolphin barely sheds at all. Only when cutting. The Parfait sheds a lot and you have to be very careful frogging and stitching is a pain. Shedding all over. LAME. I was easily able to do my magic circle in the Himalaya Dolphin, didn’t even question it. It was IMPOSSIBLE in the Parfait. I had to get out another yarn and do my 6 stitches on that yarn and then tie it tight to make the circle. Cause Chunky was NOT going to do it.
So someone start selling this shit for cheap in the US. Here’s what those 4 cost me. I better get Luigi plus a few 1 Ups. Maybe I should have ordered more? But no, because the shipping went up with every single one. Ugh. Glad I got the 4 though.
Item Total $10.60
Shipping $17.92
Sales Tax $0.85
Order Total $29.37
He very cute. OH, I got the pattern for Lumalee plus two mushrooms from AzeliaCrochet on Etsy. The pattern is well written with lots of pictures.
This weekend was supposed to be my blissful relaxation time. Four day weekend. Nothing needs to be done. Garage is clean, Both offices cleaned (I even spoofed up Husband’s). Garage and storage room — perfect. It’s too wet to rake leaves. I could put up the new ring camera, but I’ve got months to do that before the pool pump is on. So yeah. Fours days to RELAX.
Has it been that. FUCK NO. Meet my fans:
Yeah, those are industrial drying fans and a dehumidifier that have been running constantly since Friday morning and will continue to do so until AT LEAST 3:00pm on Monday when they come out and check on things. We had a washing machine incident. Downstairs is a stressful disaster. It sounds like Google’s server room and yeah, pieces of my floor and ceiling are missing. I will talk about it later.
Like, yall. Even the fucking cat is stressed the hell out. These fans are LOUD. We’ve all had to retreat to the upstairs. I live downstairs. I don’t like this.
But then, last night, we went out to a swanky dinner to celebrate K and husband looked so cute in his suit! And we got a great posed shot of my tattoo — plus I was looking hot!
I’ve also been working on my rock collection. I’ve added a few more specimens. And yes, I relabeled them all. Now the labels are all at the same level and straight. THANK YOU. I will also post more about this later. I’ve got a big Yooperlite coming in so yeah, there’s gonna be more rock pictures.
I did order more shelves. They didn’t have the distressed white anymore, so I had to order brown. So I had to spray paint them all to match each other. Which mean Walmart. Thankfully, I put out a call and K2 was willing to go to Walmart with me. We got three cans of Rustoleum white semi gloss primer and paint in one. Like one can extra.
No. No. I put the first coats on while they cut up my floor and ceiling. Then I had to run out to ACE before the septic people came to get TWO MORE CANS. Surely I don’t need two more? Yeah. Yeah I did. But they look awesome!
It looks like I don’t have room to expand, but I totally do. I liked it better with an extra vial on each shelf. Plus I mixed in some empty bottles to spread it out. I’m also going to acquire medium (2ish inch) specimens of my favorites. I have a two inch sphere of Yooperlite on the way. Then I’ve got my eye on some Petoskey stones. Then I want to get a natural uncut, UNDYED, Ruby that fluoresces. I’ve found two options I’m eyeing — click 1 and click 2. Obviously, the click 1 there is preferred, but it might sell out before I get to buying that one. I also want some peacock ore…
I was not aware that I gasped like a B movie actor in real life — nor that I snicker like a leprechaun stealing gold when I grab happy things. Apparently, I do. So there’s that. Let’s hope if I’m ever witness one of those dramatic “I’m pregnant with your baby” moments in real life, that I keep it together. I did buy this, obviously. However, kickstarters usually come so late and I never got a tracking notice so I was NOT expecting this.
LET’S OPEN IT! There is a lot of waste in this packaging because this guy has dense foam on the top and bottom and full corner pads. But it makes for a perfectly unblemished box.
I think it’s cute that it looks like a cargo crate, but I’m a bit sad that it doesn’t say “Firefly” on the side because that is what shows on my game shelves. So it’s not particularly attractive on my gaming shelves. It sticks out because it’s so large too. So it’s kind of unattractive on my shelf, to be honest. Insanely impressive when you get it out — but just not a looker on the shelf. (*See UPDATE at end of post)
The first layer is 4 token trays. Note that every tray in this box has a clear lid, they are removed for the photos so they don’t glare. So each of these trays has an individual lid for it. As you can see, I’ve already punched out all the tokens. Note that I put the round green tokens in the wrong place. They should go in the slot marked “Haven.” (*See UPDATE at end of post) I had to watch the gif of the packaging on the kickstarter a few times to get a screenshot of this level to see if I did it correctly.
I do love that everyone can have their own tray, or at most, share a tray with someone else. Less reaching around the table and huge game board. Less little piles of discarded fuel tokens all over the place where we’re not sure if you own that or just discarded it…
Level two has a lot to reveal. We can see they have a slot for the neoprene mat (which is actually part of the tray below this one). THANK YOU for giving us a place for the mat in the box. Holy shit, hallelujah!
In this tray we have all of the start up “stuff”. You’ve got your ship cards, the captain cards, and the drivecore cards here. Every ship has a custom matching die. The number six is marked by a Firefly. As you can see on the last die in the row, the number one is marked with a sad face. I think that is for a game variant.
We have the “Big Money” here. I wish it came with the regular money. This game takes up enough table space. I love the big money, but I wish they had included the small money to play with too. I don’t want to cannibalize it from my previous game because I might as well sell that game or give it away.
There’s also the setup cards, single player story cards, and regular story cards. I do love that they made in-theme envelopes to hold these large “decks.” However, there’s a major flaw. There are far too many cards to fit in the envelopes. (*I WAS WRONG See UPDATE at end of post). With all of the expansions plus all the kickstarter stretch goals, they just don’t fit. So pretty envelope with no purpose. Only the setup cards will fit. Another stretch goal was the dice bag. Unneeded since you have the slot to store them. I will use it to store the Haven tokens since I put those in the wrong slot in the token boards. You don’t need those every game so this is a nice option and location for those.
Lastly for this layer, we have the current player token in enamel. It is not very bright, but it is very nice and hefty. The punch outs also had the traditional dinosaur if you prefer to use it. This is also where they stashed one of the BEST PARTS of this campaign: EVERY SINGLE PROMO CARD EVER RELEASED. Holy fuck! Those will get distributed to their appropriate decks, but this is where they stashed them. So exciting! I only had a few promos before.
Below that level, we start to get into the card decks. We have the Navigation decks, Misbehaving decks, and various expansion decks. Plus… the mat.
Look at this baby! The original Firefly mat by itself was a pain in the ass. It folded out in 6 squares. You know those squares never laid perfectly flat. Then two expansions had additional mats for each side of the board. Now we have ALL OF IT in one beautiful mat. Might I add, nicest neoprene mat I’ve seen. Stitched edges and insanely heavy. Note that straight out of the box, BARELY any edge curling. And this is the first unroll with no effort to fix that corner. Top notch quality on this and it wasn’t even the “Vera” upgrade mat.
Did I mention it fits in the box? It does. It has its own slot in the box. No box plus mat bullshit. THANK YOU.
The last level brings us to the core decks. Firefly has a fuck ton of cards. Now they are all separated in their own beautiful compartments. That’s nice. Yes, you still have to shuffle — but this will really speed up setup.
One reason I didn’t get the “Vera” mat was that it had card deck locations. Yeah no. Aint nobody got arms long enough to reach the decks. When we play, we set up a separate card table with all of the shopping and job decks. This way everyone can take a look through the discard at any time without interrupting the game. Plan your turn, people, or never get invited back.
And whats that little box there? THE SHIPS!
Note that these do have the little stands. Those were up in the previous card level in an empty deck slot. All of the ships have been hand detailed and are made of resin. No more bent spikes on the Alliance Cruiser. The Jetwash and Esmeralda, being a newer class of Firefly ships, are larger than the others. You’ve also got other expansion ships, of course, like the Interceptor and the SS Walden. plus the others.
But can I point out the Reaver ships? They used the same mold for the three ships — standard practice. But they painted each differently. That’s such a nice touch! So they look like different ships even though it’s the same mold. I appreciate that.
I’m super happy with the ships.
I call Serenity with Jayne or Mal (maybe Zoe? I don’t know her captain stats as we didn’t have that expansion) as my captain since I bought the bougie game! I told husband this and he thought it was unfair. I was like I spent $220 plus shipping, so I get Serenity, dammit! He asked how long that lasted. At least the first fucking game night. Damn.
Though I have to point out, so worth the $220. Someone on r/boardgames (Reddit) said that was an insane price to pay for a game. Um, excuse me. First, the base game is a $70 game. And lets look at what is in this box IN ADDITION to that base game:
Two HUGE expansions that add on to the board itself:
Blue Sun
Kalidasa
Three full game expansions:
Crime and Punishment
Pirates and Bounty Hunters
Still Flying
One mini expansion:
Breakin’ Atmo
Two ship expansions (yes, they were packaged and sold separately):
Jetwash
Esmerelda
So you’ve already come to almost $400 just in the base game and expansions. And what else are we getting? How about a glorious play mat? Hand painted resin ships — the originals were all cast single-color plastic. Big Money (if you like that). Custom matching dice for each ship (only the expansion ships had matching dice before). New unreleased story cards for basic and solo play. The awesome storage box that makes set up and take down a breeze. Plus, every single promo card ever released — including the ones that were in the special lootcrate subscriptions. Plus all the new promo cards that came with the kickstarter stretch goals.
The value for your money here is huge. I actually feel really bad because one of our friends actually already owns every single expansion. So he paid a lot more than we did for our original game plus this anniversary edition and doesn’t have half the cool shit we do now. Husband had to point out that he paid a premium to have them all when they came out. Fair, I guess. I’d be pretty bitter about it though.
Also, don’t underestimate how much these huge boxes bring to the game just by themselves. We bought the big Terraforming Mars box when it came out. Like this, it holds every expansion, has trays for everyone’s pieces, two trays for the money tokens (one for each side of the board), card organization, etc. Takes setup and tear down time from over an hour to very short time. Having everything already sorted and ready to go with games like this is just like a cherry on top. Except way better, because I don’t like the cherries — so more like those milkshakes where they put like a whole-ass fucking slice of cheesecake on a stick on top of it and cake icing on the rim.
~~~~~ UPDATE ~~~~~
Today I got the game out and rearranged the token trays to be correct. I stored the Haven tokens in the dice pouch in an empty card deck slot.
I Also used some of the kickstarter stretch goal stickers to spiffy up the box. Now it looks much better om my shelf.
And furthermore, I actually tried out the Story Card envelopes. I was wrong, the cards do fit. Does the Story Card envelope close properly? No. It’s a chonker. But they DO FIT. I only wish the envelopes weren’t so thin since it’s going to take a beating with so many cards in it.
To really capture the excitement I have over these fabulous rocks, let me transcribe the text messages my three besties and K’s biologist S.O. got from me today: Ehem:
~~~~~~~~~begin~~~~~~~~~
“OH MY GOD. I got my rocks and they are better than I imagined!”
**Insert five more pictures of close ups of the various color groupings — ask if you want to see those***
“There’s three types of Obsidian and they’re so distinct! The Gold Sheen Obsidian doesn’t look special until you hold it up to the light and, well, gold!”
“And what’s the Blue Sand Stone that looks like GLITTER”
“Hematite is heavy as fuck”
“The Opal is so gorgeous”
“OH MY GOD, you have to come over so I can show you my favorites”
“Look at the glitter in this one!”
“This is genius marketing. Like, I know these are the chips that come off [when they’re] making those carved stone skulls and angels and shit. They took their scrap and marketed it and I AM HERE FOR IT.”
“Look at this Citrine!” ***Insert picture of Citrine***
“Look at this, it’s pure black when not in the light”
I suppose they are getting those hippy hits and all the Wiccans with this advertising, but some of us just like rocks, OKAY? Geology is fucking amazing! I can’t afford to actually own all of these beautiful stones. It would be an awesome collection though. It would also be a bit disorderly with stones of different sizes, and how would I label them? But when I saw THIS? Oooooooo ho ho. All the rocks in beautiful uniform little glass jars? Fuck yes. Give it to me.
Fucking genius marketing. Taking SCRAPS and selling them off. They just tossed their scraps in a tumbler (some aren’t even tumbled, actually — but most are).
The little jars are only 2 inches tall. I scoured Amazon for the perfect shelves for them. Honeycomb shelves! Are they made for Essential Oils? Yes. Fucking hippies all up in my shit. Husband gifted me the shelves for my birthday and they look great in my office! I even bought a cheap package of empty vials to set on the shelves (click for link. $8.99 I need an affiliate thing) — but I also plan to fill them with other things. Maybe other stones? Sand from Florida; Sand from Maine. Two are already filled with broken bracelets — one is pearls of different colors.
I arranged the rocks by color for the shelves. First black to white to browns:
Then the prettiest shelf is reds to pinks to oranges to yellow to greens:
Then flowing with the rest of the greens into the blues and purple:
Are the labels jank? Yes. Yes they are. I might fix them at some point. It would be a lot of effort. But I could get some cute tiny printable labels (maybe in silver or gold?) and print them. Then put them on STRAIGHT and at the same level all across. That would also cover the miscellaneous jars I add. It’s an option I am considering. I was going to shelve them with the labels facing the wall, however, I don’t know their names. I also want to show people my favorites. As you can see from the shelf pictures, the Gold Sheen Obsidian and Blue Sandstone are AMAZING in the sunlight, but look bland and black on the shelf. Same with the Garnet and Blood Stone (though it’s more the lighting in the picture for the Blood Stone).
So yes, I am THRILLED. I love them. Guess what else? I rearranged my office today. My desk was facing the window. Theoretically, so I could look out the window. But work let me borrow these huge-ass monitors and I see no window. Also, Feng Shui says you should face the door to be in a position of power.
So I rotated my desk. Now I’m facing the closet and door — really the closet. But, the closet is blocked by my monitors. Now I’m sitting right next to the window with a nearly full view of the pool. And to my left is my wall of happiness — including my rocks.
And believe it or not, I also knocked a big very visible work task off my list today. I fucking love my office. You know what I can do? ADD CAT SHELVES. Husband won’t let me anywhere — BUT NOW I HAVE MY OWN ROOM.
PS #2: I’m trying to change directorates (kinda like getting a new job completely — just less paperwork). If it works out, maybe they’ll let me work more than 2 days from home a week!
PS #3: On researching Blue Sandstone:
“Blue Sandstone (also known as Blue Goldstone) is a man-made stone made up of natural minerals (quartz sand, copper, gypsum and feldspar) Although this stone is man-made, its infused with naturally occurring minerals found in nature”
“Are you referring to the dark blue stone with a shimmering/sparkly star-like effect? If so, it’s also referred to as “blue goldstone” and a couple of other names.
This material is primarily silica glass. Some people make the glass from sand, which is why one name used is sandstone. The elements used change the colour; I think blue goldstone uses cobalt instead of the copper used in the brown version.”
I have completed my second (Woobles) penguin, Orville. Wilbur was the first penguin (I did the bats and pumpkin before him), and I gave him the Tiny Aviator Hat. I made Orville with the Tiny Bowler Hat.
These $5 tiny accessory kits are so worth it. In my opinion, these hats really take them from adorable to fantastic. They add so much more detail.
I saw a few people added feet to their Pierres so I might do that in the beak color. But really, Husband immediately claimed Wilbur to live in his office and I made Orville to pair with him and they tuck under his monitor so standing isn’t a problem.
I need more hats. They have a big summer hat, but it’s in a bundle and I don’t want to buy a whole bundle or another penguin, I just want the $5 hat. I didn’t buy another penguin kit. I bought some cheap easy yarn on the internet and made another. That’s why he’s a much lighter blue. This was the penguin I made with K and K2.
So I envision Wilbur is the suave pilot catching girls at the bar while Orville tries to fund their efforts to fly to business men at the bar. Orville also reminds me on Monty from Firefly for obvious reasons. But I’m so in love with the Wright Brothers as Penguins – It’s like a pun.
Note for any fellow Wooblers: If you notice that my bowler hat looks different, I tweaked it. The Tiny Bowler Hat pattern only goes up to 18 stitches around the top. It would have been a cute jaunty hat, but I wanted a full size hat like the Aviator Hat. So I kept circling the last row (row 4, I think? Before you start doing the sc rows to make the sides) and holding it up to him until I decided it was big enough. It ended up being 30 stitches in the edge rounds rather than the 18. This was fine, because I bought a large black skein of Woobles yarn when Amazon had them on sale (I got white and black). Other than that, I followed the pattern. I just had to do a lot more repeats to get all the way around on each row. I think it worked out great!
I’ve been tasting the telework life, and yall, it is sweet. I’ve been given permission to work two days a week from home. So I chose Monday and Tuesday. Then last week, we were iced in and had to work from home all week long. It was fucking amazing.
I can sleep super late because I don’t have to get dressed or drive in. I can wake up and be on a meeting in 5 minutes. Does that piss Louie off because he has to wait for his breakfast? Yes, it does piss him off.
Also, I can be comfortable. I have a foot rest under my desk. I fucking love having my feet up. And no ones gonna creep up and catch me talking to myself or fucking around or just looking like shit. Plus, I love my office! It’s the board game room. I added some shelves to move the books off of the game shelves and sprinkle in my own things. And I love my shelves of nick-knacks!
Today, I did some more obsessive tweaking of where everything goes. I wanted to make room for my yarn stash for crochet. I have a ton of yarn for the never-ending Christmas blanket, plus the leftovers from other projects. I moved around the books too. I rearranged the crappy mis-matched books by height and it looks much better. And I moved some shelves around that were stuff before and made them books so the stuff is more spread out. Don’t worry. If I need more space, I will not hesitate to buy another cheap Target shelf.
Yes, the pillow is on the floor so Louie has more room in the chair. He was crowded, OK?
I love my office. I love stuff. Stuff stuff stuff. I’m a stuff person. I mean do you SEE The Professional Leon-Mario crossover down there waiting to assassinate someone? Lord Concord, Star Trek Figures, my Mini Masters Jayne? All my Witcher books, that was an adventure! Notes from mom, photo booth photos of Husband and I. And my precious Penny Arcade Goombas I traded for at PAX! I got that little orange elephant keychain with mom when I took her to the chinese lantern festival at the Botanical Gardens! D & C were there and we ate at the Highway Kabbobery food truck while we watched a live martial arts play in the grass. Baby Yoda is wearing my wedding tiara that I’m wearing in that photo there — the famous texas hair photo of my momma.
There’s other stuff in there too. There’s the giant stuffed blue shell K2 gave me on the game shelf. And my desk has a sweet Bob Ross bobble head circled with the glass worry beads mom brought me back from Greece. Also the Goomba Fate sent and a special edition Funko Pop set of Crowley and Aziraphile. Plus a fake succulent with a tiny goomba tucked in the center. Like a wheres-waldo but with goombas.
I even have a light up cat ball that K gave me for Christmas. I had to plugged into the monitor and yall, I’m so stupid. So I have two huge new government issued monitors. I plugged the cat ball in to one. It happens to be the one that just won’t be turned on by the dock. The right monitor springs to life every time, but you have to turn the left one off and back on again for it to recognize it has a signal. The power button happens to be by the cat ball. So I noticed the cat ball turns itself off after a while — nice feature. Also, it appeared to detect motion to turn itself on as it would come on when I put my hand near it … to … turn on … the monitor … that it was … powered by … Ooooohhhhhhhhhh… I’m dumb.
Anyway. I have a JOB INTERVIEW Friday! It’s still government so it would just be a simple transfer with barely any paperwork. I could get away from my clusterfuck team! I bet I could be more than 2 days a week at home too! I HOPE I GET IT. And that it doesn’t suck if I do get it.
Last time I checked in with my new crochet hobby, I had made the woobles bat and penguin and started the blanket that never ends. So let’s check in. I gave everyone a fuck ton of Woobles for Christmas. This included my besties K and K2. I figured K is killer at crafts, so she’d be good with an intermediate kit — also it was a purple dragon and what is more K than that? So, I was wrong. The dragon is kinda hard. And the tutorials assume you know the basics. So fun twist, I ordered a bunch of easy yarn and now all three of us are going through the Penguin tutorial together. I think K has finished her potato and K2 and I are about to start closing ours up. K has the itch though and she sent us a text tonight with her progress on the dragon.
So what have I made? Well, I got a Michael’s gift card for Christmas. So I was like yeah, I’m making a big ass dragon. I got the code for the tutorial from K. We went to Michael’s and I picked up some velvet yarn. I dont love it itself — but the colors were just spectacular. I wont work with it again because it is MESSY A F. It’s also overly heavy and I actually like the feel of the baby blanket yarn better. But I made the dragon! I took three skeins of dark purple and one of gold. Here he is:
I like working with the bigger yarns way better than the tiny stuff. It’s fun seeing your project build faster. Also the fuzzy yarn is so forgiving in how visible the stitches are. This one was a PAIN though. I am not intermediate as much as I want to tell myself I am. And this one just had so many steps. So many. And I ran out of yarn (originally only bought two skeins of purple) and had to wait for more to come in the mail because no local Michaels had it in stock. Even though the one across town told me they did and I drove all the way over there — they couldn’t find it. Fuck that Michaels. FUCK THEM.
Anyway, damn it was a lot of steps. I got through about 8ish rows before I realized that the recommended hook size of 19 was far too big. So I went back and got a size 10 hook. Then frogged it and started over, Here’s an action shot:
So I felt so accomplished when I finished the body and head. I figured I was close to my dragon! I added the ears which are freaking adorable. I added horns. I took a break. Then I added a tail. But fuck — I sewed that shit on so damn crooked. But it was on there now. So I just rolled with it, like his tail is swooping. It looks better this way — totally my end goal all along. I added the spikes but they just looked so wrong. So I frogged them and redid them 3 times before deciding that’s just how they looked. Then I had to wait on my mail ordered yarn.
In the mean time, I added wire to the spikes. This velvet yarn is heavy so they weren’t standing up by themselves very well. When the third purple skein got here, I could do my wings! I got those done, Wired up the top ridge and jammed those babies in. The great news was that I had enough gold and purple left to wrap all the edges that had wire so it’s completely hidden. It looks fucking AMAZING! I’m so proud of my dragon! I had to rearrange my office shelves to accommodate him.
I thought his colors were very regal, but K2 can’t see anything but peanut butter and jelly. So his name is Lord Concord (like grape jelly).
So did I finish my Christmas blanket? Oh fuck no. I did travel with it over Christmas and worked on it the entire travel time and on and off while I was at my in-laws. Flying is much more pleasant when focusing on a craft. Really. And even the flight attendants were interested in what I was making. See: Here’s my bald ass crocheting at the airport on a layover:
So this blanket is going to take fucking forever. I’m going to TRY to budget time so that it’s done for next Christmas but that might even be tight. It’s supposed to be six rows of 15 repeats. That should be a 60″ x 40″ blanket. I was working on the 12th repeat this weekend and measured… I’m at 80″. Fuck.
So I wrapped up my 12th repeat and started the second strip. But my strips are also barely over 5 inches wide so 6 would only give me a 30″ blanket. Ugh. So I’m looking at at least 8 strips. Yes, I ordered more yarn so I should have enough. This blanket will never end. I’ve decided I will try to hold to a rough schedule of how much I need to have done each month or quarter or so and sprinkle in projects I’m more excited about. Having a row finished though is very exciting!
It’s so soft. Also, it’s funny to see my evolution into settling in to being comfortable with this yarn. My first three color rows were actually so bad that I cut them off and redid them. It had to be done. Then at maybe the 3rd repeat, I decided to hold the yarn with my fingers and crochet super slow so it wouldn’t be stretching and wiggling all over the place (it’s super thin and moves like crazy). You can really see where the row gets really thin there because my stitches were too tight. Then I got better and settled into a good rhythm. I’m doing really well now with my tension. I’m using a tension regulator that I made though. Got the tutorial off Youtube. You can actually see it on my finger in the airport photo — it’s a white crocheted ring.
I’m going to leave the rest of the imperfections of row one in there. It’s my first big project so it’s a good showing of how I evolved. I’m going to try to keep them in order when I stitch it all together.
So next up: I have the Woobles kit for the pig — plus the tiny wings kit so I can make him a pig with wings! I can’t wait to finish up the penguin I’m doing with K and K2. I’m going to make him a tiny bowler hat and pair him with the other penguin with the flying ace hat — they’re going to be Wilbur and Orville! I also bought a pattern for Lumalee and some Mario mushrooms off Etsy. I want to make it in the baby yarn like the grey bat, but I can only find very muted colors for baby blankets. So I’m waiting until I find a good yarn to buy for that.
