Family Crest Embroidery

For my sister I decided to make her an Ehara Family Mon sweatshirt. With hers, I thought to put our name underneath the crest, just for something different. And she liked it! I am never sure whether to make her something, cause I never know if she will like it or not. So I'm glad that she did. Now I have to make them for the rest of the family! :)

Dallas Cowboys Shadow box.

This year I made many of my Christmas gifts. I just wanted to do something different this year. And it was really great cause I didn't have to go shopping at the malls, just at places like JoAnn's and Michael's.

Since my sister's boyfriend is a big Cowboys fan, and he was in their fan magazine, I made him a Dallas Cowboys Shadow frame. I had a lot of fun doing it. My family kept giving him a hard time cause he's not a Niner's fan. LOL But I think it turned out neat.

I matted the cover and the profile on blue paper and it was neat, all you did was use the hook part of some velcro to attach it to the frame. I found a really cool silver helmet that he really loved at the local Shirtique store, and I found a neat Dallas pin too.

I went to my local scrapbook store to get those NFL stickers from Jolees, only to find that they had discontinued making them. Not sure if they lost the license or what. But it really bummed me out. SO, I went online and found their logo letters, and cut out "Cowboys" and matted that. I then found a Star Punch from Fiskars and used that. Luckily I had a 50% off coupon from JoAnn's so it didn't cost that much.

I did leave a little bit of space for him to put his own pin or something next to the star. He really really liked it, which was really cool! I'm glad that he did. :)

Skunk Fight!

So, last night I was awakened at around 1 in the morning by this high pitched animal scream. My first thought was that it was one of the wild animals attacking one of the kittens. So I jump out of bed, run to the window, and I see two skunks fighting. Well, my exact words to Phil were, "There are two skunks killing each other!!!"

There was a larger skunk on top of a smaller skunk trying to bite him while the smaller skunk was squealing. So, here I am knocking on the window hoping that they'd stop fighting. But of course, they don't care that I'm knocking on the window. They're just claiming territory.

I'm scared for the skunks, I know, it's a natural thing. But still, I don't want a dead skunk in our yard. And then I'm scared that they're gonna attack the cats. But I look up, and all 7 are sitting on top of the wood pile. Phil said that it looked like they were highschool kids watching a fight in the school yard. LOL

By the time we got to the kitchen door, they were gone. But then, the smell. OMG, it was awful! You couldn't smell it at first, but then man, it just started spreading through the air, getting stronger and stronger. And of course, it had to be near the bedroom window. So that room got the worst of it.

Velcro was looking at me like, "Come on mom, make it stop!"

I didn't realize skunks would fight like that, and that they sound like little piggies when they squeal. I hope that they will behave tonight!

Latest Embroidery projects

Here are my latest embroidery projects. The one above is a take off from the Wedding infinity embroidery I did for a couple of friends. Since these will be done on towels, the lettering needed to be bigger, so we did a full infinity symbol with the lettering underneath. I think it will come out quite nicely.

And since my friend Sandra gave her tennis towels to her team, I can now post how they came out. I really liked how they turned out, and I think I need to do this on some towels just because.

Post office rant...

I have been spending this Christmas season at the Post office mailing out ebay auctions. And it's funny how impatient people are during this time of year. I mean come on, you have GOT to know that December is the busiest time of year for all shipping companies. I hear that from Philip every time I see him. LOL

So, when you go into the Post Office on the Saturday before Christmas, don't expect the lines to be short. And don't get upset with the postal workers. They want to get through the line as quickly as possible too. Do you think they want all these people angry with them?

It amuses me when people in the lines think that their time is much more important then the person in front of them. So they try to jump ahead of the people in front of them. I guess this is true with any line this time of year. What makes anyone think that their time is much more important then anyone else's time?

My guess is that you should have considered this before going to the post office and adjusting your time accordingly. The person in front of you has just as many things to do in their day as you do. Maybe even more. So disrespecting that person by trying to jump in line, is not cool.

And don't you really think you should get all your forms and even your boxes packed and taped up before you get to the post office. Why should everyone behind you have to wait until you get your boxes taped up while you're at the counter? I think that is one of the reasons why the line is so long. People come unprepared, and try to fill all that stuff out while they are up at the counter instead of before they get there.

And, I know that the post office supplies tape for people who send things priority mail. But do you really have to use almost the whole roll of tape to close your box by wrapping the box around and around and around with tape? Do you realize that we're all actually paying for that tape with higher postage fees? it's kind of like any government service. you actually think that the tape is free, but it's getting paid for by taxes or postage fees. So we're actually paying for it with our tax money or fees.

Can you tell I spend a lot of time lately at the Post office?? LOL

Embroidered Aprons...

My sister requested an embroidered apron for a gift for her boss. I'm thinking that he's not reading my blog, so I thought I could post this now, cause I really like it! I know it's not as complex as the urban threads lady, but I get so happy when a design works, even as simple as they are.

She wanted the saying, "I am going to start my diet tomorrow." Cause that is what he always says to them when there are sweets around. I couldn't find any masculine food material at our local JoAnn's cause, everything they had was too girlie. So I found a premade apron and I figured I can embroider candy on the apron to go along with the saying.

Well, the computer took a dump right before I was going to work on this, so I had to figure something else out cause my AutoCAD program isn't compatible with Windows 7. Took me a few days to realize I could use paint and make chocolate chip cookies. how hard can that be?

So this is the final product.I like how it turned out. I had to make a couple of cookies that were chomped on just cause. LOL I hope they'll be happy with it. :)

Embroidered Towels

Ngoc asked me to embroider towels for her for gifts for Christmas. So here is how they turned out. It's amazing how much more elegant towels look when they're embroidered. She chose the tan color thread, and I just love the color combinations. I keep telling her she needs to be my color guru. Now I want to make these for gifts for everyone! :)

Tsunami Warning Signs

I am just fascinated by these tsunami warning signs. I think mainly because I never even considered that we could actually have tsunamis. I thought that was only for islands in the Pacific, or Japan. LOL Can you say, "Dur dur dur."

So, when taking my dad to the VA hospital in San Francisco, we always drive down the Great Highway. For those of you who aren't from the bay area, the Great highway runs along Ocean Beach on the coast. And one day I saw these tsunami signs. Now I love taking photos, but won't do it when I'm driving with my dad. Cause I know he'd think I'm crazy. LOL

So yesterday I had an opportunity because I had to drop my aunt off to get blood work, and then my dad off to get my eyes checked. So I thought I'd go and get a picture of the signs.


So, if you're in SF, and there is an earthquake, run for high grounds (like the figure in the picture).

Hello!

Happy Tuesday...
Today was our boutique, and it was a lot of fun. I'll post pics tomorrow. But it was so nice to see customers that I hadn't seen in awhile. I really do miss them!! I sold a few pair of earrings, and got a new embroidery job. So it was fun.

I have a few ideas running through my brain for Valentine's day. I'll get them down on paper tomorrow while I'm taking my dad to the eye doc in SF. I'll post some photos tomorrow too on a few projects I was working on, I didn't want to post them until they were given away as gifts. And I have to figure out if I got them downloaded to my external drive before my computer took a tank.

Hope you all have a great Wednesday! i think I'm going to go take a long nap. :)

Shadzz Holiday Shopping

On Tuesday my cousin Tina and I will be at the Homestead Studio suites in San Carlos for a holiday boutique. If you're around stop on by! We'd love to see ya.

It's cold in the Bay Area!

It's been very cold in the bay area the last few days. So we woke up yesterday to snow in the hills! Ok, buy the time I got up and out, most of it had melted. But it looks so pretty! we haven't had snow that far down the hill in such a very long time.

So of course I had to make sure the bed for the outside kitties were nice and warm today. These are two of the kitties that were born in our backyard. Hopefully soon they'll be barn cats at Al's house.

Oh, and these are the purple cupcakes I made for Al. For helping us fix our waterpipes, he wanted Purple Iced cupcakes with cream filling inside. I don't know WHY purple, but you know, everyone in our family is going to now have purple iced something or other cause I have so much of the darn food coloring now. LOL

Found a great recipe online for the icing in the center. And after the cupcakes bake and cool, you're supposed to fill it with some type of injector. Of course I didn't have one, so I took an apple corer, and cored out a hole in the cupcake. I dug out some of the cake, filled it, then put the nub of cupcake top back in the hole and iced it. they turned out pretty well I think.

RIP my computer friend...

Sorry that the last couple of posts are pictureless. I'm in the process of moving stuff over to my boyfriend's computer because mine has died a slow death. The motherboard was overheating, so it would only stay on for maybe 5 minutes before it would shut itself off and then back on. I asked Christoph to take a look at it, and after some exploring that is what we figure is going on. It's a good thing I had backed up most of my files onto my external hardrive. There are a few files still on the hard drive that I have to get off, but I'm going to wait till I get my next computer to do that.

So, the next couple of days will be filled with uploading the computer programs that were my most favorite to use, and to get my life back in gear. It's a pain to have to share the computer, but it will give me time to get some other things done I think.

It's so funny how you get used to having a computer set up the way you like it, with the programs you like, and it working oh just so, and then all of a sudden it crashes, and you have to figure out what to do next. Luckily my sister has a computer for me to use, or I just don't know what we'd do at the moment. I still have to wait a couple of weeks till I get it, but heck, it's better then not having one at all.

What in the world did we do before we had a computer??

Beatles Rock Band

So, tonight was the first time I've seen the Beatles Rock Band for the Wii. OMG, it was the coolest thing, mainly cause it's the Beatles. Cause I just love the Beatles. I think the different graphics are kinda fun. The big guy dressed up as a giant rabbit was a little weird on I am the Walrus.

To me, the funniest thing was watching the group of 15 year old girls play the game. The first song they chose was "Come Together". And if you haven't seen a bunch of teen girls trying to sing this song for the first time, it's a must see. Mainly because when Alex got to the part when they started singing about "Joo joo eyeballs," the look on her face was classic. And as the song progressed, she just stopped and said, "What the heck?" What kind of lyrics are those? LOL I couldn't stop laughing.

Cause really, did we even know what the heck we were singing when that song came out?

So, they got Debi G and Christina to sing because none of the girls knew any of the lyrics...um hello?? I was thinking, didn't your parents listen to this music for you to know the lyrics? Then you come to realize, half of the parents are in their 30's, and many of them didn't listen to the Beatles...WHAT?? LOL ok yes, half of them didn't even know that there is a Yellow Submarine movie with the Beatles in it. And then I said, you never saw them go to the land with all the holes, and Ringo pick up one and put it in his pocket? (ok they started looking at me really funny). Then you tell them, yes, and then at the end of the movie, he pulls out this big black hole from his pocket and says, "I got a 'ole in me pocket" in his british accent.

Boy, did I get funny looks then.

I didn't feel to bad, cause the other half of the parents were my age or a bit older, so they knew all the words to the Beatles songs like we all did. And we were the only ones singing to the game. It was pretty sad too. Thinking that there is this whole generation of kids that only know these songs because of this video game.

What an eye opening evening it has been tonight! ;)

Old Photos and Facebook

I think Facebook is such a wonderful thing! Since joining facebook, I've reconnected with so many people, a lot of old school friends, and a lot of my family too. Most of my family is in Hawaii, so we didn't get to see them very often if at all because we were born on the mainland. So it's really nice to be in contact with some of my cousins.

And a great thing to find out is that my cousin Gary is into photography, so he appreciates all the old photos just as much as I do, if not more! We've been exchanging photos over the internet, and it's fun to see photos of my dad when he was young, and even my grandparents and my great grandparents. I've never seen photos of my dad's Grandma, and I've finally saw one. I thought that was so neat.

I can't wait to see what other photos he'll post.