Tag Archives: awesome

Try Sketchbook Skool for Free!

I took a couple of Sketchbook Skool “Kourses” this year and found them invaluable. They were full of inspiration, instruction, and encouragement. I’ve just found out that you can take a sample klass for free. It includes bits from all the kourses, so even I, as a two-time alum, got something new out of it. I highly recommend you give it a try. What do you have to lose? It’s free!

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The Ankle Saga

On Easter Sunday I was minding my own business when suddenly I stepped off a curb wrong and completely screwed up my ankle. No bones were broken, so the ER staff diagnosed me with a sprain, put me in an air cast, gave me crutches, and sent me on my way.

The trouble with having a sprained ankle is that people think it’s synonymous with a twisted ankle. It’s not. By medical definition I have “just” a bad sprain, but in my case that means I have multiple tears in multiple ligaments and tendons. Two doctors, four braces, and nearly three months later and I’m still limping along, now (finally) awaiting surgery to fix the tear in the tendon.

But I’m not posting to whine. (Well, not just to whine, anyway.)

I’m posting to share some of the awesome that has been bestowed upon me during my recovery. First, my sister made me a present: a grumpasaurus to cheer me up. I love him, and he currently disapproves from atop my bookshelf. Perhaps unsurprisingly, my husband quickly snapped him up and put him in a comic:

by theshaggyfreak on deviantART

From the start I’ve been a touch embarrassed at injuring myself so grievously doing something so mundane. It also gets a little old answering “what happened?” over and over (and over!) again. At some point I decided to start lying, and even better, tell each person something different. My friend Yibble was particularly intrigued by my story about being pushed out of a plane by a Nazi while alligator wrestling and ended up drawing a rather amusing cartoon of the event:

by Illishar on deviantART

A note on the costume: Yibble texted me to ask what I was wearing while skydiving and alligator wrestling. I told her 18th century garb, naturally. I mean, what else does one wear for such occasions?

Excellent New Craft Blog

I would like to introduce you to Reve Dreams, a new craft blog on the scene. Mixing humor, good writing, and a whole heck of a lot of talent, Reve creates amazing crafts and shows you how, too. I’d like to note that she only learned crochet last November, and is already making stuff like this. And it’s not all crochet: fans of children’s literature will enjoy her embroidery, and I of course happen to be completely in love with the newest additions to my Peep family, appropriately named Micropeep and Picopeep.

But you know, as adorable as her creations are, the mechanics of crochet and other sewing-related activities don’t really interest me. Ordinarily I’d look at the pictures and scroll on down, but what keeps me reading is the random asides thrown in. Some favorite quotes:

‘Good clean fun! Hint: it is actually dirty fun.’

‘…but every time I throw out one of the covers I feel like I’m telling the Earth “today, I hate you a little.”‘

‘Of course, if you’re me, and you cut your narrow ribbon to be 8W instead of 10W, you might utter some unladylike words and have to cut new lengths of ribbon to cover the fourth side of the bag.’

‘It is a little-known fact that Peeps’ native terrain is rugged, and in fact they are semi-arboreal.’

Best of all, it’s new enough that you can easily read the entire archive in a short time. Check out Reve Dreams today!

Full disclosure: Reve is my sister. But that doesn’t make her blog less awesome. Seriously, just read an entry or two and you’ll see what I mean.

 

Addendum: I can neither confirm nor deny her fire-breathing abilities.

 

Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan

Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan: The paths of two teenagers, both named Will Grayson, cross one fateful night. Their stories are told in alternating chapters, and their personalities (and writing styles) are different enough that it’s easy to keep track of who’s narrating. But despite the title and narrators, this book is in many ways more about the larger-than-life Tiny Cooper and his struggles with identity, love, and musical theater. I loved and empathized with all the characters. I was at times horrified and delighted at the various twists and turns in the plot, always wanting more more more. And this is one book I wish came with a soundtrack so I can actually hear all the songs in Tiny Dancer/Hold Me Closer. In short, I was completely and utterly sucked in. This was my gym book – that is, the book that lived in my gym bag to be read while on the exercise bike – and I found that I didn’t want to get off the bike when my thirty minutes were up. Now that, my friend, is the mark of an engrossing book. I’ve already added pretty much the entire combined catalogs of Green and Levithan to my wish list, and I hope fervently that they write another book together. Highly recommended.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

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