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I'm seriously sucking at life right now.

That is all.

<3

rk

Flowers!

The craft challenge this week was flowers.   I decided to do something simple I had seen inBig Ass Book of Crafts  by Mark Montano.   My favorite undergrad assistant in the whole wide world, who is soon leaving me for bigger better things, got me this book for my birthday.  I love it, but this is the first project I have attempted.

I decided to make hello kitty flowers and use them to make a frame for a hello kitty card my brother sent me for my birthday.   I have a hello themed bathroom in desperate need of an update.  

I bought a bunch of supplies... frame, elmer's glue, fake flowers and glass stones from the dollar store:

Next I found some Hello Kitty stickers which came with a calender, stuck them on to scrap pieces of felt and cut around them.  I wipe a little glue on the sticker and then pressed the glass stone into place.

I then took apart the fake flowers:

I used hot glue to attach the button to the flowers.   For the flowers I ended up using for pins and hair pins, I attached a circle of felt to the back of the flower with Elmer's.

I painted a dollar store frame pink, hot glued flowers to the corners, and placed the card in the frame:

And then I went a little crazy.  The project was so simple and so fun, I made pins and boxes and magnets and more frames... I couldn't stop until I ran out of flower pieces.

Sigh.

I signed up for the 3 free days of Match.com on a whim and then lost track of time.   I logged on today, which I thought was day three to cancel.  In reality, it's day five. F.  Boo.  I'm guessing this is going to be a waste of $35.  But maybe its the window I've been waiting to open.  

Grr.

Crunch time pt 1

More whining...
3 exams next week, 2 the following and my yet to be written Pre-Kim document due in two weeks followed by the presentation 1 week later. My days are a series of panic attacks and crying fits.

This weeks craft challenge was "taxman" or "taxday" or something similar. After a zillion ideas, I ended up dolling up an old coin purse I found shoved in my desk drawer at work with a a few patches I found on clearance at walmart and some coins from my wordly travels.

I'm posting from the phone and can't directly post pics... Here's a link to the before and afters
http://m.flickr.com/#/photos/riotkitte/

Thanks mom.

I'm not spending most of my day watching a set of Eagles co-parent on a 24/7 live stream nest cam from a reserve in Iowa.   Is this better or worse than when I had the panda-cam obsession? hrm.
Eagle watching

bitch n' moan.

Whaaaaa.  I've been MIA, because I've been trapped under a pile of doom.    My prelim is in 3 weeks and I can't bring myself to write more than about 3 lines a day, which means there is no way in hell it will be done before I'm seventy.    My dietetics classes are making me want to stab someone in the eye with my paring knife. Seriously, if I've gotten to 33 without ever having to make a popover or take calculus, I probably will never need those skills.  Really.  And I most definitely will not need those skills in what ever job I happen to get.  I fucking hate math and I fucking hate baking. I will not be looking for a job in either of those fields.   In addition, at one of the shittiest points in my life to date,  the boy-who-would-rather-not-be-mentioned has decided that since he is moving on to bigger and better things in California, he will no longer be needing me around.  Should I be surprised?   Did I not know what dating an emotionally immature transitional 26-year old would entail?  Especially one who has made it clear all along that I was 1) not the right social class 2) not the right religion 3) not the right age and 4) not smart enough for him.      Good luck on finding someone cuter, smarter AND most importantly tolerant of your emotional instability and mommy issues.

Side note:  Item 31 on my life to do list is to "end a relationship with grace"    Guess I'm not checking that one off today.

In addition, I have not been able to find time or energy to run or work out.   And my apartment has succumbed to squabbit dust and hay.    If someone walked into today, they would assume I was squatting.

SCREAM.

Where is the light at the end of my tunnel?  Where???  Light.  That reminds me.  There is an obnoxious fiber optic light that appeared on my night stand a couple of nights ago.  An obnoxious fiber optic light that is practically begging to be thrown out the window and/or run over by my car.....

 grace,  Ms. Riotkitte,   grace.  *sigh*

Randoms.

1.   I am in PhD hell.  Boo.  My pre-lim is in about a month and a half and I just don't have the patience or motivation to write the approximately 100 page document that needs to be written.   Mind you this is while doing experiments, taking 3 classes, interning, etc, etc.   I wish this to be over.   Now.

2.   I had a birthday.   I'm not sure how I feel about that.   I did visit the boy-who-would-rather-not-be-mentioned in the ATL, which was fun and involved lots of yummy vegan food and sunflowers :)  I like sunflowers.  I like the ATL (minus the traffic, cars, people, and people driving cars creating the traffic).  I like the boy-who-would-rather-not-be-mentioned (ususally).  And.  I like yummy vegan food.

3.  I missed last weeks craft challenge (get lucky) due to a horrible exam on lipid metabolism, the prelim papers and my trip to ATL.

4.  I threw something quickly together for this week's challenge:  Best of Show.   The random assortment of Squabbit belongs strewn about my living room were irritating me.

  They spent last week visiting their grandparents and both their grandparents and myself were disturbed that they travel with about 6 "suitcases", while I had 1.  So I made the ladies a Science Journal covered LOL style box for a small portion of their things.  At least the grandparent maybe more amused next time they visit.
Breifly, I took an office filing box, my favorite adhesive, Krylon Spray Adhesive, newspapered my bathtub (the joy of grad student apartment dwelling) and attached pages of Science (which I "borrowed" from lab) to the box.  I touched up the edges with my Hello Kitty glue stick.  

 

5. My brain hurts, I'm PMS-y, and am facing a full day classes and procrastination, which will lead to disappointment and possibly a mini-meltdown tonight, when I have to acknowledge I'm yet another day closer to P-day and not a page farther in my progression.   F.
On a positive note (although lame), I'm super looking forward to Grey's tonight.   woot.  I'll leave the breakdown to after.

The Pee Pee Tee Pee that never was (IC 10- The Fat Quarter)

Being as this is baby week (YAY!)   I decided it was necessary to create another baby inspired project.  The challenge this week was to use a Fat Quarter of material, which is roughly 18 by 22 inches.

Here are my starting materials
I used a piece of cotton sheet that was left over from backing a quilt and some star transfer iron-ons I picked up on clearance at Walmart a while ago.  I am really not allowed to purchase any more craft materials unless absolutely necessary, but I really can't ignore stud-like objects, especially when there are shiny and especially when they are on clearance.

I, of course, left the project until Tuesday night, when I was already in the middle of a full blown anxiety attack slash/hissy fit.   In my mind, if I cut out a circle, possibly cut that into triangles...then sewed it all back together.  it would make a perfect little cone.   Wrong.    The fabric was too flimsy... I didn't put enough thought into the actual engineering behind it.   I ended up with a flat circle, consisting of 4 triangles sewn together.   FAIL

I then decided to quickly re-purpose a random pair of fleece kids pajama pants I had laying around into a Squabbit hammock.



 Problem being, I didn't have any chain or grommets, or really anything to attach the hammock to the cage.  I tried to use old hoop earrings.   The Squabbits each gave it a WTF look... Stolie yanked it down and Belle tried to eat it.  EPIC FAIL.






At that point, I was pissed off and had already screamed unnecessarily at everyone I could.  So I went to sleep.   I came home at one today, thinking I would make a pillow or a little bag or something quickly.   I found some thick stretchy cotton material and figured I could make some arm warmers and embellish them.

I cut out a couple of strips in the diameter I needed, for my wrist and upper arm.   Cut a Fat Quarter out of the material.

Laid the two strips folded on a folded edge of the material and then connected them, tapering from wrist to upper arm.

Then I sat down to sew.   I was going to hem each end and then sew it up.  Easy.  But my sewing machine decided to be a little bitch and pick a fight with me.   I ended up throwing everything on the floor and quitting, decided this week I would not participate in the challenge, being it was already 2pm, I had class at 4 and then had to go to work.   Done.

I sat down and wrote up a lab report for this ridiculous 100 level cooking class I have to take as part of my RD degree.   That's a whole separate story for another day.   I could not stop thinking about the project and how it was almost a personal failure (damn type A personality) if I did not submit something.  So at 3:15, I attacked the sewing machine in a flurry of curse words and tears.     And ta da!

I was out the door at 3:47.  And I made it to class with 1 minute to spare.
Read about this week's challenge here: http://theironcraft.blogspot.com/2011/03/challenge-10-fat-tuesday-in-quarter.html

Oh.  I almost forgot.  As I said in the beginning,  this week was baby week!  I'm an Aunty!


Caleb John
Born 2:15pm 3/7/11
7lbs 15oz, 20in

Officially too old for Unofficial (maybe)

So once upon a time, here in cornfield land, St. Patty's Day fell during spring break.  This made the bar owners very very sad.  So they decided to create another St. Patty's Day... Unofficial St. Patty's Day.  St. Patty's Day is no longer during spring break, but Unofficial has become a random green drunken holiday on this campus.   Not that I need a excuse to drink.  It's more that I need to justify  my drinking.   So today, this is my justification for drinking beer at 3pm on a Friday.

I did make my friends and cutesy little buttons to commemorate the occasion:

Even though this is another one of my wonderful kindergarten craft masterpieces... here's a play by play:

1.   I found a pattern online and printed it out:

 2.  I have a ton of green felt left over from the turtle shell I made to run the 1/2 marathon.   A turtle.  In a race. Get it?  Get it?   OMG I'm so creative and cute.   Any way... I put said green felt to use, cutting 2 shamrocks for each pin:

3.  Using a backstitch, I embroidered "UO"  for UnOfficial, and 2011 on one shamrock of each set.

4.  I then stitched the sides together using a running stitch... adding a piece of gold pipe cleaner for the stems.

My friends were great sports and wore their pins proudly, even though they were probably thinking (1.  She's totally losing it.  and 2.  And she wonders why she never gets her research done??)    :)

Cheers!

I just do my thing... IC9

This week's craft challenge was an Oscar/Movie Theme.   I went pretty literal, instead of doing an inspiration piece.   I decided I wanted to do some sort of mixed media possibly with a movie quote or actress.  At first I was fixated on one of my fav. movies, Empire Records, so I'm not sure how I ended up with Audrey Hepburn.
So the first step was to clean off the craft table:

Which I did and then almost in one fluid motion cleaned off my desk, moving the contents on to the now spotless craft table.  Fail.  About three days later, I revisited the table cleaning project and moved everything back to the desk, which still has yet to be dealt with.

The next step in this project was to choose a picture.

And then I painted the base:

I  added a coat of glitter "paint" over the edges..which isn't really paint at all...more like mucus with glitter mixed in.

Next was picking out the embellishments:  One of my personal Challenges with the Iron Craft Challenge, is too keep purchases to a minimum and to use up my craft stash.   So far I've only bought some beans to use as filler for I think it was IC2.  Here I found some Mardi Gras beads, some seed beads I picked up for clearance at target probably at least 5 years ago and some trim that was in a Free Cycle box.  

 And the fun part of putting it all together:

 Final Result:

After I was pretty much finished... the boy-who-would-rather-not-be-mentioned suggested I make this in to a multi-paneled piece, using women in my life that are my icons. I didn't have time this week.  There's only so much I can procrastinate.   But someday, I hope to add a couple of panels of women who encouraged me to "do my thing".  (Hey mom, scan and me a picture.)

Read more about Iron Craft Challenge 9 here:  http://theironcraft.blogspot.com/2011/02/challenge-9-and-oscar-goes-to_24.html

See all the fabulous IC9 projects here:  http://www.flickr.com/groups/1525156@N25/

a little bit of this....a little bit of that

First of all.   Here's a dose of squabbit-y cuteness:

As it turns out, they were having a pooping contest.  Stolie won.  Not so cute...being that is my lap they are sitting on....being they can produce approximately 50 pellets a piece in under 20 minutes, if they put their furry little minds to it.   The boy-who-would-rather-not-be-mentioned constantly reminds me how adorable they would be if only they could learn to control their bowels.   I work with crap pretty much on a daily basis, so it doesn't effect me as much.  It is unfortunate that I can not study their crap.  It takes me weeks to collect the amount of mouse crap they provide in a hour.

In other non-feces related news...

I booked a birthday trip to Atlanta.... and it was free!   Apparently, I was sitting on a pile of United Miles that were about to expire.   I had actually assumed I had already lost them.  Thankfully, United left me a voice mail letting me know that I had a month to use them.    The boy-who-would-rather-not-be-mentioned is in Atlanta currently for work, so I'm really looking forward to seeing him and also visiting me Emory friends and EATING.   Mainly, eating.  I have a list of restaurants I must go to.  Way more then a normal person would go to in 4 days.   I have a super human stomach.  I can handle it.   The trip is a month a way and I'm already planning my entire trip around meals, snacks and adult beverages.    

In the PhD hell arena:   the  abstract that I have been putting off writing, that was due on Tuesday, that has been giving me panic attacks around 3am for the last 4 nights...is not due until March 15th.  woot!    Now, if I had checked the website I would have had this information days ago.   Sigh.  I am still presenting at lab meeting on Tuesday and all I have done so far is about 3 slides featuring the always stunning, Belle and Stolie.   My goal, is to convince them I've gone crazy, so they are scared to question or criticize. My original approach was tears and an occasional irrational hissy fit..   Tears which are usually my best defensive and offensive tool were surprisingly ineffective.  The boss actually mentioned he misses the hissy fits...he has taken their absence to mean I have lost interest in my projects.     

EDIT:  Lab Meeting Cancelled!   Happy week!  Now only if the exam tomorrow and the experiments on Wed. and Friday would also magically disappear.

AND the most exciting news I have for today... my week long plague has finally lifted.  I am once again almost healthy!  Yay immune system... thanks for finally waking up and coming to work.  Slacker.

Hot dogs and babies

This week's Iron Craft Challenge Theme was "hometown".   I asked the boy-who-would-rather-not-be mentioned (but is irritated when I don't), what first comes to his mind when I say "Chicago".   He said "hot dog". Fair enough.   My brother (or his wifey rather) is about to pop out my first nephew any day now and I've been meaning to do something with this white onesie I picked up at a baby consignment sale awhile ago... so Chicago hot dog oensie it was.

First, I looked up what exactly a Chicago hot dog contained...

Then I sketched this design while I should have been paying attention to the finer points of the regulation of CHO metabolism (I really should have been paying better attention... I barely got a B on that stupid test.  a B!)

Next I busted out my blue chalk, embroidery kit and  stitched away.  I attempted to make a stitch sampler of sorts, but I really don't embroider and know like 3 stitches.   During my time on the couch laboring away (again, while I should have been studying or thesis-writing), the following conversation occurred (note it's paraphrased... I have a horrible memory):

boy-who-would-rather-not-be mentioned:  "are you sewing that by hand?"

me:  "Yes,  I'm embroidering.  Sort of."

boy-who-would-rather-not-be mentioned:  *sigh*   "that's just another reason I have to marry you"

me:  "why?  So I can embroider your name on your underpants?"

boy-who-would-rather-not-be mentioned: "No.  It's a valuable life skill."

Hrm.   Maybe if I was born at least 40 years earlier.  I think he forgot the fact that I'm 1) awesome and 2) A kick-ass scientist that is going to invent a cure all super drug and and support him (or a younger version of him) someday.

Anyway this is what I came up with:

I'm pleased overall... although I would have done the tomatoes differently... I was attempting some loopy knot stitch, that didn't quite work.

Read more about Iron Craft here: http://theironcraft.blogspot.com

See all the other awesome projects here: http://www.flickr.com/groups/1525156@N25/

Meet the Squabbits!

Stolie and Belle...Mommy calls us a "bonded pair".  We think that means we are
best friends!  We do everything together and love to snuggle!

I'm Belle (Short for Belvedere)!   I'm tiny, have lots of energy and like to explore and destroy things!

I'm Stolie!   I'm a scaredy-chinichi.  My favorite things are eating , sleeping and pooping!

I am Riotkitte!

Who is Riotkitte?

Riotkitte is an amazingly awesome female in her early 30's who lives in a cornfield and pretends to do science in hopes of someday leaving said cornfield as Dr. Riotkitte.   In reality, she does not like science all that much, but that may be the result of last year PhD-itis.   She has lofty dreams of moving somewhere warm, where snow is non-existent, meeting her prince charming and developing a miracle drug that will both save people and make her and the previously mentioned prince millions.   She will then buy an island and adopt a lot of cats.  A whole lot of cats.  As in enough cats to earn her a spot on Animal Hoarders.

Until then, to pass the time and delay impending insanity, she has begrudgingly taken up running (ran her first 1/2 marathon in October and is training unenthusiastically for her 2nd in April),  is participating in an online craft challenge, Iron Craft, through which she is  producing a plethora of kindergarten grade products, and has adopted two little squabbit babies which are really squabbit ladies being that they are over 5 years old.   Despite their old age or maybe as a result of it, she spends the majority of her free time scooping up poop and hay which they fling out of their cage just to spite her.

Miss Riotkitte also has created a hand written 10 page document on a yellow legal pad in purple ink containing her life to do list.   One item was to run a 1/2 marathon (check!) and another is to blog about her progress in completing her list (check?).

Riotkitte intends to keep this fairly updated with bucket list success stories, tutorials for Iron Crafts and painful recounts of her PhD experience.

But Riotkitte intends to do a lot of things.

Work in Progress...

This is a work in progress.
 I will be making it pretty little by little in the minute bits of free time I find.   I will be using this as an outlet to document my last (hopefully) dreadful year in my doctorate program, the completion of items on my life to do list and just bits and pieces of things I find interesting and would like to share.

So most likely this will be filled with random rants, recipes and craft projects.

Enjoy.