Sooki is the main character in The Saggy Baggy Elephant, he’s happy with himself and life in general until a parrot starts making fun of him.

Parrots can be such dicks.

Sooki then tries ways to make his skin fit better, mostly by asking predators for advice and putting himself in harms way. Each time he tries and fails the parrot is there to make sure that Sooki feels the sting of public humiliation.

Really depressed, Sooki hides in a cave (an obvious metaphor for eating a gallon of Cherry Garcia and wearing dirty sweatpants) and a hungry lion finds him there. Sooki cries out as loud as he can when the lion goes after him and his terror is rewarded– he is saved by a herd of elephants that not only chase off the lion but affirm that there’s nothing wrong with Sooki, he’s a fine looking little elephant sags and wrinkles and all. Then they go stampede through the jungle in a rage (okay, the book says they all dance through the jungle, but I’ve watched a lot of National Geographic specials on elephants and dancing was not even mentioned in passing.)

It’s probably too sad to recount that the elephants’  joy stampede destroyed several small villages and took many innocent lives so it ends with them “dancing” in the jungle. Not to mention that graphic depictions of death and destruction could have been problematic for the illustrator of a children’s book. I can respect editorial discretion and I still love this story even though the intended moral of the story is “You’re okay as you.” and I’m pretty sure the real moral of the story is “Yell loud enough and an angry mob of adults will eventually come and save you.”

Also: “Parrots are dicks.”

The truth is no angry mob is going to save anyone from deeply seated self loathing caused by the taunting of parrots with borderline personality disorder or lions that may or may not be suffering from a serious eating disorder.

Still, it’s a lovely story and I couldn’t pass by the little handmade elephant in Keeper’s Corner without thinking of the book, so I bought the elephant and Matt gave me the book.

My re-organizing of the craft room is going well. I took a little time out to deal with a pressing case of yarn vomit. Yarn vomit is when a skein of yarn expels the loose inner core of yarn in a one or several large clumps which will then tangle if left to their own devices. Yarn vomit is the bane of knitters and a single skein of yarn suffering from yarn vomit is capable of infecting the whole herd.

Somehow winding new neat and tidy balls of yarn just isn’t giving me my crafty fix for the day. I think I’m going to make a push to finish painting my Queen Anne doll later and start working on hearts for Valentine’s day.

Instead, I thought I’d be productive and sleep in late, contemplate my utter ignorance of British history and start reorganizing my sewing/craft room into something that makes sense.

It did make sense before; I’m a very organized person. I’m a very organized person because I have the attention span of a hamster and if things aren’t organized I get lost, then I get distracted, and then: “Oooh something shiny.” It was extremely organized and tidy, to the point where I was accused of having the craft room of a serious killer. It certainly looks that way when I’m working on dolls, all those little dismembered bodies and loose limbs.

The problem is that the room in question is terribly small and in the smallness I lose things, and when I lose something I look for it with a terrible ferocity and the result is that I leave behind a glorious trail of chaos. The smaller the space; the more glorious the chaos.

There was a point in time where I would actually give up, put things back in order, shrug it off and buy a new whatever-it-was-that-I-lost; but then I started finding things I’d lost and wondering why I owned so many duplicate tools and thinking that all these duplicates were putting me dangerously close to being a hoarder.

Obviously, I haven’t found a balance between extremes. I know (from watching A&E) that there’s the possibility that hoarding has a genetic link. In that light my fear of one day being a hoarder isn’t completely unreasonable.

Today I’m sorting things out by utility. Since I really hate chasing down all the packing and shipping stuff, I’ve made myself a sweet little station for all of it. The labels are upstairs with the printer, everything else like the boxes, packing material, tissue, tape, and scale are down in the craft room where I keep my inventory so it won’t get messed with before I put it in my booth or mail it out to a customer. I even have a little dedicated counter space– very exciting.

The rest of the cabinet still contains brushes, paints, sculpting material, paper maché supplies and stamps that I’ll have to revisit later.

Then I cleared off my shelf and started stacking my uncut fabric flat folded. Because I really do have OCD I unfolded the fabric, shook it out, ironed it and refolded it so all folds are all nine inches wide. Nine inches are good because those make for easy counting of actual yardage from the ends. I’m planning on getting some large bull-clips for the ends to keep the silkier materials from shifting.

Now I’m working on figuring out the best place to set up a photography area that I won’t have to move out of the way for other things. Once I figure that out I’ll make another lightbox and get my lights figured out for product shots. I made a backdrop curtain that I’ll also have to hang near over a table surface, which complicates things a little, but shouldn’t be too much of a concern.

After that, it’s a draw between making some kind of system for yarn and yarn related pursuits or figuring out a better storage system for my patterns.

this is my set up for making salad rolls

I just like them, because they taste good and don’t make me feel bad about myself, and I thought since it’s quickly warming up that it would be good to share something that won’t over heat the kitchen during preparation.

First, I julienne the carrots. Josey cooked the pork sausage. Then I rinse, shake, and wrap the cilantro in a dry cloth, and soften the noodles in hot water before transferring them into a new bowl in cold water. Then I put some hot (but not boiling– definitely not boiling) water into the pie dish. And a kettle of hot (but not boiling) water.

I did attempt to take pictures of the in progress stages, but I found out it’s pretty difficult to roll and hold and snap a clear picture at the same time. If the husband is willing I’ll try to get him to take a few snaps while I make rolls tomorrow.

My excuse for not having pictures of the finished rolls is completely valid, I had a hungry family and they tend to have epic levels of not-giving-a-rat’s-tiny-bottom just prior to lunch when it comes to my blog.

The system is pretty simple, get a clean flour sack towel, or kitchen towel or bar rag (so long as it’s clean) wet it and pop it into the microwave until it’s warm, squeeze out any excess water and put it over a cutting board. Take fresh rice paper round, wet it completely in the hot water on both sides and lay it out on the cloth.

Then arrange your veggies, protein, and noodles as you like. I roll the 6 o’ clock position up once, tightly, and then fold both the left and right flaps in carefully, before rolling all the way to noon. It takes a bit of practice to wrap as tightly as possible, but the wrappers (once softened with water) are very stretchy when they are fresh.I used cellophane noodles this time, but ordinary vermicelli noodles or rice noodles will work in a pinch.

the wrapper is there, on the towel, I swear it

Even though these are pork, I also like shrimp when they can be found fresh at a good price, or chopped roasted peanuts, or even tofu scrambled up with a splash of chili oil and oyster sauce. I guess it depends on what strikes your fancy. Vegetables are interchangeable too; mung bean sprouts, carrots, mashed yams, peppers, red beans, onions, cucumber, egg plant, cabbage. Do I have to mention there are no hard and fast rules on the herbs used either? I like cilantro; but mint, parsley chives, lemon grass and basil all work so long as they are fresh.

I know the round doesn’t show up well in the photo but the carrots and noodles are on the 6 o’ clock side, and the cilantro about an inch from the edge of noon (if you can’t see it in the picture, just try to trust me on this) that way when the roll is stuffed and rolled completely the bright color of the cilantro shows through best. Rose petals and borage or other edible flowers look really pretty on the noon too.

I usually just put these on the table family style over a bed of crispy fried noodles with peanut sauce and hoisin sauce or some hot soy sauce. They usually don’t last long enough for me to worry about keeping them in the fridge but they can be stored over night wrapped in a moist towel (so that the rolls do not touch each other, if they touch they will bond and become conjoined salad rolls.)

We’re still waiting for the roof to dry out enough so that we can repair the leak above the bathroom, and get to work remodeling the bathroom. This weather needs to start cooperating with my plans– I find it totally unacceptable that it insists on drizzling right over our house.

One bright side is that this gives Matt and I more time to argue over materials, colors and fixtures. I am trying to convince him to let me clean up the old tub (which is quite good and usable) and shower doors and sell them, so that I can put the money towards a nice old clawfoot tub and hardware.

He doesn’t think that cleaning it up would be worth the effort because it’s so old and ordinary, and that in order to sell it we’d have to refinish it. I looked it over (yesterday, when I was taking a bath) and I can’t see any wear or scratches so I’m not quite sure what he means. I think he thinks that I am not going to have the patience to sell it.

Admittedly we have wildly different tastes when it comes to materials and colors.

We’re like that song; he’s a little bit country and I’m a little bit rock n’ roll punk rock.

So there’s just a bit of water damage in the bathroom. Just a little. I mean, it’s not like we have to tear out all the dry wall and replace studs.

Right?

Okay, so– I’m guessing this isn’t just going to be a roof repair and bathroom remodel. It kinda looks like we’re going to have to replace dry wall in both of the bedrooms and then buy me a brand new bucket of sanity.

Candy + Sushi = candy sushi.

I’ve wanted to do this since spotting this Make: How to.

I made the rice crispy treat base, but everything else was a group effort with the kids right down to the roe eggs and oddly placed jelly & marshmallow frogs on the board. Lexi even added her own chopsticks next to the ‘ginger.’

Clean up was a breeze (it mostly involved the phrase “Eat the extras and put the wrappers in the garbage”– there were no complaints.)

• Dizziness
• Nausea
• Vomiting
• Loss of Bladder control
• Uncontrollable urge to clean and decorate

Okay, maybe we can skip loss of bladder control. I did dig out some of my vintage aprons and hang them on the wall, after cleaning the closet.

Tacking the aprons to the wall looked off. A little clothes-line and some old fashioned clothes pins fit the bill.

This is from a slightly different angle. So cheesy or cute? Or cheesy cute?

I think it needs something. I must have actually said “I think it needs something”out loud because the husband made this face and rolled his eyes. It does need something else though, doesn’t it?

I’m thinking more hats, or maybe a pair of garden gloves and a trowel.

The husband seems fine with them. I’ll test them on the children at snack time, if they’ll eat them I’ll make more.

I think like most people I get a little overwhelmed with the stuff that might need to be saved for future reference and just make little piles. In the dark of the night the little piles romance each other in mysterious ways and reproduce. Like tribbles, the little piles of squalor reproduce quickly because they are born pregnant.

My little piles of squalor weren’t as cute as tribbles, nor did they react in any manner to the presence of Klingons disguised as humans, and they didn’t make soothing noises. So the little piles of squalor were disassembled and order has been restored to my desk once more.

I seem to have a space worthiness issue that I need to address. I have three drawers, one shelf (not the whole shelf unit, just one shelf of the unit), the typing table, and my laptop (aka Hal.) You can see the arm of the scroll saw right behind the screen.

This is where I work. See my goofy glasses? The pair on the desk I took off so that I could look through the viewfinder of the camera, they are what I wear most of the time. The retro looking glasses in the coffee beaker are just my sunglasses. And the black frames next to them are uber-magnification, the prescription is designed for doing miniature and fine repair work. I have one more pair (not pictured) which are bi-focal and really too heavy for wearing as much as I should (for some reason they are glass and not plastic lens.) I broke my prescription safety glasses a few months ago and I’ve yet to replace them, so I wear the bi-focals under my face shield for turning.

The rubber ducky tin holds index cards and address labels and sometimes an extra calculator. The ceramic blue and white thing used to hold a jade plant, the plant out grew it so I use it for holding a ball of yarn as I knit. Eileens tacky glue (totally essential), pens, pencils, game-boy, games, timer, binder clamps, and a rotating stock of books also share the shelf space.

So that’s the Great Desk Purge and the grand tour of what really qualifies as my office space.

This was probably the fastest overhaul of a blog theme that I’ve ever done, in part because I wanted to keep things simple, and in part because I’m starting to figure out what I’m looking at in php.

By no means does this imply that I actually know what I’m doing.

Okay so quick update on all the things I haven’t blogged about here:

1. My house broke, no biggie– we’re fixing it and doing a bit of remodelling at the same time.
2. I’ve started doing art work again
3. I’ve applied to further my education via an online college
4. The chickens are just getting past that ugly stage of chick-hood, now that their neck feathers are filling out they don’t look quite so much like tiny vultures.
5. I’m scaling down our major appliances in order to a) economize our space and b) stick it to the power company
6. The girl child is *completely* (Oh thank you God, thank you.) potty trained.
7. I’m doing what I do every night: Plan to take over the world