It's a Whale of a Tale

So I'm battling an epic cold.  it started like a month ago and now it's just gotten worse.... or possibly better?  Either way I'm coughing and there's all kinds of gross bodily fluids involved and yeah.  You all totally needed to know that.
So anyway, I know I posted previously about how I wouldn't post about my job, but right now I'm finding that a difficult promise not to break.  As of today, I'm going on about 4 weeks of no hours.  I work in a women's clothing store, and apparently myself and one other girl who are cashiers, are 'expendable'.  This means that we get like 5 hours a week (off season) on the schedule and then are called the day of and told that our 5 hours for the week have been cut (this has happened 2x in 2 weeks).  Well I hope my manager doesn't expect me to be available the next time she makes a schedule, cause I'm finding a new job.  This happened once after the holiday season from the tail end of January into February, and my manager promised me it was a one time thing.  Load.  Of.  Bullshit.  I've been job hunting since I started working in retail for a full time job, but every time I'm asked if I'm currently employed I have to answer yes.  But I'm in a retail limbo, I'm technically employed, but they won't give me hours so I end up with a 'working status' (according to the unemployment agencies) but I'm really sitting on my ass at home.  This has caused me to loose job opportunities because they don't wanna hear about how I haven't been given hours in over a month.

As a result of my sitting-on-my-ass syndrome, I've been working on my art everyday.  If I didn't work on my art I'd probably go crazy and start watching more "quality" TV shows, like the Jersey Shore.  I'm thinking of going down to the real Jersey shore, ok not Seaside or Point Pleasant, but Sandy Hook beach or Keystone beach.  Sandy Hook Beach is a beautiful nature preserve and there's always shells littering the beach.  Mainly hermit crab and snail shells but I manage to find the occasional conch shell laying around.  The last time I went, I brought home a bucket of shells with the intent of distributing them to all the kids at the studio.  Well I quit working there and I still have a ton of shells sitting in a bucket in my garage.  So I don't want to go back and then bring more shells home, cause I think my mother will have a shit fit.  Well, she has a shit fit over nothing anyway do it's nothing new.  Well back to what I was previously saying, I've been working on my art more.  The Brain is sitting in the corner right now and I'm focusing on getting more work done on the Whale.  I spend hours working on that piece and I'm only managing like a square inch every day, or at least a very small area.  I'm still working with the first color of beads!  I need to find a specialty store and color match the beads to the reference that I'm working with, then buy them in bulk.  I've got another 4.5-5 inches left with this color and I'm hopping that I can finish that section in about 4 days. 
Today's an amazing day, it's sunny but it's also raining on and off, without losing the sunshine and it's breezy.  I had wanted to go into NYC today and job hunt, but I realized that most of the places I want to go to are not open until Monday or Tuesday.  Maybe I can convince Dory to skip out on church to hang out with me on Sunday and walk the Garment District.

So I found some great comics via some friends and also from 'link-hoping'.  First there's Minor Acts of Heroism I love this comic. The humor is believable, the characters are adorable and the plot line is so far really engaging.  It also helps that the artistry is all kinds of awesome.  I've encountered web comics that even with the of best plots, I lose visual interest in because the art work is just not polished enough.  The humor is great, it doesn't sound hookey or campy, it sounds like something myself or a friend would say in an everyday conversation and they have some great one-liners.  I highly recommend this comic to anybody who likes super hero comics.  There are a few panels that may come off as being a little boy love or hinting at a relationship between two male characters, but the overall theme doesn't feel like it's swinging in that direction.  But if you don't like that, read at your own risk.  
Then for those of us that are DC comics fans, there's JL8 by Yale Stewart.  This is an incredibly cute series of comics with the Justice League as Kindergarten kids.  This is just all around cuteness.  It's too freaking cute <3

TCHOO TCHOO!!

Playing Spiderman!!!!  I love the guy who makes these comics!!  The art is like an old comic strip from a news paper and there's even texture added to make the effect believable.  I love the villains too!  There's a great sequence with the Joker and Batman where he's like "c'mon hit me!!"  and I was squeeing so hard for the movie references it comes from.

Now for those of you who like retro stuff (and I think I can thank Marina for this link) read I Was Kidnapped by Lesbian Pirates from Outer Space.  (link should take you to vol. 1 cover).  This has a great 1950s feeling to it and it's freaking hilarious.  Basically you meet Susie and she's kidnapped by lesbian space pirates and the crazy adventures that ensue.  The art starts off a little shaky and amateur, but as the comic progresses the art and the plot get better and better.  Of course being a ship full of women, there are lots of shoe jokes, and the ineffectiveness-of-men jokes so all around the humor is pretty good.  The characters are extreme personalities, but that just makes them likeable, but there's no subtlety going on it's all pretty much in your face.  

Well I guess that's all I have to say for today. 
See Ya'll Later!
~Amy

Music For The Soul... Not So Much.

Still waiting on my sewing machine to come back.  In the meantime, I love this song:

I don't even have a break-up experience anywhere near the meaning of this song, but I love singing along (poorly) to it in the car. I love the radio edit of this song, the original is too soft for me.  Singing in the car is how I amuse myself while driving to work.  Favorites include the above song, Photograph by Def Leppard, most classic rock songs and Renegade by Styx.  Love singing Incubus songs, but I don't have the range for that, I save those for drunken karaoke nights.
But enough on music, is anybody else excited about Free Comic Book Day?!  I didn't know that existed until Marina brought it up.  I'm so gonna grab a free comic book on said day.  Info can be found HERE.  Will definitely be running to the next town over to find a comic book store.  I'm kind of upset that Kevin Smith's comic book store will not be participating.  Jay and Silent Bob's Secret Stash will not be giving away free comic books I'm sad to say.  I still enjoy going there, I find all those "indie" comics and independent publishers.  Last time I was in I picked up Jesus Hates Zombies.  I had to read it.  I rather liked the idea behind the comic.  There's a plot where the Earth is having a zombie apocalypse and Jesus is sent to Earth to find a church full of people who he's supposed to save.  Shenanigans ensue.  The best part (for me anyway) was that it's done in a format similar to Gotham Knight and The Animatrix.  Each chapter is drawn by a different artist.  I love the diversity in the art and how each one depicts the characters and surroundings.  
There's not much else to report on..... the Steampunk Demeter costume is at a stand still until I get my sewing machine back and the Apoxie gets here.  I'm continuing work on the cable tie pieces at a snails pace and the Whale is on the back burner until after May. 
Hmm... I've started some deep spring cleaning but that's about it.  Really.  There's nothing else really going on.  So on that note I leave you with this, (I'm not really sure how to describe it) youtube video.

Don't question it just watch.
See Ya'll Later!

That Which We Call A Rose, By Any Other Name Would Smell As Sweet...

Wow, been quite some time since I last posted. Let me give the short version of what's been happening. I got hours at work, then that time-of-the-month thing happened, and finishing up some little projects. Yesterday and today were incredibly productive. I volunteered to help out Dory at her table at MangaNext from the 24th-26th. I remember her telling me about how she got stuck at her table during Otakon and what a miserable experience it was, so I thought it would be nice to offer some support in running her table. So since Dory is awesome, she's allowing me to use a little bit of space for my stuff (among other things), and I've been helping her with production of her work. Really the only thing I'm doing is varnishing or dipping the origami, Dory does all the hard work. So yesterday I made a little pin board and found a frame to fit it as a display piece for the convention (to the right). I recycled the stretchers from a painting that was un-salvageable, and found some fabric samples from Crate and Barrel that I picked up from the fiber lab back in my college days. I think it looks pretty. I made up a resin pour about a week ago, to protect some dried flowers and get some practice with the molds. I'm pretty happy with the results... just haven't been able to photograph the cabochons that I made due to working during daylight hours.(to the left) Yes, that is my work station and yes it is a mess. That's my set up for the flower dipping, although at the point I remembered to take a picture the resin was already settling (on the right). Those flowers held a lot of resin but most of it dripped out onto the cardboard... it was incredibly messy. But on the bright side, the flowers look amazing and I learned how to make fake water droplets. As you can all see I prefer photographing when there's sunlight for obvious reasons. Look at the flowers they're so pretty! So now that you're up to speed, yesterday I started putting those flowers to good use. I made a few necklaces and started some pins. I was given some really beautiful lace trimmings by Jillian, which was super sweet of her, she's Awesome! I had a third necklace but my mother claimed it for Valentines day. The necklaces are made out of individual dried rose petals dipped in resin. I thought they would harden more, but they are rather flexible, which makes me think that maybe I didn't mix the resin right. I have a few more petals to dip and a leaf or two as well. I already coated one leaf and it looks really great, I just need a bail to glue to it and a chain to hang it from. I'm thinking that I should add a small ribbon to the bottom of the lace and trim the stems of the roses a little bit. There are holes in the stems from where the wire was inserted to allow them to hang dry and it looks a little ugly. I'm really proud of them and I hope they sell. I could definitely use the cash.

That's me

Today I went to Dory's place and set up shop with the resin there. I thought I had more left in the kit, but apparently that was not the case. Since I'm not in any rush to create stuff, I put Dory's roses as top priority to be dipped, and to experiment with a few of my things. We had tried this once previously with some really great results, her origami roses took on a plastic-like quality while retaining the look of folded paper. This way the paper is protected from hand oils, weather, and being crushed by slamming your hand into a wall... or LARP-ing too hard. (Seriously, my first Katsucon I was signed up to LARP and they this disclaimer before we started that people needed to ease up on the rock-paper-scissors because the year before someone had been sent to the con-infirmary from playing rock-paper-scissors too hard and injured their hand.) We had some great surprises this time around and I hope if anyone is going to this Convention that they check out Dory's table and buy some of her cute stuff... or buy it online... hint hint nudge nudge. We spent most of the time prepping her pieces for the resin, and also setting up the station (on the left: me working on some resin dipping. On the right: our set up for drip drying). While we were doing this we were watching Tangled. I've never seen Tangled before and it was so cute. It bothers me that Rapunzel is rather ditzy, but she kicks some butt too. I liked how she wasn't a helpless princess (most of the time). Speaking of Tangled, that reminds me of this picture floating around on the internet...

Anyway back on topic, I worked on two new brooches while at Dory's place. I had these half faces that came off of a door hanger... thingy. It was supposed to be a Christmas/ Mardi Gras themed door hanger but it was butt ugly. So I salvaged the little plastic faces to reuse and thought this would be the perfect opportunity for that. Since they're hollow I decided to fill the backs with hot glue, (a trick I picked up from a workshop on "How to mod out your nerf gun") so that i could give it a backing and pin. Of course nothing is that easy, and I snapped my hot glue gun in half. Really not sure how, but it's beyond repair at this point. On the right is the copper toned one. I wanted to use fabric with this one, and I like how it turned out. Reminds me of an Illustration of Monks Hood I saw in a book once... which is a whole 'nother story on it's own. I might add a flower or something but I'm not too sure. On the left, is the second face, which was supposed to be an antique gold color, but has turned green for some reason. haven't quite figured that one out yet. All I can come up with is that the metal in the pigment oxidized? Not a clue. Anyway that lace part is cut out from the background so it has a really nice shape to it. The only thing I dont like about this whole process is the glue fumes. They stink to high heaven. It's this stuff called E6000, and it's essentially an epoxy meant for crafting and jewelry making. It's really strong stuff but it smells like a two part epoxy and gives me one massive migraine.

So during the week I get lazy and all I want to do is surf the net for anything remotely interesting. I stumbled across this artist, Jacek Yerka, a painter from ( I believe) Poland, and he makes some really lovely fantasy art. There's this one painting that really struck a chord in me, a painting called Autumn (pictured to the right). I love this painting. It's what I imagine the lost boys from Peter Pan would have lived in. You know the whole "hollowed tree as a hide out... Capt. Hook will never think to find us here." I kind of wish we were able to live like this within the trees, almost a symbiotic relationship. Understandably the tree would never survive being hollowed out like that, but the romanticized notion sticks with me. One day, when I'm a rich and famous artist (lol), I'll have the ability to design and build a house that's in a tree. I never had a tree house as a kid... I'm also not a great climber, but I've always wanted a house in a tree. I don't really want the squirrels and possums that come with the territory, but the idea of waking up to see the sun rise through bright green leaves is really... calming.







On a more random note, found this image on PoorlyDressed.com of the Disney Princesses... if they were Hipsters. I had to laugh. Honestly though, I secretly wanna wear Belle's outfit. It just looks so cozy and fluffy! (Original Artist Here)

Well that's about all that has happened recently. I'll post something else real soon... during the weekend... maybe. Yeah I'm gonna get some sleep since I have work in the morning (thank god).
See Ya'll Later!