darkfoxx

https://giphy.com/gifs/chubbiverse-chubbicorns-chubbicorn-chubbifrens-9d3LQ6TdV2Flo8ODTU I feel ya on the hospice front - apparently, my grandmother is ready to go - probable altzheimers - and my father is handling it exactly as expected (not well). I’m blessed to be on the other side of the planet and send you all the damn hugs being in the thick of it.

Friday, Saturday Ms. UrGeNt didn’t get back to me - not at all shocking - but that’s fine. I’ve got 4 hrs of billable time in and projects to attend to on Monday. Trimmed the hem of the circle skirt, made a zillion miles of bias tape of the cut-off material and re-hemmed the skirt with the bias tape instead of attempting to roll the hem. This is a much easier way to hem a circle skirt. I also wore this skirt out on Friday for our semi-regular Friday Pub Night and it was … ok. I think maybe full circle skirts aren’t for me, but this one wasn’t bad - just not my favorite in life. The hem is like 90% even, though. It’ll be good enough to wear on vacation. I cut out the fabric for take 2 of the tie-shoulder shirt - may go back and cut a facing piece because I think it probably needs it to stay crisp - and a deep teal fabric for a bonus princess seamed crop top I wanted to make. I’m completely flying by the seat of my pants for these two shirts. Fingers crossed it goes well! More work was done on my latest bug brooch - this one kind of a magenta & copper bee feel. Crochet was had as well. Went to a core class with a new instructor Friday which ended up being great. I was skeptical I’d like her since she has RBF, but I do. She also has chronic wrist issues and we spent a few minutes talking through modifications; she reminded me about knuckle push-ups and plank. Also had my Saturday morning vinyasa class with one of my faves that is still in town - also with chronic wrist issues + also hyper extends her joints like I do. We are all now on ‘let’s not let me blow my ligaments out before YTT’ watch. Classes are set for the week, projects are lined up, and menu will be planned either tomorrow or Monday at breakfast.

😍 Brain is not latching on the right way to phrase the fireside good book or satisfying lap craft + underlying excitement for the juicy research and odd social overtures feeling your triple post is providing in any way that makes more sense than this sentence so we are sticking with teh above emoji. Or, as I’ve recently seen it referred to - social glyph.

Monday - Wednesday Yoga was had 3x and I said goodbye to another of my favorite instructors + one of my yoga friends for the Summer. Boo. And I believe one of the ones left is out soon, too - double boo. I bailed again on today’s handstand class. While I do forearm stands, my wrist is bugging me a little and I don’t want to stress it more than I already am with the drills we do that are aimed at hand balancers. My knee is also slightly pissed off at me. I think I overstretched it yet again. I finished another dress - this one was supposed to be tea length but ended up being maxi, which is fine. It’s a cornflower blue soft af linen and exactly what I wanted it to be in the first place when I made a shitty tunic top version in cheap black cotton a couple years ago. I think I’ll keep this one as long as it wears well - it slips over my head. 1 dress to draft, cut & sew (estimated time: 1 day) 1 tank top to cut, adjust the fit of & sew (estimated time: 1 day) 1 cap sleeve top to draft, smock & sew (estimated time: ?? 2 days?) 1 bonus top to cut & sew (estimated time: 1 day) to go before the 9th. I can do this; I just need to do the damn thing and stop gathering anxious underpants about it. DH will be out for a few days, so I can hyper-focus until the wee hours if I so please instead of keeping anything resembling responsible adult hours. All I’ve got 100% on my plate is my yoga schedule, and with him gone I can shift all that and do me. I also started another bug, sketched out a few more, pulled reference images of some I aspire to, and generally fluttered around a bit with that project. Worked more on my 7th-try crochet project and hate it less than the last version. Most of it. Still not a huge fan of shell stitches, but for fucks sake I’ve got to finish something with this yarn. I can go back to open squares with some of the rest of the yarn I’ve got if I’ve got enough left. This version will make a nice portable lap project for the plane instead of lugging the Switch that I won’t actually play on the plane but will just take up space and weight. Food has been decent - DH ran into another sale on steaks, so we’ve got a good stockpile of our ‘kitchen steak’ dinners. I also made a nice big salad to dole out over the week for some veg. Hot Mess Ex Boss called again. *here’s me, ducking in case Tank throws something at me 😂* I told her I’d have very limited time, would have to weave her work around other priorities, and would absolutely be unreachable for a week in July, all of August and half of September so there would be no rushing. And I chucked 2 hours of her copy Tuesday, skipped Wednesday entirely because I wanted to sew, and then gave her 2 hours of sitting in a cafe and writing time today before checking on y’all. I skipped a day past-me would have freaked tf out to skip because uRgEnT. Go, me. I’m not going to pretend I’m a balanced human with boundaries - especially not where this hurricane is concerned - but I’m working on it. Not My Monkeys ……….. Not My Circus.

Good to know. This is important structural information.

Going back and giving more kudos to this bit: MACHINE True to its role as a troll, the scale went from the 98,8kg benchmark to 99,6kg on Saturday morning that I got curious, to a nice round 100kg this Monday morning. Not really sweating about the numbers, I know that not only is the scale a massive troll, I'm also not at the start of my fitness journey where all the newbie muscle gains and water weight losses lie. What matters is I'm feeling good about myself, no longer smoking and regularly working out again. I feel physically, mentally and emotionally better, a result I'll take over attaching my entire value to a number that I'll stress about. Yeah the metrics are nice, but they don't tell the whole story. Kinda how AI can compose artistic pictures, but can't produce original Art. Troll brain is a troll. Ooh … and teenager brain. I has it. And I’m glad to hear the handy dandy gif inserter is shite for more than just me. I just assumed it was a #ILiveInAGoddamnHole issue.

Yesterday: One of my favorite teachers’ last vinyasa class before her month & a half long holiday was yesterday morning, so I opted to practice with her one last time rather than go to the earlier-than-i-wanted-it-to-be Lululemon sponsored yoga thing with other friends in honor of International Yoga Day on the 21st. The goodie bags looked great, but I’m glad I stayed and supported my friend. That was about it, other than dragging our asses out of the house to see The Flash. Or is it just Flash? Dunno. It was a fine enough movie, full of memberberries as they all seem to be these days. Food was mostly abysmal - an emergency peanut butter ball right before class because I slept like absolute shit and wasn’t hungry until just then + a club sandwich from Tea Time with a hand full of fries for lunch + about a quarter of my popcorn at the movie + corn nuts for a not actually needed snack with my whiskey diet. I should probably eat a vegetable today. My wonky little first draft of a moth brooch. Waiting on the wire to come in for antennae, pin backs and buckram for the brooch bit - but my wonky, wonky girl is complete on the front. I’ll keep her lopsided self around until I need to harvest beads. Of course, where I live, really nice glass beads are super common. Strangely fancy af and weird shapes & colors are not. But if I wanted a bag of 10,000 pink glass beads for like $10? No problem.

In ‘issues we’ve covered in previous challenges’ note, i did a thing, and posted 21 days of unedited (except for mood lighting) pincha posts. This is the first of my current studios’ inversions challenges I’ve participated in past like day 2. I usually post day 1 in Insta stories (only) and then get too wrapped up in vanity (#edrecovery) to post further and drop out. I posted 21 days of one-take pincha practice with little editing. Mood lighting and vignette let me hide a bit, but I refuse to download anything resembling a Facetune or run my pics through similar. I know I don’t see what my friends see, and even though she’s not a part of our family, I’m thankful to my friend and one of the runners of these challenges @khemwambold on Insta for encouraging me and pointing out the things I can’t be objective enough to see. Some days I even choose to believe her. Poop. The forum won’t let me post my Canva masterpiece (🤣) it took an hour to create directly. Here’s the Insta link: https://www.instagram.com/reel/Ctj6igWAt8x/?igshid=MmJiY2I4NDBkZg==

Today: Back-to-back slow flow & core classes and then light lunch with a couple of my yoga friends; one of which is also going to teacher training this Summer. Came home and got my visa straight for the course + got the rest of my prerequisite books purchased on Kindle. Tidied up a little bit this morning. Friends are coming over with a currently chaotic toddler this evening for dinner if she doesn’t land in jail for punching anyone at the kids party they will be coming from. Next week’s yoga classes have been signed up for. Yesterday, I cut all the pattern pieces for the tea length dress I’m making and mocked up a pattern for a Princess seam semi-crop top I may make if I can make the fabric I already own work; otherwise, I’ll remake the V-neck tie shoulder top in a drapery fabric. I think I need something stiffer for the princess seam; just not sure if the eyelet cotton I have is too jazzy or not. I could just make it and see if I can still take myself seriously in a jazzy texture (because let‘S face it: it’s black cotton with black embroidery on it).

Yes! This first one is a hot mess and lopsided, but it’s a starting place. I need to get the wire & pin backs in still but I’m finding bead couching relaxing while I watch tv in between crochet rows.

This week so far: Went to class Monday, Tuesday & Wednesday. Skipped Thursday’s handstand class because of squirrel brain and wanting to not injure myself. Screwed up one of the tops I’m making for my trip - worked on patterning a couple alternatives. Debuted wearing the 1895 bicycle skirt and it worked just fine. Debuted wearing the complicated multi-size skirt and it’s … off. I’ll even the hem and see where that gets me. Cut the fabric for the tea length dress. Got the fabric in for the ruched top. I think I have a working pattern for a black top. It’s not the tie-shoulder variety I had planned and may not work with the fabric I have left. We shall see. Signed up for Yoga TT training, have paid for it and have booked my flights. Have gotten the e-books for 2 of 4 required readings for the course. Had social time with my yoga friends 2 days so far, with plans for another afternoon + couple friends coming over tomorrow. Have also destroyed + restarted a crochet project + half finished a janky af first stab at a beaded moth brooch project. A couple more digital fabric patterns have been added to the list.

When does this one end? Late July? From now to then: Continued yoga 5 - 6 days a week Finish my holiday me-made wardrobe bits (sewing a tea length dress, drafting and sewing a circle dress, sewing a crop top, drafting, sewing and ruching another top, fixing a hem). Holiday in Greece & meeting up with our very own @DarK_RaideR Studying? Maybe? Prep for the next big curveball I’ve decided to throw myself …. A 200Hr Yoga Teacher Training course. I’ve got a list of required reading to do before early August, and a few things to grab for the trip. I’m sure I should have more goals or things to keep in mind, but I’ve had squirrel brain all day and am doing well to not spin out.

Us, too!!!

Love that color palette - but yeah, you could totally skip the grey. I love grey, but the blues could absolutely stand alone.

I love the idea of stockpiling banned books! Those always used to be my favorites, and luckily I had English teachers with very flexible lists of titles to choose from when it came time for (some) papers to be due.

Club tentacle FTW! Following for awesomeness

Good going on the refocus! 🙌🙌

Sending energy out your way - hoping your desired new employers make the wise decision.

🙌🙌🙌 Astrid 😍😍😍

*sPiNNiNg oUt* some big life changes may be on the horizon. A few weeks ago, my yoga studio announced that it would be reconvening Teacher training, and 2 of my favorite teachers were creating the curriculum. Studio drama aside, now it’s only 1 of them + the dude handling the woo part is someone I don’t vibe with. I don’t want to disappoint my friend, but I don’t think this is the area I would like to focus on. I do feel a pull that if I were to teach yoga, I’d want to focus on anxiety riddled beginners and people needing physical modification. Functional yoga is my jam. Talked to DH, and he’s been pushing me to do TT for years. I brought up the general tack people take - a month-long intensive somewhere away from their home - and he said that sounded like a much better route to go. Enter one of my other favorite teachers, who has moved away to teach in Bali. I love this woman, and while she is not a functional-based practitioner, she knows that practice well and works on tRauma, rehab and recovery. She is also the only yoga person I have ever listened to about the woo stuff without my eyes trying to roll out of my head. And she just so happens to be teaching woo in a course whose main teacher and school leader is a physiotherapist. The price isn’t bad for what it is - DH is supportive even if I don’t end up turning this into a career. He thinks deepening my own practice is worth the price and me being gone for a month. The sPiNoUt: so much. Mostly physical questions (2 hours a day of asanas before breakfast and up at 6:30), and have a call scheduled with the owner of the school to answer. Not sure if this is the right path for me - not sure that path will lead anywhere - and I’m not sure I’m ready. But if I decide I am, this is kind of the ideal setup, no? Adding insult to: the class runs August/September. I’ll be home for a couple weeks in between vacation & this crazy ass thing. This may be an exhausting Summer.

Sewed for 5 hours Wednesday and then missed yoga class by 15 mins due to a schedule change I wasn’t aware of. 🤦‍♀️ So, I hit the mall to pick up a happy baby card for the pups’ walker - she threw them a goodbye for now party before she has the baby: I think they had a good time. I gifted her one of the beach bags I made back when I was contemplating an Etsy shop. I’ve got the same design and have absolutely loved it for the past 15 years. It’s my go-to. Handstand (pincha for me) class went well the next day and yoga friends were hung out with. Today I had back-to-back slow flow & core flow classes with another lunch with friends after. Also finished the skirt I was working on. Skirt is 100% done. Pants/skirt is 95% done. Shorts are 100% done. Pattern has been pulled for the long dress. Tutorial has been mapped out for the short dress. Tutorial has Ben mapped out for the tie shoulder tank. Shirred tank tutorial has been chosen; waiting on fabric to come in the mail. Have also worked on my crochet busywork project and have been coloring a bunch. Food has been vegan restaurant & steak at dinner heavy as of late.

Moar yoga has been had. Shorts have been finished. Complicated skirt has been half finished. Extracurricular crochet project is marching along. Resisting the urge to drop everything and bead some bug brooches. Recipe for this weeks post has also been photographed but not written up yet.

Same! 😍😍😍😍

* More hanging out with yoga friends. * Secret Pants - aka 1800s riding pants have been 90% completed, though I need more buttons because I sewed the damn skirt flap on backwards * Shorts pattern has been drafted and a mock-up has been tried on - and works as pants. * 6 yoga classes have been attended this week. * managed to eat mostly healthy. * A few more patterns have been designed.