Ninja's Attack!

I must admit I am quite proud of my ninja toy adventure. My first ninja came out quite successfully.


Then I thought, well if I can make ninja's, I bet I could make teenage mutant ninja turtles. And so I did. Here is Raffaele. I also made little tin-foil weapons for him, but later decided to throw them out as they weren't very child friendly.




Then I thought, well if I can make mutant turtles, I could probably make mutants. And so I did. This cycloptic alien looks a bit meager on his own, but I think with some other alien friends he could feel quite at home.


And so at that point I decided that I needed to get some more yarn to make sets of ninja toys for kids. So I bought some colourful thread and got to work. This however was when I discovered that I had actually messed up the original pattern I was following on my first ninja (which also explains why my ninja turtle is larger than my ninja). I then spent many ninja-attemps at trying to repeat my original ninja size. Here is my ninja graveyard of failed attempts.


But I finally have it down to a science and here is my first set of ninja toys! Ideally I wanted buttons for all of their eyes, but unfortunately, Micheal's did not have a bag of small black buttons, so I have had to move to felt eyes - which is probably more child friendly.



I also managed to find on-line some of the free patterns from the creepy cute collection. Next up, I'm thinking of making the druid! (see needlenoddles link below)

http://needlenoodles.com/home/?q=node/134

The army begins .....

My friend Jamala is currently taking a knitting course, which amazed me because it hadn't really occured to me that one could sign up for such a course. I mentioned that I also knit (mainly mittens) and that we should get together for drinks, cheesy movies and some knitting. And so we did.....

Of course this meant that I needed to find something to knit, and since it is not really mitten season, I decided that maybe it was time to branch out in to something else. When I opened my knitting bag, a two-needle sock pattern fell out and I decided that maybe it was time to take up sock knitting. Now I must say I'm not terribly inspired by knitting socks, especially since I don't really like wool socks - too itchy and bulky. But it was a nice exercise, and I was forced to learn a few new stitches. I made a concept sock (see below) .... it is oddly shaped because I didn't bother to follow the proper proportions, I just wanted to practice the hard parts.

Test Sock




But all this got me to thinking, maybe I should find something new to make. Somewhat inspired by my friend Catherine who has been posting pics of baby toys she has been making, I decided I should look at fun rather than functional things to make. And that's when I came up with ninja toys!!! Here's what I am now trying to make,



...but of course I'm too cheap to buy the pattern and too crazy to actually follow the pattern if I did breakdown and buy it, so I am creating my own ninja warrior designs. Stay tuned for upcoming results....

BTW - In case you were wondering, Jamala and I decided to watch "The Net".... lets just say, the internet has come a long way since 1994!

An oldy but a goody .....

I must say, I am extremely happy with the fervour with which people have latched on to 80 Postcards to Adolph. It has been a success from many standpoints so far - not only has it created a renewed interest in checking the mail for my parents, it has also allowed them to connect with people that they have not heard from in years.

Olive Schurek - Dad's cousin - sent through these fantastic postcards from 1920! Yes 1920! And to add to the excitement, the postcards are of pin-up girls! So as you might expect, at this point I will have to issue a warning - the following content is for mature audiences only, parental discretion is advised.


This first one is a little racy - she's showing some serious mid-calf, and look at how she teases the audience by putting her fully clothed toe in the water.



This next one is very saucy with some significant mid-thigh showing. The photographer taunts the audience here by using the table to almost cut the girl in half.



Definitely a fav, this one shows a private moment in the life of a pin-up girl.



Probably the most provacative of the bunch, this postcard has a nice ariel view of her bossom.



And finally, the best for last - this girl pulls out all the stops; she flaunts her body, showing full ankle!!!!



Hope you enjoyed these as much as we did - they are truly a fantastic find!

Burberry Eat Your Heart Out

With my hair nicely trimmed, I realized that I was starting to look a little less Jennifer Aniston circa 2002 and a little more Emma Watson Burberry 2010. Of course, it really does me no good whatsoever going around comparing myself to stunning 17 year olds, but I was surprised by the similarities in our dos. Now although we are both rocking the same hair colour and roots, of course Emma's steamy brown eyes, team of photgraphers and stylists somewhat out-does my home-based version.





Eric also pointed out that I should have had a fan! And I'm sure an actual Burberry outfit probably would have helped. Next time, I'll try for a little more pout in my smile....



And yes ... this means I have far too much time on my hands!!!

Makeover Madness

While Eric diligently plugged away at doing the taxes this morning, I thought it might be a good idea to give myself a makeover - and I think after seeing this upcoming "before" photo, you too will agree!

BEFORE


And so off I went to the hair-stylist. If you weren't able to guess it already, I am currently having a bit of a battle with my hair. After a decade of processing it, well ... it is quite crispy (go figure!), but at the same time, I am trying to grow my hair into long beautiful locks - therein lies the trouble. If I cut it, well it gets shorter, which goes against my goals; but if I let it grow, it just gets more dead and crispy. So I resigned myself to the fact that in order to get longer more beautiful hair, it needed to get cut. I'm also trying to figure out what to do color-wise. Again, after a decade of dying it, I'm starting to think that my hair might be better off with a little less peroxide - however, I just had it died deep brown-red which promptly faded away to the color you see in the previous "before" picture. Talking this over with my stylist, he claims that lighter colours hold better than darker colours for my hair type, so I should consider highlights over low-lights, especially over the summer. But today, I decided not to conquer that battle.

And so here is my "after" make-over pic. Much better. Bouncy, fresh looking hair. I decided I would have the stylist try to bring out the natural curl since I almost always get it straightened. I'm pretty happy with the results.

AFTER


Tomorrow I am going to try the Emma Watson in the Burberry ads looks (yes, despite just recently ranting about being mistaken for looking too young, I am going to copy a 17 year old's hairdo ... I am well aware that I am just perpetuating the problem!)

Life on the road ....

This week I'm kicking off round II of my big market research - so today I am in Baltimore prepping for a long week ahead.

Now often when I mention to people that I travel for my job, they tilt their head and in a melodic voice say "Oh that's too bad." or "Oh that must be tough." But as my husband would like to point out, I'm not staying in a tent in bush camps, I'm staying at the Hilton (well actually right now I'm at the Sheraton, but that's a minor point).

In fact I kind of like the travel, it has many benefits:
1. It gets me out of the office - mixes it up a bit, so that things are a little less humdrum.
2. I get frequent flyer and hotel points which I'm hoping to bank for super fun vacations.
3. My husband appreciates me more when I return. My cooking is always far superior (or at least perceived that way) when I get back!
4. I get to visit people on my way - this leg of research, I got to come see Kristen and Jason's new place, and on the next leg I'm visiting Tracey in Indiana.

And so although I find myself stuck in a hotel room watching Anne Hathaway movies this evening, I'm sure I would probably be doing the same thing back in Boston but would be many more Starwood points away from the future vacation of my dreams (yes the vacation of my dreams involves me not having to pay for anything!)

Battling the 30s

My understanding was that at each milestone birthday a person should sit back and reflect on times past, and ultimately realize that they are growing old - very old. And so, when I turned 30, of course I started to feel the weight of years long-since-past press upon me. The youth of my 20s was behind me, I had entered the decade of corporate climbing, mortgages, and child bearing. It didn't help of course that I was surrounded by 22 year olds at work, and that the "really old people" in the office were only 34. I had resigned myself to the fact that I was no longer young. (I do appreciate that if I think 30 is old, then what about 40, and I can't even imagine 80 at this point).

And then I moved to America .....

I'm not sure what happened, but all of a sudden, I am having a "young" crisis. People everywhere seem to think that I am almost a decade younger than I actually am.

Yes - I got carded at the Cheesecake Factory. I know, seriously - the Cheesecake Factory. And even though I recognize that the legal drinking age is 21 in the US, I'm a good decade above that. In shock, I reached for my id slack-jawed, muttering "but I'm old?!?!?"

And this comes on the heels of a couple of recent client experiences of a similar nature. I recently mentioned to a client that I had played on an ultimate frisbee team - to which the client (with the same name as me) retorted "Why you're just like a younger version of me!" To which I responded - "what do you mean younger?" because from my impression we were the same age (in fact I might be a year or two older than her). "How old do you think I am?" I asked. 24. Yes. She thought I was 24. Appauled, I gasped and blurted out "I'm 31!" At which my whole team was shocked - apparently they too thought I was more like 25-26. Seriously? And then another client just last week asked me and my much younger counter-part if we would ever consider doing an MBA in the future. At which point, I had to tell her about my years building the space station, my gluttony for collecting degrees, and that I had finished my MBA two years ago. (Now of course she is probably 50-ish, so I felt a little better that she saw me as "younger")

But all this to say, it is giving me a weird complex. Some have said it's my positive-Canadian attitude that makes me younger, but I don't really know what to think. I should love it - because what woman doesn't want to be told she looks years younger. But the 30s is an awkward time in a career where you're trying to establish yourself and climb the corporate ladder, and that's difficult if everyone thinks 21 (or 24!) I know I'm probably not gaining a lot of sympathy on this one, but it's weird and unsettling. And frankly, if I'm going to be 24 again, I want a cooler wardrobe!