Day 367: Penultimate Make

Today I made a collage of some of the books I read in 2011. I used a fancy online program that seems to not want me to have a jpeg of the image, so you have to click through the link.

www.ScrapWalls.com/view?v=152519

One more day!

Day 366: A Very Large Number

For the past few days, I've been calculating the cost of the books, audiobooks, and DVDs I've checked out from the library this year. Actually, it's only the past 6 months, because I didn't activate the little "keep track of my checkout history" feature until June.

So here are the dollar values for the materials I borrowed from the Sno-Isle Libraries since June. In other words, this is how much money I saved by borrowing these things for free rather than buying them (not that I would have bought most of them anyway). Put another way, this is the value I've received for whatever tax dollars I've spent toward libraries.

Books: $961.15
Audiobooks: $1664.45
DVDs: $654.34
Total: $3279.94

If you assume I checked out just as much stuff in the first half of the year, which I definitely did, that adds up to over $6500.00 for the year.

$6500!

Not too shabby.

For all of you who pay taxes and don't use the library, I thank you for your contributions to my super awesome money-saving scheme.

Day 365: The Power of Dyson Compels You

Today I made a clean spot in my apartment.


I bought a refurbished Dyson vacuum about a month ago from Woot.com and finally took it out of the box today. Mere hours ago, this carpet that you see was covered in boxes, papers, clothes, books, cords, books, bags, and books. And now it is CLEAN! I couldn't have done it without Mat's help, cajolery, and stink-eye. Just what I needed. After weeks (months) of letting crap pile up, it feels very good to have a carpet again If I'd taken a Before picture, you'd understand. - Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 364: Not Just for Garnish

Today I made kale chips. Like potato chips, but with kale. And baked instead of fried. The ladies at work have talked about wanting to try them, so I gave it a shot. First, I tore the kale into bite-size pieces and removed any thick stemmy parts. Then I washed the leaves and lovingly patted each one dry.


Next, I tossed them with a little olive oil and seasoned salt, plus the teensiest amount of garlic powder, and spread them out on parchment on a baking stone.


I baked them at 350 for 12 minutes, when the edges were brown but not burnt.


They're not pretty, but they taste pretty good. Maybe a bit salty. They're so thin and light that they just disintegrate in my mouth. I'd probably make them again, with different seasoning and less salt. Now they're all packed up and ready to go to work tomorrow, so my coworkers can try them out too. - Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 363: Digidoodle

Today I blew the dust off my Adobe Illustrator and attempted a doodle using my mouse and the blob brush tool. Here's what I ended up with.

It's definitely not as easy and relaxing as doodling on paper with a real pen, but this kind of doodling has its advantages. Mainly the undo function. Also being able to draw in white on top of black is pretty cool. And uniform dot-making makes me happy.

Maybe I'll try again when I have more patience with figuring out how to change the brush size and maybe even use the pen tool.

Imagine what I could accomplish with a Wacom tablet instead of a mouse. I'm just sayin'.

Day 362: Have Yourself a Spicy Little Christmas

Merry Xmas! Here's a picture of the three spice rubs I made, with their homemade labels attached. I hope they're tasty.


And with that, I'm all caught up. Now I can clean my kitchen and figure out a few more makes for 2011. Almost to the finish line!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 361: In Lieu of Labels

I was going to make some spice rubs for Ed, but the little jars I got were too squatty for any kind of useful labels. So I made these little tags. I like fonts.


The actual spice rubs count as a different make - see the next post.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 360: Drinksperiments by the Dozen

Now that Xmas gifts have been distributed, I can post my makes for the last few days. First up: Friday.


Oodles of experimental infused vodkas with fancy little labels designed by Mat. Some went to my mom and some to my sister, and I expect some kind of tasting party soon. I think I ended up with 18 or so, and I have many more flavors yet to try.

If you're wondering about the size, these are little spice bottles - as close as I could get to test tubes.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 359: Vodka Vodka Everywhere

I have about seven thousand vodka infusions going on right now. So I spent the entire evening straining each flavor multiple times, starting new flavors, and even bottling a couple.


My kitchen looks like a bomb went off. A vodka bomb. Maybe a Molotov cocktail.


Since my make for today isn't as exciting as you might like, I'll throw in a bonus cute monkey picture.


Pogo says hi. - Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 358: So Close, Yet So Far Away

2011 is almost over, and so is this horrible make-something-new-every-day monstrosity.

For today, here's a lovely drawing I drew using my phone.



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 357: Vodkatania

Today I strained several of my latest drinksperiments. In fact, they're still straining, and it may take a while.

I did a batch of twelve different flavors this time. On Friday, I put them in jars.


Clockwise From top left: caramel, candy corn, peppercorns, marshmallows, lemon heads, coffee, candy canes, black licorice, sour skittles, bubble gum jelly bellies, atomic fireballs, and cashews.

Here they are swimming in vodka:


And here's a glimpse of the lengthy and tedious straining process:


I'm so sick of smelling vodka, I'll have to wait until another day to actually do taste tests.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 356: Ella Minnow Pea

I'm currently reading a book called Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters.


It's very funny and clever in a word-nerd kind of way. A major theme in the book is the pangram you probably have heard: The quick brown fox jumps over a lazy dog. (A pangram is a sentence using every letter of the alphabet.)

For today's make, I made a minimally planned and hastily executed bookmark for this book.


It's covered on both sides with pangrams, some of which are pretty funny, and all of which are more interesting than the fox/dog one.


If you like nerdy word stuff, I recommend this book. Although I'm only halfway done, so it might turn to crap at any moment.

Oh, and I had to pick my favorite pangram, it would probably be this: The big plump jowls of zany Dick Nixon quiver.

But I also agree with the sentiment of Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 355: Deformed Snowflake

Today I attempted to X-acto a fancy snowflake. Unfortunately, card stock is not the most friendly paper option for this purpose. This is how far I got before my hand cramped and I gave up.


Maybe I'll try again with origami paper or something else suitably thin and X-actoable.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 354: Delegation

Today I started to draw some random stuff. I wasn't inspired, so I delegated my make to Kaidin.


He did a very fine job.


And Keagin helped a little too.



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 353: Hot Buttered Yum

Today I made hot buttered rum, with actual rum. I remember having hot buttered water a lot when I was little, but now I'm big.

Here's the buttered and the rum:


And here I've added the hot:



Yeah, the buttered came from a package. Bite me.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 352: It's a Bird! It's a Plane!

Actually, it's two planes. More paper airplanes.

Here's the Wyoming V-Wing. It has a nice long glide.


And here's the Montana Long Ranger.


Despite its name, it tends to take a sudden downward twisting dive after gliding a few feet.

No, these are not exciting makes, but at least there are two of them.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 351: It's Beginning to Look a Tiny Bit Like Hanukkah

I know there's another week until Hanukkah begins, but I made this today, so post it today I shall.

Dig my groovy Photoshop skills (just don't dig them too close up).

Day 349: Tricksy Google

Today I have compiled some tricks you can do with Google. Or maybe they're tricks Google does with you. Either way, it's neat. But you'll have to try each one to see what happens, because I'm not gonna ruin the fun.

Sit, Google, Sit. Enter the following search commands in Google and see what happens.

1. do a barrel roll
2. askew

A Bit of Geekery. Now try these.

1. anagram
2. recursion
3. Copy the following equation into a Google search: (sqrt(cos(x))*cos(200 x)+sqrt(abs(x))-0.7)*(4-x*x)^0.01, sqrt(9-x^2), -sqrt(9-x^2) from -4.5 to 4.5

Do You Feel Lucky? For each of the following search strings, click on "I'm Feeling Lucky" (most of these work best with the Chrome browser, which is free and awesome, by the way.) Play around with each, moving your mouse and clicking and such.

1. google gravity
2. google sphere 
3. find chuck norris
4. google pacman
5. google guitar
6. google epic
7. who's the cutest person in the world?

Many Ways to Skin a Google. Here are more "I'm Feeling Lucky" goodies.

1. google klingon
2. google pig latin
3. google pirate
4. google rainbow

There are probably many more, especially in that last category, but this is enough for anyone. At least, anyone with the low expectations set by reading this blog.

Day 348: B, P, and SC

Today I played around with a festive little photo of Boris, Pogo, and Santa Cthulhu.

Here's the original.


Fuzzy lens beauty shot. Awww.


Trapped inside a scratchy scratch sketch box.


Old-timey vintage.


Very startled monkeys, especially Pogo.


Shake and bake.


When did pastel get so creepy?


And this one is gonna give me nightmares.



Boris and Pogo wish you a merry Monday. Santa Cthulhu does not.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 347: Skittles Containment

Today I folded some pretty paper into a Skittles dish.


The shape might be familiar to you, especially if you were ever a 7th grade girl, but I insist it's a Skittles dish, and nothing else.


See? It holds Skittles!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 346: Kitty Queen

Today I had a persistent dull headache and a bad case of the lazies. After doing some Spanish homework, it was time to color.


Coloring is soothing, but it doesn't cure headaches, apparently.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 345: Coloriffic Doodleroni

Today I finally finished a doodle on special colory paper.


It has a lot of detail.


And it took a long time.



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 344: Chocolate-Covered Cinnamon Bear

Today I was staring at my liquor shelf, wondering what to make, and I came up with a strange but tasty concoction.


I mixed chocolate liqueur, honey liqueur, homemade cinnamon vodka, and milk.


It was okay, but hearing it up made it better. Very relaxing and toasty drink for a blustery night.

I wish I had a moosehead-shaped class to drink it out of while I watch Christmas Vacation again.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 343: The Whole Shebang

Here's the damage:

• 10 HTML5s
• 4 CSSs
• 3 PHPs
• 1 TXT 
• 1 XML 
• 1 XSLT 
• 1 DTD
• 27 JPGs
• 4 PNGs
• 1 MP4

What does all that get you? This horrific Frankensteinian monstrosity I like to call my final project for my web design class.

All I have left to say is...

Day 342: A Sample Page

Since I got home from work today, I've been feverishly working on my final web design project. Most of it is still under construction, but I think there's one page that's done enough to look at, and it includes some neat JavaScript goodies that I made.

Visit that beautiful page now.

If it doesn't make sense out of context, just wait until tomorrow, when you'll be getting the whole complete and polished website as my make.

Oh, and the links may not work, because I haven't uploaded all the other pages yet. Under construction, remember?

Day 341: Feeling Sketchy

Today I used up most of my energy working on work and working on school. I only had enough left to do a little iPhone photo playing.


That vacant look in my eyes is the result of hours and hours of homework.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day 340: A Banner Day

Today I spent many hours working on the design of my website for my final project, which is what I'll be feverishly working on all week. Well, until it's due on Thursday morning. I didn't get any whole pages done, but I did make some graphics that I'll be using for banners, so those will have to count for today's make.

My website is supposed to be for a virtual library branch targeted toward the Israeli American community, in case you were wondering.

It's a fun project, but extremely time-consuming. I know just enough about web design to spend way too many hours trying to figure out complicated little bits of code. But at least it's the kind of work that keeps me glued to my chair and forgetting to eat, not the kind that makes me pace the room every ten minutes yearning to do wash dishes or organize my sock drawer just to be away from it.

Hey, maybe I should be a web designer. If I got paid by the hour, I'd do pretty well.