Tag Archives for life

Mia and Lapis: or, how I finally got my license

This post isn’t even remotely crafty or nerdy, so for those of you who follow the blog for my craft projects or nerdy rambles, I’m sorry.  If you’ve been following the blog for a while, you’ll notice that I do occasionally talk about my life here – and, well, some pretty big stuff has happened in my life recently.

The biggest thing: I GOT MY DRIVER’S LICENSE.

holy freaking crap I DID IT OMG OMG

Yes, after seventeen years of anxiety, terror of piloting a vehicle at speeds faster than 20 mph, three scooters, one moped, and two cars, I’ve finally got my driver’s license.  At the ripe old age of 35.  But I did it.

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The return of Startitis

Well, to be completely honest, it probably never left in the first place.

Ah, here we are again, making lists of unfinished projects…

As part of me trying to get some craft projects actually finished instead of lurking around my craft room or piled in the closet, I made a list of what I know I’ve started and haven’t finished yet.  And I gave myself an ultimatum: no spending money on craft supplies until I finish a good chunk of these projects.

Yes, that’s right – The Crafty Nerd isn’t going to buy craft supplies.  It’s scary, right?

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The State of the Nerd: May 2017

I know, I’ve fallen into that pattern of not posting again.  It’s been a crazy month or so here in my little corner of the world – there have been work changes, life changes, and all sorts of other things going on.  For those curious, let me break it down for you:

  • First off, I was diagnosed with ADHD last month.  It answers a lot of questions I’ve had for many, many years about why my brain operates the way it does, and now that I’m getting help for it, things are getting better.  With the meds I’m on, my focus has improved, my anxiety is greatly reduced, and it feels like my brain is finally working properly for the first time ever.
  • Work has changed.  LOTS.  That’s all I’m going to say about that.
  • I graduated!  With TWO Masters degrees!  Yep, I finally finished my dual masters in Library and Information Science, and while I didn’t walk in graduation, I had an epic gradu-birthday party that was probably much more entertaining than sitting through a lengthy commencement ceremony.

With grad school done, and my brain finally working properly, I’ve now got the time and energy to update the blog more regularly, with more than just status updates about how crazy life is.  I’ve got so much in the works, so many half-finished blog posts that I can finally wrap up and share with you all, and I’m hoping to finally settle on a new blog layout soon that’s a little more organized and less cluttered.  So, stay tuned – there’ll definitely be more of the crafty nerdiness you’ve all come to enjoy soon!

The Overwhelmed Nerd

I know, I know – I didn’t post last week.  And here it is, Wednesday, and I’m just now getting around to this week’s post.

Long story short, I’m pretty overwhelmed at the moment.  Changes at work, combined with nearing the end of my final semester of grad school, with extra anxiety thrown on top, has made things a bit of a mess for me lately.  And trying to keep it all together lately is a bit of a struggle.

This pretty accurately describes how I feel right now. Overwhelmed Peridot, attempting to hide in a toilet… although I wouldn’t necessarily choose that as a hiding space…

I’ve been trying to find ways to calm my brain down, and reduce my stress – mostly they involve crafting.  I picked up quilting recently, and the intense focus quilting requires has done a good job at not giving my brain any room to process anxiety.

I made this quilt over the course of a few weeks.

That’s been helpful on the anxiety front, but not quite so much for the schoolwork front.  I’ve been trying to balance it all, and I’ll admit, I’m not doing a very good job of that.  And on top of it all, with so many work changes going on, things just are a discombobulated mess for me right now.

So, I apologize for not having anything of substance to share the past couple of weeks.  I’ll at least try to share some nerdy stuff next week, and post any quilting stuff I’m doing to help keep my brain sane, but bear with me if it doesn’t end up being as awesome as usual.

Thanks for sticking with me, readers – I do all this for you.  And a little bit for me, because I don’t want to overwhelm poor Ross with my crafty ramblings. 🙂

The exhausted Crafty Nerd: rambling edition

Peridot resembles how my week went, pretty much.

I apologize in advance, folks – this week’s post isn’t going to be terribly entertaining.  I’m freaking exhausted.  I went from the craziest week ever (so much stress, so many things going on!) to the most relaxing weekend ever (Ross and I spend the weekend at the West Baden Springs Resort, a little trip we do every year around the end of January), so I didn’t really have much chance to even think about the blog.  I didn’t even do any crafting this week!  Blog-wise, I’m on a roll, though, and have been cranking out at least one post a week since the beginning of the year – and I really don’t want to lose my momentum.  So, this week will be devoted to a collection of nerdy rambles, in no particular order.

  • Remember the Rose Quartz costume I told you guys I was going to work on making in last week’s post?  Well, I have the first part, thanks to my friend Kasi – she’s loaned me her uber-poofy floor-length petticoat.  It’s going to be PERFECT for my Rose costume.
  • I got to borrow a fancy tablet monitor from work to use as a second monitor with my work laptop, and guess what – it’s a touchscreen, too!  After some fighting with drivers, I managed to get it to behave well enough to doodle in Photoshop, so I’m going to test it out for some more heavy duty drawing soon.  Plus, it’s going to be awesome to be able to have that little guy in my lap to take notes on PDFs on for work.

    You know me and technology – I always love having something new to play with.

  • I’m attempting to reduce my crocheting overwhelmedness by picking one of the myriad of in-progress projects and actually finishing it.  Right now, I’ve got a number of things in the works, including a sweater, a cowl cape, a dragonfly shawl, a hat (I’m seriously three rows away from being done with that sucker), and an awesome blanket I’m working on for a friend’s baby.  I’m currently working on said awesome blanket – that’s going to be my “work on this sucker until it’s done” project.

    I’m sure you Star Trek fans know what sweater was the inspiration for this blanket… 🙂

  • I almost dug out some cross stitch today.  I have two projects in the works that I haven’t touched in years – a Sailor Moon pattern that I made myself, and a Sherlock pattern for my friend Josie.  I hope I finish that Sherlock project before Josie’s next birthday – it’s already two birthdays late. :X

I promise there’ll be a far more entertaining post next week – if I can get my hands on my camera tripod, I’m going to attempt to record a video tutorial!  I’m excited about being able to use my video development skills on something new. 🙂

Things I have been doing instead of blogging

This is me lately. But with far more yarn and other things on the pile as well.

This is me lately. But with far more yarn and other things on the pile as well.

What I’ve been doing lately:

  • I have been crocheting.  A lot.  A LOT.  I’ve made a shawl to go with my wedding dress, a baby blanket, and have another baby blanket, a corner-to-corner blanket, and another shawl in progress.  SO MUCH YARN.
  • Oh yeah, and I’ve been planning mine and Ross’ wedding.  We eloped a while ago (surprise!), and we’re having the celebration later this summer.  Which involves lots of planning.
  • Grad school.  I swear I’ll eventually finish.  At least I’m almost done for the semester.  I’m making a My Little Pony metadata schema for one class! 😀
  • Scootering.  Lots and lots.  Mia and Max both got baths yesterday!
  • Helping my friends J and Kasi with their farm.  They have Angora bunnies!  Someday I shall make their fluff into something awesome.
  • Riding with Ross on Garnet, his new motorcycle (named after Garnet from Steven Universe!), and Worf, J’s scooter (an honorable scooter!).  I’m helping both Ross and J get used to ferrying around passengers.  I am far less terrified of this than I used to be!
  • I’ve been doing work things, like putting together video trainings and such.  It’s awesome.
  • I may have bought a ton of Star Trek figurines and spent some time putting them into silly situations.  I call them my Space Friends!
Worf, Dr. Crusher, Troi, and Jadzia, along with Kira (who's not pictured here) make up my Space Friends.

Worf, Dr. Crusher, Troi, and Jadzia, along with Kira (who’s not pictured here) make up my Space Friends.

What I haven’t been doing:

  • Writing blog posts.

I’ve been a horrible blogger.  I was so good earlier this year, making sure I had regular posts every week, and then life exploded and I got distracted.  And then I actively avoided the blog, because I didn’t want to think about how long I’d neglected The Crafty Nerd.  But here I am, dragging myself back in shame, the horrible blogger back to funnel some content into this site. With this essentially being my finals week, I’ll actually be able to post regularly all summer without getting too overwhelmed.  But will I actually do it?  Who knows.  At least I have no shortage of things I’ll be able to blog about coming my way this summer.  Like learning to spin my own yarn!  And planning my wedding (and crocheting a gazillion roses for it).    So, here’s to a summer that’s hopefully full of blog posts, and hopefully not full of a quiet blog.

Things that The Crafty Nerd has been up to…

I know, sometimes I’m not very good at this “regular posting” thing.  Especially during the school year.  I’ve got to kick my own butt about it, and remind myself “hey, you have people actually maybe wanting to read what you write, so you have to write something”.  Even if it’s just something little and silly like that pony creator I posted a few weeks ago, it shows you guys I’m still alive, right?

Well, here’s what I’ve been up to that’s keeping me from posting regularly…

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