The green and black one will be my husband's arms in time. ^_^
Making good progress! Red and black is (almost) finished on both sides. A few little touch-ups here and there is all that's left. Getting the yellow base on the rest now. I should have that much done today. I should be able to start on details tomorrow!
The green and black one will be my husband's arms in time. ^_^
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It's been an unnecessarily grumpy day. Ever have those? Doesn't happen often and the irrationality of it irritates me (which doesn't help)
Got a second coat of black paint and a first coat of red on eight pennants. Ninth is ready for yellow paint on the back! Almost done! Now I stand at that annoying spot where I look at my lil' bottles of red and yellow paint and know that I can't shake much more out of them. And I'm almost out of Pero. This means (ugh...) time for a trip to Walmart. But that has to wait until pay day. So - I'll finish that ninth banner and otherwise focus on black (recently bought a new, big bottle) until then. If I run out of black... or start getting sick of painting... I'll go back to the Big Book O' Russian Names. (Still only on the B's) This is the easy part.
Painting all of these at once will speed things along. What's slowing it down is, as expected, the felt soaks up the paint and leaves plenty of visible splotches of white. Two layers of paint. Per side. Yes, it will be a double-sided rope full of heraldic flags. And it will be awesome ^_^ Based on my experience tonight, the Desert Wynds pennants will be entirely finished in five days. I could probably finish them in two or three but there isn't much of a rush and I'll get sick of it if I don't do something that allows me to sit upright every once in a while. Thinking about trying a bit of braiding.... Oh, and I checked the bones in vinegar. It's been five days (with the nets suggesting three) but they are not really rubbery yet. They are rubbering a bit but we'll see how it goes in another week or so. (is rubbering a word? It certainly is an amusing verb...) As usual, even though I anticipated the issues - they annoy me. Felt absorbs liquid quite well. Even paint. And it remains fluffy which leads to patchy spots. I'll see if it helps when I paint the other side - but it's pretty evident that I'm going to need a LOT more paint. I'm debating the type. Right now I'm working with the standard cheap acrylics I've got on hand. I want to get hold of some of the (even cheaper) tempera powder and see how that works. Also considering house paint. It's more durable and I can get a big bucket..... I'll probably end up trying all of the above and see which fares better. When I get home from work it'll be time to paint the other side to match this. Once that dries I can start on the details - sun rays and swords.
I haven't decided whether to go over the yellow with a layer of gold. It would look nicer.... but I think in this form plain yellow would be more proper. Most of yesterday was spent cleaning and organising. There are still a few spots needing attention but most of that can't be helped until we get some shelving built on the back porch.
I did add a few more pages to the Big Book O' Russian Names. I may add more later - but today I will be working on pennants again. Nine down, eight to go! ...then begins the painting. (I'd have them all sewn up but I tend to get bored after three or four and wander off to do something else for a bit. This is why so little gets finished - Everything progresses, just slowly) Lots of great pies showed up - mine won a prize for most original ^_^ (and confused one person after the 'not blackberry pie' sign was taken off of it)
Other than that, got three more pennants sewed up and got as close to finished as I could with the German Name file. I'm about to start on Portuguese. A couple people have asked about that one. After that - Russian. Then, hopefully, Austria. I started Austria once and got frustrated followed by distracted. Today is my sister-in-law's third annual Pie-palooza. Last year I made Bubbleberry pie. I'm having trouble finding the recipe and that has been irritating me for a few weeks now. I really liked it, though I wanted to work on it a bit more. I can't remember what I used for the 'berry' part. This year, I made 'Not Blackberry Pie'. (Name courtesy of my favorite Jesster) It's rich, chocolaty and substantial. He said it is what he always expected from a chocolate pie but usually all you get under that heading is chocolate pudding in a pie crust. Disappointing. Not Blackberry Pie Cooked Pie crust (I used the pre-made kind you just unroll. Yes, that's cheating and I'm not entirely happy. I want to experiment a bit with home made - just don't have time for that right now. Avoid flaky crusts, though.)
2/3 cup Maple Syrup 1/4 cup Vegetable Oil 5 Tbsp Cocoa Powder (I use Special Dark!) 1 tsp Ground Cinnamon 1/2 cup Peanut Butter (I didn't measure, a little too much won't hurt) 1 cup Rolled Oats 1 tsp vanilla extract In a saucepan over medium heat, combine the syrup, oil, cocoa and cinnamon. Boil for 3 minutes stirring constantly. Add the rest, mix well, pour into pie shell and smooth out as best as possible. Refrigerate. Eat after it's had time to set. This makes one addictive pie. It doubles easily. My favorite part about this pie? I only have to buy maple syrup (and there's about enough for 3 pies in one bottle with a bit left over for pancakes) since most of the rest I keep on hand. ^_^ So cool! I used the usual cheap syrup this time but I also want to get the REAL stuff. It has such a different quality from cheap stuff. In a few days my father-in-law will be here to visit for a while! YAY! ^_^
Unfortunately, this means the next couple days will be focused on cleaning. I added a few more pages to the German name file. ...also.... I was reading about viking musical instruments. I saw something on making chicken bone whistles. This didn't look difficult... So yesterday I made a BIG chicken noodle stew and have a number of bones to work with now ^_^ ....also.... Bones is one of my favorite shows. They turned a skeleton in to rubber by soaking it in wine. I found out online that it only takes 3 days in vinegar to make a chicken bone in to rubber. I'm totally doing this. ^_^ I'm curious as to whether a rubberized bone can be wrapped around something, left to dry and harden in to that shape. It might just start to stink. I'll do this in the workshop where it won't stink up the house. I imagine if they DO harden again - they will be fairly brittle. Now.... imagine if they did harden in to a brittle curly shape around something. That would be a totally gothic Christmas tree ornament. ^_^ So - off to drop bones in to vinegar, clean the house and listen to good music too loud ^_^ I got a few of them ready for paint. Did the sewing with wool yarn, It shouldn't be too noticable once there is color on them. The rest are still waiting for attention.
But I did get another nine pages added to the Big Book of German Names. |