The Dressage Ring

And here's the To-Do List for 2019.  Major goal this year is to start making serious efforts to replace things that need replacing.

( Maintaining the household maintenance )




( Updating the house is a never-ending project... )



( I want a garden of candy canes! )




( LANDSCAPING )



( SCA skills )

( Stitching Fever! )




( Fannish Endeavors )

( Personal Administration )

( Health Maintenance )



( Furniture Projects )

( Wishlist )

So, we got some new stuff, and got rid of some old stuff, which is about the way it's supposed to be.

-boogieshoes, the busy

Well, it's that time of year where I see how things have gone last year....  note that for most of the text below, the black text is actually coded black, not 'automatic' - some weird thing about the html means when i highlight and hit 'automatic', the color isn't changing... so just an fyi.
( I feel like I did more this year... )

-boogieshoes, the busy

So, some time ago, I promised a list of the embroidery finishes I did for 2017, and some pictures to go with.  Most of the following are fairly small/ or were started in prior years, and going forward, I'm trying to finish my WIP (works-in-progress) stash before starting new projects.  Predictably, this means I started a peacock kit at some point last year, instead of finishing one of my other kits, heh.


( 9 finishes in 2017! )


S( Plans for 2018 )

-boogie, making a grab for the thimbles

Well, 2017 turned out to be a busy year, and part of that was the improved health over 2016.  I never seem to make all my goals, but having the list and keeping it updated really helps a lot.  Let's see what happened this year:


( Household Maintenance )


( Household Updates )


( Garden Plans )


( Landscaping Galore )

( SCA skill sets )

( Stitching Gallery )


( Fannish Endeavors )


( Personal Administration )

( Health Maintenance )


( Furniture Projects )

( Wishing these wishes were mine )


Overall, I'd say 2017 has been a good year. I felt productive at work and at home, and my health has had a great improvement.  I'm really looking forward to the new year, and doing a lot more.  Hopefully, that will include fannish endeavors - I'm working on setting up my DW account to mirror the set-up and feeds I had on my LJ account.  I'm trying to update my FB to be more me-friendly.  I'm going to try to spend Saturday afternoons/ evenings on the PC doing writing or other electronic-related things, probably starting around late March.  But I'm happy to be alive, and in 2016 at this time, I wasn't even sure I *was* alive.  So... let's get to the new year, eh?

-boogieshoes, the much improved.

this is more an update list than a post-post, but it's time to let people know i'm still alive.  i think.  *checks pulse* yup, still alive.

so here we go:

*in Feb, at my routine dr's appointment, i was dx'd hypothyroid - the gland isn't making enough hormone.  the good thing about this is that now i understand why i was so *completely and utterly* dragged out at the end of last year.  also, now that i'm on synthroid, my body isn't fighting losing weight, and 4 mos later, my chemical soup seems to be just about completely in balance.  the bad news is... i'm not going to be 'cured' from this - taking pills forever.  don't get me wrong, there are FAR worse things in the world, but my health goal has always been to minimize the pills i'm on... this is one step away from that.  It does make me very thankful for modern medicine, though.

*2 weeks after my dr's appt, Gulf Wars happened  - it's a pretty amazing event when you're not too sick or too glazed over too appreciate it.  Otoh, I forgot that last year, the things in my 'Accessories' box had gotten quite damp.  I took a few things with me, but decided to clean the rest later... which happened only a couple-3 weeks ago.  I lost a couple things to mold - just couldn't kill it, or in the case the belly dance scarf, the jingles were just too rusted to save - but I did save the majority of the items.  Since I am trying to streamline my SCA closet, a number of things are going to wind up getting donated, but I'm not entirely sure when.

*more recently, i sewed slipcovers for the couch cushions.  this is because in less that 2 years, my dog pretty much shredded the original fabric.  Cotton duck is much more resistant to Great Dane claws that the original what-ever-it-is.  I'm thinking of going back and sewing slipcovers for the back-cushions, too, so the entire couch is a bright cheerful yellow.  it'll match the curtains that way.

*speaking of the great goofus - she gained 10lbs in the past few months.  Oops... guess I was a little too enthusiastic about giving her treats.  Abbie and I are both on a diet now.

*my diet consists of continuing good food choices, and counting calories and recording non-caffeinated intake.  the last two are mostly to keep me honest.  My progress this week supports my theory that I'm 95% there, but I needed one last puzzle piece to make it stick... apparently, that's keeping myself accountable. 

Abbie's diet consists of limiting her to 1 or 2 treats a day. 

*Abbie got a new blankie today - it's Wonder Woman.  I thought about giving her Darth Vader to chew on, but then I decided I'd rather she ingested the power of a strong woman than the Dark Side of the Force.  She won't miss the cookies.  I promise. *hides cookies from Abbie.*

*today, i'm going to start organizing the personal papers in the office.  This should cut down on even more clutter, though right now it's mostly clutter limited to the closet.

*I paid off my truck on Thursday!  next up: the CC.

*I am 3/4 done of the dual embroidery piece: 'this is your flame... this is your flame on O2'.  I will find a way to get and post pictures, because while I love Mary Corbett's needlework site, and the piece would not have happened without the blogs very encouraging tone, I'd like to show her what happens when you let a nerd work stumpwork, lol.

That's all from chez boogie *brushes off dog-hair* you may now go about your business...

-boogieshoes

I'm finally getting around to doing this post, which is one of only 2 posts I try to make certain I do.  The other post is, of course, the yearly round-up.  So it's with mild guilt that I realize I've not posted this until nearly Feb.


( Deck the halls of the house with folly... )

( Mary Mary quite contrary... )

( Yarding by the Garden.... )

( Middle Ages Mash-ups )

( Stitchy Woman... )

( I swear I will be fan-active! .... someday )

( bills bills bills )

Personal ADMIN:
  1) Organize household items, including
       a) disaster kit
  2) Transfer data from old laptops to PC, when i get it.
  3) Make the database for my library
  4) File rest of bills from 2012 – and now, also 2013!... and now 2014...2015...
  5) Convert VHS and audio tapes to updated platforms. (Contingent on buying platform converters)
  6) Make a list of cyclical maintenance duties and times due.
9) pay good chunk of personal CC

( to my health! )

( Furniture Fair (-y Tale) )

( Wishlist )


-boogie

So I wanted to post my Christmas pie-in-the-sky wishlist, because I’m feeling really greedy.


( greedy christmas wish list here )



Whatever holidays you celebrate, whether with religious observances or commercial delights or an exuberance of both, Happy Holidays!

-boogieshoes, humming 'Walking in Women's Underwear'

my birthday is next week.  high on my "most wanted" list is a steamy Escorts AU fanfic.

Buck/ Chris anything.

Supernatural anything.

Kidfic with Buck or Chris the little ones (but not Buck and Chris both little in the same fic).

Sequal to "Loser Takes All" - what happens the next time someone gets in trouble? ;)

I have a special love for Vin is psychic/ gifted in some fashion stories.

I quite like the Yellowstone AU - gen or slash, more please?

Crack!fic... wing fic.... Crossover fic - i lover "Xander's real parents (Xander from BtVS)";  love the Highlander AU fics; how about some more Sentinel/ Mag7 fics, any time, any place, Sentinels known or not. :-)

All that, and if the Lord and Lady are truly pleased with me - a break in the weather.  I'm getting tired of 80% humidity and 95F weather....

-boogieshoes, humming

My birthday is the 17th of this month, and I am greedy. Well, not really. I want some fairly simple things this year, albeit they may not be easy to get. My wishlist for this year’s birthday is:

1. Someone to buy me a kit from Herrschner's.They’ve had some great deals lately, and I’m tired of not having the money to take advantage of it. Le sigh.
   
2. Master the Single Brussles Stitch, also known as the detached buttonhole stitch. It seems like it should be fairly easy, and perhaps I’m doing it with the wrong weight thread, but it’s kicking my arse right now. And it plays a major part in my proposed stumpwork piece for my first SCA Arts & Sciences submission. So, you know, I kinda need to figure it out.
   
3. I’m dying for a long, meaty Mag7 ATF:AU (or Skip Trace, although that may not be possible since Charlotte wants to file the serial numbers off, iirc) casefic told from Chris’s point of view, where:
   
   
   
   1. Buck sees ghosts like they were solid people
      
   2. This turns out to be a major plot point/ help in figuring out the case
      
   3. Vin seriously starts questioning Buck’s sanity, and pulls some stupid stuff because of it
      
   4. JD is afraid of Buck after his gift is revealed
      
   5. Somewhere in the fic is the line: ‘The first time Chris caught Buck talking to a ghost, he almost had him medically discharged from the Navy.’ (This can be modified to fit the scenario if necessary)
      
   6. Adults or other kids in Buck's childhood were physically abusive, and he has the physical scars to prove it. Buck never discusses them with the others (but Chris knows about them)
      
   7. Bonus Points if this is a Chris/Buck fic
      
   8. Points squared if they have a safe-sane-consensual D/S relationship
      
   9. And cubed if that is also a central plot-point somehow…
      
   10. 100 million points if Josiah’s girlfriend is actually a pre-op transgender XY.
       
   11. A Gazillion Million Points Raised To The Infinite Power Times Infinity if you can then transfer all these plot-points into a novel-length Dragonriders of Pern fusion-fic, and make it believable.
       
   
   
   
   
4. And also, I’d love it if someone made me Dragonrider!7 icons.
   

Pretty please? Someone?

-boogieshoes, giving her fellow mag7 fen 'the big eyes'

so, just a general update as i go along, to keep people in the loop of my life.

the awesome: I have green things in my garden!  it's pretty cool.  as much as i tend to be unable to keep things *alive* once they've sprouted, it's always fun to watch those seedling sprout and grow.

the good: i'm going to gulf wars (SCA event), and the tent should be fine, and i'm building a bed 'kit' so i don't sleep on the ground.  i'm excited, and it's going to be fun!

the bad:  some of the roofing shingles are coming loose, and i need to get that repaired.  total cost: $130 for shingles and labor.  not so bad.

the ugly:  when the roofer came out, he told me i'd have to replace my entire roof in 6mos to a year - this is a wear and tear issue aggravated in part by the fact that there's no wind or sun blocks whatsoever out here.  now, the no trees thing is in part because there's a big advantage to having nothing around to fall into your house should a hurricane come by.  otoh, hurricane...  guesstimate - because the roofer hadn't measured the roof yet, and you can't pin down the price of shingles until you order them - is $6-7000.  I'll have to put that off a few months until i can save up for it.  i'll be getting a 'standard 20-yr roof', which as the roofer said, should last 10-15 years in Mobile.  yay local weather.  i could pay a premium for higher-grade shingles, but those will wear out earlier than they're 'supposed' to, as well.  ah, well.

at least i have a goal to save up for.  and GW after this year should be much less expensive than last year.

-bs, happy homeowner