Three sentence movie reviews: Warm Bodies

Oh my goodness was this a romantic comedy for me.  Romeo* and Juliet with zombies instead of parents to keep the young lovers apart.  Very cute and clever and includes a positive message and with that big-eyed girl from Crazy Stupid Love** playing a supporting role.

Cost: free from library
Where watched: at home.

*Can’t get enough of the dude who plays Beast in X-Men?  He’s the male lead.
**Analeigh Tipton

poster from: http://www.impawards.com/2013/warm_bodies.html

Random song. fun. without Autotune

I love fun.  Despite the fact they have a stupid name that constantly causes confusion.
Example:
 “I’m going to the fun. concert tomorrow.”
“Oh good.  Who’s playing?”
“fun.”
“Is that a band?”
“Yes, they are called fun.  But with no capital ‘f’ and a period at the end after the ‘n’.”
“Huh.  Never heard of them.”

But they have, of course.  That “We Are Young” song was everywhere for an entire summer and “Some Nights” took over the following autumn.  People have heard them, they just don’t know it.

Their first album, “Aim and Ignite” was full of quirky and well, fun songs with non-standard pop music instruments (trombones anyone?).  I loved it a lot. They reminded me of Queen in their playfulness.  So I wasn’t really that excited when their second album “Some Nights” seemed to have been taken over by the Autotune.  It was out of control, espeically on later tracks.(What would be “side two” if we were still listening to albums)  At one point while I was listening to “Some Nights” the boyfriend yelled from the back of the house, “Are you listening to Autotune the News?”  Not the greatest thing to be confused with.

Where was all the great singing I heard on the first album?

So I was happy to find the above video taken by a cell phone wielding college student at the University of Rochester on October 2, 2011. It’s the same song from the album, but minus the Autotune.   I’m hoping their next album will be more of what came first and less of what came second.

Also, here’s my favorite song from “Aim and Ignite”  It’s chock full of lyrics (unlike the catchy-but-overly-repetitive “We Are Young”) it seems to be about the lead singer’s parents, and is very sweet.

Pop Up Project Finished. Capes

I’m visiting Heather in Kansas and she is the mother of two girls.  So I used those blue satin sheets from Goodwill and made capes.  (Don’t worry, I laundered the material before I got to sewing).
The pattern (found online)was a circle skirt, essentially. You cut two circles (four in my case) drafted a Peter Pan collar, sandwiched everything together, sewed, turned, and then stitched around the outside.

I bought buttons you could cover so they had matching closures and embroidered a monogram in each one.  I’m really happy with how these turned out.

Guess who wants to monogram everything she owns now?  Me! I see where Laverne had the right idea about that particular topic.

Here are my templates. I found a font I liked, blew up the letters in Word to the right large size, and then printed and sliced out the black part.  
And guess who still has an entire blue satin sheet left?  Did you guess me again?  You are correct.  I have notions of a circle skirt with a monogram.

Random songs from Guardians of the Galaxy

Aside from being a charming and funny film full of misfits, Guardians of the Galaxy has an outstanding soundtrack, as my postcrossing blogging friend pointed out in her post.

My favorites:
Escape
I can’t not like this song, even as cheesy and stupid as it is.  Plus it takes place in Boston!  Or thereabouts.  Heather introduced me to this song back in high school.

Hooked on a feeling
Much like Kathleen (the aforementioned postcrossing blogging friend) I love this song.  It was used very effectivly in the trailer for the movie and in the movie itself, it is playing when we see our heroes being disinfected while in jail.  (read: the beefcake Chris Pratt scene).  I love the horns (the #1 way to get me to like a song) and how many different parts you can choose to sing.

Three sentence movie reviews: Guardians of the Galaxy

I’ve been a fan of Chris Pratt since he was the loser boyfriend of Rashida Jones on the television series Parks and Rec. His boyish slacker/charming vibe was perfect for the role of Peter Quinn and  the rest of the cast were top-notch as well.  The movie was funny, had a great soundtrack, whisked along at a very good pace and for once, a completely CGI animal character did not at all annoy me.

Cost:  $6.00
Where watched: at the St John’s cinema with Matt

poster from: http://www.impawards.com/2014/guardians_of_the_galaxy.html

Moneta Dress. Finito!

Man, this was a sewing win.  Big time.

I’m 39 years old with a BMI that puts me in the obese range.  I dress nicely when I am out and about because I think we should all dress nicely when out and about.  Still, after a certain age/weight, a female is pretty much invisible.
Not in this dress. The first day I wore it I got seven compliments.  SEVEN COMPLIMENTS!  From people I encountered along the way, from random passers-by in the street, seven people told me how much they loved this dress.  And I love it too.  The cut and the colors.  And the compliments.

Three sentence movie reviews: Just Friends

I hated this movie.  Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaated it.  I watched it for Anna Faris, because I enjoyed her so much in What’s Your Number and I thought she acted up a storm, but the movie itself was a trial.

Cost:  free from library
Where watched: at home.

poster from: http://www.impawards.com/2005/just_friends.html

Moneta Work Uniforms. Tricks with the clear elastic, attaching it to the skirt.

I found it helpful to mark the stitching line on the top of the skirt where the elastic will be sewn. It was too hard for me to try and manage stretching elastic and keeping track of where the elastic should be sewn on the fabric.  Drawing in that stitching line gave me a guide for this.
In the Moneta sew along, the instructions are to divide the elastic into five parts.  I think that is fine if you have a relatively small waist, but mine is not and so I had to stretch the elastic over very long distances, which resulted in some uneven elastic attachment in the first dress I made.  So I did the five marks and then found the middle of each of the five segments and marked them.  I found the middle of the official anchoring points and marked them. 

So here we see I have less length to stretch the elastic.  This was quite successful.

I also found it easier to not sew the elastic in a circle before pinning it to the skirt.  Here’s one end here.

Then I just pinned the other end over the first, matching my ending places.  This way I could start at that point and do some firm back stitching to join the circle of elastic right to the skirt.

I have no idea if this is a correct technique, but I found it easiest to stretch my segment out so the elastic pulled tight against the fabric and then plop my fingers down on the sewing machine, keeping the elastic taut.  I then sew until my fingers hit the presser foot and repeated the stretching process.  Because I have more than five points of contact between elastic and skirt, this worked well.

Three sentence movie reviews: Girls Season 2

Dissatisfaction is the word that sums up my feelings about the ending of season two with almost every character in a place I am not really thrilled with. Our main girl Hannah had a big change during this season which I didn’t buy because if it had been part of her life since high school, why are we just finding out about it mid-season?  Still, I had fun watching it and I love how actresses of a certain age rotate in as mothers and other older women.

Cost: free from libary
Where watched: at home with Matt.

poster from: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1723816/?ref_=ttep_ep_tt