gold dust gecko

Nothing special today, just a random picture I took at my Grandma's house over the weekend.  This little guy is a gold dust gecko... they were introduced to Hawai`i  (maybe by accident?) a little bit ago.... I never remember seeing them as a little girl, but my family found one when I was around 10.... now they can be found in many places here.  Although they are aggressive and sometimes eat other lizards (including the normal pink/grey house geckos that used to be more numerous when I was young), they are quite photogenic.

presents!

I've been very busy as always, but unfortunately not with any fun crafty stuff; nowadays my grown up job + a side research job for the university keeps me pretty busy.  But I have good news; I got accepted to a pretty cool program on indigenous resource management here in Hawaii, and I'm really stoked about it!  My job is going to let me do the program while I'm still a full time employee, so I'll be even more busy than usual (but I'll learn so much!).

My birthday was a little while ago, but I wanted to share some of the things I got since I never got a chance... they were wonderful presents that made me super happy!  My friend Nia sent me a handmade card and a journal with a handmade felt cover; I love the color and the kawaii flower embellishments! The last journal I got from Nia I took with me to my fellowship with the Smithsonian, so on my upcoming program I'll be able to keep another journal!

 

Donna and her sweet ones sent me a huge box chock-a-block full of lovely fabrics, felts, yarns, and kits, which I can't wait to make millions of things with!

 

Here also are the thank you cards I made; I thought I'd share because they were super easy to make!  I used precut cards and envelopes (I got my set from Target; its a huge cube of 200 one-sided cards+envelopes for crafting, I think it was around $13) plus a scalloped-circle paper punch... I embroidered a little smile and glued two eyes on each one to make little cookies that say "thank you!"

If Nia and Donna are reading this post, thanks so much again for your birthday wishes and presents! 

funko pop vinyl-sanrio

I haven't amassed a huge vinyl toy collection as of yet (mostly because of time and $$ restrictions, ahem), though I do dabble here and there if I really like something. Well, darn it, my coworker showed me the new Funko Pop Vinyl collection in the Sanrio flavor, and I knew that Mr. Tuxedo Sam had to be mine (I also got Badtz Maru and Chi Chai Monchan for my sisters). If you're not a fan of Sanrio, check out the other Pop vinyl characters they have... Star Wars storm trooper anyone?

berrysprite tutorial videos

I hope the long long wait was worth it!  Some of you might have had some recent hints that I've been trying to put together tutorial videos... I finally had a chance the other weekend to film some footage, and it took me another weekend to edit all my videos!  But it will all be worth it if they are helpful in some way.  So far, I have videos on holding the yarn when crocheting, the magic ring, increases, and adding rows.  I also have one on how to do the tentacle part of my amigurumi takochu... the pattern and instructions are here, but I've gotten a lot of inquiries about how to do the tentacles so I hope this will help make it clearer!  I'm uploading to youtube and vimeo (I only have two on my vimeo channel right now). I'm hoping to do more tutorial videos in the future, including one where I make a whole takochu from start to finish!