Tired of this site

I am sort of tired of pimping my own jewelry for right now, so I started an alternate blog that represents my diverse interests a lot more. I won't be posting anything here for a while, at least until I get my jewelry makin' urge back.

My new blog is over at GirlyNerds.com

All my SYTYCD reviews are over there. I plan to write about cool stuff, gadgets, gizmos, shopping, innovations, style, crafts, puppies, or whatever.

So - update your bookmarks etc. and check it out! Add me to your blogrolls too if you can! Thanks!

SYTYCD#4 Results Show #2

Man, I missed the opening number by Shane Sparks! I had to pee and my stupid Verizon DVR wasn't counting the results show as the same series as the Wednesday show. *edit* Okay I finally got to see the Shane Routine. Kick Ass! Does anyone doubt that Comfort was running that whole show?

~~~~~

Bottom Three Girls:

First up -Chelsea Traile. Her solo was athletic, enthusiastic, and bubbling with personality, despite the awkward wardrobe choice of handkerchief and diaper.

Susie's solo wasn't bad, but she obviously has a limited repertoire. Representin' Miami yo! - by wearing leg-warmers?

Comfort's Solo was above average, but not fantastic. I think she suffered from a lack of choreography ideas for her first solo. If she ends up here in the bottom again, she'll improve it.

And the loser is:

YAY they sent little miss Miami packing! I will not be missing Susie. I thought she put in a lot of effort on her solo, but that still left her a one-trick pony with a rather poor trick! Thank god because I have hit my lifetime limit of hair extension flipping viewing. HA! My grammar checker isn't flagging that sentence as insane.

~~~~~

Bottom Three Guys:

Thayne goes first and basically proves what we already knew. He's kind of charming, he smiles WAY too big, and he's absolutely middle of the pack in every way.

Marquis turned in a sweet performance, in which he obviously put his heart and soul. It got a bit out of control near the end, but isn't too much effort better than too little? He's a bit effeminate for this show (Nigel seems to have a pet peeve about it), so his days were numbered from the beginning.

Personally I thought Chris's solo was the worst of the night. The choreography had very little thought put into it, and the intensity level was very low. I know he's not a tree, but I'm having trouble finding anything about him that really shines.

And the loser is:

Boo. I think Marquis got robbed in this decision. None of these three guys is going to win the competition, but Marquis seemed like the only one with a chance to improve with a different partner. Chris is tragically white and despite his good intentions and his sweet puppy dog look, is going to fail at every single dance that requires any soul. Thayne is just average too.
I hated how they ragged on Marquis for doing "all tricks" in his solo, when normally they bitch at people for not showing off their best stuff! I thought his solo was the best of the night. I also wanted to see Comfort or Chelsea or Marquis with a different partner. Are they trying to keep all the partners together or something? They always run out of time at the end of the show and rush through one or both of the kick-offs so you don't get to hear their reasoning.

~~~~~

Loser's Lounge

So You Think You Can Dance (#4) Episode 2

I made some perty pictures to share. All the "styles" are self-identified by the contestant on Fox's website, so don't make fun of me because some of them are cringeworthy. I even edited Joshua's because I like him a lot and I felt like a tard captioning him with just "Performer". I am REALLY bored at work today and I have trouble remembering some of these guys without their name plastered all over their torso.

Here are my reviews of last night's performances:

Fruity King Costume Jazz Ball What?

I was mad at Nigel for talking so much about their costumes, when the contestants can't do anything about the wardrobe. They did look ridiculous though, and their performance was pretty forgettable. A lot of contestants aren't hitting 110% effort on stage yet. Mandy Moore's routine has some potential, but she didn't bring any spirit out of these two at all.

*****

Very Uncomfortable Argentine Tango

Mark gives me the creeps so much that I can barely stand to watch. I feel bad for Chelsie Hightower. I even got the impression during that intro segment that she thinks he is creepy too. :( I certainly can't possibly find their tango sexy when he gives me the oogies. I don't understand why he is in the top 20 anyways.

*edit* Okay after getting some comments, I watched this again, and it wasn't nearly as uncomfortable as I remember it. I don't KNOW why I dislike Mark so much, okay? I will try to look at him with fresh eyes next week.

*****

Hip-Hop that I can't seem to remember at all.. I think they had suspenders on?

This must have been pretty unremarkable since I can't remember it. I seem to think they did okay?

*edit* After a second run through to get the screencaps, I noticed that they are NOT in fact, wearing suspenders! I guess this routine was pretty forgettable for me after all. Will is also noticeably better than Jessica :( Maybe he will luck into a new partner at some point. Sorry Jess.

*****

A Cute Little Foxtrot!

I really liked this one and actually called and voted for them since they did great but they're not one of the WunderCouples. Her green dress and that flapper hairdo were fantastic and they were classy and fun to watch.

*****

Adorable Pocket Dancers doing Contemporary

This routine was so cute. The two of them really do have a great chemistry. I hope the judges don't play up the fact that Gevorg (haha) has a crush on her too much and make them uncomfortable. They were in sync and hitting everything, and Gev doing contemporary was a nice suprise. PS - is Kat Deely 8 feet tall??

*****

High Energy Broadway (make-up courtesy of KISS)

What can you even say about these guys? This routine even got Nigel out of his seat, dancing around like a lunatic. These two will be around for a long time. Not least of all because of Joshua's ridiculously charming grin. If this guy leaves the show, it will be like watching someone kick my puppy. They are a great couple and this Broadway routine was super fun to watch.

*****

Salsa con Queso

Is it just me, or is Susie extremely unlikeable? Between her inability to conquer the type of dance she supposedly does best, and the ridiculous pronunciation of Marquis that drives me nutty, I hope they are in the bottom 3 tonight. Maybe Marquis can get a new partner when Susie is booted. I will only feel happy with that if Mark goes home first.

*****

Free Pass to next round - Viennese Style

They definitely did a good job with the choreography given. Like everyone else said, this was obviously a lucky pick for them with the story behind it guaranteeing that nobody would say anything uncomplimentary about it. At least the dance routine itself was better than that one Mia did for her dead father. I was a little surprised with the smoothness of Twitch doing this routine. He really is pretty fantastic so they've earned their favorites status. Kherington's name makes me insane but I can't help but like her. Damn it.

*****

Krumping will never be done on a street corner ever again

This reaction shot is in response to "My granny is more gangsta' than you". Thank you Nigel.

I felt terrible for Comfort after this routine. They blasted her for not hitting it any harder, but I thought it was pretty obvious she was toning it down in order to dance more evenly with her whitest-of-white-boys partner. She was already killing him up and down the stage. Any more aggression in her dancing would have made him look even sillier - something he was managing to do fine on his own. I want to like Chris. He seems so NICE, but he has a beady too-close-together eyes thing going on that freaks me out, and he hasn't really done anything noteworthy yet.

Oh HEY! I found the suspenders.

*****

Bonus:
Already caught the boot:



I also have slightly bigger 200px versions of all these, blank or with the names, if anyone wants them for the their own devices.

Digsby is Delicious

I found a really cool new combo Instant Message + Email alerts + Social Networking doohickey. It's called Digsby.
It sort of merges all your different web personalities and lets you monitor multiple IM clients at once. It will even send you tiny messages when someone contacts you on Facebook or MySpace. The client is very new and still under construction, but if you have a chance, check it out.

The coolest thing is that it lets you build a little flash application, which you can post on your blog or website, that lets people chat with you in real time as long as you are online. Pretty NEAT if you ask me.





As you can see, since I embedded one in the left column, and I also added this one here in the main post, you can make them different sizes, colors etc. I added this big one to my website too.

I'm not much of a social networking junkie, but as I was just typing this, a tiny, unobtrusive message just came up from my Digsby, telling me that one of my friends just updated their status on Facebook to "fighting off a cold".

Children are Scary

So the recent story here about a horde of evil 9 year olds planning a master scheme to tie up and hurt their elementary school teacher, has led me to question how long I would last in a Children-Of-The-Corn type scenario.

Apparently I could only take 20 of the little buggers. I blame my short stature and stumpy arms.

20

I did, however, answer that I would be willing to pick up and use one small child as a bludgeoning weapon against the advancing mob. I think that raised my score.

I couldn't find any web quizzes (with sufficiently accurate results) where the children are also zombies.

Etsy Heart-O-Matic is Back up!

I just noticed today that the Etsy Heart-O-Matic is back up and running. It is also new and improved with even more info for Etsy Sellers to obsess over! You can even see how many hearts an item gets compared to the number of views (although this isn't telling me much since all my views got reset about a week ago). If you still have your correct number of views, this new tool can be really helpful.

In other news, I have listed a ton of new items over at my Etsy shop. I'm particularly proud of this new crop of items! Here is a sample:It was a great day of excitement and picture taking, except for the bracelet that got magically lost! Stay tuned for tomorrow's sob story about a lost bracelet.

We have a winner

Saturday's Show may not have been a huge financial success, (you need customers in order to make sales), but it was certainly a success for me. I not only met a ton of wonderful people, but I gained confidence in setting up my booth, talking up my wares, taking credit cards etc. Space was a bit tight, but I even had a great time being sandwiched in between Moonlight Bindery and Penelope Designs, because both crafters were uber nice and fun to chat with when the customers were scarce. I am feeling so good about the fair, I am now planning to do another show in Woodbridge on March 8th that benefits the Gar-Field Highschool PTA.

In More exciting news- I have randomly selected a winner from the drawing I held at the Craft Show! I ended up with 19 entries to win this lovely handmade Sterling Silver and Multicolored Beryl bracelet.

The winner is: Kelly P. of Columbia Maryland

I will be mailing out her new bracelet tomorrow via USPS first class mail. I hope you enjoy it Kelly!

I had a lot of fun running a drawing and I think I'll do it again at the Gar-Field Craft show in March. In this case I mostly had other crafters participate, but I hope the next show is busier and I can get some real customer involvement.

Who cares though! Free stuff is FUN! Woohoo :)

PS. Thanks to Lourdes of Glass On The Square, who put the entire show together. Thanks for your hard work Lourdes.

Snowdrop Show is Tomorrow

Tomorrow is the Savage MD craft show featuring 30 crafters from the DC metro area. I have some new designs that I haven't put online yet, so if you want to see them, you have to come out to the show!


I have most of my designs packed up and priced. I have a tablecloth (well, a bedsheet), and earring cards and hangers and sales slips and a credit card reader, and jeez I sure feel like I'm missing something. I am even taking some supplies so I can change the length of necklaces and such if there is a demand. I talked to my mom on the phone today, and she told me to take an item to work on in case there are slow periods. I also have to pack a lunch!

This will be my first ever craft show, and I'm nervous as heck! I know that I make great stuff, but I have yet to show it in person to complete strangers. No matter what happens, at least I will have met the other crafters from EtsyCrest, and gained some experience.

I will also get to see how the more experienced crafters run their tables, how they are set up and how they manage customers. I am also running my own drawing for a bracelet - my most popular design, a beautiful ring of Aquamarine coin beads, hand wrapped and looped with sterling silver wire. From that drawing, I should get a number of email and snailmail customer contacts.

My husband I think expects me to come home with $200 or something, but I will be amazingly happy with one sale. I know the other sellers who have coordinated the show have put a lot of work into the hall rental and signage and advertising, but it's going to be cold tomorrow, so we'll see how many people stop in!

If you are coming to the show, I will see you there! If you have any advice for a first-timer, let me have it :)

Sales make me happy!

Over the weekend, I finally made my second sale on Etsy. I was so excited. There is something amazing about a random stranger appreciating something that you really labored over. The necklace is actually one of my favorites. It combines Pietersite cubes and amazonite beads of different sizes and colors, and very very fine 26 gauge sterling silver wire.

It is extremely lightweight, and the pietersite has an amazing range of colors.


The only thing I'm worried about is that it is only 15 inches long + a one inch extender. When I first started, I made everything pretty short like this because that's the way I prefer my necklaces. Then I read some threads on the Etsy forums, where person after person stated their preferrence for 18-inch necklaces. That surprised me, so I have started making them longer in general.



Does anyone have good statistics for the average size of women's necks? Mine is about 13.5 inches, so an 18-inch necklace hangs down really low on me and looks funny. Does anyone who does shows have an idea of what size I should shoot for? Maybe 16-inches w/ a 2-inch extender if the design allows?

Threadless Shopping Spree

I completely forgot that I got a gift certificate to Threadless for X-mas. Despite having a closet-full of shirts (well maybe a closet and a half if you ask my husband), I could always use more! I got 6 shirts total but here are two of my favs:

This one is called "How hamburgers are made". I always knew it was delicious magic!

I also picked up this Threadless select shirt "Diodes are a girl's best friend". I've never payed the $25 bones for a "select" T before. I wonder if they print on different t-shirt stock.


I haven't been to threadless in a while. I can't say I was overwhelmed by the new selections. They seem to fall into very few categories - Puns, cute food, amorphous blobs of animals/plants all intertwined in some environmentalist wet dream, oh and robots. But I like Robots!