Linnaea Niele

Linny! This is my icon I used for the ED Forum. I've decided to change it though, so yep, now it will be here.






So an update on my finger, it's healed. Finally. But I've put the clay practice on hold for now, since I started another project I want to finish first.

And an update on me possibly joining a vlog collab channel... the due date for auditions is September 10th. I am... still unsure of whether or not I will audition. I have what I will say all written out, should I decide to... but I'm still not sure. Eh. I'll give myself a deadline of September 1st. I'll decide then if I want to do it, and then well, do it.

A few days ago, I was having a conversation with my mom. I disagreed with something she said, and she snapped at me. She called me a bitch for attacking her, and proceeded for twenty minutes to scream at me. What did I say? "I'll have to look that up and double check, because it seems too good to be true." When she started talking about Boost Mobile's international rates.
...
My mom has a way of butchering what you say and turning herself in to the victim. The best way to carry on a conversation with her is to keep quiet and let her do the talking. Sometimes, I forget that. The whole ordeal upset me greatly. I just wanted to crawl back in to bed and cry. But instead, I turned to one of my BJD's. Linny.

I felt bad, because there she was, sitting in her Barbie outfit. I was so incredibly tired of that outfit. I wanted her back in her blue leotard with pretty pink tutu... but I lost the leotard. No idea where it is. Here's the last picture I took of her in the barbie outfit:

It wasn't actually a picture of her. It was a picture of the entire desk. I just cut the desk out. So yep. There she is, in a bright green crocheted hat, her purple hair, a lovely scarf from annina, and her Barbie outfit that didn't really fit her too well. She had one other wig, but I hated it. It was too poofy. I honestly love her purple wig with bright green hat look,

but it was time for a change. And on this particularly sad day, the time came.

I started by crocheting. I'm still a beginner with it. In all honesty, I'm not a big fan of crocheting, so I never really planned on expanding my expertise. The last time I crocheted was to make two ED scarves for Marina, and before that it was that green hat. But I thought it would be a good way to distract me, so I went about making a shawl type dealy for her. It turned out alright, maybe a little wider than I had wanted, but eh. It works. Then I tried to make a hat. Fail. So I pulled it apart and tried again. FAIL. One more time. FAIL! How on earth was I having so much frickin trouble making a tiny hat, when that was the ONE thing I COULD make aside from a tiny ED sized scarf?! So I pulled it apart and tried again, failed again, except this time I just kept on going. It... turned in to a tiny sock. lol. So I made another tiny sock. Yay. Socks for Linny.

I then went in to my stash of fabrics to find some colors I wanted her to wear. I found a sash I stole from a reception hall. It was one of those sashes that they tie in to little bows around all the chairs for a wedding. They had gathered all the sashes except for one, and then the folks disappeared. So before I left, I took it. I chose this fabric as the under dress. And I went about hand sewing. It didn't turn out too bad.

Tada.


There's just a simple tie up thing in the back to fasten it shut. It doesn't look too pretty from back there though, so I didn't take any pictures of it.


While working on the dress, I also worked on a new, embroidery thread wig. Her purple wig was not going to match the light cream crocheted socks and shawl, champagne colored under dress, and dusty pink over dress. (the same material as Colette's skirt and accessories) Since I was giving her all new clothes, why not a new wig? Now, let me get one thing straight. I do not know how to make a wig. But I do know how to fake it. And faking it works best with embroidery thread. lol. I chose to give her a black wig this time, which I didn't like at first, but now I'm beginning to love. I think I was just so used to her in her purple hair. lol.


I had different plans for the outer dress. But those plans fell through. I'm just fine with what came out instead.

I didn't like this length though. It was just a smidgen too long, especially since she's to wear socks.

So I readjusted the length. I like this length better, but I might make it shorter eventually. *shrug*




And here she is with her shawl:
Adorable. I'm happy with the look. But... I still wanted her to have a hat!!!


There she is with her socks. Anyhoo, a hat. I decided to try again, even though I was so sick of crocheting the "hat" over and over again only to produce socks. So I try again. And it's beginning to look right... for a while... but at some point in time, I switched techniques... and forgot how I started it in the first place. I figured it was okay, because it looked like it could stretch... then a while in, I switched techniques again. Then... when I realized what I'd done, I stopped. Enough. NO HAT FOR LINNY!!! Instead of unraveling though, I tied it off and kept the failure. It wasn't big enough to fit over her head. I sighed and flipped it inside out.... and realized it took a shape. Of a top hat. ROFL. A tiny top hat! How cute!!


So there she is, her whole outfit.





Oooooh yeah... so totally meant to make a top hat. It's "fastened" on by tiny wires bent in half - bobby pin style.



I'm very happy with the outfit I managed to make, even though most of it happened by accident. Tee hee haha.

Llama Llama Duck.

Okay... technically this post is about llamas. And toothbrushlets. So I used a duck icon to make up for it. Ha.









Yep. Llamas. I have mentioned once or twice that I am a vlogbrothers fan. Back in May, I tried to participate in Hank Green's birthday video, but my pictures were not included. I showed them to you, in my moonlit walks and gardening post. The theme was "Hank plants".

Well, this August was John Green's birthday. There were two projects to participate in. One, was the first half of his birthday video. Hank recorded himself for two minutes or so, talking. Then he got thousands of people to take frame by frame pictures of themselves doing the same poses he did. The result was actually quite weird, and kind of really cool. I took three of such pictures. And this time I was included! YAY! The thing is, with thousands of people taking pictures that add up to only two minutes of video... you don't see me very well. In fact, I could only find two of my pictures. I'm not sure if the third picture just wasn't included, or I just can't find it. lol. But I could find the other two pictures, because I had the bright idea to wear a hat those two times.







If you're curious to see the end result, here we go. I can be seen for a fraction of a second at 1:40 and 1:42. I'm wearing a cowprint cowboy hat. Hee.


There was a second project for this video too, for those who wanted to participate in both projects, or who couldn't participate in the first one because they didn't have a webcam. The theme to the second half of the video is "French the Llama". Once upon a time, John Green was unaware that "ftl" meant "for the lose". The result was French the Llama. lol. And so I wanted to participate in this section as well!


First, I decided to make a French Llama. But then... "French the Llama" sounds more like french kissing a llama. So I'd make two french llamas, and then have them kissing. Perfect! I was going to make two clay llamas, but then I wanted to make them move. Like, bend their necks. So, I changed my mind. I used wire to make a skeleton, and needle felted some stuffing to the wire.



And then I covered the taller one with some lovely gray wool I got from my ED Friend mayple. And then he needed eyes and a tongue, and a beret. Then I gave him a white shirt that I then drew stripes on with a black marker. And a red scarf. I named him Jean Luc.

For the female, I wanted her to be a blonde. But I didn't have blonde wool. I had blonde yarn though... so I unraveled the yarn, and tried to smooth it out as best as possible. Then I gave her a skirt, with a matching scarf and flower. I also found one of my old rings that's missing a stone, so I gave it to her as a bracelet. I named her Colette.


Tada!! My llamas.

He has a tongue, she doesn't. I thought he looked adorable with one, but I liked her without. The "flower" in her hair is the same fabric as her scarf, just glued on to a thumbtack. So it can actually come out of her hair. And her scarf is just tied on, so that can be removed too. The skirt was sorta sewn on her, so I don't think it's removable, and none of Jean Luc's outfit can be removed.


So yeah, finished the llamas. Yay. Then, to emphasize the fact that they're french llamas, I painted a quick scene of the Eiffel Tower:

Eee hee hee

And there they are with their names to identify them.



And there they are, french kissing in France.


Awwww. Yep. So yeah, I made a very short, like, 10 second video of them kissing and whatnot, it can be found in the video above at around 4:36. Hehe. I'm very happy to see it there.


But that's not all!! The email that informed us of the theme and whatnot said we'd get "extra points" for llama cakes. Now, the extra points are imaginary, but since I tried to participate in the last birthday project and was unsuccessful, I wanted to try and participate in this one as much as possible. So yep. I went and made a llama cake.

Progress! I've never carved a cake before. This was an interesting experience.


Finished llama. Halfway through my frosting it, the neck started tipping over. I guess it makes sense, since I'd only used a straw to keep it all together inside. A... bendy straw, which probably started bending... wow, I'm a genius. So I stuck some toothpicks in it, to try and keep it up. Which worked for a second. I then needed to stick a bamboo stick in it. Which worked for a second longer than the toothpick. Finally, I snapped a bamboo stick and propped it up under the chin. That held, but I didn't know for how long it would. So I very quickly finished the llama. From this angle, it just looks like the llama is hugging a stick. lol. I added text to the picture before submitting it.



The beret used red frosting that was actually really runny. It's my fault, it's not premade frosting, I made it myself, and made it too runny. lol. So the beret looks terrible. Almost like the poor llama's brain is just sorta sticking out of his head. I added the extra dot on top to hopefully make it look more like a beret and less like bloody brain. ROFL. This picture can be seen in the above video at around 3:56.


When I was finished taking the pictures, I sat there, wondering what to do with the extra runny red frosting....


I poked a hole in his tummy and oozed some red in to it. Ha. I killed it! And it was so much fun, I added more.


ROFL...


Added new text too. Hee hee. The best part? The stick that's holding up the head? Even though it's not even straight standing, is still holding up the head. Ha! Success. When my brother saw it, he asked if "that was supposed to be his brain sticking out of his head". It made me giggle. Yes. Sure. Why not.


So yay! Two of the three of my pictures in the first half showed up in the vid, AND my french llamas and llama cake made it. I'm VERY happy about it. I participated. :D


Finally, toothbrushlets. You may be asking, what are toothbrushlets? They're toothbrush bracelets. One of the folks I watch on Youtube made them. And I immediately wanted to make them too!!




I went to the dollar store and picked up some toothbrushes. I started with the purple one, because of all of them, I wanted a pink one the most and purple the least.


Boiling water = steam. Steam is a pain to cameras. lol.


There we go, toothbrush boiling.


The way it's done in the video makes it sound like it comes out all wiggly and you can bend it for forever until you drop it in ice water... but my toothbrushes must have been different. They cooled almost immediately after being removed from the pot - even after boiling it for half an hour. So I had to bend the toothbrush while it was still in the boiling water. Which, was tricky, because I had to use tongs. I finished the purple toothbrush and pulled the bristles out and was like YAY! But then I realized I made the bracelet too small.

So while I stuck the toothbrush back in, I went about removing the bristles from the other toothbrushes. I wanted to see if it was easier removing the bristles before or after I boiled them. I removed the blue bristles real easy like. So, excited, I started removing the pink ones... and broke it. :( It was a sad moment for me. The one I wanted most was broken in seconds. Dammit. So I threw the blue one in the pot with the yellow and green one. I then started bending the purple one to try and fix it... and broke it. Dammit. Another one bites the dust. I must not have waited long enough to bend it or something.

The other three survived.


And there they are. They're cute. They don't close all the way, they have a gap so that I don't have to try getting them over my hand. I think I'd like to try again, maybe with a different brand or something. And hopefully get a pink one this time. Grrr.


So yep. There ya have it. Hee. Jean Luc and Colette now sit on top of my monster monitor, along with one of my Murdock action figures - which I finally removed from the package. :)

What a beautiful day for a walk... wait - what?

It's a paper doll icon. I think it's in reference to John Green's Paper Towns, but I can't be certain anymore.






Ha! How appropriate that this noxyism would show up during my blog about walking. When I save these noxyisms, they go in to a folder, and are named by me hitting random keys - because all noxyisms are the same name, and so I need to save them with different names - so noxyisms are called things like "iufgew" and "dtrgd". The thumbnails are too small for me to read, so I just grab at random. Hee.




So yeah! It feels like it's been FOREVER since I've blogged, but in reality it's been less than a week. ROFL. I guess it's the fact that I spent a couple weeks straight blogging every day, so when I stopped, it didn't feel right. But I didn't have anything to talk about! Sooo not my fault. Or, well, okay, so it is my fault. Oh well. ANYHOO. I do have things to talk about now. Three things total, but today will only feature one. I'm pacing myself. lol.


Yesterday, as usual, I went to the gym. It was around 3am. Normally, I'll walk 3.5miles while reading. That takes an hour and five minutes. Then I'll leave. Why the precise time? Because the treadmill automatically gives one hour as the time limit, then proceeds with a 5 minute cool down. Works for me. During these walks, which is on the faster side of "walk", I read. It's actually been the only time I've been reading. I was about halfway through The Death and Life of Charlie St. Cloud when I started yesterday... and one hour, five minutes further in, I could. Not. Stop. So I hit the "Quick Start" again, and read for another hour and five minutes. It was SUCH a great book, I didn't want to wait until the next day to finish it. And perfectly, I finished it just as the second hour rolled by. Things would be so much easier if I could read faster. lol. But yeah, so that meant I just doubled the amount of time I normally walk. I was like, ooooh yeah, that's awesome.

Then once home I checked my library because upon finishing the book I immediately wanted to read more Ben Sherwood. But when I logged in, I noticed one of the books I was in queue to put on hold was ON hold for ME to pick up. They're supposed to CALL me when things are ready darn it. I swear, I think they're getting sick of me putting books on hold. I put three different books on hold, at three different times. The site is kind enough to show me what position I am in the queue line. Three different positions. But I end up with ALL THREE at the same damn time? Uh... huh... sounds suspicious to me! In case anyone's wondering, the three were Charlie St. Cloud, Eat Pray Love, and the Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake. I've only read the first so far, and will be starting the second soonly. So yeah, the site tells me that a book is ready for me to pick up. But all this week, my dad's borrowing my car. Which means, I do not have a car to pick up ze book! WHAT WILL I DO??!?!

I had the bright idea to walk. I'm telling you, no matter how close a place is, I've never had the idea to walk there before.

The library is only minutes away when driving. But, that's driving. At an average of 30 miles an hour. And I walk 3.5 miles an hour. So basically, you times the driving time by like... 8 and a half minutes? A math problem I had only just thought of, but looking back, it's almost accurate.

So yeah, I went. For a walk. In the morning. Yeah, with the sun up and everything. In case you don't know, I'm a night person. I prefer night. I prefer darkness. I hate the sun. I named the sun Alistair and I curse at Alistair whenever it attacks me with it's hot stare. I avoid Alistair at all costs. I also tend to avoid situations that might force me to encounter bugs. I've gone on night walks before, but they were before mosquitoes and the like started feasting in the season. So there I was, 8:30 in the morning, deciding to go on a walk. *insane*

It never even occurred to me that it might be hot out. The only thing in my mind was "gosh I hope I don't get bit by mosquitoes. No - wait - no, don't think about it, you'll jinx yourself. Get the mosquitoes out of your mind. Stop thinking about mosquitoes. What's wrong with you. When do mosquitoes go away for the year? STOP THINKING ABOUT THEM!!!!" Luckily, it wasn't hot out at all. It was a very comfortable temperature, with a light breeze. I'm think that had it been hot, I would have turned around immediately and chosen to go to the library some other time.

I took over 150 pictures on my walk to and from the library. ROFL. I did not realize I'd taken so many. For that reason I will not be sharing the entire selection, but I will share some, or a lot... halfish?? Photo heavy post anyone?

COME ON A WALK WITH ME!!! ....Yay. :)





We begin our walk. This is about two minutes in to the walk, when I remember I brought my camera.


I realize that a normal person would think this is a beautiful day for a walk. Bright and sunny, not too hot, bright and sunny, birds chirping, bright and sunny, cicadas being loud, bright and sunny, light breeze, bright and sunny. Geeze, was it bright out.


Riddle me this, what on earth is the point of this bricked out corner? There's no bench to sit on or anything... it's like they accidentally started that little stone wall too far away from the corner of the sidewalk, so they fixed it by making the sidewalk bigger. But they didn't want to just pour concrete - that would look tacky. In my opinion... this serves no purpose and so should not be here. I do not believe it adds to the landscape at all. But eh, maybe that's why I'll never be a landscaper.



There are lots of ponds in this subdivision. (This is not my subdivision, but rather the one right next to it.) It's to help prevent flooding houses in case of massive amounts of rain. And they're pretty. Two points for Bigelow Homes. (Company who built this subdivision.)


Geese.







As much as I love the look of this bridge, I cannot accredit it to Bigelow Homes. They bought this land after another company had started building houses. Since this bridge is at the very beginning of the sub division, I'm going to go ahead and assume it was not the work of Bigelow Homes. No point for you.


You know... spider webs can be quite pretty.... so long as there aren't any spiders on them. My dad says there's a 7-legged spider outside his window at work... he's named him Otto. *shudders*



A mini stop sign!!!! I have an urge to STEAL THIS SIGN!! But I'm afraid I'll get caught. I've wanted a stop sign for forever. I was going to go steal one once, because I saw it just sitting in a barn in an open door... but when I got to the opening, I realized that A: the "open door" was actually an open window, and was a lot higher than it looked (damn that tall grass throwing off my perception) and 2: the stop sign itself was much LARGER than a normal stop sign. (damn my inability to judge perception AT ALL. Also, "A/2" done on purpose. Don't judge me.) So it was a sad night for me. I had to walk through all that stupid tall grass to get there for nothing. Sigh.



There are two bridges across this lake. A road with a sidewalk next to it, and a bike path. I'm not entirely sure why a bike path and a sidewalk is needed. But yep. This picture was taken from the bike path and it looking towards the road/sidewalk.


Check it out. Do you see it? Right near the middle there?


Here, how bout now? Yep. Shoes. I always wonder about shoes like this. Is it... hard to get shoes strung up like so? If you miss... especially since this happens to be a bridge and there's a river below... do you grab another pair of shoes? Or do you go for a swim and retrieve the ones you missed? Hmmm....



Sorry folks. All metal park benches located on the bike path are chained down. No stealy. I know when *I'm* on my bike, the first thing I want to do is steal all the park benches near me. Of course, I'd need to plan ahead... would probably need a bike basket to put the bench in while I'm riding off in to the sunset giggling madly.


The little entrance ways to the park closer down to the river are pretty.




I. Want. That. Bug. Teehee. Yet another bug I can tolerate.


This is a memorial in front of the library. I have reached my destination. Took only five minutes to get the book I had on hold, and return 2 of the 7 books I have already checked out. It would have taken less time, but they have these self checkouts, and all you have to do is place the book on a pad and BAM, it registers it. But it wasn't BAMMING. So I had to flip the book over, then I took the rubber band off, then tried to flip it over again... finally I just used the scanner thing. Stupid new technology.


I went down a different way back. This is the back of the memorial. And a park bench that's not chained down. Thus I've concluded that the path I'm on is not a bike path.


Poor dead tree. What made you so different? Why wouldn't the others let you live??? Tree discrimination. *shakes head sadly*



I do not know why I chose to take this picture.


The sign said no trespassing, but oooooh how I wanted to! It looked interesting down there! Must be why they put the sign up.


This was my view when I looked straight up.



This house looked so cute. The sign says "This House Matters". Not sure why it does, but yeah. It's also for rent. ANyone interested? lol.


I'm um... not too big a fan of its garage though....



Yay for abandoned buildings!! I reeeeally wanted to wander inside, but I couldn't find a way in.



Oh. What's that? Yep... in front of the abandoned building...


More shoes. Boots this time. These must have been easier to get up though, because they're not above a river, so you could easily have more than one try. They actually look kinda cute too. I wanted to get them down to look at them better. lol.


The main entrance to the park near the river.



SQUIRREL!!!


I then took a picture of some flowers.


And a tree. But really, I was distracted. By the



SQUIRREL!!!!



Oooooh yeah Mr. Squirrel. I gots you on camera. I was a few feet away, and used zoom, cuz I didn't want to scare it off. I can't say exactly how far away I was, because, well, my perception sucks.

Zoomed again. Whatever the heck it's eating, must be good.


Zoom again! Sitting in the shadows munchin' on num nums. Sounds like my kind of squirrel.

EXTREME SQUIRRELLY CLOSE UP!!!!

That was as close a zoom as my camera goes. When in full zoom and looking at something so far away, the slightest nudge of the camera sends you faaaar away from the subject in question.

I had to zoom out to find Mr. Squirrel again. Which, is when I realized... he was no longer eating.



He was just looking at me. I experienced a fleeting moment of panic as I imagined EXTREME SQUIRRELLY WRATH


Lucky for me though, Mr. Squirrel instead decided he was done posing for a camera and hid behind a tree instead.



See? SEE?? THIS brick laid down is a PATH. Not a completely useless corner next to a sidewalk.

Yay playground.



A piece of trash. McDonald's fries. Really? Really?? There are two McDonald's near us, and they're both about 5 miles in opposite directions of here. Are you kidding me? WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE TRASH?! Ridiculous. Almost as ridiculous as the fact that there are NO TRASH CANS ON THIS SIDEWALK. Sigh.


And here's a picture of me on the sidewalk looking over at the bike path bridge.



This picture makes me feel really short. I don't remember judging the railing... was it really that tall?


As you can see it's now 9:30.







Thought you'd enjoy some pics in silence. That, or I had nothing to add.


Geese.


Geese on the bike path = showdown. DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNN.


Them geese high-tailed it outta there by the time I got closer. I WIN! WOOT!


This is the other side of the bridge. The stone one above that I like? It's a stone bridge, and one one side there's a bike path attached, so here's the railing for the path.


If you know Bigelow Homes, then you know these houses. They use the same models/style. The reason I know them is because before we moved to this town, we lived in a Bigelow Homes subdivision for almost ten years. And when we moved, I still worked at a cafe within that subdivision. I was very familiar with these houses.


Yay clouds for providing me with shade from Alistair!!


When I first passed, I acknowledged this ambulance with not much more than a passing glance. Upon further inspection, I've noticed that aside from the red line around it, it has no makings. No "ECNALUBMA" written across the front of the hood, nor is there anything on it's side or back. Do they sell used ambulances? And if they do, why would you want one? Pretend Paramedic?


This was a pretty spot. And the furniture wasn't chained down either.



Dunno if you can see it very well, but someone spray painted some purple on to this fire hydrant. That someone was on to something. Purple fire hydrants sound way cool to me.


Check out the kid shoe chillin' on this thinger-whatsit. What are these called???? Crocs? Right?


Another shot of one of the ponds I showed earlier.


Taking the previous shot made me notice the plane. You can't really see it here, but it's sorta right "on" that biggish cloud near the middle of the picture. Oh my gosh, I am so amazingly good at describing whereabouts. I have discovered my calling.


There we go. The plane made me uneasy. It felt way too low. Before we moved to this area, we lived in Des Plaines, which was maybe five minutes away from O'Hare Airport. So I was used to the low flying planes and all the noise. But we're about an hour away from that now. So seeing a low plane is weird.


Don't worry, our walk's almost done here. Pretty white flowers.


I took one as a souvenir of my walk. Lol. And there you see the stupid freckle on my finger. I'm still not used to it. It showed up a couple years ago I think. So it's still "new" compared to all the other freckles, which are, you know, like over TWENTY YEARS OLD. I keep mistaking this freckle for a speck of dirt, and have to keep reminding myself it won't wash off.


Last picture:
Lawn flamingos are awesome.


Yep, so there we have it. Thanks for coming along as I relived my walk. lol. It took over an hour there and back. All in all, pretty successful. I walked in to one spiderweb, which sucked and made me think that people don't use that sidewalk near the road bridge thing very often. They must all use the bike path. Blech. And best part? NO MOSQUITO BITES!!! YAAAAAAAY!!!

That also means I walked a total of THREE hours yesterday. Which, is a lot. And my legs are sore. I didn't go to the gym today, but I do plan on going tomorrow.