In which there is space/Samus Lego

 In my latest post I mentioned that I received some Lego for my birthday. For me Lego has several stages of fun -the building, the building take 2, finding a place to show it off and taking lots of photographs. I am particularly proud of the new figure I have made out of the birthday parts and I am going to talk you throughhow she came about.

New space patrol figure, all epitome of masculinity with his stubble and his broad shoulders and his double barrelled space gun.

He has two possible faces. One with target locking and:

Helmet off and his grinning face and bionic eye are shown.

But look! Oh no! A laser blast to the chest and a blonde haired lady astronaut has taken him down. (I got her for my birthday too)

 Ok. So you've been introduced to the new space figure which I love. I then took the cave girl's hair (and the other space woman's silver lipstick).

And made the new Space Patrol member: 

She is seriously The Best Minifigure Ever.

Look at that smile! She's like Samus. I know Samus has different hair, but it's that idea! I love her.

 

Then I took my Stunt Guy's hair, the pink astronaut and the original patrol guy's face. 

From this...

...to this!

I also got this conquistador figure as a surprise little present from Andy several weeks ago.

Now it's me! Sort of. Well I have an epee. But not a suit of armour. YET!

 The main Lego set I got for my birthday from Andy was this one from the Monster Fighters series. It's a very interesting series because it has a lot of steampunk elements. Several of the figures whilst dressed in victorian outfits have robotic body parts. Plus there is a mixed use of guns and swords for taking down monsters. And, although mostly male, the monster fighting team includes one woman: Ann Lee.

And a skeletal horse with flame eyes. We all need one of these in our lives.

Don't mess with someone who keeps a crossbow bolt in their hair.

AAAh! A mummy at the end of my crossbow fire.

I had so much fun taking these pictures and playing with Lego while we have torrential rain outside. Thank you all for the indulgence.

In which it is my Birthday

Actually it was my birthday on Sunday, but this is my first blogging chance since so I am celebrating it again through prose and photographs

I didn't have a party or anything huge like that, but I did cook pancakes for breakfast (both savoury and sweet), watched the Bourne films, played Scrabble, built a Lego helicopter and ate Japanese food out in the evening. All the things I love.

So, after that recent post of all the things I wanted, I did indeed get some money which I managed to get a ton of stuff with! I got a new pair of shoes just like I wanted. I found the perfect pair of red brogues. I am absolute sucker for lace-ups and should to do a photo of all my pairs at some point. I actually have oxford heels as well, but you will not see them in the blog because I rarely wear them. I buy them because they are beautiful and then find out how uncomfortable they are. And then I just admire them for a few years before giving them away. These new red shoes are similarly uncomfortable with newness but I will put up with the bleeding for looking so splenidiferous.

I also got four scarves for my birthday! Four. My neck will never be cold again! One of these is featured below, and I intend to show the others in upcoming posts.

And, as I wished for on my list, I got Lego from both my boy and my sister who know me so well. I haven't had a chance to photograph them yet, but I will. I also got a tea set from his parents, a new Dianna Wynne Jones book and lots of dvds. Pretty much spot on. :)

This is what I wore on my birthday, doing that childish thing of wearing all my new things at once.

I adjusted the colours here a little to make the jumper accurate. As I commented last time I wore it (in a ridiculously similar outfit) my camera refuses to get it the right colour.

One of my new scarves and my spare glasses (I feel weird with these on but they match my red theme)

I also bought myself some nail varnish from Topshop. Been after a brick red colour for ages.

New shoes! Shiny shiny brogues from Salt + Pepper

Coordinating these pops of red everywhere again. After my last post where I had so many nice comments on my engagement I also feel it is legitimate to share the ring again.

My dinner. Nom nom. I only thought of taking photos a few minutes in, so there was a lot more than this. Oh and Andy had food too! It wasn't just me. His hasn't arrived yet here.

Miso soup. Mmmm.

In which there is soppiness, sunshine and a shoe rack

I don't think that me and Andy have ever taken so many pictures as we did on this day. I have a folder full of them because Andy seemed more than ever before to be delighting in capturing pictures of me. Perhaps it was the weather and the getting out of work early, but we were in one of those giggly silly moods. Perhaps it was that we had just had milkshakes.

The sun and the still air reminded me of America. 

Although I often am very critical of American politics and such things, the times the two of us spent there were wonderful. I love the food, the feeling of being miles from home and leaving every bit of responsibility behind, but I especially love the smell of the still warm air we had in Texas (and the ability to go into a pool when it got too much). Any moment where I get that scent of Summer brings back all those feelings of escape and happiness.

As I blogged a while ago, and any picture of my hand reveals, Andy and I are engaged. This means that at any moment of boredom or lull in our conversations we fantasise about the wedding, discuss plans, do invite sketches and talk about how much we cannot wait to get married. I really can't. I love how much we are doing it together and how much fun that day is going to be. 

It sometimes feels like there are two worlds. The real world and the one the two of us inhabit inside our bubble. We really have plenty of life issues going on with jobs at the moment and I suffer from a lot of self-esteem and anxiety issues. Sometimes I get completely overwhelmed by a sense that I have failed at life, but never at our relationship. It means everything to me and even if I never get to fulfill my dreams and ambitions and even if feminism winces at it, the two us together means I'm never failure.

/soppy

Back to the real world! These outift photos are me daring to do something different with my hair. I having a strangely round head like a ball so I always keep my hair down to try and look like I have a reasonable shaped face, but here I am giving it a go for once. Expect a return to hats.

Dress: Camden market; Shirt: Andy's; Monopoly Neckalce: Made by me/Eccentric Accessories;
Hairband: Ditto; Shoes: Asos; Socks: Topshop

Elmer bag! I love Elmer. Got this from a book fair. It came with Elmer books.

Handmade hairbow by me. I went through a period of making ribbon bows all day. I have loads of these at our house from running craft fairs for Eccentric Accessories

Scotty Dog Monopoly Piece necklace. I have one of these in my shop.

Shiny nails!

Side story: I made this. Yeah! Absolutely super proud of this bit of home DIY. It's a shoe rack. And I totally made it. I did the drilling and the screwing and everything. Andy just held the pieces together. (Obviously that was a Very Important Job). I am PROUD.

So was that too many pictures? Too much soppiness? If you made it to the end and my random shoe rack story -thank you!

In which there is Science and Ice Cream

I am trying to make September a frugal month. After weddings and parties and holidays for August (good times) it was/is really necessary to be a good person who stays in and watches videos on the internet for a month. So after that well-meaning resolution, yesterday I had a day out in London! Woop Woop. Well. This is the joy of living near London me and Andy had an Amazing Day and spent less that £30 –including travel and snackerals. I call that a win. It was one of those perfect days when you can push aside all the things you are worrying about (aaah jobs/money/reallyneedtogetthatmarriageliscense/whyareotherpeoplesoawesomeandiamnot) and just go Look At the Science, the Views and the Ice Cream.

It’s also a silly detail but before we left we tidied the whole house so it meant that I was in a really calm frame of mind. It’s a funny thing because our house is often cluttered, but whenever it is tidy I find myself just feeling better about the world.

We took a train into London and went to the Science Museum. It’s surprising, but I had never been there before. I have been to the V & A more times than I can remember and seen the Tate, the National Portrait Gallery and all the other major art galleries about a dozen, but I thought it would be fun to do something non-arty.

 Ironically the part I enjoyed the most was the history of drawing instruments and mathematical designs. I learnt about Klein Vases – inspired by the Mobius strip (and shown below).  Beautiful twisting glass shapes. They are explained with the concept of an ant walking along the surface, it will return to the starting point having covered the whole surface area without ever crossing an edge. Amazing. I mean we spent hours there and read lots, especially in the space section where I took no photos at all, but I know that most of the dates and names will be forgotten instantly so I am clinging on to these amazing shapes as the bit I am taking from it.

Klein Bottle.

Display of polyhedrons.

Beautiful

I took photos of the vehcles in the next section, but the display was actually on our changing relationship with machines, leading up to 'The Age of Ambivalence'. It was actually really interesting to read about how the way we think and react to new inventions has changed. 

Close up of traction engine

Original Ford

 We then headed up to the ice cream bar and it was like the Marble Slab in America. Tucked away inside the Science Museum, and mostly deserted was this amazing bar. They had tons of flavours with toppings and milkshakes and mini oreo buckets for sale.

My ice cream: Blueberry and Chcolate. Look at the scale of this!

Andy's ice cream: raspberry sorbet and rum and raisin

After ice creams and some card games in the cafe, we got a tube to Embankment just to watch the sunset over the Thames. After living near the sea for four years I miss large expanses of water and good views. This is the best I am going to get. 

What I wore. Long t-shirt, felt necklace, Andy's purple shirt, Polly's satchel and my turquoise usn hat.

London skyline

Beautiful blue skies

I call that a good Saturday. Plus there was Doctor Who to watch when we got in. What did you get up to? Enjoy the lingering summer?

In which I am on a swing without instructions

I have had one of those up and down weeks so far, both from real life instances of upsetness and from spending too much time reading the news. It is hard to keep track of the emotional rollarcoaster in my mind, but the amount of board game time I have had this week counts for a lot of positives.

One thing that has been frustrating is that every day Andy has said he will take outfit pictures of me after work. On Monday we go to the comic shop for games night and he suggested taking photos on the way -but then he got stuck in traffic coming back from work. Tuesday we were having friends round for games again and my train was delayed this time so no time for photos before Order of the Stick the board game began. Yesterday everything in my schedule was changed and I wasn't merely delayed - I had to get a later train and then Andy was off to Orchestra. And you know what? Every day I carefully dressed in something blog-worthy so I've been wearing great outfits, but day after day without recording! Perhaps tonight. :)

In the meantime I have some photos from a couple of weeks ago to share. (I could have just pretended they were recent and avoided all the exposition, but there we go. I just love unnecessary honesty). This dress was a present from Andy's parents from Hawaii and given over a year ago. I wore it about once and never again till now. Because I lost the instructions. Yes. This dress is actually a piece of fabric with two layers and a tie. It doesn't hang in the wardrobe or fold up in the cupboard because it is all slippery-soft. It came with a little card showing fifteen ways to wear it through a series of complicated knots and twists: like a halterneck, like a boob tube, a top, a maxi skirt, a short skirt, a pony, a bicycle and a cape.

I gave up.

But last week I decided to brave the fabric and try and work something out with it myself and this is the result: 

I am very squinty in these pictures because the sun was blinding me.

Wheeee! I like swings.

Frown face kind of ruins this, but you should see how much worse the other pictures were.

Close up of Bow belt and patterns

So I am going to spend some more time negotiating it to see if I can create any more styles.