Knot Sew Crafty

Do You Have a Dish That Makes You Happy?

Then you should enter Sweet Paul's Contest!  The dish that makes me happiest is probably a bowl of really good cherries, but I'm guessing that that's not enough of a recipe to win a contest!  Maybe you'll have better luck.

From Sweet Paul's Blog:

My Happy Dish Recipe Contest!

Its time for another "My Happy Dish" Recipe Contest.
Kriss Mullen won the summer issue contest with her yummy Orange Creamsicle Milkshake.
Check it out right here!

You can now enter the contest for the fall issue.
All you need to do is to email us your favorite fall issue recipe.
It can be anything from a cocktail to a cake. It just needs to be your recipe, not anything you found in a magazine, a book or online.
You also need to send in a hi res portrait of yourself and the a few sentences starting with, "This dish makes me happy because......".
Please email your entries to myhappydish@sweetpaulmag.com
Deadline is july 1st.
Good luck!

 

I Want To Go To There

I don't know who made this, but it took a special kind of brilliance.  Enjoy!

via Ze Frank

And a little more Ze:

On Perfection

~~~~~~~~~~

Ring the bells that still can ring

Forget your perfect offering.

There is a crack in everything,

That's how the light gets in.

~Leonard Cohen

If you have a moment, go visit Amy of A Commonplace Life and read these two lovely posts about perfection as it relates to blogging.  I wish I had Amy's gift for expressing my feelings so clearly and beautifully.

What's Tasty + What's Tedious

Loobylu and Meet Me at Mike's are doing a meme called "What's Hot + What's Not" and I thought I'd join in.

Since I've never cared for the word "hot," except as a description of temperature, mine will be "What's Tasty + What's Tedious." 

I also cannot be counted on to do a weekly feature, so it's going to be 

what I like to call an "occasional feature."

Tasty

--being able to get comments again. Hooray!! Please leave one today!

--Auntie J is blogging again at Venn Circus.

--Maya of Springtree Road is selling yarn at her etsy shop 

to benefit breast cancer research.

--Boomerang is giving away a free episode of their audio magazine. My kids 

love it because they learn cool things, and I love it because there are no 

mentions of Disney or princesses!

--The Small Object has super-cute things for sale... I bought one of each. 

Simply could not resist.

--Getting a Direct Message from the Dalai Lama on Twitter.  

I know it's not really him, but still...

Tedious

--Having lots of yarn, but none of what I need to make what I want to make!

--Having a cold and running out of orange juice.

--Sibling rivalry. Now that Obama has the Nobel Peace Prize, maybe he 

can come to my house and arrange a peace accord 

between my three girls.

--All of our friends in California have new babies, and I don't get to 

smell their delicious baby heads!  

(I'm talking about you Julio, Sage, Emmett, Bodhi, Tambry, and Roman! 

Please keep your baby smells until I come visit!)

--Typepad is doing wonky formatting things! Boo!

Sunday's List

--Jessica is having a Soup Swap tomorrow!  I'm excited to have some great new soup recipes for the Fall.

--I'm back up to 148 blogs, which feels just about right.  Under one hundred was impossible because I like to read blogs about lots of different things.  I'll just have prune ruthlessly every once and a while.

--I'm loving this post.

--As usual, Eugene Robinson has taken my feelings and expressed them better than I ever could.

--You know how all of the craft bloggers from countries that are not the US make amazing Granny Square and Ripple blankets?  Where do they find the fabulous bright colors of wool that they use?  I feel like everything I see in the States is a little bit blah.  I probably need to be prepared to go to good yarn stores and spend a lot more money than I am currently spending on wool.  Doesn't anyone make great colors that are not enormously expensive?

--I think I'm going to play this song over and over until the movie comes out:

 

See you tomorrow!

Worst Beatles Cover Ever?

 

As found by CMR on the Montreal Gazette Words & Music blog.

Truth be told, I kinda like it.  :)

What's your least favorite Beatles cover ever?

And the Winner Is...

Paige of Funny Magic!!  

Paige is a supercrafty mama and her blog is delightful.  In my dream neighborhood, Paige is one of the bloggers who would live just down the street.

I have the feeling that I might have another Mystery Giveaway soon, so please check back often...

Mystery Giveaway and A New Leaf

(Card by Letterary Press on Etsy)

If you are a regular reader, you may have noticed that I've not been a regular writer lately.  I've been completely swamped by the demands of the beginning of school, and totally overwhelmed by life in general. 

My new mantra for the 2009-2010 school year is:  SIMPLIFY.  I'm hoping that, in simplifying my life, I will have more freedom, more time, and more fun.  I want to enjoy what I enjoy, do what I have to do, and let go of as much of the rest as possible.

For example, I have 532 blogs in my Google Reader, or I did until yesterday, when I dumped them all and started all over again.  I now have 42.  I am letting go of my fear that I will miss something if I don't read every new blog post under the sun.  If there is something that I am supposed to know, the Universe will get it to me somehow.  I want to savor reading my favorite blogs again, instead of racing through them to get through the list!  

This sounds great, but, I am aware that with three children under the age of ten and my own tendencies towards hoarding and disorganization, it will not be easy going.  All I can do is try, right?  Then again, we all know what Yoda has to say about that...

In this spirit, I will doing a Post #413 Mystery Giveaway, in which I will de-stash and reward a lovely reader at the same time!  

As in previous Giveaways, the package may or may not contain:

--Something to sew with --Something to knit with --Something to read --Something to listen to --Something Japanese --Something French --Something vintage --Something pretty --Something useful --Something frivolous --Something mysterious... Leave a comment on this post by Friday, September 25th, 8PM Eastern Time and you'll be entered to win.

Ugliest Tattoos: A Gallery of Regrets

Ink Spotter: Heather H

via ugliesttattoos.com

OK, this might not be the nicest or least vulgar website I've ever featured here, but it is pretty funny and lets me feel superior for a moment even when I'm having a lousy day. I can always think, "However bad today might be, tomorrow is another day on which I will awaken without a badly-rendered Clay Aiken tattoo on my back." 

 It does give me some comfort in these troubling times.

**WARNING: Many of these tattoos are quite obscene, so don't look if you are easily offended! Perhaps go back and look at the lovely Ponyo trailer again...

Auntie J on The Hidden Seed!

My sister's design was featured on The Hidden Seed, which is a fashion/style blog by the super-humanly talented Elsa Mora!  I'm not kidding about Elsa's talent either-- I think there must be something divine about her, and if you look at her papercuts and other 

artworks, I'm sure you will agree that a mere mortal could not make such things.

via elsita.typepad.com

Is anyone else having trouble formatting their posts on Typepad?  Everything is coming out wonky.  :(