A Fairy House

When I was about seven years old, my best friend Laura, and sometimes our other friends, would make fairy houses. Laura's older sister Debbie came up with the idea, which tells you why Debbie was the world's most awesome babysitter.

I hadn't made a fairy house in decades, but today I suddenly thought of it and decided it was about time. Besides, I haven't posted here in a while--I haven't had time to do much of anything except write my current book--and fairies are a bit steampunk, right?

Here's the finished house in the flowerbed, in the upper lefthand corner:

The houses we made as kids were just single rooms built of twigs, with moss carpets and bark roofs. We made them in the forks of trees or among exposed roots. I decided to make mine in the corner of the raised garden bed I made recently, because it's pretty boring right now.

First I gathered up some materials: twigs, bark (from dead trees only; even as a kid it bothered me to pull bark off live trees), and other stuff. As I worked on the house, I kept getting up and gathering more things, and the things I gathered gave me ideas for what to build next. That's the lovely thing about making fairy houses: you start to think differently about the odds and ends of forest detritus you see.

First I set some flattish rocks down as a floor in the corner of the flowerbed. I decided this would be the larder because it's so protected. I started breaking twigs into the right lengths to make corner posts and remembered, with complete clarity, the concentration needed as a seven-year-old to find just the right size forked twigs. I put straight twigs across the top to hold up the roof, and added bits of pine bark as walls. Inside the larder I put things fairies would eat. The door is another piece of bark, slightly ajar. I made the roof from sycamore bark, which is heavy and scaly like shingles.

Here's the larder without the roof:

Next I decided on a bedroom, so I put a lot of moss down for the floor. Half a walnut husk with some moss in it made a cradle. More pine bark for the walls, and no door because fairies like lots of fresh air.

Here's the bedroom without the roof:

Lastly I made the kitchen, with pieces of walnut husk for bowls and a wall made partly of a stone. No door to this room either, but to keep rain from blowing in I put a piece of bark down as a partial shelter. I also set some shiny stones (from my gravel driveway) outside for the family to sit on while they eat together.

Here's the kitchen without the roof:

I added a few details before I decided I was done. Here's a close-up of the entire house with the roofs on.

Fairy houses are ephemeral. I did a pretty good job building this one, but after the first good wind, or the first curious squirrel, it will be mostly gone. But that's part of the enjoyment.

How to Make a Practice Drum Pad

I'm learning how to play drums, after a couple of decades wishing I knew how. It was only a day or two before I realized I needed a drum pad to use for practice, since I don't always want to sit at my kit, and whacking a pillow or book just doesn't do it for me. So I made one.

It was supposed to be a lot more steampunky than this, and it was also supposed to be decorated with a skull-and-crossbones, not a gay pirate skull, but anyway, this is how I did it.

First of all, I lucked out because I already had a piece of plywood that was almost the right shape already. I only had to saw one side. I bought two thin mousepads at Walmart ($3 each--I'd have gotten one thick mousepad but they didn't carry any) but before I glued them on I decided I wanted to trim the corners of the wood. That only took a few minutes, and I sanded the edges down with part of a cinder block I'd found while doing yardwork. Hey, you use what you have.

I glued the first mousepad face-down onto the wood, using my favorite glue, Gem-Tac. I got frustrated, though, because the nozzle kept plugging up and the glue was starting to dry while I was trying to clear it, and finally I just cut the end off. That was sort of a mistake since now the glue just pours out. But it did the trick.

Next I glued the second mousepad, the blue one, face-up on top of the first mousepad, the black one. If you're confused as to why the finished picture above shows a black mousepad on top, it's because after the glue dried overnight, the pad looked like this:

I'd gotten glue all over it, and it looked awful. Also I didn't like the blue. So I went back to the store and bought another mousepad, another black one.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. When I set the drum pad on the counter to try it out (and my counters are green, not yellow, but that's an awful picture--just wanted to make that clear, it's important), I discovered that the wood was a bit warped. The pad rocked on two of its corners.

(See? Green.) Fortunately, I have a bunch of little foam dots that came with the new cabinet hardware I installed in January. I thought I might be able to use them as shims, and they would help keep my new drum pad from scratching up tables or whatever as I used it. I put a dot in each corner and one in the middle, and to shim the wobbly corners I added a second dot on top of the first on the problem corners. I wasn't sure it would work, but it did the trick exactly. But I recommend you check first to make sure your piece of wood isn't warped.

After I did that, I tried a few paradiddles to see how I liked the drum pad. It worked fine but I thought it could use a bit more padding, which is why I ultimately went back and bought a third mousepad. I glued it on very carefully, using much less glue and making sure not to get any glue on the top.

The glue's still drying, but I went ahead and drew the skull on it (with silver Sharpie) so I could take pictures. I'm not the best artist ever and not only does my skull resemble a troll skull or something, with that huge jawbone, but I also managed to get it off-center. Since I need to practice hitting right in the middle of the drum, I added the blingy star thing, whatever you want to call it. And when I tried to add a pirate hat, it turned into a lady's Easter hat with a feather. Whatever. My dead troll is fabulous!

I wasn't going to include this picture, since it's just glue, but I like the pattern:

Follow-up to AnachroCon report

This is important enough that I feel the need to post about it here. I wish I'd known about the situation ahead of time so I could have canceled my membership to AnachroCon and not attended after all.

Apparently the convention has had a long-term, known issue with one of its co-chairs making inappropriate advances to women on staff and attendees. He has also violated the terms of the convention's weapons policy. He was instrumental in the refusal to set up a harassment policy for the con.

For a good overview of the situation, please read this article at Steampunk Chronicle.

The person in question has stepped down. It's infuriating, however, that he was allowed to act this way for years without repercussion.

The Artifice Club has renounced all participation with AnachroCon until major changes are made. (That's how I learned about this, from an Artifice Club tweet.) While from the Steampunk Chronicle article it does look like the con plans to conform to the Con Anti-Harassment Project, until and unless it does (and does so in good faith, with concrete measures in place to stop harassment before it becomes an issue and deal with complaints promptly and appropriately), I will not attend AnachroCon again or recommend it to friends.

Last year I put my name down as someone who would follow John Scalzi's Convention Harassment Policy. I wish I had remembered to check the AnachroCon site for a harassment policy--or its lack. From now on I'll remember to do so and plan my con attendances accordingly.

AnachroCon report

IMPORTANT ADDITION: Please read my follow-up post as to why I will not be attending AnachroCon again.

Con report warning: this is long and probably kind of boring. I didn't take very many pictures for some reason.

Above: spicy chocolate cogs I bought in the dealers room. They're good! They got kind of smudgy and melty from me carrying them around in my hot little hands.

This weekend I went to AnachroCon in Atlanta, a convention focusing on history and alternate history. I left for Atlanta after work Friday afternoon, and got checked in at the hotel and convention in time to attend the leatherworking panel at 8pm. It was a lively, interesting panel, well-moderated, and set a good tone for the convention. After that I went to the Eat Your Drink panel, about cooking with alcohol, which was also excellent and had food samples. This was good, because the hotel had no real restaurant in the evenings--you could order food at the bar, but it was noisy and crowded and the food overpriced. I figured I'd walk around outside and find a nearby restaurant. I mean, who ever heard of a big hotel (the Atlanta Marriott Perimeter Center) without at least one moderately-priced restaurant next door? But there was nothing nearby except a pricy, crowded restaurant at the bottom of the hill. I ended up eating some chips and an orange I'd brought from home instead of a real meal.

Anyway, the con is a relatively small one but I was astonished at how many people dressed up for it. I estimate at least 90% of attendees wore a con outfit/costume, maybe more. I wore my awesome hat, but jeans, boots, and T-shirts, and felt very underdressed! It was awesome. Everywhere I looked I got ideas for outfits. And even though I didn't know anyone at the con, the tone was warm and welcoming, and I felt comfortable starting up conversations with strangers.

In the morning the tea-room was open for breakfast. I got the buffet and wasn't enormously impressed with the food for the price, although they did have some excellent fresh fruit. I stuffed myself, because the schedule I'd worked out for the day was so busy I wasn't sure when I'd get a chance to eat again. AnachroCon has TONS of programming, and so many of the panels interested me that sometimes I had a hard time deciding what to attend.

I'm an early riser, and after breakfast had over an hour to kill before the first panel at 10am. I'd brought a book with me, Kenneth Oppel's excellent Airborn, which I was almost done reading, so I got some coffee and tucked myself in a corner of the quiet bar to read and watch people wander by. That was pleasant, and then I attended three excellent food-related panels in a row: the history of candy and Sweet Alchemy (the science of candy) by the same panelist who'd presented the Eat Your Drink panel the night before (Esdee Ar, who has an etsy shop where she sells her awesome handmade candies), and a panel on the history of chocolate. After that I went straight to a history panel about WWI pilots, which was both interesting and fun.

After that I had planned to go to a few more panels, but it was 2pm and I was hungry again, and I didn't want to go to the 4pm absinthe tasting on an empty stomach. I checked the area map on the con website and found out there was a bagel shop about a quarter mile away. I walked there and got a bagel and (bad) hot chocolate, then came back and got in line for the absinthe tasting.

It was a $20 extra charge which I'd paid in advance, and I believe it was sold out. It was run by the folks from Tea and Absinthe, and it was so much fun! I'd never tried absinthe before although I'd always wanted to. We tasted six brands, plus a homebrewed absinthe for those who were brave (I wasn't). The talk was fascinating and the absinthe very different from anything I'd expected. It's not really to my taste but I'm glad I got the opportunity to try it. It's got a very strong licorice taste from the anise, with a slightly bitter aftertaste from the wormwood. Oddly enough, while I didn't love the taste, I liked the aftertaste.

After the tasting, I asked the presenters, Daniel Myers and Pacita Prasarn (that's her in the picture above, on her knees to get a closer look at a glass) to sign my bucket list book. They were both very gracious to do so!

I had planned to attend the Tea Dueling at 5pm, but the absinthe tasting ran long--it was a big crowd--and I came in at the very end of the duel. After that, though, Daniel Myers gave a talk about the history of tea, called Blood on the Leaf, which was both fascinating and a bit demoralizing considering how awful people are to each other. But he made it funny too, and brought good tea so we all sat around to listen and ask questions and sip.

I was so full of absinthe and tea after that that I skipped supper and went on to two more panels: a fun and inspiring panel on the panelists' favorite types of tools for costume crafting, and a panel called Character Through Costume, which was also inspiring. Seriously, I have so many ideas! I can't wait to hit the local thrift shops to see what I can find.

There was programming today (Sunday), including some panels I wanted to attend, but I had a long drive ahead of me and wanted some time to wind down, do laundry, and get ready for the workweek. So I left this morning early.

I'd love to attend AnachroCon again next year--but not if they're at the same hotel or if the hotel doesn't open a real restaurant. I enjoyed the con enormously, though. It was well-run, friendly, and a lot of fun! Next time I will dress up.

ETA: I've heard the con will be held in a bigger hotel next year, so I'm definitely going to attend.

Snow-powered with a sidecar

I've neglected the blog, and the garage, this winter. It's just been too cold to do much except read and write and do a bit of knitting. I have lots of ideas for spring, though, if it ever gets here.

I'm in East Tennessee so we don't get much snow ordinarily--but last night we got ten inches! I made a snowman. Actually it's a snowwoman, representing me, and a snowcat, representing Jekyll, and we are about to rev into our next adventure in a snowcycle with a cat-sized sidecar.

I'll be at AnachroCon in Atlanta this weekend. I wanted to make an outfit for the con but I didn't, so I'll just be dressed in jeans and T-shirts and my awesome hat. If you're going to be there, say hi! We can go to the absinthe tasting together!

Simple airship ornaments

I'm steampunking my Christmas tree. So far this has meant removing all the green and blue ornaments and adding some dark brown and deep red ones. But I wanted to make some ornaments of my own. Here's my first, very basic try.

I chose a yellow-brown shade of cardstock and a dark brown shade, then freehand-cut airships out. They turned out pretty good although I probably should have made them smaller for my little table tree. I punched holes in the tops and strung them with dark brown yarn.

But that was pretty boring, so I found some model paint that I bought on sale ages ago and had never used. It's supposed to be gold, but it was only sort of goldish. It didn't show up at all on the yellow airship, so I used black instead. If I make more of these I'll probably use a glitter gel pen or something.

Here are the finished ornaments.

Making a bucket list booklet, part 2

I finally finished this! The leather got here quickly but it took a lot of work to get the cover made. But I'm happy with the finished result, considering it was the first time I'd tried making a leather cover and only the second booklet I've ever made.

The leather was supposed to be green but no matter what light I look at it in, it looks brown to me. I don't mind; it's still just what I needed. It's thick leather but not stiff. I ordered it from TheLeatherGuyMN on etsy and got it within days. I ordered two pieces, so I had to sew them together.

First I trimmed the top of the pieces to just a little larger than the cardboard cover already in place. Then I sewed the two pieces together using the same technique I used for my lawnmower handlebar grips that I made this summer.

Once that was done I measured the piece again with the sewn edge over the spine of the booklet. I wanted the cover to be snug but not so tight that it would stretch. I trimmed the ends so that they would come right up to the inside edge of the first and last pages. Here's a picture of how I arranged the cover, before sewing.

After I was sure I had everything cut to just the right size, I glued the inside front and back flaps to the cardboard. I did not glue anywhere else, just here to keep the leather in place while I worked.

After that I had to sew the top and bottom edges in place. That's what took so very long. First I had to punch holes with the awl through both thicknesses of leather (and sometimes the cardboard), then I had to sew carefully to make sure the stitches were taut but not so tight they might pull through the leather.

I sewed from the edge of the cover to the spine, then knotted the threads from both sides and cut them short. Unfortunately, I cut them too short, forgetting that the upholstery thread I used is tough but thick so tends to untie itself if given half a chance (that's a problem with one of my lawnmower grips too; I need to repair it already). To keep from having to resew both sides, I cut a tiny piece of vellum paper (not real vellum, just the thick but transparent paper they sell to scrapbookers in craft shops) and glued it down over the thread ends to hold them in place. I then did the same thing to the other side even though the knot held, just in case.

Once it was done, it looked good--but there was a problem. I accidentally tore the paper edging the spine a bit, and that worried me that eventually the page might tear through. In the photo above you can see how flimsy that blue piece of paper is and it is pretty much the only thing holding the pages in place (there's a strip of cheesecloth too, but it's not that strong). Major oversight, plus that signature of the booklet wasn't as tight as it should be so it needed stabilizing anyway.

I wish I had realized this before I had glued and sewn the cover in place. It would have been easy to put a strip of vellum or something down before I'd made the cover. But it was too late so I did the only thing I could really do at that point without starting over: I cut more vellum (it's fairly tough paper, and I also had some on hand already) and glued it in place. I used as little glue as I could because I knew it would look bad and I also didn't want to wrinkle the pages.

I put a strip in front and one in back, then let them dry overnight while weighted. The vellum was almost invisible on the paper, and is prettily patterned anyway, but the vellum glued to the leather just looked horrible. To make the best of a bad situation, I drew all over those sections, front and back. At least now anyone looking at it will be too busy thinking, "What is that supposed to be, an octopus?" to notice anything else.

But despite the hiccups I'm happy with the result. It's handsome, sturdy, and I made the whole thing. I left room to add photos, and I already have some to add.