Category: Megalomania

That’s Just the Self-Doubt Talking

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

esteemIn several areas of my life and in regards to several aspects of my existence, I am a confident person. In fact, I have been told that the confidence I carry from knowing who I am and how I relate to the world, from knowing my job and doing it well, from being smart and funny and tossing that 1-2 punch like I’m going for a knockout is really intimidating. From certain vantage points, it looks like I actually have my shit together and I know what I’m doing.

And then there’s the rest of the time.

While my self-doubt is always present in a few areas of my world, right now it is really rearing its unattractive head in terms of my unsuccessful writing career.

Here’s how it goes: I get the idea to do something. I think it’s a great idea. I think it could work. I think I could pull it off. I get gung-ho. I start to work towards bringing this idea to fruition.

And then I realize that it’ll never work. No one will go for this. I’m not popular enough/charismatic enough/smart enough/good enough to pull this off. It’s wasted time and effort because for this to work, people will have to participate/pay attention and nobody wants to do that. Nobody gives a shit what you do and they don’t want to play, Kiki, so stop wasting your time.

And then I get really bummed and start questioning what the hell I’m even bothering with all of this for.

It’s not just a vicious cycle, but it’s also very effective at ensuring that I don’t even try to do something because, hey, what’s the point? I’m just going to fail anyway and haven’t I landed directly on my face enough?

The latest aborted idea was the giveaway of one of my “wrecked” print copies. At first I thought, yeah, this will be fun. A few of my friends and family members will enter it. Nobody will get uptight if it doesn’t go completely smoothly because it’s my first one and I’m still learning the ropes and they’re my friends and family. It’s all cool. A practice giveaway! What fun!

It didn’t take long for the self-doubt to come strolling in like Blair Warner on a mission to out-snob somebody.

“Nobody wants one of your crappy wrecked copies. That’s a stupid idea. Nobody’s going to enter. They’ll just ignore you like always. You don’t even know how to run a giveaway. This is going to go tits up and you’re going to look like an idiot. Stop yourself.”

I don’t think I need to say that my friends and family don’t always ignore me. They don’t, of course. But my self-doubt is no dummy. It knows that I’ve been overlooked. It knows that I’ve been dismissed. It knows that I’ve been patted on the head and told “that’s nice” in order to be placated. It knows that people have shown absolutely no interest in anything I’m doing. It knows that I’ve been kicked aside in the rush for folks to surround someone else.

It knows.

It knows and it uses this to its advantage and I hate to say it, but I’m not completely up to the task of battling it every time it decides to make a grand entrance. My self-doubt gets a lot more encouragement than I do, unfortunately. Not always intentional, not always actual, but my self-doubt will bow to even an imagined applause.

And so I continue to struggle and I continue to fail through lack of action, but I keep coming up with the ideas and I keep trying to actually carry them out because one day, I might actually succeed.

But I doubt it.

Of Dreams and Revelations

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

ThinkingI’m one of those weirdos that thinks sometimes your dreams are messages from your subconscious.

Not all dreams, obviously. At least I certainly hope not since I have what I like to call the nightmare trait and tend to have a lot of bad dreams. I’m used to them now; rarely does a dream upset me enough to keep me awake. And many of them end up being great fodder for stories. There’s no waking trigger for them (like watching a horror movie, for example). That’s just how my brain works.

My poor youngest niece has the same thing. She is somewhat comforted by the fact that Aunt Kiki deals with the bad dreams, too, and that she’ll get used to them. In the meantime, I’ve told her of a few ways she can cope with them. So far, it’s seemed to help her, but we’ve both agreed that we don’t our dreams coming true. No one would want that. Trust us.

Anyway.

I think most dreams are probably just the brain’s way of entertaining itself while everything recharges. It takes whatever it finds lying around and uses it to put on a production, like some kids in a backyard on a summer afternoon or Roger Corman.

But sometimes, I really do think that the subconscious uses dreams to send a message to the conscious. I think the conscious brain continually asks the same question that the subconscious knows the answer to and the subconscious finally gets tired of the conscious being so damn stupid when the Answer. Is. Right. There. that it blasts the brain with the knowledge it seeks in the form of a dream.

Granted, sometimes it’s like trying to figure out interpretive dance.

And sometimes you don’t need to have a dream symbol book handy to understand the message that you’re receiving because your subconscious is so tired of you being an idiot that it basically stopped short of spelling everything out.

It, in fact, drew you a picture.

I had one of those dreams the other night about something that I’ve been thinking about off and on for the past several months. Sure, there were fantastical elements to the dream (a fashion show? why am I wearing a dress that looks like I stole it out of Blanche Devereaux’s closet? why is there a kiddie race track in the middle of this? night, day, night, day, winter, fall, pick one and stick with it!), but the overall message of the dream couldn’t be clearer. I woke up feeling like the biggest moron in world because the answer I had been seeking, had been ruminating over all summer trying to find, was in my brain all along, Toto. Should have clicked my heels so I could have found it quicker.

I feel like I need to send apology flowers to my subconscious.

What I See Ain’t What You Get

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment
Did I mention the Ursula purse? Oh yeah. I took my Ursula purse.
Did I mention the Ursula purse? Oh yeah. I took my Ursula purse.

Last week I went to my cousin’s wedding. It was a simple, pretty affair in a ballroom that was decorated subtly, but effectively. The ceremony was very sweet and I had a great time visiting with family I don’t see very often.

Now this is the first wedding I’ve been to in years and I agonized about what to wear. I am one of those people that frets about dressing appropriately for the event. So, I was trying to come up with an outfit/dress that would be appropriate but also wouldn’t make me look like a frump. Because I’m one of those people that frets about looking like the frump that I’m not.

The first outfit I picked (coral shift, purple jewelry, white flats, ’60s style hair and make-up) got scrapped because the dress wouldn’t survive a 2 1/2 drive in 90 degree heat with no a/c. With my roommate Carrie’s help I ended up going with a black, flouncy skirt that I hiked up above my waist, a white cami tucked in (the effect made it look like a color blocked dress), a hot pink shrug, black flats, the purple jewelry and ’60s mod hair I was going to do before, and bright pink lipstick. I thought it was super cute and not at all old, fat. I could drive in it without worrying about wrinkles and I could dance in it without worrying about anything falling out. Total win.

In the few days after the wedding, family posted pictures they’d taken (I took like four because I’m lousy at acquiring photographic evidence of events I attend) and there I was in one of my cousin’s pictures, full on frump while boogying on the dance floor.

No, I'm not wearing tights. I'm just that pale.
No, I’m not wearing tights. I’m just that pale.

Dammit!

This happens a lot.

When I look in the mirror, I see a hot chick. Fat? Yes. Not classically pretty? Yes. But still, I rock the package I’ve got and I think I rock it pretty damn well.

Then I see a picture someone else has taken of me and I’m like, “Holy hell. That’s what everyone else sees.” It’s jarring because I don’t think I look like that at all. I think I’m looking super cute and in reality, I’m looking like an uncool fat girl trying too hard to look cool.

It’s like a magic trick.

And it’s not just pictures, either.

The mirror in my bathroom must be blessed because other mirrors aren’t so kind. For example, I look about thirty pounds heavier in the mirrors during floorset than I do at home. I also look about ten years older. And while the college girls I work with are pulling off the sloppy-cute look with their yoga pants and tank tops and hair messily arranged in an up-do, I look like an old, tired woman who lost the will to fashion even if I put my make-up on just before I left and I’m wearing a cute outfit of t-shirt and pedal pushers (I don’t wear my “good clothes” to dress mannequins) with my sneakers. It’s like something horrible happens on the twenty minute drive to work. Because I know I didn’t leave the house looking that way.

The point of this isn’t to fish for compliments. My ego probably shouldn’t be fed. I’m just acknowledging that there’s an obvious gap between what I see and what everyone else sees.

It’s a little disappointing to know that my hot looks are all in my head and no one else can see them.

You guys are being deprived.

A Horoscope, An Eye Exam, and Davy Jones

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

Davy Jones UKYou’re probably looking at the title of this blog post going, “What the hell?” Trust me. It all connects and it’s all a lot of introspective, realization bullshit that you probably don’t care about, but that’s okay. You can refer back to it when you decide I’m not acting like myself.

I’m going to try to make this as brief and witty as possible, so let’s start at the beginning.

I love horoscopes. I don’t care who knows it. I look at them very scientifically. Statistically speaking, given the number of people born under any given sign, it stands to reason that any horoscope on any given day would be accurate for at least one person and, hey, why not me? Besides, even when they’re flat out wrong, I’m amused, and sometimes they say I’m going to be a bitch or I should take it easy and be lazy and you’d better believe I use that like a doctor’s note.

Every year I have a solar return chart done. A solar return chart analyzes where the planets are in your chart for that given year. So, this year, it was about what planets are in what houses while I’m being 35. So, amusement and excuses. And once again, from a scientific standpoint, it’s interesting to try to figure out how much this information influences my behavior, consciously and subconsciously, and therefore makes the reading “true”.

This solar return chart said that I’d be dealing with self-worth and part of that would come with analyzing how people treat me. And to be honest, I have a tendency to be treated as an afterthought, not out of any malice, but just that’s how things have gotten to be. Other people and their needs come first because Kiki can take care of herself. And just like the horoscope said (probably because it’s been lying in my brain all year), this is really starting to come into better clarity for me. I realize this is an energy I carry with me and can project even when I don’t want to.

It was illustrated this past week when I went for an eye exam. I filled out my paperwork, was told it would be a few minutes, and that was the last time I saw anyone until I left almost an hour later. I never got the exam. I said I had an emergency and I had to leave. This was not a lie. I did have an emergency and that emergency was that I needed to get out of there. I hate eye exams and in the past few years, I’ve really come to dread dealing with the people there because they treat me like I haven’t been wearing glasses since I was in third grade and haven’t been wearing contacts since I was 13. Sitting in that little room, forgotten, did nothing for my mood or my temper.

And for everyone saying that they would have said something earlier about the wait, good for you. I didn’t say anything for two reasons. One, I would have been there longer in order to endure my exam and by that point I was done being there. Two, I was too busy having an existential crisis about being invisible. Basically, I was no longer in a good mental place to have this exam done and when you’re uptight about all things relating to eyeballs, that’s not a good place to be.

(I know that sounds stupid. I think it sounds stupid. And one day I might tell you all about my eyeball issues, but for now, let’s stick to the topic.)

I left. As the incident rolled over and over in my head, I realized that a) I need to find another eye place because I deserve to be as comfortable as possible when I’m doing something that gives me the anxiety and this place isn’t up to that challenge and b) I deserve to be seen and I deserve to be seen in everyday life without having to yell for attention. Right now, I feel like I have to scream at the top of my lungs just to be ignored rather than completely overlooked. And that can’t be acceptable anymore.

Then yesterday, I saw pictures from Davy Jones’s last performance as part of The Monkees. This would have been in 2011 when he was touring with Peter and Micky for the 45th anniversary. That year, they did a show within driving distance of me and I really wanted to go, but I didn’t go.

I didn’t go because I was working a day job that I hated, a job that didn’t like to give me any time off during the work week because “it would look bad” because I hadn’t been there “long enough”, a job that the guys I worked with hated doing  as much as I did and felt that was beneath them. I didn’t go because I put work ahead of everything else, like I always do, and decided that they were right and I hadn’t worked hard enough to earn that concert and shoved my heart’s desire to the bottom of the list. I told myself I’d have to catch the guys during the 50th reunion.

Because that’s what I’ve always done. Put what someone else wants first. No matter who it is, no matter what it is, it trumps me and whatever I have going on lest I risk being called selfish and be given lectures on hard work and earning fun things and how inconvenient it is for me to want to do things that I want to do. It is the established law of the west and one I’ve accepted.

Davy didn’t make it to the 50th reunion (which is next year) and I’ll never get another chance to see him perform.

That’s a supreme bummer to think about, but indicative of the way I’ve been running my world.

If I don’t respect my wants and needs and desires and goals and wishes and dreams and requirements, nobody else is going to either. Nobody else is going to go out of their way for me because I don’t go out of my way for me. I need to lead by example. It’s the only way shit is ever going to get done.

Me putting myself first sometimes is not going to go over well because it’s going to buck the status quo and the order of the Universe a lot and people are going to have to get used to seeing me even when I don’t yell for their attention.

But, hey. That’s what my horoscope said, man.

This Fat Girl Isn’t on a Diet

~ Kiki Writes ~ 3 Comments

donut dietYou’re probably coming into this post going, “Who cares?” because you’re probably tired of people talking about their diets (and exercise routines, but that’s another post). You’re tired of hearing about paleo and gluten-free and high protein and low fat and no carbs and fasting and juicing and everything else that everyone else is doing in order to get healthy, be healthy, and lose weight. You’re probably wondering, “Why does this ditz need to proclaim that she’s NOT dieting?”

I’m glad you asked.

Two reasons.

1. I’m probably giving people mixed signals in regards to my eating because I can’t eat mass quantities in one sitting (I’m the disgrace of my family; my tiny little ninety year old great-aunt eats more at a family dinner than I do) and I do eat fairly healthy most of the time. I don’t drink a lot of soda, I don’t eat a lot of fast food, I don’t eat a lot of sweets or candy, I don’t eat a lot of processed food, I make a lot of vegetarian meals, I will crave salad, and if I’m not careful, my baby carrot addiction will get out of hand and I’ll end up turning orange.

So, it can look like I’m on a diet. Especially if you see me eating celery because who in the hell eats celery any other time?

(For the record, I actually eat it to help with acid reflux. And it works. Weird.)

And since it can look like I’m on a diet, then it also looks like I’m going off my diet or cheating on my diet when I talk about eating my weight in Sorrento’s pizza. Or when I talk about drowning my sorrows in ice cream because the Cubs lost. Or when I post pictures of me eating a plain cake doughnut with strawberries and whipped cream. Or any other time I talk about eating stuff that’s “bad” (the labeling of certain foods as bad irks me, but again, another post).

I don’t want you to panic and think I’m failing at yet another thing in my life. I’m not. Everything’s cool. I’m not riding on any wagon so you don’t have to worry about me falling off.

Also, that baby carrot intervention isn’t necessary. I can quit any time I want.

2. It’s easily assumed that because I’m a fat girl that I should be on a diet so I can qualify for Good Fat Girl Status.

You know what that is, don’t you? Good Fat Girl Status? Being a “good” fat girl means that you’re trying to lose weight. When people see you eating healthy and/or exercising, they assume you to be a “good” fatty because you’re trying to no longer be any kind of fatty.

Well, you know what happens when you assume, right? I wreck your world and burst your bubble and make you sad.

I am not on a diet. My health focal points actually have nothing to do with weight loss. For me, weight loss is a side effect of doing better for my health. My ultimate goal is to feel better, a total subjective measurement that only I can evaluate. My “diet” for this is drink a lot of water and don’t eat too much garbage food. That’s it. It gives me far less angst than counting calories or keeping track of points or wondering if cavemen ate cottage cheese.

And if that gives me Bad Fat Girl Status, then I’m cool with that.

We all know that bad girls have more fun.

Why The Timeless Man Got Postponed and Other Life Lessons

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

Cheaters and ChupacabrasI was supposed to self-publish The Timeless Man last month and the reason why I didn’t publish it is because it didn’t have a cover.

It’s like this.

A friend did the cover for the first Ivy Russell novella, Cheaters and Chupacabras. I decided that I wanted the other three novellas to use the same background, but a different symbol for each novella (for Cheaters it was the wedding rings). I asked this friend if they could do the symbols for the other three novellas earlier this year and they agreed.

But between illness and humidity (because that affects art when you’re working with water colors, kids) and communication issues, it’s now July and the cover still isn’t done. I’m not sure when it’s going to get done or what I’m going to do when it gets done since this has sort of jacked up my entire self-publishing timeline, not to mention it’s not just this cover that needs to not be plagued by humidity, but the next two as well and I don’t feel like it would be a good idea for me to try to publish anything until I have every cover done. And so, we limbo.

The last time I inquired about the covers, which was Tuesday night, in the course of our conversation, my friend said to me, “I thought you got mad and just did it yourself anyway.”

See, that’s the life lesson I’ve taken away from every interaction I’ve had like this and there have been a lot in my existence. People I work with or ask for help from or ask favors of don’t come through for me often, so I just end up doing it myself, if I’m able to do it at all. It’s now such a common occurrence that people just expect it to end this way.

And it’s all my fault.

When you come out of the birth canal (or in my case, c-section incision) as a preordained responsible, independent human, then that’s your label for life. People go to you for help and you help them because you can and that’s what the world tells responsible, independent humans to do.

But when the script gets flipped and the responsible, independent human needs help, nobody knows their lines anymore. They don’t know how to react. Because the responsible, independent humans have a tendency to attract and surround themselves with somewhat flaky, dependent humans that just aren’t up to the task of helping. They want to, but they just can’t. Because reasons. Or they will, but it’s on their timeline, which is completely out-of-sync with your timeline, and that’s just too damn bad because you should just be grateful that they’re helping you at all.

So, I don’t ask for favors very often because I know the likelihood of being blown off or disappointed is pretty high and when I do ask for a favor hoping that maybe this time will be that one time things are different and they end up being the same, yeah, I tend to stop asking and keep on slogging through life on my own, doing everything the hard way because it’s been made pretty obvious that I’m a responsible, independent human and therefore shouldn’t not require much in the way of help. So, yeah, I either get pissed and do it myself, or I find myself in limbo, at the mercy of someone else’s timeline.

Which sucks.

‘Cause it makes my books late.

 

Disclaimer: I love my friends, I really do! Even though some of them aren’t the greatest at helping me out when I need it, they still have other qualities that are absolutely marvelous. All of my friends have their faults, as do I (and I have more than most), but they’re all really good people.

I wouldn’t be friends with them if they weren’t.

Give me some credit here.

A Quick Thought on Love Winning

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

rainbowflagLast Friday marriage equality was declared law of the land and I am down with that. Not because I’m the marrying kind (thought if I do decide that I am the marrying kind and the kind I want to marry is a woman, then yes, I have a vested interest in this outcome in the future), but because I know that there are other people that are the marrying kind and I think they should have that civil right. I am all for it.

The reason I think I am so all for it and probably would be all for it even if I wasn’t a bisexual gal is because of my great-aunt and my childhood.

I have a great-aunt who is a lesbian and throughout my childhood she and her then-girlfriend were often present at family functions. These were happy occasions usually, filled with food and laughter and hugs. Wonderful, warm occurrences in my existence. Now, the children were never expressly told that my great-aunt was a lesbian (I was in my teens before I did that math and then got confirmation from my mother), but in my kid-brain I put her and her girlfriend together. They were always at the family functions together so in my head they were one entity, a team, a partnership. And I remember a lot of my cousins referring to them likewise.

The big thing about these family functions, though, was that even though it was not expressly stated to the children that my great-aunt was a lesbian, none of the adults treated her as anything but a beloved family member. She was never treated as an other or a less-than. She was never treated, at least in my memory, as a deviant or a disappointment. She was loved and respected and cherished and so was her girlfriend.

So to see people so dedicated to treating people like my great-aunt as other or less-than, to deny them a government contract that grants them a certain set of rights that are only granted to couples that enter into that contract, to see people that I share DNA with, my own blood, HER own blood, putting their religion and their adherence to a cherry-picked handbook above someone that they are told by that same handbook to love, is just fucking baffling to me. I don’t get it and I decided on Friday, once and for all, that I’m not going to get it and I don’t want to get it. I’m sorry you feel that way and I feel sorry for you because you feel that way. I’m sorry you choose self-righteousness and a promise of an afterlife by some super judgmental god over loving and protecting and relating to people in the here and now. But if that makes you happy (and considering how many folks are frothing at the mouth right now, it doesn’t seem to make them THAT  happy), then you do you.

But my great-aunt is not an other. She is not a less-than. I am not a less-than. That guy you don’t know marrying his partner of fifty years is not a less-than.

The way you cut your own humanity off like it’s some sort of defect, though, that’s pretty less-than.

Love wins.

Charity Money

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

thumbs upIf you’ve been present in my social media world in the past week or so, then you know that I’ve been doing some linking to a few different things that are raising money for a couple of different causes (a teacher friend has a campaign to raise money for some hands-on math supplies for her high-poverty students at DonorsChoose.Org; The Davy Jones Equine Memorial Fund is having an auction; Davy’s Angels are selling t-shirts with the proceeds also benefiting DJEMF). In addition to trying to raise some awareness for these activities, I’ve also donated to my friend’s campaign, bought a t-shirt, and have been getting outbid left, right, and center on the nifty memorabilia at the auction.

I like to put my money where my mouth is when I can. And I try to work it so I always have money for my mouth (thought I will have no trouble running my mouth for various charities and organizations when I can’t afford to donate; that is the very least I can do).

So, I feel I should make a full-disclosure about my charity money, the money I earmark to donate to various causes, charities, organizations, and whatnot because that money might involve you, too.

My charity money is the money I make garage sale-ing my life.

That’s right. If you buy any of my crap on eBay (stuffed animals will be going up in the next month or so, BTW) or any of the stuff I’ve made and put in my Etsy shop (new bracelets should be in the shop in the next few weeks), then the money you pay me will probably go to one of my chosen organizations.

Now, it didn’t always work like this. For the longest time, that money went to pay my bills. And then, when I started making enough money through my various day jobs and a little from writing, I started saving it up. It’s never been a big cash flow. More like a nickel trickle. And last year I came to a point where I decided to put those nickels to some good use.

Why am I telling you this? Because some people like to tell other people how to spend their charity money. Even if they have absolutely no connection to that person’s charity money, they still feel the need to tell them that there are other, more deserving organizations than whatever one they chose to donate to, oh, and by the way, there’s no need to tell people that you donated to any charity because they do it all the time without needing to mention it, you unhumble jerk.

I am telling people this so they don’t make the grave mistake of buying something from me (except my books; that’s bill-paying money and I’m fairly sure folks are cool with me paying my bills) only to then have me take the hard-earned money they gave to me in exchange for goods and give it to some organization that they don’t feel is deserving and would rather I not ever mention.

I am also telling people this so I can tell the people that don’t even buy my stuff, but still have a problem with the organizations I give to, that they can just shut the fuck right up, turn right around, and give to the organizations they think are more deserving. Don’t like me talking about my organizations? Then you talk about yours louder than I talk about mine. Or don’t tell anyone at all and just mute/unfriend/hide me. Whatever trips your trigger, floats your boat, and/or tickles your fancy.

But for the love of all that is unholy, just in general, STOP TELLING PEOPLE THAT THEIR GIVING PRACTICES/AWARENESS RAISING IS WRONG. Sweet mercy, you fucking buzzkills. Shaming people because their giving/awarness-ing isn’t to your liking is just a dick move and you’re a terrible person and you should feel bad. No, really. You need to analyze your need to belittle someone trying to do something good. Because that seems like a serious hang-up to me. Major personality flaw. Also, not a good look.

(For clarity’s sake and to cut off an argument before it starts, I’m not talking about valid criticism of an organization because not all of them act on behalf of the greater good. I’m talking about people shitting on a reputable organization and/or fundraising/awareness attempts because of blah blah bullshit bitchcakes. You know what I’m talking about.)

So, in conclusion, if you buy something from me during the garage sale-ing of my life, that money will probably end up going to a organization that I dig. If that offends you, then you should not buy my stuff.

Except my books.

Always buy my books.

Garage Sale-ing My Life

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

dresserI realized that “sale-ing” isn’t any kind of a word, but sometimes my world requires artistic liberties to explain.

Now is one of those times.

As mentioned before, one of my not-so-serious resolutions this year is to get rid of some stuff. This quickly became The Great Purge of 2015.

In addition to clearing projects from various To Do Lists, I’m also getting rid of my stuff. I’m either throwing it away, giving it away, or selling it. I have a lot of stuff I no longer need but other people may find useful. I hope to put together a garage sale this summer (probably with someone much better at it considering the last time I did it, all I got was a sunburn).

In the meantime, I’m using eBay and my Etsy store as online garage sales.

Right now on eBay, I just have some magazines (The Writer, Writer’s Digest, Sports Illustrated), some books, and that last Monkees VHS tape in my collection that no one will friggin’ buy. However, if I can ship it easily, it’ll probably end up there. I’ve got some Family Guy stuff (DVDs, a Blu-ray, lunch box, collector’s stuff), walkie-talkies, earbuds, and some other stuff in my T0-Sell pile that will probably end up on eBay before my yard.

As for Etsy, in addition to the jewelry and bags already there, I will be listing more jewelry, more bags, and probably some jewelry making things (beads and such) and fabric I’ve decided I’m never going to use.

The one thing that I’ve decided not to sell is my artwork. I gave it one go round on Etsy just for shits and giggles, but in the end, it’s just not the art you sell. It’s the art you give to unsuspecting people. Or suspecting people, as the case may be. The point is that right now it’s taking up space in one of my drawers when it could probably take up space on someone’s wall or fridge and it’s more likely to do that if its free. So I’ll be giving it to some random folks in my life.

Maybe I’ll even put up a few of the drawings here, Twitter, and Facebook to see if any brave souls want to lay claim and risk having their tastes mocked.

So if you want a piece of me, now is the time to get it.

You Can Sew Make Pajama Pants Into a Skirt

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

Pajama skirtsNope, haven’t run out of sew puns yet.

When I went through my sewing drawer and bin, trying to assess what projects I needed to do this year so I could make some progress in clearing out my sewing drawer and bin, I came across two pairs of pajama pants. One was ripped up in the thigh area (friction is a science-based bitch) and the other pair was stretched out (there was a time when they fit a lot more loosely than they did when I tried them on to assess their worth, I won’t lie). And while it was rather easy for me to see which t-shirts would be good candidates for tote bags, I was a little stumped as to what to do with the pants. At first I thought I should just keep them for fabric scraps.

And then it hit me.

Why couldn’t I just make skirts out of them like I’d done to my jeans? The fabric and designs would make for cute skirts and I already had experience since I’d done a couple of skirts, so this wouldn’t be too difficult.

The plaid skirt wasn’t and I was pretty straight forward with it. I just cut off the legs at the desired length, cut open the legs, sewed everything together leaving a small back vent (the thigh holes weren’t any trouble), and then used hem tape to give the bottom him some weight. Ta Da! Skirt!

The star skirt was a little more involved because in order for this to work I’d have to take in the waist. The elastic was old and stretched out. Taking it in was the most obvious choice and I didn’t let never having done that before stop me. I did the same thing with the star skirt as I did with the plaid skirt, except I cut up the back seam as well. I cut the band, resized it, and then sewed everything back together. I decided that I liked the way the front looked with that open part and just did a small hem on it so it would keep that ripple effect but not fray. Then I used hem tape on the bottom hem and done! A second skirt.

It’s been too cold lately for me to test drive either of them. Maybe this weekend. I admit that since they’re old pajama pants, the material is pretty thin, but I think they’ll be really nice for late spring/summer/early fall when the temps are warmer.

And, of course, I did both of them by hand.

I’m still waiting for the day I learn to work a sewing machine.