Fun 'n Horror

Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Malin Space Science Systems
HALLO, EARTHLING:  Last week, I posted about NASA's Jupiter-bound Juno spacecraft doing a low fly-by. Launched on Aug. 5, 2011, by an Atlas 551, that rocket only had enough oomph to give Juno enough speed to reach the asteroid belt. Then, as anticipated, our Sun's gravity pulled the craft back toward the inner solar system. Juno used Earth's gravity to boost it on its way toward our solar system's gas giant.

During the process, JunoCam took the time to snap a photo of home. Hope you were waving!

Juno is expected to reach Jupiter on the Fourth of July, 2016.

HARVEST PARTY: Sunday afternoon the kids were thrilled to attend the annual harvest party of CJ's BFF from kindergarten. Such a nice family. Thank goodness we have one super awesome aspect of CJ's otherwise super awful kindergarten year at a local public school at the south end of Queen Anne hill. ...

The kids had a great time carving and decorating pumpkins.

Actually CJ wasn't so interested in the art aspect of his pumpkins. Rather, he viewed it as food and wanted to harvest every seed he could out of it. :) So while the other kids got their art on, CJ conducted an autopsy.

We brought the seeds home, roasted them up and enjoyed them, so I can't fault his pragmatic approach. :)

BAD WITCH: I have previously shared that CJ and Annabelle have decided to be Glinda the Good Witch and a flying monkey this year. Sounds simple enough ... OK, not so simple, but nothing I can't handle. ... Or at least that's what I thought.

I knew that Simplicity had the Wizard of Oz rights, and so we "scored" a pattern for the Glinda dress. Unfortunately, they only had tiny kid sizes or adult sizes, no 'big kid' sizes. So, I opted for the adult pattern, 4136. Looks, OK, right? ...
                                              
Four words for 4136: So much, so wrong.
                                   
Sweet Jeebus. I know my way around a pattern and a sewing machine. Really I do. But this pattern is beyond not good. From fabric cutting out advice to sewing directions, it's flat out freaking WRONG in so many places. And by wrong, I mean 'let's waste yards of fabric and having you look like the Wicked Witch of the East.' Not that I know exactly what the Wicked Witch of the East looks like, but now, in my mind's eye, I picture her in Simplicity 4136.

Case in point: There are numerous pattern pieces with multiple pattern pieces. Yes, I know, that's confusing. Welcome to my world. But let's say once you realize there are multiple piece 22s, you think, OK, there's a piece 22 for size 8 or 12, and one for size 10 or 6. But what if the piece is so confuzzuled it doesn't even know what it is?!

At some point, after my left eye developed an involuntary twitch and I said Many Bad Words that Glinda the Good Witch has never even THOUGHT let alone said, I was like, "Screw it, I'm sewing this ball gown MY WAY," as Frank Sinatra would say, if he were ever to sew a pink ball gown.

And so I'm OK now, and Annabelle will have a g.d. poufy pink dress, and she won't look like the Wicked Witch of the East and she might even look a little like Glinda when I'm done, despite Simplicity 4136.

LEFTOVERS: In happier news, here are photos of cake. Because cake makes everything better.

Dontcha love the glow-stick candles on Bee's cake? Makes me want to do a Star Wars cake just to use 'em for the light sabers.

And here was its ooey gooey inside of Annabelle's oversized birthday cupcake.

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