Oh Hai, I've been MIA

Why hello there blog......
I've missed you have you missed me?

Life has, as it will, unexpectedly thrown me many a curve balls over this past year. It was been a little over one year that I have now held my position as the Gallery Manager and Organizational Administrator for the Ohio Art League.  It has had many trials and tribulations and I want to stick by my guns by not put anything negative on my blog. Hence not posting lately, not necessarily because of the job and work but everything in life has been a big ball of stress and angst but also light in unexpected areas.  It has been undoubtedly hard to focus.

My yarn store dreams are once again at a standstill. I have it all set up I just need my business account with the hubby and the space. I'm almost so prepared that I am scared to jump in. Also I am finding that I would like to be a bit more financially independent when I move onto this venture so I am content to sit another 6-8 months with a paying steady job to get majority of my debt paid off from silly things like store credit cards and low $200-1500 credit cards that I don't really need and should learn to live without.

All is well in the world of Torn Angel. I have been busy with custom orders, lot's of bridal work and working closely with the lovely new group that is Columbus Alternative Fashion Mob. Below are two of my favorite creations for that show.

 

Working on fashion things again has gotten my brain and fingers itching to also have the yarn store as a studio space. I have 1,001 ideas but no time or space to create them. I know I have the talent to make a living off of it, I just need to be kinder to myself and believe in myself more.

My biggest accomplishment since last I wrote was completing my level one shorts testing for my Muay Thai gym.  It was an amazing and humbling experience. I don't think I've ever worked that hard or trained so much for anything before in my life.  It was 11 full, non-stop minutes of physical intensity that felt like my lungs were on fire and I could barely stand. Clenches, boxing, kicks and just for fun I had jumping kicks to added as my extra special contribution to pain. A friend told me afterwards they felt like they were watching Mortal Kombat and repeatedly pressing for the jumping kick because I just kept going for a near 2 mins on jumping roundhouses. 

TOTALLY WORTH IT!

I can now consider myself a true student of Kru Hope Vitellas. Having this outlet has been the best thing I have done in a long time for myself. I have lost weight, been in amazing shape and the people at the gym are nothing but loving positive energy that helps me great through some of the tougher days I've had this year. My friend Laura also joined the gym with me and nicknamed me for Rainbow Dash from My Little Ponies.

REPRESENT!

Finally for this post I also hosted a Korean Indie Rock Band during their first US tour! It was great to hang out with some Koren natives and practice a bit of my broken Korean with them. We actually communicated very well considering how terrible my speaking is.

The band is called Love X Stereo and they are AMAZING. I got them a last minute hook up at Kobo Live with the help of my buddy Jacob Wooten and the fast thinking of Wolf Starr. Amazing fellows to work with for anything local and community. Anyways back to the band!

 

Love X Stereo is anything BUT the usual kpop. They are a indie rock electronica band and I love their sound and feel. My favorite two tracks are Soul City and Lose to Win.  It was so random but isn't that how the best things always happen? My friend Vinh had become friends with them and asked me to host them and find a spot for them to play. Now I have 5 new fantastic friends across the sea. It's always cool when you meet people that you see as "celebrity" and they are totally down to earth and cool and enjoy playing video games as much as you do. I can't wait till they visit again next year on their next tour!

Check out their new Album GLOW and help support another form of independent artists!

This is all I've got for now. Things are looking better and brighter.  Even with the yarn store on hold I am still checking out and doing as much research as I can by visiting other yarn stores and sampling new yarns and companies.

Cheers!

All the Shorties

With summer pretty much here I've been on the hunt for some shorts that are not "short short" something a little more grown up and classy looking. The hunt has not been going so well suffice to say. At least not in my budget range. I was fortunate enough to pick up these sweet Seneca Rising Shorts (which you can find here) In a foam green color. I was lucky enough to get them also locally at Brigade in the Short North During their 40% off flash sale at the most recent Gallery Hop.

Aside from these I haven't found anything that I am dying to buy. For some reason shorts have gotten shorter. The ones I do have look silly with my oversized dolman shirts and long shark bite tanks because you can't see them and it looks like I am wearing nothing for the bottom. I've tried to go the bike short route via American Apparel but I can only do that so much without feeling like a broken record from the early 90's.

So as you can guess I'll be making some shorts for myself this summer. Hopefully I will have the time and strength to accomplish this between my classes so that I'll actually have things to wear. I'm taking a lot of inspiration from the descriptions of riding skirts in this book I have been reading "A New Spring" by Robert Jordan (yes let's all laugh at the fantasy fiction geek). Anyways here are some pictures I found that I am taking inspiration from.

All of these shorts were found at Shopbop

I love the drape in all of them and I've noticed that there isn't a lot of structure in the sewing as shorts normally have had.  Which is very good for the drape to get that nice flow to the fabric.  I also like that there is a lot of elastic for the waistbands to help with the gathering.  Also because I'm lazy and I get annoyed having to unbutton and unzip shorts since they are already much less fabric to work with.  Not to mention doing button holes in a drapey garment are a big pain and all that interfacing to calculate in is completely the opposite of easy breezy summer sewing.

Oh and I had this really weird blogger nightmare/dream about Sea of Shoes and her mother.  I was hired to be a Nanny for the weekend and just kind of hung out with them and went to do their errands like picking up food and helping picking accessories for their blog shoots and playing with the dogs.  No idea why.  I didn't even read her blog yesterday at all!