Craziness, a move, and the Fall Collection

Well.  I am not the best at blogging.  I know it's been awhile since I posted, and I know I have yet to deliver the photos of my fall collection.  For this I apologize, but I have to make an excuse this time... I have been in the process of accepting a new job and planning a move to Louisiana.

When I went to Baton Rouge two weeks ago, it was for a job interview at LSU.  Well, guess what... I got the job!  I'm now the Foreign, Comparative and International Law Librarian at LSU, and a soon to be resident of Baton Rouge.  Geaux Tigers!  There are lots of fried green tomatoes in my future!

I'm so excited for this move.  I'll most likely be relocating sometime around the end of October.  The time between now and then will be filled with things like looking for an apartment, packing up all my stuff, renting a moving van, and figuring out how to transport my two lovely cats to Louisiana.  So, I might not be blogging that much for awhile.  I also may need to put my shop on vacation around the time of the move, though hopefully not for long.

Anyway.  Pretty much everyone who's currently following this blog is also following me on Facebook, so I'm pretty confident that you guys have seen the fall collection since it posted last week.  I am really proud of this collection, which I've been working on since mid-summer.  I'd been reading a lot of dystopian and post-apocalyptic fiction, and it led me to adopt a darker, more industrial aesthetic than I usually do.

The inspiration for these pieces is, as you know, the idea of "life after people."  I envisioned my beloved New York City as it would appear if human beings suddenly ceased to exist - I imagined urban and industrial areas overgrown with vegetation and harboring various birds and insects, both gothic and pretty.  I only created five pieces for this collection - it was an exercise in planning, execution and cohesiveness more than anything else.  I loved having a single concept to work from.  So without any further delay, here it is:

These will not be the only pieces to appear in my shop this fall!  However, they are the official "Fall Collection" of the House of Decadent Delusion.  Like I said, I wanted to see if I could design a collection, and I think I did pretty well for my first try.  I hope that you guys enjoy it!

My Fall Fashion Wishlist

Want to know what I'm eyeing up for fall? Well, maybe it's all the time I've spent with the Time Travelers Team this summer, but I'm really feeling anything with a bit of a steampunk edge. I'm looking at browns, reds, gold, brass and copper. I'm also knitting up a couple pairs of fingerless mitts with a Neo-Victorian feel and vintage embellishments, and I've ordered a few gothy accessories in basic black from some of my favorite Etsy sellers.

Here's a peak at some of the things that I've bought or am planning to buy for fall.



I want to highlight some particularly amazing shops that are included in this list; I LOVE shopping, and when I find a brand I like, I tend to be an extremely loyal customer. First, let me draw your attention to two outstanding knitwear designers: NeuroticKnitterz and The Jane Victoria. Both have patterns readily available in PDF format in their Etsy shop (I LOVE PDF patterns because they offer an immediate solution to the knitter's syndrome commonly known as "startitis.") NeuroticKnitterz seems to draw inspiration from a variety of sources, and I've already purchased a few of her patterns. I'm planning to knit her Last of the Sky Pirates mitts later this fall in a fabulous brown sock yarn, and I've already ordered the antique buttons to go with them. The Jane Victoria has a distinctly Neo-Victorian aesthetic that can be made goth or steampunk depending on the knitter's choice of colors. I am currently knitting her Lúthien Ar-Feiniel Opera-Length Fingerless Gloves out of Madeline Tosh Vintage in the colorway "Antique Lace." I must say that I am enjoying the pattern immensely... it moves quickly, is easy to follow and memorize, and looks amazing. My experience with the designer is that she is very helpful and quick to respond to questions about her patterns, so I would highly recommend any of them, even if you think they might be a challenge.

For those without an inclination toward the fiber arts, check out ScarletRabbit for ready-made crocheted accessories that will fit into your steampunk, goth, or chic urban wardrobe. I recently purchased a large collar and matching wristlets for early fall, and I was blown away by the quality and craftsmanship of the items. This is another designer whom I highly recommend.

Finally, I have included two absolutely outstanding perfume designers on my Fall Fashion Wishlist: Catrianna of Deep Midnight Bathery, and Sara of Sarawen Perfume Art. I've recently begun wearing more natural perfume oils and fewer commercial products, and have become seriously addicted to both of these gals' fragrances. I now own two from Sara and three from Cat, not to mention the 17 sample vials I have floating around. Of course, it's hard to describe fragrance in a blog post, especially when you don't know jack about perfume design to begin with. However, I find that Sara's fragrances are deep and rich with a few clearly recognizable notes, while Cat's are complex, with subtleties that will make you think "what IS that unusual smell?" as the perfume dries and changes throughout the day. Of course, the best way to check out any fragrance is by sampling it; luckily, both of these ladies offer sample vials in their shops. I would highly recommend going and getting lost in their stores... their photos and descriptions will have you dying to sample every one of their creations!

Oh, glorious shopping. Don't you just love it? I have really enjoyed writing up this post, and I hope you've enjoyed it too. We all know that fall is the best season for fashion and for changing up your wardrobe... I hope you've enjoyed my recommendations, and I'd love to hear some of yours as well!

You've Been Treasured

Sometimes I just like to put the crafting aside and put on my curator hat instead.  Creating Etsy treasuries is fun... I love looking through other people's listings and arranging them together in my own little collections.

Here are a couple of my recent treasuries... please check them out and give them some love!

First is my weekly STATTEAM treasury.  This week, I went with a back to school theme, and called my treasury "Book Learnin'."  Between finishing my library degree and knowing that school is starting for everyone else, I definitely have books on the brain...



Second is a treasury I did for no other reason than that I am LOVING the new Chanel Le Vernis fall nail color, "Peridot."  It's a beautiful, rich gold-green, and I am all about this color for the fall season...



And finally, here is my favorite.  This is my entry into the Time Travelers Team Halloween treasury contest, and it's entitled, "A Dark Night of the Soul."  We have a lot of wonderful artists on the team who happen to have something of a dark aesthetic (to say the least), so I decided to put my own love of surrealism to the test and come up with the most terrifyingly surreal treasury I could create using entirely items made by TTT members.  This is it...



I hope you enjoyed the eye candy!  Be back next time with something more substantive to say!

NaNo Fail

I'm supposed to be doing NaNoWriMo right now.

For anyone who doesn't know, NaNoWriMo stands for "National Novel Writing Month." It happens every November, and the goal is to write an entire novel in one month. It's pretty popular... there's even a website through which you can arrange local meetups and chat with other writers about your ideas. It's a big crazy writing party, basically... at least, from what I've heard. I tried to do it in 2008, and wrote about 15,000 words of a crappy vampire novel before I got totally overwhelmed and quit. Every year since then, I've promised myself that I would participate again, and every year something (Christmas knitting? Final exams?) has happened to prevent me from doing so.

This year, the powers behind NaNo decided, quite rightly, that November was a pretty craptacular month to have to write a book. So, for people like me, they set up "Camp NaNoWriMo," to take place during the entire month of August. I got really excited about this, thinking I'd have plenty of time to write, and I contacted a friend and we agreed that we would both participate. Fast forward to yesterday, when I realized that it was three days into August, and I had never even signed up.

The sucky part is that I actually feel guilty about this, even though it will probably have absolutely no impact on my life. I could still start, of course, and try to make up for the lost time. I also have what I would consider to be more important things to do... job hunting, managing my Etsy shop, and bringing my cholesterol down, among others. But I feel like I'm letting myself down by not doing NaNo yet again. When will I get around to this? Will it become like the enormous stash closet of yarn that I will never knit up because it so far exceeds my life expectancy? Or the "to read" list that still includes unread titles from 18 years ago?

Arg.

Anyway... I don't know what I'll be doing about that, but having gotten that vent out of the way, let me focus on a few things that I HAVE been doing.

First of all, the Glee Cast Knit Project seems to be a go. If you haven't visited the Rav group yet, then definitely check it out. It seems that one of the team leaders has been in touch with someone from the costume department and is photographing all of the items before sending them on. Whether or not my scarf ends up on the show, my dream is for Naya to tweet about it. Everyone should be following her at @NayaRivera on Twitter, because she's just fantastic.

From the scarf, I moved onto a couple of new projects. I'm actually knitting for MYSELF for a change. I'm working on an Amiga cardigan, the pattern for which can be found in the spring/summer issue of Knitty.  I'm also test knitting a really cute felted witch hat pattern for everywitchway on Etsy... check out their store to see the pattern, as well as a lot of adorable Pagan-esque quilting patterns (they will appeal to non-Pagans as well; for example, the "Samhain" pattern will easily fit in with anyone's Halloween decor.)  They have an awesome shop, and I'm excited to be trying out one of their patterns.

I've also been doing quite a lot of metal collage and assemblage work.  I'm probably going to do a post about metal collage at some point, but for now I'll just say that I've gotten some awesome things up in my shop, and am working on getting a few placed at a local gallery (because I really think that metal collage pieces look a lot more spectacular in person.)  Here are a few of my newer listings:

I sent in my contribution for the August Phat Fiber box, the theme of which is Bollywood.  To be honest, I wasn't nearly as into this theme as I was with the Art Nouveau one last month.  I'm not crazy about Bollywood, so I didn't take any particular film as inspiration; I just sort of conjured up some Bollywood type colorways and sent in a variety of samples:

Even though the theme wasn't really my thing, I am thoroughly enjoying these contributions.  I'm definitely going to continue with this... the September theme is "Enchanted Forest," which is a bit more appealing to me, so I'm already thinking over some potential colorways.

Finally, I am seriously gearing up for Halloween!  Though I appreciate the idyllic summer I've been having here in the countryside of Pennsylvania (last summer I was doing an internship in Boston and sleeping on the floor in an unfurnished apartment with no air conditioning), I always get antsy for Halloween around this time of year.  The Time Travelers Team on Etsy held a big surprise Halloween event on Monday night, and it was a raging success.  I think people are getting ready for fall, and I'm excited to start putting up more yarn and knitwear and other cold weather stuff, not to mention knit myself some fall sweaters.  What do you guys think... are you ready for fall?

And I wonder why I don't have time for NaNoWriMo!  This blog post probably has enough words to make up my daily installment and then some!  Ah, well, you can't please all of the people all of the time (or even yourself for that matter.)  Perhaps I'll start late, perhaps I'll wait until November, but either way, I can't say that I haven't been busy.  :)