Latest Happenings at Skull Mansion and Surrounding Metropolitan Areas

How is everyone doing this fine Halloween week?  We are doing pretty well here at Skull Mansion (for the record, there are a few skulls in our house, mostly belonging to Felix, and by mansion I obviously mean town house).  Aside from having a few events planned last week, I mostly didn't get dressed or leave the house.  What can I say?  It was just one of those weeks in which I chose to wear my pajamas and feel kind of sick and sorry for myself.  This week is way better!

Things have been transforming around here.  A couple weekends ago I transformed basic pantry goods into glorious sugar skull cookies!





I am super dooper proud of these, you guys.  Of course, I didn't just go for it and have these guys magically appear.  I may or may not have spent a couple days reading blogs of people who make fancy cookies and picking up tips like woah.  Tips like when making piping frosting, wrap your blob of frosting in plastic wrap, then put it in your piping bag.  When you're done, you just pull the plastic wrapped part out of the piping bag and have no piping bag mess to clean up.  Boom!  I didn't explain that well, but there are videos on the internets explaining this business.  Also, I spent a whole day making these.  I baked in the morning, spent at least an hour getting the frosting ready, and then it took probably 5 hours to decorate them.  Felix helped, and I think you can tell which ones are his.  Josh also helped with the last few, and he was a natural who did not spend days reading tips.  Of course.



Another tip was to store your piping bags in a mug with a wet paper towel at the bottom to keep them from crusting up when not in use.  It made for a pretty clean up!  Also all the food coloring makes for beautiful spit later when you brush your teeth, even if it's been several hours since you consumed a cookie.

We're having a Halloween party this Saturday, and that usually means our same group of friends come over and hang out only in costumes.  I've been pretty lame about decorating every year we've done it, but this year I wanted some spooky pizazz up in here.  I made a bunch of Martha Stewart bats, and they're hanging all over casting spooking shadows and driving my cats crazy.



Spooky!  I'll get pictures of the actual bats when I'm done cleaning up and spook pimping the place.



I'm also making good use of a package of spider webs.  Also note the mouse!  There are Martha Stewart mice scurrying all over.  Driving the cats crazy.







And this guy is hanging on the door again.



Felix transformed into a butt face, which we knew was bound to happen any day.



I transformed my dirty, dirty hair into this giant dirty hair mountain to go to a concert last Thursday.  I know I probably shouldn't make myself several inches taller when people need to see past me, but I have suffered so hard behind tall dudes at shows lately that I decided not to care if I was part of the problem.  All the tallest dudes are blocking views, and now so is my tall hair.  And lest you think I go to bed fabulous, this is what I looked like when I took it out later that night.



Not pictured is the 15 minutes I spent in the shower the next day combing knots out of my conditioner saturated fro.  Why do all the best hair do's later involve me crying in the shower?

Ok, that's enough transformations for the day.  Today's plan involves shipping wallets and further spookifying my residence.  What are you guys being for Halloween?  I'll be posting my reveal soon!

Pumpkin Patching

It's that time of year where we go to the pumpkin patch to pet goats again!



Before you ask, no, this goat is not possessed by the devil himself, but I did catch her at a very awkward moment.



My favorite thing about these goat shots is Chainsaw in the background.  He definitely suffers from Resting Bitch Face and usually looks like a grumpy Gus in pictures unless I tell him to smile OR ELSE.  But look how dang happy he is to be feasting his eyes upon this goat (and her kids!).  He did tell me that he would love to have a pet goat.  Awww.



I also petted some sheep!  Someone had their giant dog (I think it was a German Shepherd, if my memory serves), and it was having a great time sheep sniffing.  It was super cute, sticking its head in the fence, trying to get a good sniff.  I'm pretty sure it wanted to play with them so baaaaad (please read that in a sheep voice!).  And then some older guy was walking by with his family and said, "Baa ram ewe!"  So I had to complete it by saying, "to your fleece, your flock, be true!"  It was a beautiful moment, I tell you.



Gravity has been very hard on my boobies, ya'll.



And here is Jezebel Lincoln being spooky next to our beautiful little pumpkin from the patch.  I also bought a gigantor pumpkin from the grocery store because I can't afford to blow all my Halloween doubloons at the pumpkin patch.

I have not been feeling so good this week.  I slept until 11:15 the other morning after getting up at 6:30 and getting Felix off to school and then going back to bed.  Yesterday I took Felix to the doctor to get his gnarly cough checked out, Thursday we're going to a concert (after two nights out in the last week!), and Friday I have to take Jezebel back to the vet for more shots (so she's going to hate me again!).  And then next week is Halloween.  Also my oven broke again last night mid pizza baking and ruined my life.  I want to rent a cabin in the woods all by myself for a week where I can hide out and sew and draw pictures and take naps and baths.

Day of the Dead Bag for my Sister

I left a box of HB with my youngest sister, Alyssa, this summer after the Festival in the Park, and she proved herself to be a professional part time HB saleslady.  I offered to pay her for her work, but she requested a custom bag and wallet (and I think I gave her some other stuff at the time as well)!  She came to visit in August and requested a bag made with some Day of the Dead fabric I have.  I didn't have very much of it, and it's mostly off white.  Off white doesn't do too well in cotton bag land.  It gets wicked dirty.  So I bought some black suede cloth at JoAnn's to use as a base for the bag.



I appliquéd some dead people on it, and it turned out pretty darn awesome.







Pardon the blurriness of this inside shot, but I am so dang proud of that inset zipper pocket.  This is the prettiest one I've ever made.  Truth:  I've only made a few.  The one on my laptop bag is super ugly.  I wouldn't have even made one, but those pockets were specifically requested.



I wasn't sure how the suede cloth would hold up to wallet making.  It's not supposed to be ironed, which sucks when you want shit to look cleanly made.  I am technically a known follower of rules.  I don't like dealing with the consequences, but in this case the consequences would be that I ruined an 8 inch square of fabric that I bought on sale.  It was a risk I was willing to take.  So I ironed it on a fairly low heat setting with a piece of regular cotton on top for protection.  I think it shrunk a smidge, but it worked out so well I ended up making a couple more of these babies immediately afterwards.



I love that surprise lady inside!  Subsequent wallets made with this stuff did not have the inside lady so my sister can still feel special.

Now I just need to find the right packaging to get this mailed out before she goes crazy and shows up demanding her bag.

Shop Update!

Hello everybody!

I made a bunch of new small and long wallets over the weekend.  Some of them are for sale at Curating the Cool in downtown Lafayette, but these guys have been listed in my etsy shop.

Long Wallets:


Small Wallets:


Plus more that didn't fit in the collage or were a few odd man out phone wallets.  Check them out, and don't forget that Hot Butter makes an excellent holiday gift (if you're one of those people who are already Christmas shopping- Hi Mom!).

I'll be back soon with pictures of some fun projects I've been working on for gifts!



Celebratory dranks time!  I bought this Shaq soda this weekend and haven't gotten around to trying it.  I'm thinking today is the day, yo.

October Updates

I had a doctor's appointment this morning that I had to leave for not long after Felix leaves to catch his bus, which meant I had to get up 30 minutes earlier than usual to shower.  I don't know how you grownups do this stuff.  I swear my shower took longer than usual due to fuzzy brain, and I didn't even shave my legs or anything!  Oh well.  I'm home, clean, and the day has just begun.

This weekend Felix and I went to the fall Horseshoe Market to load up on soap and salted caramel.  You know, important stuff.  My favorite Clean Getaway soap is Sassafras, for the record.  And my favorite salted caramel is ALL OF IT.  In my mouth, yo!

We went to Bella Frida in Louisville for first Friday.  They were having a Day of the Dad celebration (a little early!) with students with painted faces and fancy hair, a beautiful spice cake, and both henna and face painting artists.  Felix and I got some awesome henna tattoos!



Felix got a day of the dead Darth Vader, and I got an adorable owl.



Felix had to wear a short sleeve shirt today so everyone could "be jealous" of him!  Ha!

We went to Pet Smart to pick up some new cat food to hopefully cure Jezebel Lincoln of her puking disease, and Felix begged me to buy him a parakeet.  I did not, but he was so cute singing songs to the one he wanted about how he wanted to take it home.







I also got obsessed with making fancy lighters for friends.



Personal Fire Device #1: A gift for a friend with a picture of her own adorable kitty, Freya.
Personal Fire Device #2: A half birthday gift for my friend Charlie (who shares my birthday and is my twin brother from another mother from another year).  Yes, that is my face pretend eating a giant pile of the reefers.  I haven't shared much about it, but I worked for three years at a medical marijuana dispensary as a "wellness specialist," and this picture was from my last day of work.
Personal Fire Device #3:  Another ME lighter.  I'm riding a jackalope.  This one goes to my main man Chainsaw.
Personal Fire Device #4:  Bailey's bunny!  Another birthday present.

I'm pretty obsessed.  People can expect pimped out lighters with or without my face for upcoming gifts this year.  I'm sensing that there might be glitter involved!

Also, in HB news, Hot Butter is cruising around Denver in the Denver Fashion Truck.  Check it out!