End of an Era

Well, it's official. I'm the mother of a gigantic Kindergartener. No more pre-school for us. As we were leaving the girls who watch the kids after school started crying (they're high school seniors in the Child Development program). Then their teacher started crying. I had to high tail it out of there before I started crying. Sheesh!

I cannot believe this, but I might actually come out of this crazy month *thisclose* to on time. I have to give myself a tiny little pat on the back. I did regular custom orders, invoiced, contacted the first 150 people on the wait list, invoiced, packed and shipped 56 pairs of Peruvian longies, took and invoiced another 52 pre-orders for the next batch, bought a HOUSE and am almost going to finish on time. Almost. I just finished these little guys:




and have started on the very last pair of May customs, which Sandra has graciously told me could wait until June if I needed more time. They will be my very first pair of Crankypants making their way to Croatia, so I'm excited about them.

I did take an hour out of my day today to go check out an estate that is being auctioned off tomorrow night. We are in desperate need of a few pieces of furniture for the new house, so I thought I'd see if anything fit the bill. There was enough cool stuff that I registered and will be bidding tomorrow night, it should be exciting! I'll definitely post pictures of anything I might snag.

In another fun tidbit, Dom "the sticker guy" emailed me and said there is a possibility that we could get REAL scratch and sniff monster stickers made with one of your suggestions.

How. Cool.

Sticker Give Away Update

That wasn't very well thought out, lol!

If you find yourself in the first 10 commenters (not actual comments, but people commenting) please email me your shipping address at info[at]crankypantshome.com so I know where to send the little monster!

Crankypants Stickers, Ahoy!!!

I am super duper excited about these! I am a big fan of barter, so when Dom from Jump Shout Media emailed me about trading services I was psyched. I have wanted weather proof stickers forever and a day and he has been wanting Crankypants forever and a day, so it was a match made in monster heaven. And they're here!




They are about 4" tall and can stand up to being put on your favorite car, bike or Big Wheel. They are die cut, so the sticker is actually shaped like the monster. The white rectangle is just the paper it's sitting on. And the one in the background? 18" of monstery goodness that Dom threw in just for fun. He's so awesome.

Sooooo...anyone want a sticker? I'll send one to the first 10 people who leave a comment (do 10 people even read this thing?) telling me this- if Mr. Monster was a scratch and sniff, what would he smell like?

I also have a few reminders:

1. I have a couple of Jolly Roger sets going up on Hyena Cart today, one at 11:30, one at noon.




There is also a free lottery for some Cranky stickers going on over there if you are really serious about getting one.

2. Auctions for June custom spots start tomorrow at 10am.

3. Because of closing on the house, moving, traveling to CT and VT and Henry's very last day of preschool forever and ever all happening in the next two weeks or so, I am NOT taking any custom orders via email/lottery in the month of June. I am hoping that things go back to normal in July.

Like My Manicure?

I found another packet of Ice Blue Raspberry Lemonade and one Berry Blue in a drawer, so I thought I'd try my hand at darkening up those jolly Roger longies. And forgot to wear gloves.



I'm going to walk around saying "All the cool kids are doing it" for a while and see if I can't turn it into the next fashion craze. Hey, jelly shoes are back in style. Anything can happen...

Luke Skywalker Meets Scarlett Johanson...

This morning after the boys left for Henry's second-to-last-day of school I settled in for my customary 30 minutes of futzing around online before settling into my work day. My first stop is nearly always Bloglines, where I read all the update-y goodness of the morning. One of my favorite blogs is Go Fug Yourself, which feels like sitting at the mean girls' table in the high school of the stars. I followed a link from there to YouTube and slipped my headphones on to experience Scarlett Johanson's foray into the music world, hoping for a little giggle. It seemed like she was kind of shooting for somewhere in the neighborhood of Fiona Apple with a little dash of "Lucky" by one BSpears, but there was this bizarre sci-fi laser noise throughout that was truly puzzling. I thought maybe she was trying to add a dash of avant-garde or street cred to her single by using this totally random laser noise in an otherwise run of the mill pop song. It was only when I closed the window I was watching the video in that I realized that Henry had opened another window earlier and had been playing a Star Wars computer game. I didn't hear it before because the headphones were plugged in. I guess she's not that avant-garde after all...

I also forgot that Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator has been set aside for the moment and replaced by Stuart Little. I think we were all Roald Dahl-ed out and needed something with a different rhythm for a while. I also got the first Narnia book so we'll see how that goes. I came in the living room yesterday and he was reading East of Eden by John Steinbeck- uhhhhh...not quite ready for that one yet. It looks like we'll have to be a bit more careful about what reading material we leave lying around. Not that East of Eden is a "naughty" book, just slightly inappropriate for a 4 year old! I doubt that he understood most of what he was reading anyway, but there are a lot of things in there he WOULD understand on their face that I'm not ready for him to read yet-especially things regarding mother-son relationships!

Holy Stripes, Batman!

Last night I finished Beth's super stripey Black Rainbow Monsters. 13" of 2 row stripes left a lot of ends dangling in the breeze to deal with, but I love how they turned out. Stripes are one of my favorite things ever, so I couldn't resist snapping waaaay to many pictures of them this morning.







I had a lot of fun dying the strawberry Jolly Rogers I posted yesterday and had ONE lonely little pair of 12-18 month longies left over, so I decided to try a different color on them. I wanted a nice bright blue, so I gave them the ole Kool Aid treatment. I did it with some Kool Aid I had from quite a while back when my mom decided to try her hand at Kool Aid dying thinking that if they weren't solid enough I could just re-dye them to solidify things and make a nice, consistent blue. Unfortunately, it seems as though "Blue Raspberry Lemonade" wasn't a best seller because I can't find more anywhere! I am going to check around and see what I can come up with, but they might have to stay a more uneven, lighter blue than I'd hoped for. I also thought about doing a second dye of green, but I'm not sure if that would make them look cool or just kind of brownish gross.

Things and Stuff

Whew, what a long and great long weekend we had over here at Crankypants HQ! The weather was gorgeous and we took full advantage.

Saturday we had a long overdue yard sale. We aren't millionaires, but it was the perfect excuse for me to drag my knitting out onto the front lawn and sit and work in the sunshine all day. Kyle took Henry to play at a friend's house lest he decide all of the toys he hadn't played with in ages were now "his very most favorite" when he saw them spread out on the yard sale blanket. I even met a few people who are going to be my new neighbors when we move! One of the women down the block from the new house came by because she saw the sign, and when she found out where we were moving she started telling me how much we were going to love the new neighborhood. I guess there is another little boy on the block starting kindergarten at Henry's school next year, so I'm hoping we meet that family soon. She also said they have lots of block parties, the next one being Summer Solstice, and get this-the block has a Wednesday evening knit night. As if I wasn't excited enough to move before...

Yesterday we were up and hiking by 8am. Go us! The mountain laurels are blooming right now and I wanted to get out and see them before they went away. Growing up we had mountain laurel all over my yard, so they kind of remind me of home.







The only down side of the weekend was that Henry started having what we think are allergy triggered athsma attacks at night again. He woke up gasping for air on Saturday night and we were *thisclose* to going to the ER when he finally started responding to the medicine we gave him and calmed down enough to breathe well enough that we felt safe. I went and got some Zyrtec for him and that seemed to help, but he still slept with me the past couple of nights just in case while my poor, dear husband slept on the most uncomfortable couch on the planet. I'm going to call his ped today and see if he thinks we should get him an inhaler. Breathing stuff is so scary.

I finished Cristi's teddy bear longies and snapped a couple of quick pictures yesterday.

Back:



Front:

Also, I had an extra pair of 6-12 month jolly Roger longies from the Peru shipment so I decided to have a little fun and Kool Aid dye them. I think they came out great-a really deep, bright strawberry pink-almost red, but not quite. I paired them with a lap tee appliqued by Jess at Quilt Baby and the set will go up on the 29th at noon at my Hyena Cart shop.




I have gotten a bunch of emails about the extra pairs of longies I had posted about earlier. I do believe everything has been spoken for, but I'm waiting for a couple fo payments to come in so I'll re-post if anything falls through.

Nautical Star

I know these aren't the best Cranky pictures you've ever seen, but I know there are folks out there anxious to see them, so here are the nautical star Crankypants Jason designed for his little one.





He wanted a black bum and 3/4 black legs with a red/white nautical star and red/black stripes on the bottom 1/4 of the legs. I put the star slightly lower than center on the bum so that it didn't get covered up with a shirt, since it was a slightly smaller design than usual. That star was rough to chart, but I think it looks pretty dern cool. I hope Jason and family like it too!

6-12 Month Sock Monkey Longies

It looks like I also have a couple of extra pairs of 6-12 month Sock Monkey longies left over from this last shipment. If you are on the wait list and would like them, please shoot me an email.

The 18-24 month Jolly Roger longies are gone, but I still have a couple of 6-12 and 12-18 month pairs left.

Normally I would hold onto these until someone on the wait list pre-ordered them, but with closing coming up on the 6th of June I both can't afford it and don't want to move them so if there are no takers they'll be up on the Hyena Cart in the next few days.

I hope everyone is well!

Jolly Roger Longies

If you are already on the classics wait list and you are waiting for the Jolly Roger design, please send me an email at info@crankypantshome.com. I have a few left over from the last shipment and would like to find them good homes as soon as possible.

Orange You Glad I Didn't Say Banana...

Henry recently learned that knock knock joke.

Knock knock.
Who's there?
Banana.
Banana who?
Knock knock.
Who's there?
Banana.
Banana who?
Knock knock.
Who's there?
Banana.
Banana who?
Knock knock.
Who's there?
Orange.
Orange who?
Orange you glad I didn't say banana?

I'll leave it to you to imagine how long it takes a 4 year old to get through that thing...

But it is appropriate because I finally finished Joy's super Orangey Monster Longies!



I don't usually take pictures on "the amazingly ugly but amazingly comfy green velour chair" but I've somehow misplaced the nice white backdrop sheet. Sorry 'bout that.

Tonight is official Clean Out the Basement night, so wish me luck. If you don't hear from me for 3 days...send help.

My Little Genius Pt. 2

The graduates:





He takes Spanish once a week so they did a Spanish dance. How cute is his little friend Ella? My Memere and I used to do the very same dance in her kitchen and we called it "the Mexican hat dance". I'm not sure what the Spanish teacher called it, but it sounded much prettier...



Think he's excited about graduating???



I promised him that when we finished Charlie and the Chocolate Factory we could watch the movie, so that's wheat we're doing now. The original movie. I love Tim Burton and I love Johnny Depp, but that new adaptation was a hot mess. Augustus! No! Don't! Come Back! I love this part...

My Genius Child Pt.1

Henry has been knocking my socks off lately with some of the things that com out of his mouth. First of all, let me tell you that I have been woefully behind on keeping up with what we're reading. We finished James and the Giant Peach last week, moved on to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory which we finished last night, and are now a little ways into The Twits. If you are wondering why we are so completely stuck on Roald Dahl it is because we've been reading out of my own collection since I didn't expect to be on chapter books quite yet and I am a huge Roald Dahl fan. He seems to like them, too, so we've stuck with it. Since Henry gets out of school for the summer next week I predict much more time spent at the library and a better selection of reading material. Now onto his burgeoning genius...

We were watching AFV the other night and they were on a world tour. When they came back from a commercial the host guy was standing under the Eiffel Tower. Before he even got one word out, Henry yelled "Hey mom! They're in Paris!". Ummm...wha? I asked him how he knew that and all he said was "I just do". The only thing I can think of is Ratatouille, which we saw in the theater months and months ago. Last week we were in a store and, replying to his request for a bigger kid toy, I told him "Maybe when you're older". "I am older", he replied. "You're older than your own self?", I asked. He looked me in the eye and said "No mom, that's silly. But my brain is much older than the rest of me". Truer words have never been spoken...

At 3:30 he is graduating from pre-school. It sounds silly, I know, but it is pretty much the cutest things on the planet. He walked as an "undergrad" in the ceremony last year and was dubbed "Most Likely to be a World Traveler". Remember that?

*sniff sniff* He's getting so big!

Sock Monsters

Mommy, You're SO Booooring...

That is what Henry would say were he one of my faithful blog readers. And he'd be right. I have been so consumed with the business end of Crankypants and house buying that I've been absolutely no fun to be around. I'll make it up to you, I promise.

I put the next order in to Peru this afternoon, so pre-orders are closed. When I get word that the box is en route to the good ole US of A, I'll take the next batch so the gears are always turning. For inquiring minds who want to know, I'll be speaking to Mr. Peru about adding pink into the mix and also adding 2 more designs to the "classic" list for Fall. I can't pinky swear that it will actually happen, and I'll only follow through with it if it won't hurt the flow of the regular wait list, but I wanted to tell you I'm working on it.

For being so horrifyingly boring the past bit, I will be showing you all of my favorite bits and pieces that haven't made it into places of honor in this house, but will definitely be getting the love they deserve in the new house. And I'll be doing a fun little give away sometime next week, too, so keep the eyeballs peeled.

Prepare Yourself...

...for some serious cute-ness.

My friend Susannah was kind enough to let me borrow her amazingly beautiful little red head, Gabe to take some action shots of the new fair trade Crankys from Peru. There are a million bajillion, but here are some of my favorites:












And speaking of these bad boys, the wait list/pre-order thing is driving me batty. Seriously. I am having trouble keeping it all straight, it is kicking my heiny. If you have responded to my email and asked for an invoice to be on the pre-order list as of now-5:28PM EST on Friday- and you haven't gotten the invoice by bedtime, email me! If you were on the wait list on the blog and never got the pre-order email- email me! I appreciate all of your help and patience with my crazy habitrail "system". Y'all rock.

I also went a little overboard taking pictures of Skye's Monster princess Skirty, which will be in the mail tomorrow morning:








My customs list is going to have to bear with me this month. Things are going' but they are a goin' slow. At this point I am thinking I will NOT be taking any random customs on the first of June. I can't handle it. I'll do the regular auctions, but we'll be waist deep in moving boxes and Henry will be out of school by then-plus we'll be getting ready to spend 10 days in New England. I don't want to get even further behind, that's not fair. Something has to give, and with closing and whatnot, I can't afford to drop the auctions, sorry guys!

Okay. Back to the needles...

Wait List/ Pre-Order, Etc..

Holy cow, this wait list is proving to be a force to be reckoned with!

At this point, if your name was posted on the wait list blog, you should have gotten an email from me regarding the wait list and/or pre-ordering. Or both. If you are on the blog list and didn't get an email, please let me know! It has been so long that emails are bouncing back, have changed, I can't find some folks, etc. I pruned the list of everyone I've contacted so far (I think, lol).

I've been at the computer for 3 hours this morning, so I need to take a break and get some knitting done. I'll be back for a second round of wait list stuff this afternoon.

Thanks for everyone's continued patience!

Customs!

With all this talk of Classic Crankys and houses and Kindergarten where are all the May customs? Well, I have to admit that in all the excitement of the beginning of the month I have fallen pretty hopelessly behind. But with the customs I have finished, it kind of seems like a jungle around here!

Mr. Hippo:



Mr. Lion:



I've never done a lion before so I was a little nervous, as I always am while working out something new, but I really love how it came out. I think the colors are perfect for this little Panthera leo.

These will ship tomorrow and I'm hoping to start invoicing for the first batch of Classic Crankys and open the next 100 or so on the wait list for pre-orders either tomorrow or Thursday. I am supposed to touch base with my "Peru guy" Thursday, so I hope to know more about turnaround time then.

Tomorrow will be another busy one. I'm hoping to meet a local customer and her wee beastie for a little photo shoot with the Peruvian Crankys sometime in the morning depending on weather and the mood of my little Crankymodel. I have to clean the house, which has fallen into some serious disarray, so that my land lord can come in and photograph it to put on the market to rent. I need to get a sitter for Henry on Saturday after his soccer game so that we can start going through the boxes and boxes and boxes in the basement Clean Sweep style. I need to wrap up the first wave of wait list orders, get invoices out and get them ready to ship. I have to get the bum done on Skye's Princess Monster Skirty at LEAST. I have to do a repair on the knees of another pair of well loved Crankys and get them back in the mail.

Whew!