Hello Kitty Beanie

Greetings everyone

With much advice and coaxing, I have placed my first pattern up on Etsy for sale. I created my very own Hello Kitty Beanie that was designed for my size head (about 22inches) but the pattern is written in a way where you can tailor it just like my other beanie patterns.

A big thing about these patterns is that I am writing them for the Easy and Beginner level. Yes you can create many beautiful things with the basic of stitches. You don't have to be a pro at this or be a writer for a major magazine. These patterns are meant anyone of any age to get into crocheting.

For those interesting in purchasing this pattern, you can find it at http://www.etsy.com/listing/57078825/womens-hello-kitty-beanie-crochet

Pattern is now FREE on this site

I would put up a picture of the person the hat was created for but she's camera shy. Oh well :')

Have a great day and keep creating out there!

AWRPG 2

Roleplaying has been a very big part of my gaming life. As mentioned in previous postings, I have been in this since 9th grade starting with my first Dungeons and Dragons group. That same love of the RP world transferred over into my online experience. Shoot even before DnD, I hosted Rp events in chatrooms (yey ImaginNation....) and people loved it. Roleplaying hits its highest enjoyment for me when you can get your friends and even strangers to play along.

With that in mind, I want to introduce you a place dear to me  because it involved a very special community of roleplayers.  Go into the virtual world systems of Activeworlds (www.activeworlds.com) and you will find a universe unlike any other. Think of a theme and its there. Let's focus our attention to a world named AWRPG (Active Worlds Role Playing Game).

AWRPG started in March of 2003 by Poseidon. He created a roleplaying world where the users were able to play in a fantasy setting involving wars with the Gods and several cities. What made this place so addictive was the interaction between developers and players. There were quests to do, puzzles to solve, drama to be had, and there was jobs to fill. What place out there could a little player grow to become a key leader of a entire city filled with players?   At times the NPCs would be controlled by the devs talking, interacting with the players on a nonlinear scale. This made things unpredictable and very addictive. When was the last time a banker in World of Warcraft held a realtime conversation with you? What about a God answering your prayer?   It happened here in AWRPG.

Recently the creators of AWRPG allowed the citizens and players of activeworlds to experience for the first time in YEARS a behind the scenes look at the AW universe's oldest RPG. We took a tour in the test world of AWRPG 2, a test world that is invisible on the main grid.  Poseidon gave a personal tour to some of the major projects in store for the next game upgrade and left many of us speechless. With cityscape overhauls, new particle effects and added realism with the latest AW 5.1 physics patch, it truely left the fans wanting more.

City of Orda and a beautifully crafted Bridge

The City of Orda has been a constant problem for many years with players. With many attempts to reduce lag it became choatic in layout and very haphazard on framerate. With the new update in store most players on the tour were breathing a sigh of relief for the fact ...they can move!  The City of Order has ....Order!  Streets that flow and made sense. Beautiful views of the city's harbor which has been its pride for many years. The working bridge is artistically done with well oiled gears. Its no longer the blocky, almost hidden, eyesore of its previous editions.

The Great Palace nested high on the hill.

Although a work in progress, The layout is soothing with not as many hard lines.

Although Orda has its needed help. Another city strikes as home for this person. I am currently (until Pos or Allen smites me) the City Leader of the City of Neua. Neua is the city of Love and Enlightenment. It was meant as a place of nature but in its more recent incarnations had taken on a stoney feel where the trees and even its once proud ponds seemed closed in. My character for many years, in game, roleplayed her nausea being enclosed in tight spaces.  With the new update to the city, nature has been restored. Thanks to the builder named Digigurl, the city returns to its natural roots with sweeping waterfalls, sparking waters and a feeling of peace as if in a monestary.  Even in its mountain home, you feel you are in the elven community from Tolkien's Lord of the Rings. Even though AWRPG has no elves, I've always felt the Neuans acted very much like the high elves from peoples roleplaying games. They forgive the troubled, always quested for new forms of enlightenment and were the first to live life with a free spirit and open heart.   Thankfully now, thier city reflects it.

As you enter Neua you are greeted with this grand view

Gorgeous sparking waterfalls add to the serenity

I can see many people fishing here in peace

Although Kao'a (city of chaos) and Xi'a (city of mystery and magic) were not on the tour, I expect good changes there as well.

Last part of the tour took us to an underground quest area that will be in the new update. I was glad this was included in the tour because we saw the fluffy good places in AWRPG but we havent seen the brutality of it. Here we saw that not everything in there is nice.  New lava particle effects made the place feel hot. Ashes hung in the air. If it were real, you would be choking and seeing the same demise as the skeletons in the area. Allen Iverson is doing a fantastic job bringing the dungeon areas to life.

A picture cannot capture the intensity of the moving lava spray

Overall the tour was a really nice glimpse into whats to come. There is no set date on the release of the update since all that you are seeing here is done by volunteer builders within Activeworlds. Thats the beauty of AW!  People helping each other to create some very impressive creations in a virtual platform that is over 10 years old..... more I think. Alot of time and effort goes into each project and those involved could tell you that its the people you are working with that make the difference.


If you wish to join in the fun of Activeworlds, please visit this link http://www.activeworlds.com/   For less than 7 dollars a month you can be visiting not only AWRPG but over 800 virtual worlds in the AW universe. If you don't have the money, no problem!  As a tourist you can still visit many AW sponsored worlds. Some of them you can even build your own little place to play.

Come have fun with us! My citizen name is Tattiana in AW too!

Geek and Gamer Girls Song

Hail to the Gamer Girls!!    We need to give some big  Kudos to Seth Green and Stan Lee for this.

Check out this link over at break.com. 4 minutes of sheer hotness to Team Unicorn!

http://www.break.com/break-originals/other-funny-stuff/geek-and-gamer-girls-anthem?ref=nf

Dragon*Con 2010

Things started off crazy since I needed to graduate my students out before I could go anywhere. They all passed with flying colors which not only had me excited for such a high class average but it meant I could leave town ontime. Flying was no trouble. Landing in Atlanta was nuts.



I can't remember the last time I took a subwaylike system. Jared told me to take Marta which I thought was the train that went between concourses.....oh no... it was the public sub trans system that will shoot you into the heart of Atlanta. Wasn't bad but still had my stomach in knots trying toget where I was going.

Only there 10 minutes and already attacked by Deadpool fans!

Once I made it to my destination that is where the fun began. DragonCon is like the biggest multiblock party that lasts for 4 days. You are bumping elbows with Klingons, superhero characters, steampunk creations and everything in between. Its not just for the geeks....its for EVERYONE and oh man there are some really hot men and women cosplaying out there (cosplay- costume of your fav characters). What is even more funny is the fact you could be walking alongside a celebrity at any moment. Next year I know of a few celebrities that may wear their attire from their shows just to see if people think they are a good rendition of that character :')



I was supposed to be assigned to Marc Singer (Beastmaster, V the series, etc...) but the man moves at such a high speed that giving him a person to help handle business would only slow him down. He is amazing to watch because he is very people friendly and is willing to go out and shake everyone's hands if you let him. Since he didn't need help, I was assigned to Summer Glau as a line manager..... trust me she needed it. She is known as River on Firefly and as the cute terminator on the Sarah Conner Chronicles. That girl is sooo sweet. She let the line continue even after closing just to get a chance to meet and sign for more fans. Meant long days for us handlers but still it was worth it!

Summer Glau and our friend G.

Line duty? Easy some think but when you are working in a convention setting where there is thousands and thousands of people with about 300 of those people wanting to be in line for Summer.... well.... its nuts. My job was to keep them all on the marked off taped areas (so we know which guest's line they were in) and I was taking their orders ahead of time to save the handler sitting next to her some time. It was almost a mantra to be telling these people "30 for an autograph, 10 to take a picture with her using a personal camera......" At least 3 times I was asked how much to take Summer home in which I replied, "You need to negotiate that with the man up there with the tattoos, that's her boyfriend." I tried to make the whole ordeal fun since they were all in for a long wait. We joked, laughed and talked about where they were from, what costumes they were wearing and so forth. When I had people trying to take unauthorized pictures I would get in the way and then have to make the people delete what was on the camera.... I got tired of this so the next crazy thing i did was I told these people that I hated to get mean (which I did) but the big man behind me (Kane who plays Jason in Friday the 13th movies) has a machete and isnt afraid to assist. On one of these times he heard me he thwapped the machete hard on the table in front of him. Was frickin hilarious to see a full row jump. He and his buddy were looking at the table to see if they dented it....thankfully the machete he had used still had the plastic safety edge on it LOL



I still did a lot of running when not doing line duty. Would say that working the con saves you money but it didn't. When Bobbi and I had a chance to break away for awhile, I spent over 300 dollars in stuff to bring back for friends and family. OH well. Did get a chance to look over at the pictures of Eddie McClintock's table when he was on break. He stars as Pete on Warehouse 13 but I didn't know before the convention that he was an artist. His bold line work and comical pictures were really good! When I had a chance to speak with him later during a slow period he was telling me how his wife encouraged him to set up a website for his artwork. I need to look at the website later to see whats there at http://www.eddiemcclintock.com/ He is a really nice guy to shoot the breeze with.

Obama Jedi and Bubba Fett

Two people that were also very enjoyable to talk to were Daniel Harris and Shawnee Smith. Both girls worked on various horror flicks like Saw, Friday the 13th and so forth. Looking at them they look like they should be carded for cigarettes but omg they were 33 and 41....that blew my mind! Shawnee was telling me about her 3 kids and her significant other Braiden who has a company called Miles of Chocolate. Dang it I missed out on the divine chocolate he was passing out! I was picking on him later about it but we went off on a tangent about the Amazon Kindle instead :')

Beautifully done!

One person to watch out for when it comes to the actors we were working with.... Kane Hodder. That guy (who played Jason ) is a prankster.... someone gave that man a bottle of Con funk! Con funk is that awful smell of a person who smells like they ran a marathon and hasn't bathed in weeks. I never understood why you don't SHOWER before coming to meet some of your favorite stars. Someone out there found a way to bottle this funk as a practical joke and Kane got a hold of this stuff. At the time I was having a nice conversation with Kevin (Erin Gray's son) about audiobooks when he smells it first. We were looking around trying to figure out who reeks when we see a grinning Kane from 2 tables away. He shows us the bottle, then casually walks out to the middle of the room where the fans walk. He descretly sprays a whiff then walks back to the table to chat lightly with his friends. Poor Poor steampunk group that happened to walk thru the fallout area, they started choking and holding their nose looking around for the foul being. Kane and the rest of us are laughing til that fallout crowd (damn the circulating A/C) started making the smell head our way. I warned Bobbi and her friend,who where sitting with Edward James Olmos, about the impending doom.

Sorry Guys, I didn't get their numbers

We did have some hotel troubles while out there but overall the whole DragonCon experience was great this time around. My Velma costume was a hit and had to stop about 20 times for pictures. I saw some great inspiration for a steampunk costume for next year.



Definetly worth doing it again

Me as Velma

Back in Town!

Hi Everyone!

I will be posting soon what all was going on this weekend at Dragon*Con 2010! I have a new idea for a new hat pattern but it will remain a surprise til its done and given to its next victim.....uh.... I mean.... friend!! yes friend! Hee hee

Stay tuned and I will have Con coverage and photos to share.