Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Being sick sux, but Spongebob makes it better!

Well, I've been sick since yesterday with who-knows-what. Fever, sore throat, and now cough... meh, hopefully it will pass soon...

But! My awesome friend Niv went and got me a Spongebob thermometer!!!

It even plays music when it's done taking your temperature!!!

I <3 you, Niv!! ^.^

Finally... more about the Javinale wedding

Now that I'm finally moved and mostly settled in my new place, I have time to write a little more about Javinale's wedding ^.^  It was really really awesome, with the ceremony being a mix of Indian and Christian traditions (although admittedly there were many more of the Indian segments).  So it was definitely exciting, since I'd only seen Indian weddings in Bollywood movies before :-P Amazingly enough, the real thing was pretty much as ornate and crowded as the movie ones!

The night before the actual wedding, they held a dinner reception with a talent show, which was lots of fun. I played the violin for their talent show, and even though I thought I really did poorly, given that I hadn't actually practiced the violin for about a year, everyone apparently was very pleased, so that was good ^.^

I also got henna art done on my hands. That was super-exciting because it's the first time I've had it done by a real henna artist (rather than just random friends playing around with henna).



The reception after the wedding itself was also lots of fun, with speeches by family members, videos/slideshows made by family, and then at the very end, open dance floor.

I had a great time, and hopefully I'll be able to find some more pictures from this to post!

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Javinale Dreamcatcher

August has been a really busy month for me, and it's barely even started yet! In the midst of moving from my one dorm to another, I also went to the wedding of my friends Javier and Finale.  I was trying to make them this dreamcatcher for their wedding present, but didn't finish in time.  Luckily, they're coming up to Boston for another get-together celebration with all us MIT peoples, so I finished it for that ^.^

It's an interesting and symbolic (in my head at least) variation on a dreamcatcher that I came up with, although I'm sure other people probably have done it too, I just have never seen it myself until I made one. It's two overlapping dreamcatchers woven simultaneously. In addition to the obvious parallel to Javinale's lives now being intertwined, it also forms a Venn Diagram, symbolizing that their two distinct lives now have an overlapping component representing their relationship with each other, but at the same time still maintain their distinctness, representing their unique personalities and interests. Or maybe I'm just a nerd... That's okay, they're nerds too.

So without further ado, pictures!

The entire dreamcatcher:


Closeup of the green and blue medallions (instead of feathers because I was having trouble finding ones that I was sure were synthetic, also, they're circular, that seems to be a theme...):



And a closeup of the web:


The webbing was made from LionBrand Suede Yarn (I don't have the exact color names anymore, I threw away the wrapper). The frames are actually a pair of bamboo purse handles that I ordered a long time ago and didn't end up using (for that Geisha swap purse, in fact). The medallions and beads were all from the bead section of the Pearl Art in Central Square.

Now I get to go back to packing my room up for moving.... X.X