Still hanging in there

Posted on June 7, 2022
by Beth Lynn

Hey everyone – I’m not sure how many folks are keeping up with the blog anymore, but I’m still here, still trying to dredge up the energy to write new content.

It’s been a rough few months, to say the least.

I figure I may as well update everyone on what’s been going on. Not much of it is really crafty or nerdy, but at least it’s a post, right? I’ll start out with the rough news, then share the good stuff.

The rough stuff

This has been a very rough year for me. I haven’t talked about it all much on the blog, aside from Rana’s death, but depression and grief have been a constant fog over my life since the beginning of the year. And it sucks.

Saying goodbye to Steve

A black and white cat sitting on a set of stairs, looking out a window.

My buddy, Steve, enjoying the view in one of the last pictures I took of him.

I’m sure long-time followers of the blog remember my cat Steve. After Rana’s death, he and his sister Hannah came to live with me, and while everything felt unbearably terrible after Rana died, having Steve and Hannah here helped me cope. Steve especially helped me feel better – he stuck with me just like he always had when I wasn’t doing well, and his presence had the same calming effect as always.

Sadly, Steve passed away from an unexpected illness at the beginning of May, and his passing really hit me hard. Aside from the two years between me moving out of Rana’s and Rana’s passing, Steve had been by my side since early 2014. He was the best cat anyone could have asked for. I miss him fiercely, and the past month has been rough without him.

Farewell to the Fanthropy running clubs

In other sad news, it turns out that the Fanthropy running clubs are shutting down, due to legal nonsense involving Warner Brothers and the Potterhead Running Club. This hits me hard too, because doing the virtual races with the Whovian Running Club have helped me out as I’ve been processing Rana’s passing. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to find a virtual running group that’s as wonderful as the folks from Fanthropy Running. At least they’re still planning on releasing all this year’s medals, so I can still finish out the season’s races for the WRC. I’ve earned quite a few medals this year so far, and may sign up for a few more virtual events from the Fandom/Whovian Running Club back catalogs to earn later on before things wrap up there.

Virtual running event medals from left to right: Fandom Running Club Keep Your Feet 5k, a Lord of the Rings themed race; Roar Your Light 5k, a Doctor Who themed race; Nearly Full 9k, another Doctor Who themed race; and the K9 9K, yet another Doctor Who themed race.

The Fandom/Whovian Running Club medals I’ve earned so far this year!

I’ve got the Kissing Book 10K and the Everything is 5K virtual events lined up, as well as the last three Whovian Running Club events. If you want to sign up for any of the Fanthropy Running Club virtual races, you can check out the back catalog of all available medals, or view the following collections of 2022 events:

The good stuff

While there’s been a lot of rough things happening last year, there’s also been a fair amount of good. And the good things have definitely helped keep me going recently.

The new house

Close-up photograph of a blue house with tan trim in the Folk Victorian style.

The new house!

First off, I just bought a new house with my dear friends Peter and Heather! It’s a lovely, giant, old Victorian house built in 1908 with enough rooms for me to have a proper office again – which you might have seen a little peek of if you follow the blog on Facebook. I’ve been working on turning the closet in my office into a small recording booth for work, which has been a good and much needed distraction. I’m trying not to immediately throw myself back into podcasting once the studio gets set up, even though I will someday have a podcast that lasts for more than two episodes. (I need to start writing blog posts more regularly first before I decide to throw myself into something else that requires sticking to a schedule…)

Anya moving in

I haven’t really talked much about Anya, the tiny cat J and Kasi and I adopted in August of 2020. (Mostly because I haven’t really done much talking in general on the blog over the past two years, but that’s my fault.) To make a long story very short, a stray kitten found her way under my co-worker’s house nearly two years ago, and when I asked my co-worker to send me a picture of the kitten so I could see it (I’m a sucker for cats, and was curious to see the wee kitty), I instantly fell in love.

A tiny kitten with black and white markings coming out of a box.

How could you not fall in love with that tiny kitten?

J and Kasi and I decided to take the little kitten in, and I came up with the name Anya (after the Buffy the Vampire Slayer character of the same name) as a bit of an homage to Rana’s old cat Buffy, who had run away earlier in 2020 and was also a black and white kitty.

Anya’s an anxious girl, and with all the changes going on in everyone’s lives over the past few months, poor Anya was not doing well at J and Kasi’s. So, we all came to the decision that Anya should come live here, since it’s much quieter here and would hopefully be a calmer place. The only other cats here are my moderately-cranky Hannah and Peggy, Peter and Heather’s 15-year-old sassy orange tabby lady, and so far things are going well with the three kitties. (Granted, that’s mostly because Hannah’s limited to exploring my room and the attic so she doesn’t start fights with the other cats. She’s a territorial old lady.) So far Anya’s been doing pretty well, given her anxiety.

A young cat with black and white markings, laying on her side on the floor and looking at the camera.

She’s not quite as tiny as she used to be, but she’s still small for an almost 2-year-old kitty.

I’ve been reading to her a little bit each night to help her calm down and get used to everyone. She especially seemed to like it when I read The Slow Regard of Silent Things by Pat Rothfuss to her – which worked out well, because that’s an extremely soothing book to read, whether it’s to myself or out loud. I’m glad little Anya is here – and I think she’s glad to be here, too.

Gen Con Online

The best four days in gaming – and I don’t even have to leave the house!

Another good thing coming up is Gen Con Online. My pandemic-induced anxiety is still bonkers, so I don’t think going to Gen Con in person this year is doable for a number of reasons, but there’s still Gen Con Online – and I am looking forward to that. It’ll be something for me to focus on for the blog that I can do from the relative comfort of home. (I say relative comfort because the attic – where my home office is – gets insanely hot during the summer. Then again, it’s not really Gen Con unless you’re stuck dealing with the heat at some point, right?)

Also, to be completely honest, I think it’ll be a little easier to go to Gen Con Online than it would be to go to Gen Con in person – I haven’t been to a convention without Rana since 2014, and I’m not sure I’m ready to go to Gen Con without her yet.

I’ll post more about Gen Con Online when the online event catalog is released on July 10th.

Doing better in general

I’m also finally starting to come out of the grief fog that’s blanketed my life since the beginning of the year. I don’t want to jinx things, but I’m feeling a bit more energetic lately, and have actually started crafting again. Granted, my first project was hemming curtains while watching Thor: Ragnarok and Guardians of the Galaxy, but even though it wasn’t exciting, it was something. And that’s what counts.

I’m hoping to get back to posting more regularly. I have a list of topics to write about, and now I just need to figure out a posting schedule for myself that I can stick to for a little bit. I might even change up the site’s branding a little, to freshen things up a bit. I’m certainly not letting The Crafty Nerd drift off into retirement, though. This blog has been a huge part of my life for the past nine years, and while it’s been quiet since the beginning of the pandemic, I finally feel like I’m at a point where I can start writing again.

Thanks for sticking with me, everyone – not just through this long post, but through the long quiet spell. I appreciate it beyond words. 🧡

It’s a cat picture kind of week.

Posted on March 2, 2019
by Beth Lynn

I totally had all these grand plans to finally put together the Toothless shawl I’ve been working on for… well, I can’t remember how long now, and write up a post about it. But then I ended up having to present at a conference, and I’m still trying to kick this stupid cold I’ve been fighting for three weeks now, and every night this week I’ve come home with absolutely no energy.

So, instead of an actual post with substance, I bring you Steve, helping me make an English paper piecing quilt out of tiny hexagons.

“oh hey, this is a new craft, how can I involve myself in it?” -Steve

Thanks for bearing with me as I’ve been dealing with a complete lack of energy – it’s much appreciated. I promise I’ll have something more substantial for next week.

The Crafty Nerd tries a crochet-a-long

Posted on January 16, 2018
by Beth Lynn

Did you folks know I’ve never, ever done a crochet-a-long before? Ever?

Well, that changed at the beginning of January – and I’m having a lot of fun with it. For those curious, I’m taking part in the Woodland Blanket Crochet-a-Long, led by Lucy of Attic24. Kasi suggested we do the crochet-a-long together, and so we bought the yarn in December and waited.

This bag of yarn taunted me for weeks.

And on January 5th, the Woodland Blanket crochet-a-long started! And I did a first for me – I made a gauge swatch before jumping headlong into a blanket.

And it was exactly the size it needed to be!

I was ridiculously excited that the gauge swatch turned out exactly as it should – and I jumped right in after that, and crocheted until my wrist hurt. It’s been a while since I crocheted anything, what with my recent obsession with sock making, hah, and my wrist was out of practice.

Steve’s been really enjoying me crocheting, too. A warm human, sitting still for hours while making a thing to snuggle under? Count him in.

I think he’s already claimed the blanket as his own.

And I’ll admit, instead of writing blog posts, I’ve been crocheting furiously and hanging out around the Facebook group for the crochet-a-long. There are so many pretty blankets being showed off there, and I love seeing all the different ways people are working with the colors and following their own path through the crochet-a-long. It’s almost addicting, working on the blanket and looking at others’ blankets as they’re in progress. The pattern for this blanket has a nice rhythm to it, and the colors we’ve all been working with the past few weeks are delightfully warm and have really brightened up the recent string of snow days I’ve had.

The best thing to do on a snow day: crochet and drink chai.

I’ll post about the blanket again closer to when it’s finished, so I don’t end up overwhelming everyone with blanket posts like I’ve been doing on Instagram. It’s been a great project to unwind with when I get home from work. Especially on days like today, when I had one of the least pleasant commutes home ever – I’m so tempted to hibernate until all the snow melts. Driving in snow is scary. Crocheting is not.

Game Review: Pairs (or: What to do while waiting for GenCon housing access)

Posted on January 25, 2015
by Beth Lynn

Well, I found myself with some unexpected time on my hands today, and I’ve been intending to review this game for a bit, so….

Pairs: The Review

I’ve had this game on a shelf since September, waiting for the chance to get to play it. I discovered the Kickstarter for Pairs through Patrick Rothfuss’ blog, sometime last spring, and eagerly backed the project and snagged three decks as a result. (I mean, come on, Pat could put his name on anything and I’d be likely to back it.) There were many decks available to choose from, and I picked three with artwork from Pat Rothfuss’ Kingkiller Chronicles series, as I do love those books and was curious to see Shane Tyree and Nate Taylor’s artistic interpretation of the characters I’ve enjoyed reading about. Once the decks finally got delivered, I opened them all up, looked at the beautiful artwork, and then set them in my “let’s play this later” pile on my bookshelf.

There are even more games, but they don’t quite fit on the bookshelf…

Fast forward to today – the day housing access opens up on Gen Con’s website! I eagerly awaited the coming of 12:00 pm, to see how long of a wait I’d have to get to the housing portal…

WHAT

So, Ross and I figured this would be a good time to pick up Pairs and play. Based on what I’d heard about it from the Kickstarter page, and what I’d read in the rules when I’d first opened the games, it seemed pretty simple – points were earned by getting a pair of cards, and the person with the highest score lost. So, going off of that, we figured we’d shuffle the cards (which turned into an ordeal, due to the fact that neither of us can properly shuffle a deck of cards without turning it into a game of 52 Pick-Up) and start a game! I read off the rules while Ross and I took turns slowly shuffling the deck – and the rules ended up being a little less straightforward than we initially thought…

It took Ross and I a little while to put the rules in terms we could wrap our brains around…

Gameplay, for Ross and I, went as follows: Whoever dealt took five cards from the deck and put them face-down to start the discard deck, as the rules suggested, and then the dealer passed out a card to each of us – whoever had the lowest card went first. Then, we’d take turns drawing cards, hoping neither of us would end up with a pair – especially a high scoring pair. (The deck is a pyramid deck – there’s one 1, two 2s, three 3s, and so on, making your chances of getting a high numbered card pretty large.) When one of us ended up with a pair, that ended the round – we’d set aside a card from that pair to keep score, and the rest went into the discard pile. We repeated that until one of us hit 31 points, the suggested “losing” score number that the rules gave us.

A round in progress…

It was actually pretty fun – and once we figured out what we were doing, we enjoyed it. I think we ended up playing three games – I lost twice, Ross lost once. It didn’t help too much that Ross kept commenting on the artwork on the cards – it hinted at what cards he had, haha. The artwork for the Commonwealth Deck (the one we played with), done by Shane Tyree, is absolutely gorgeous. While I wish the art focused on specific characters in the Kingkiller Chronicles, the game is mentioned to be played in the universe of the stories – and characters from the story seeing themselves on a card, well, that’d be rather odd.

Steve enjoyed the game, too. He thought it was tasty.

Overall, it was a pretty fun game, and a good way to kill time. I think it might have been even more fun with more people playing, but for Ross and I, it was pretty good too. I might even bring this along with me if I’m going out to eat with a group of people, as a fun way of keeping everyone entertained while waiting for food. If you want to learn more, visit the Pairs page on Cheapass Games’ website!

Well, killed some more time…

And it meant a half-hour’s worth of time not spent looking at the computer, anxiously waiting our turn for housing. (At the time of this writing, I’ve got fourteen and a half minutes left – I hope hope hope there’s still room in the JW Marriott or even the Hampton Inn…)