i'm so gonna be the 4th dixie chick

so back in the day, when i was newly split from the old lady's dad and living out on my own, i was a huge country music fan.  of course, as is often the case with singletons (and moony-eyed teenagers, same thing right), this was influenced by a super cute guy i had a major crush on.  heh.

this was right around the same time that the dixie chicks were hitting their stride and becoming major players in the country music world.  i loved them, had their CDs playing on continuous loop in my car, what have you.  and later on, while the hub and i were dating, we got to see them live during their last three major tours.  they put on a really fun show, and i was a huge fan.

i was super excited when they announced that they were going out on tour again for the first time in, like, a decade.  as luck would have it, the show in the l.a. area is in october at one of my most favorite venues ever - the hollywood bowl.  i snagged two tickets and now i'm patiently waiting for october to get here (which it will, in no time at all).

of course, i follow the band and all 3 members on twitter.  natalie often posts funny tweets, and i've actually gotten replies from her a couple of times on comments i tweet to her.  it's always stupidly exciting when a celeb tweets you back...super lame, i know.  but still, i always think it's pretty awesome.  social media at its best, yeah?

one day while perusing my timeline, i saw this tweet from emily:

it's amazing how some people just can't let shit go, even a decade later.  i'm sure she was referring to the comment natalie made years ago while on tour, something about being ashamed that george bush was from texas (the band's home state).  you might remember the crazy backlash the band faced back then, with death threats and flag-waving former fans making bonfires with their CDs and all sorts of insanity.  anyway, i replied to emily's tweet with this:

and then i got distracted with something shiny and turned off my phone for awhile.  when i went back and looked at my twitter feed again, i was super stoked to see this:

mind you, i was all atwitter (heheheh) just at the retweet.  i brushed off the comment, not really thinking much of it...until the next day, when i saw this:

a second later, i noticed that i had a direct message.  i clicked on it and...

after trading a few more messages (plus a couple of emails), the end result is that when the hollywood bowl show gets a little closer their PR team is going to contact me to figure something out in the way of getting me backstage to meet the band.  !!!!!!!!!  they aren't technically planning any meet-and-greets during this tour, but apparently they're going to work something out for me.

eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!  october can't get here soon enough!

twitterazzi

last week, the teen and i were lucky enough to be part of the audience for the first screening of a documentary called #140characters.  my friend jen, who i met at matt logelin's book signing at cordially invited, is one of the producers of this film.  she's been super excited about finally getting to share something she's been involved in for a couple of years.  and i was pretty stoked when she invited me to come as "press" - because after all, i blog it all, right?

#140characters tells the story of four very different individuals whose lives have been touched by their use of twitter.  one found love, another an aspiring actress who landed a gig in one of justin bieber's music videos, the third owns and operates the grilled cheese truck, and the fourth story was that of heather spohr, friend of my friend nanette, a super popular blogger who started a charitable organization in her daughter's honor.  i was also curious as to whether or not i'd be able to spot myself - jen had put a call out months ago asking for a quick video to be used somewhere in the film, and we all know how much i love to see me onscreen.

the film was being shown in the screening room of the autry national center of the american west (say that five times fast).

right as i was snapping this:

i heard a "hey, what are you doing here?"  and when i looked up there was matt, sitting there with a big ol' grin.  ha!  i should've known he was going to be there.  and then since he's good friends with the spohr family, we had the great fortune to sit with them during the screening.  heather and mike are both really nice, and without sounding like a super duper freaky stalkerazzi cha cha cha, i feel like we would totally be BFFs if only we lived closer together.  but heather and i are totally facebook friends now, so that's the next best thing, right?  whee!

the teen and i totally smirked over the statue in front of the entrance.  she really wanted to hop into that saddle and pose like her sister.

at the check-in desk:

and i got my extra special press pass.

then we were escorted VIP-style to our reserved seats.

a couple of the producers got up to introduce themselves and the film.

although she was slightly less than excited about it when we got there, the teen found herself totally entertained through the duration.  the documentary was really only about a half hour long, but the stories presented were really interesting.  and despite the fact that we're both familiar with the spohr family's backstory, we cried through heather's segment anyway.  when it was over, the principals got up for a quick Q&A session.

before we all left, i got the teen to take these:

i also managed to talk to heather and mike a little and let them know that i'd love to help them with friends of maddie, the charity they started to help families with babies in the NICU.  maybe i can do something to help from way out here in my neck o'the woods.

oh, and by the way - i sure did spot my mug at the very end of the film.  i brought a copy on DVD home just for shits and giggles, too.  and not only did i appear in the credits, but i found one of my friends there too!

ah, it's fun to be an attention whore.

wanna see something hilarious?

i submitted my twitter funny to that damnyouautocorrect site, and look:

i still crack up every time i think about it.  awesome.

to give or not to give? that is the question.

oh mah gah, i almost didn't get to blog today.  stupid time warner and their out-of-the-blue internet outages.  bah.

so anyway...i bet you've been saying to yourself, "i wonder if wan's ever going to get back behind that sewing machine again.  and when she does, what on earth will she MAKE??"

no?  not even a little?  because i'm about to answer that question for you, and i'm thinking you've been on the edge of your seat waiting for it.

well, fine.  i'm still going to share it, because i don't really have anything else to talk about right now.

the hub has had a couple of co-workers spring forth from their loins, and lucky for me, both of the newborns are girls.  i've been waiting for the chance to make something cute and tiny and fun, and even though he gave me "the look" when i mentioned sewing a gift rather than buying one, i forged ahead.  heh.

i found some cute lightweight printed corduroy on sale at joann's, which was just begging to be made into a sweet little dress.  using this tutorial, i tackled my first-ever attempt at using piping, which kind of failed pretty miserably.  obviously, i was far too confident in my sewing skillz than was warranted.

from far away, the dress isn't that bad.  i'd envisioned gifting this with a long-sleeved onesie, a pair of tights, and maybe a matching blanket.  pffft.  and i was too embarrassed (or far too vain to show you proof of exactly how badly i botched this one) to do any close-up shots to show you how truly awful it really is.  let's just say that the bean's baby doll just got lucky.

i decided to head in a different direction and headed over to my friend rae's blog, for her "itty bitty baby dress" tutorial.  i've been successful with her patterns in the past, and i knew i could count on her for an easy-to-follow project.  but i'm just a glutton for punishment.  while i was 95% pleased with the end result, my lack of piping skills (apparently, i just suck at piping whether it's sewing or baking) left me questioning whether or not i could actually give this as a gift.

you can't see from here, but the ends of the piping didn't quite meet properly and now i have a weird little section on the side that i have to figure out.  maybe i'll cover it with a bow or a button or something. random, but maybe it'll work.

and see those little matching shoes next to the dress?  i used this tutorial to make them, and while they aren't perfect either, they're not bad.

i decided to give rae's dress another shot, this time just skipping the piping altogether.  and i was VERY pleased with how it turned out this time.  a little less exciting, with no cute little decorative touches, but at least it's actually good enough to present to a new mom.

and even the inside of the dress is pretty - i used some pink bias tape to cover the seams where the bodice (with white lining, thankyouverymuch) meets the skirt, used pinking shears on the sides of the bodice, and went the french seam route for the sides of the skirt.  no ugly ragged edges on this dress!

and because i effed up in cutting the pieces out of the main fabric, i didn't have enough to make the blanket i wanted to do.  so instead, i'm giving those little shoes another shot and am halfway through the first one.  it already looks better than the other pair.  i'm going to stick with the onesie and tights idea, though, and maybe make a blanket in a different pattern (in similar colors).  think that'll make a good present?

oh!  totally off-topic, but so fun - i tweeted a link to my yo gabba gabba live recap last night.  and my timing was perfect, it seemed, because the folks at YGG actually read the post and tweeted me back - not even just once, but three times!

that pretty much made my night.

oh, and while i'm on the subject of twitter, i gotta tell this story, too.  so the hub's off on a one-nighter to vegas with some guys at work.  i thought i'd hit him up to bring me home some macarons from one of the fabby places on the strip that i haven't seen (since i haven't been there in three years).  using my iPhone, i posted a tweet that was supposed to say "where should i send the hub to pick up some macarons for me in vegas?"

except that the stupid ass autocorrect decided to kick in right as i hit "tweet" - changing my "macarons" to...

LAXATIVES.

i almost deleted the tweet, but was laughing too damn hard.  and i thought it would be awful to deprive my friends of the huge belly laugh i was indulging in.  so i just followed up with an explanation:  "OMFG, autocorrect changed "macarons" to LAXATIVES?"

and then i couldn't stop cackling.  i was seriously laughing so hard, tears were rolling down my face and i was giggling and snorting and i thought i was going to pee my pants.

huh.  maybe it's not as funny now.  but trust - i'm still cracking up over it.  dang.