Zine in Progress

So now I've only got one module left to focus on at uni I've finally been able to start putting my next zine together. It's been written since last year, only I've had no time to work on layout and illustrations etc, but it's finally all coming together! It's gonna be a long one, so I don't expect it will be finished any time within the next couple of weeks, taking into account other commitments. But I finally see the end in sight. It's all about my adventures in California last year, stories of places I went and people I met, with lots of gushy rambling about how much i love san francisco and bay area punk.
 Here's a sneak preview - a picture I drew that I think could work as the cover image! Woop woop. And below that is a photo of my zine making space. Will update once it's really, truly complete.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, the image you can see on my laptop screen is the video playing for my motivational song du jour: Azealia Banks' "212". I'm not sure if I like it because it's about oral sex and has queer themes, or just because it's catchy. Either way, it's stuck in my head and helping me work :)

 If you're interested in a feminist critique of this song, I found this an interesting read and you might too: feministmusicgeek.com

Birthday Haul

So it was my birthday on the 20th April and I haven't had lots of time to reflect on it since lots has happened in the few weeks between then and now. But, on reflection, it was a really good one. I try not to look forward to birthdays too much because I hate the anti-climax for things like birthdays, xmas, new years, etc. But this year I did fun stuff (went to see Robin Ince perform in Liverpool on my birthday and went to Leeds to celebrate with my family at the weekend, as it was also my older brother's birthday and he threw a party) and got some great presents. I wanna show them off....

I now have an abundance of good t shirts! I'm gonna need to throw out all of the ancient stuff in my drawers to make room for all of these snazzy little numbers:

  James know how much I love the Labyrinth <3









 Sweet collection of bikes on a shirt from Beth & Kim :)


















I love this t shirt! ---------------------->
Made by fellow zinester Tukru, it can be bought HERE. Okay, so I bought this one for myself, but I had £10 left from the shoe money I got from my brother and this t shirt seemed the perfect investment!
 

Genius gift from my mother- a top with Little Red Riding Hood kicking the Wolf in the 'nads! Perfect!





My brother gave me money to buy some new shoes. I am normally a boots or sneakers only kinda girl, but I thought seeing as it was gift money I would buy something a bit special that I wouldn't normally splash out on. I got these lovely Iron Fist flats which should be nice in summer.




Toxic and delicious, I got not one but two boxes of Lucky Charms from my other older brother


I got lots of lovely little presents from Culture Vulture, one of my favourite shops, from Ali, James' mum. I am particularly enamoured with this cool 40's image "sew and save" mug

 I got lots of other lovely things too, but I can't list them all here. Most particularly amazing, it has to be said, was the cake my mum had made for me by one of her friends, Cakey Bakey Art, who do cake making classes, using similar techniques to how my mum makes miniatures. The cake was a replica of me, and sooo much research and detail went into it, it blew my mind! It had some of my favourite cds and zines on it, lots of fabric, and sewing and zine making accessories, oreo cakesters and more! Check it out:

 

So amazing! I was so reluctant to eat it :-( But yeah, overall it was a happy April, and made me look cheerful, like this:


Can it be summer now, please?

Sad but True

Yesterday afternoon I found out that an old friend had died. I haven't seen Paul in years, and it doesn't quite feel real that he could be dead, just out there having fun like usual. To be fair, I didn't know him really well, but he was one of the friendliest most unassuming kindest guys I ever met. I've been sad about it ever since I found out, but a facebook page has been made for people to share all the amazing and hilarious stories and memories of him, and so I've found myself laughing a lot as well. Particularly amazing is the story of him deciding it was important to throw a crab at ice cube. I thought this was a massive joke, but it turns out he actually did it, with evidence! Below is crab in question, then a video of the crab being thrown at ice cube. It doesn't hit him, but 35 seconds in you see it fly past his head, missing him by inches. RIP Paul/Pineapple Paul/Scabby, everyone's really gonna miss you x

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaACf03s5W0&feature=autoplay&list=ULQMCbq1JgdpI&lf=mfu_in_order&playnext=1

Spring is FINALLY here!

This week has been pretty amazing so far. For the past month I've been genuinely stressed out with assignment deadlines and lots of other time and energy consuming stuff. I even had horrible chest pains for a week or so which was a bit worrying! I had to abandon any blog or zine plans I had in mind, and ban myself from sewing or making stuff. I will have to keep that up to an extent until I have done my next exam and essay too, but that's not as much of a worry as the last few deadlines (which included giving a presentation, which I suck at so far!).

But, I did it all AND managed to survive! And now it's the easter holidays for three weeks and I've finally managed to unwind and relax.

So many nice things happen when I'm not in a constant state of panic. I've been chalking on concrete, finished typing up my SF adventures for zine writing, had beff n kim round for a BBQ, learned to make delicious new salads, walked down to the river...

On Monday we had to go to Leeds for a brief appointment, so afterwards we made a nice day of it by going to Roots & Fruits - a cosy family run vegetarian cafe in the Grand Arcade. They had lots of good food, and could make anything vegan if you want. I'm not sure, but I think they had free coffee refills too, as the guy sat in the corner had his refilled by the lady about 6 times. The menu looked like a zine too, and the food didn't disappoint. It was so good! Although we were disappointed to see that Rio's, the club where we went to see Citizen Fish, Voodoo Glow Skulls and Random Hand in (I think) 2007/2008, has been closed down. The staff were so nice and friendly, and the venue was a good size :( Before leaving, we also visited the vintage shop and I browsed the old sewing patterns and shoes, and eyed up the vintage typewriters, telephones and hairdryers. We chatted a bit to the lady in the shop who was really nice, before realising we had about 15 minutes until our train, and running to catch it (we did, thank goodness or we would have had to catch the rush-hour one with all the suits)!

Yesterday I sat on the field on campus and made notes on Alice's Adventures in Wonderland for my next essay in the sunshine. In the evening, on a walk to the shop, we noticed that the sky was clear and we could see Venus and Jupiter very bright and close to eachother next to the moon. So when we got home James got out his telescope and we watched and identified stars (we noticed Mars too), and James saw what he thinks were two shooting stars, while we drank hot tea and ate chocolate cake. Lovely!

I've actually managed to do a few other things that aren't uni work recently, but I will write a new blog about those very soon! For now, here are a few pictures of the things that have made me happy over the past few days:

Chalk Love

growing excessive amounts of garlic!

Lovely cafes with zine-style menus and cloudy lemonade!

Winter update and WIWT

So, winter has been a pretty busy time. Xmas was different as James and I spent it alone in Chester this year. It was really awesome actually as we just got to chill out, drink and eat yummy food all day, whereas usually there's a lot of rushing around visiting loads of different people, as well as reminding my extended family I'm vegetarian and explaining why etc...

We went back to Hull for New Year's Eve instead, which was super fun. We went to see Counting Coins play at Lamp for the first time in too long, and got to see all of the beautiful familiar faces that we wanted, and a bunch more to boot. Got very drunk, and didn't vomit, both of which are rare delights :)

I got a lovely warm winter coat that I love. It's late 1940's military dress coat inspired, long, orange and swishy

And here's a WIWT photo (although it's not technically What I Wore Today as I took the pics and started this blog a couple of days ago, but got distracted):

My vintage foxmoor jumper and bicycle skirt (lovely blue chiffon printed with white bicycles - I wish I could find just the fabric to make other stuff with). Oh, and my warmest scarf, cuz it's BLOODY FREEZING!

Got some lovely xmas presents,

The tribe 8/blatz split vinyl from james, plus a ridiculous amount of eyeshadow and eyeliner, paintbrushes and a super cool t shirt (amazing boyfriend!!!! he just knows the perfect gifts!), the new Star Fucking Hipsters record from Beth and Kim, cake decorating stuff from my mum, cupcake mug and retro sweeties, Lush stuff, Kerouac novel, and diary from James' mum, plus lots of other things, many of which arent pictured, like chocolate, cookery book, amazon voucher etc. Great haul!
Ali also got me this little guy for xmas - a crocheted skull pincushion! Super cute gift! <3

More updates sooooon

- Kira

bike rides and high fives

Last week for us was the last week of summer. There was an unexpected heatwave for the entire week - unheard of in october, technocally autumn now. Where leaves had started to fall and shops had been selling warmer clothes for the next season, now people were going to the beach to bask in the sun, bikinis and shorts were back in demand. As for me and James, we had to go back to university yesterday, so we wanted to enjoy the weather and the free time while we could.

A bike ride was definitely in order. For a large portion of the year I was lending my bike to Beff & Kim so they could get to work etc while theirs was broken, and, while I didn't mind this whatsoever, it was sooo nice to have my bike back and start riding it properly again.


We set off with no real aim in mind. There's a lot of bike tracks around Chester, going into Wales, most of which we have not explored yet. We decided to head up a track which we had been up before, as we had only been so far as Blacon and wanted to see what was beyond that.
It was a glorious day, and the bike track wasn't too busy. The view was really nice, lots of trees and fields and nature-type stuff like that. We eyed up the trees and bushes full of brambles, apples and rosehips, planning to collect some on the way back for jam, or syrup, or crumble, or pie, or whatever we wanted.

We stopped at a bench for a break opposite a field full of cows. They all ignored us except for the closest one which kept staring at us, making me feel slightly unnerved.


We carried on for a few miles until I saw a nice winding downward path that led to a grassy area by a stream with a small wooden bridge. I decided we had to make a short detour, as it was the perfect spot for a break. It was super nice, the sun shone through the trees and I saw fish in the water.
After basking here for a while, it might have been a good idea to turn back and go home. But we decided to keep on going. It was a really fun ride, and when we heard an ice cream van in the distance, we decided it would be a good idea to find a town and get something cold to eat and drink. we cycled over a couple of nice bridges, one which went over the river Dee and had a train track directly next to it, which was cool. If we had turned left and followed the river along we would have ended up back in Chester. But we didn't. We kept going.Soon enough we got to Shotton, locked up and went for some food. But, alas, as soon as I tried to get some money out of the bank, I found out I was wayyy overdrawn. This always annoys me as I don't have an overdraft. I think if there is no money in my account, transactions shouldn't go through! Anyway, luckily James had a pound, so we rationed it and bought a 40p energy drink and 2 curly wurlys. Yum.

Anyway, the journey back was tougher than the first. I was over hot and over tired, so we took many more breaks, picking up lots of the fruit that we had spied on the way. We figured out when we got home that overall we had cycled approximately 13 miles, which is a lot for me, considering I haven't ridden my bike for more than half an hour at a time all year. It felt good. Two days later we went for another bike ride with Beth and Kim, going the same way, but only so far as the field of cows. I'm feeling eager to go and explore the other bike routes around here, I just hope that on my free days the weather stays good enough.

More bike rides and high fives

top shelf material

The other day I decided to rearrange my bookshelf. After putting all of my favourite books on the top shelf and gazing at them proudly for a while, I realised that we have too many books for our own good. I mean, we always want to have more books, but we need to cull the collection every now and again.That's one good-lookin' shelf!

But that is not all of it. I had a whole box in the corner full of books, as well as the stacks piled up around the shelf.

James sorting through the sea of literature. You can't even see in this picture the other 4 stacks of books we had already sorted through to give to charity or sell on amazon...

We decided together that we definitely needed a new way to store the excess books, as anything would be better than our previous setup. Unfortunately last week we had absolutely no money at all (I found my bank account overdrawn, by -£46, I hadn't even realised :/ ) as well as the fact that installing shelves on brackets on the walls would involve calling up our letting agency to ask the landlord if it's OK. YAWN! So we took the initiative and decided to make our own small shelves, out of an old cardboard box that we put cardboard shelves in and covered with paper mache newspaper.

Since we ran out of black spray paint before painting the insides, I couldn't get a picture of the completed thing. But, nonetheless, it looks good and I'm pretty proud that we made a fairly sturdy bookshelf completely free and easily! :D