Thrashing and Agile crafting

Am totally thrashing on crafting now. I've got intense urges to draw (with reasonable results), perhaps in feverish anticipation of the Inkling I plan to buy the second they go on sale. I've also got a half-skinned Zergling plush to finish, a Frankenturret plush to rev, a Frankenturret model to do final touches on, a Settlers of Catan quilt to limp along with, and a Halloween costume to plan. ... So instead I've found myself playing Mass Effect the last couple nights to chill. And any time I do pick up a craft, all I can think of is the other things I should be working on (or worse yet the nigglings of new ideas).

Despite this, I have been making minor progress. The weekends have been clobbered recently with socializing (parents in town! friends hanging out!) which leaves me only the evenings to squeeze in an hour or two of something (given how often Adam and I eat out and how much time that takes up... who would have guessed hanging out with your S.O. would consume so much time!)

I dislike the concept of Agile software development as I've actually encountered it so far. I think the ideas are nice and reasonable enough, but the way it has evolved at work is very displeasing... But! Let that not sully the entire Agile idea. I feel my recent (ongoing & diverse) Portal 2 projects sort of embody some of the basic ideas... Recently I was under the impression I could make a cute Frankenturret plushie that met the following requirements :

low complexity

machine sewable

durable

no non-snuggable parts

cute

small-ish

These are all things I'm bad at and need practice with. Which means it shouldn't be surprising that the first results look like shit:

The scale is too small to be reasonably machine sewable... I've no experience with fleece (though I must say it is awesome!) and I've stared too long at frankenturret details to easily abbreviate it. So much failure... But the point is iteration! I can't just expect it to be perfect on the first go. I've got to rev my designs, put forward due diligence to get each rev as close to the "done" state as possible, but not obsessively dwell or grind to a halt if it doesn't turn out the way I like it. Try again! Am giving up on the machine sewable portion rule (at least for the head) but hope to hold onto my other goals. If anyone has any ideas, I'd be very open to them!! The 'less is more' design concept for 'cute' is a struggle I seem never to be able to win.

At least I have my stalwart Catan quilt to stand by. It lives on the empty stereo box now and is mainly Duck's perch in the den. I'm down to 5 tiles to edge and then it's playable!!


The darkening days has it's pros to counter the obvious cons. The season of coding approaches. I'm excited to be getting back to the Tichu project soon. Coding while the sun is up is ridiculous... but now it's well into dark by the time I get home... which means my time will have yet another contender. Along those lines, I was at work until 10-something tonight. Working on a KnockoutJS demo for our project as it shifts into the wondrous realm of JavaScript. Holy poop- Knockout is flipping awesome. Seriously! I've no doubt I'll be doing the Tichu client with it.