#i made a little swatch for my first time doing it and it ended up waay better than any of my regular crochet projects

[tumbler-dot-com-user]

tunisian crochet fucks so hard this is so much fun

[superblysubpar]

modern!husband!steve harrington x wife!you

2,603 words

warnings: so like, technically, you don't have to read "We'll Call It Love" , my modern steve series, BUT you're missing soooooo much that got these two idiots here, so I really encourage you to do so. This scene is so so so much more fun if you know all that led up to it, I promise. anyways: | alcohol mentions, slight descriptions of use by reader | smut (public - you get caught *kind of* / fingering / piv unprotected intercourse - creampie / wife,mom,breeding, all the kinks from one Mr. Harrington) - 18+ as always

a blurb for the "Trick or Treat, Freak?" event - don't forget to vote for tomorrow at the bottom of the fic!

A/N: I just wanted to say again, thanks for loving We'll Call It Love so much. I actually got to go see the band COIN last night, the music that inspired the fic, the screenplay, and just...wow. I don't have other words for it. Idk, feeling very sappy for all of you today and this story that means so much to me. Thanks for being here, it was fun to revisit these two 💛 and *now* I'm done with them.

Probably.

The day hadn’t been without its issues, but he’d expect nothing less, when it comes to the two of you.

First, there was Eddie’s girlfriend showing up in fake blood, late, covered in swatches of dark and gory fake gashes and goo all down her arms as she frantically rushed past him and shouted something about busy season and don’t worry, his bride was gonna look beautiful and not in a tragically haunting poetic way but in a romantic sunset kissed glowing kind of way.

Which, you did.

But then, there was an issue with the cake, which, wasn’t supposed to be a cake, but a bunch of peach pies. Robin and Nancy were whispering loud enough to bring him into the kitchen, both of their mouths snapped shut as Steve blinked at the largest solitary pie he’d ever seen. It was massive, comically so, and Robin was waving her hands at him, it’s going be fine spilling out of her lips that had just been freshly glossed for photos. Nancy was on the phone with a bakery and then Eddie was stumbling through the door shouting about canceling the order. He smiled at Steve and told him that you started crying which made him frown and start towards the direction Eddie had just come from, but his groomsman and your best man stopped him, assured him that then you started laughing, that you said your parents would have loved it.

Which, ultimately led to issue number three.

Robin had approached him slowly, fixing his tie, before she whispered that they couldn’t find you, but that there was a note, with his name on it. He had grabbed it with trembling fingers, only to find it didn’t say anything like sorry or I can’t do this, but a quote:

“I’ll have what she’s having.”

He rushed past Robin, shouted about being right back.

Steve found you on a balcony, which took a little bit of work, asking the front desk if anyone booked a room under Buttercup, or Allie, Kate, and ultimately Sally Albright. Then they wouldn’t give him the room number till he confirmed his name was Harry Albright, not Harry Burns. His breath caught in his chest when you turned to look at him, chin quivering and a quiet greeting for him before you started crying. It all ended alright, after you talked about your parents and him and all of it and he kissed you and made a joke about wedding curses. If seeing you in your dress before the ceremony already happened, where was the harm in a sunset balcony quickie?

You didn’t go for it that time, only grabbed his hand and pulled him out of the room with you, asking if he was ready to get married.

Which he really fucking was.

The floor to ceiling windows overlooking the skyline had been good in theory, letting in the beautiful, breathtaking sunset as you said your vows. But they also let in the warmth, the room an oven, leading you to laughing during the ceremony and swiping at his temple with your handkerchief and Eddie fanning Robin while she officiated. And cried.

There was so much crying.

But it was perfect.

You were perfect.

“Sir?”

Steve blinked away from where he was watching you take pictures in the vintage photobooth, you, Robin, Nancy, and Eddie’s girlfriend were all crammed in, sitting on each other’s laps, to the attendant in front of him.

Perfect, but distracting.

“So sorry, what did you ask?”

The venue employee smiled, like he knew the look on Steve’s face well, and then he shook his head. “Nothing to apologize for, sir. I was just letting you know that all the gifts are put away and locked in the car downstairs as instructed by your wife. Anything else I can do for you?”

His wife.

Steve looked over at you again, sighing as you tilted your head back in a laugh at the images in Robin’s hand.

He smiled at the man in front of him and shook his hand, “No, thank you.”

You felt him before you saw him, or rather, smelt him.

Your body spun to find the source of the salty and fried scent to see Steve holding a container of fresh french fries and a smile and eyes that seemed to be perfectly made, and only for you.

“Hey Mrs. Harrington,” he kissed your cheek, lips lingered against your skin as he asked, “Hungry?”

“Starving,” you groaned, your body crumpled against his as you exchanged your glass of champagne for the fries you knew would end up being a great late night snack offered. Warmth filled your stomach at the sound of your new last name, like a lovesick idiot you swore you’d never be.

Steve lifted a fry to your mouth, eyes a deep burnt amber in the low reception lighting as he watched your lips part and steal the fry from between his fingers, his tongue with a mind of it’s own, swiping out over his bottom lip as yours brushed the pad of his thumb.

You snorted.

“You’re so easy, Harrington.”

Steve lifted the fries away from you, eyes glinting as you pouted and reached for them half-heartedly, content to just lean against his body instead as he joked, “Hey. We’re married. You have to be nice to me now.”

Warm breath hit his jaw as you huffed, “Well, if I knew that was the rule, I never would have said I do a few hours ago.”

A kiss was pressed to his neck despite your words, right against his two freckles, then a smile ghosted against his skin when you heard the low rumble in his chest.

Steve’s lips brushed your ear as he bent down, speaking softly, lowly, and sending the warmth between your stomach directly between your legs.

“Don’t start something you can’t handle, honey.”

Your head lifted, stares at one another challenging and hopelessly and sickeningly in love to anyone who was watching.

“Oh,” you laughed, quietly, leaned in to whisper against his lips, “I think I can handle you just fine, Mr. Harrington.”

He had you in the bathroom not even a minute later, one hand locking the door behind him and the other pressing over your mouth as you giggled.

Steve’s mouth was all over your neck as his hands found your hips, guiding you to the counter.

“You’re so beautiful,” words warm and sticky and sweet against your skin as your head fell back against his shoulder in a gasp when his lips found a new spot behind your ear. “Can’t believe I’m married to you. Can’t believe you said yes. Can’t believe you’re all-“

His hand smacked at your ass as he grabbed a fistful of it, scrunching up the fabric of your dress you could care less about now as he growled in your ear the word, “Mine.”

“Steve,” you hated how breathless you sounded, hated how he’d barely touched or kissed you and you were wrecked already, “Hurry.”

He whined into the crook of your neck, spun you and let his nose trace along the straps of your dress, across the lace covering your chest as his mouth followed, leaving a trail of goosebumps in their wake.

Steve knelt, regretfully removing his lips from your skin so he could carefully lift your dress, handing it to you with a quiet, “Hold this, honey.”

He pressed a kiss to your check as you did what you were told, but then he got a proper look at you and your lip was captured between your teeth at his groan, from the way his hands ran through his hair.

“Fuck,” he sighed, as his finger trailed up your thigh and found custom, cream colored straps and shiny buckles and pretty lace you’d ordered just for him. “Look at you.”

“You like it?” The question answered by Steve’s own lip bitten raw, his fingers still roaming higher, up the sides of your cunt, already soaked.

“Baby,” Steve laughed, eyes cast down between your bodies, watching carefully as his fingers slipped beneath the wet lace. “Do I like it? I love it.”

“That’s,” your head fell back, exposing your neck his mouth was grateful for. Distracted by the way he dragged his fingers through you, swirled around your clit, the same way his tongue was against your throat. “Go-good.”

Steve pressed against your clit harder, humming against your skin where his mouth was still latched to when your body shook underneath him. Your thighs clamped around his hand, yours clutched at his shoulders with fistfuls of your dress still between your fingers.

He removed his fingers from you, quick to make work of his buckle and pants, aligning himself with you but hesitating just as his tip brushed against your entrance.

Steve looked up at you, under his lashes that cast shadows against pink cheeks dotted with freckles. He gazed at you with the kind of look that you imagined you gave a sunset. Admiring, awed, like you were taking in its beauty the first time every time. Like you knew your time with it might be fleeting, so you had to watch it every second so you didn't miss a single second of it.

He leaned in and let his lips brush over yours tenderly, deciding to take his time and forget the frantic pace you both had started with.

He murmured into your lips as they parted in a sigh beneath his kiss.

“I love you. So much. I think I’ve loved you since I saw you in that bar, I texted Robin about soul mates before I talked to you, I-“

You caught his top lip between yours, an over too quick kiss, but then you were speaking into the corner of his mouth, against his jaw.

“I love you too.”

Steve’s forehead knocked yours, your hips wiggled, making his dick twitch as you stared into each other’s eyes.

“Ready, Mrs. Harrington?”

The tip of your nose brushed his as your laugh bubbled out of you, voice all sarcastic and fond, “Ready? I’ve been ready, Steve. You’re the one taking his tim-ohmygod.”

Steve’s smug smirk twitched in front of you as he thrust into you while fake grumbling, “Me? How about you miss I’m gonna wait over a year to say I love-fuckyoufeelsogood…”

He rolled his hips, only getting deeper, and your thighs tightened on the outside of his, head thrown back against the mirror from the feeling of him inside you, which he followed. His lips skated over your cheek, your jaw, as he slowly pulled out of you and thrust back in.

Your mouth fell open with each drag against your walls that cling to him, that want him to stay there. A noise catches in the back of your throat every time he pushes into you, each time only harder and deeper as he babbled.

“Sorry, I wanted,” he grunted, mouth finding yours only to kiss you once and keep talking, “The first time I have sex with my wife to last, to linger, to-“

Your mouth captured his in a kiss this time, tugging on his bottom lip and gasping into his open mouth when he thrust faster, shallower, your name a begged breath between the two of you.

“Sorry, I didn’t want to wait anymore,” you whimpered, your dress left your fingers so you could grip the back of his head, card your fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck and tug, “To finally have sex with my husband.”

Steve moaned at the word husband, twitching inside of you, which made you grin at the way his hips stuttered, at the way his bottom lip pulled between his teeth.

“Yeah?” You gripped at the back of his head a little harder, knowing what each other liked now. He frantically pushed under the fallen dress to find your clit again with ease, trying to get the upper hand once more as you asked, “You like me calling you my husband, Steve?”

Your mouth brushed the apple of his cheek, it kissed his temple as he fell forward, thrusting faster and making quick figure eights against your nerves, gasping at your teasing.

“Wanna tell everyone I’m your wife? Tell ‘em I’m a Harrington?” Your stomach clenched at the thought too, at the pace which Steve slammed into you even harder, hips meeting in a filthy grind as your head knocked against the mirror. The thumps mingling with the sound of how you were coating him, all a little louder in the bathroom and only making you both a little more turned on.

His forehead pressed to yours as he nodded, lips of parted mouths catching every time he thrust. He moaned, he begged, “Yeah, yeah. Wanna tell them. Wanna…want…pregnant. Mine.”

Your back arched, hand searching until it found his, lacing your fingers together. His others grew sloppy against your clit, slipping over it as you nodded. Chest aching from his admission, from the way you sort of wanted it too, how it didn’t scare you as much anymore, not when it was him.

“Yeah?”

“Ye-yeah, fuck, honey, I can’t-“ Steve kissed you. Passionate and breath stealing as he held your lips to his like he’d wanted to all day. Your clasped hands hit the counter, the click of your rings together made you whine into his lips when they parted. You let him go, his name loud in the bathroom, echoing against tile and sure to be heard even on the moon as his hips stuttered when you clenched around him. Your stomach burned and your eyes blinked rapidly, sure you weren’t on the planet anymore from the amount of stars you could see as his warmth spilled into you.

It takes a second for you both to come back down to earth, for Steve to laugh, for you to press your hands to your cheeks as you looked down at the mess you’d made of yourselves.

Steve kissed at sweat kissed skin, tenderly cleaning you up as you joked with each other, sleepy eyelids and content smiles. Slow kisses that left you both sighing in between lingering touches that weren’t out of necessity, but just because you wanted to be touching.

Completely in love.

He helped you off of the counter and winced at the way your dress fell down all crinkled and obviously mussed. You shrugged before running a hand though his hair, messing it up even more than you already had, then you untied his tie and let it hang from around his neck saying something about it only being fair.

He grabbed your hand, fingers curled into yours as he kissed your knuckles and led you out of the bathroom.

Robin was the first to slow clap.

Your nose pressed to his shoulder, a groaned god dammit on your lips against his suit jacket.

Then Rocketman was blasted on the speakers, a loud “Annnnnnnd Buckley owes me one hundred dollars!” comes from Eddie at the bar, earning a smack to his chest from his girlfriend, which was nice, until she said “I get fifty of that and you know it.”

And it’s all fine, Steve doesn’t really care, because most of the guests are gone and you’re laughing and heading over to grab pie, flicking Eddie’s ear as you went.

Robin slid up next to Steve, shaking her head. “Wow. I really had faith in you Harrington. A bathroom? On your wedding night? I know you two are animals, but you couldn’t wait to have your wife in, oh, I don’t know, a private bedroom?”

Steve only smiled at the way Nancy handed you a water as you caught peach filling from your lip, while you played with the little ‘S’ dangling between your collarbones with your left hand, the large blue sapphire stone sparkling next to glittering diamonds in the light.

His wife.

For those of you who don't know, Leather and Lace was an Eddie series I started when I first started writing for the fandom. I only posted two chapters, and I just fell out of writing it. It was something I was holding close to me, and I wanted to really tell it right. I've been poking at it a lot lately, and the story has changed so much, and I'd love to share it again soon. But for now, have a little blurb from it tomorrow, and I'd really love to hear what you think. This Eddie is a childhood best friend, an enemy, a stranger, and hopefully, one day, a lover. Okay, anyways, happy voting!

*voting will close at 10am CST tomorrow, 10/3

[strwbnnie]

‎✧ lovesick!chifuyu x hyperfem!bimbo reader : A jealous, pining Chifuyu finally gets the courage to approach you after watching you fraternize with Mitsuya ♡

black fem reader, chubby bimbo reader, reader is a fashion girlie! not really mentioned but chifu studies literature, semi-public sex (I think), kinda whiny reader, kind of a shift at the end. lovesick!chifuyu, reader is a maneater not a mean girl! (jk) Mitsuya & Takemichi make an appearance! There’s like one b*ji spoiler, standing doggy, slight choking, pussy eating, unprotected sex (wrap before you tap), excuse any mistakes, MDNI

author’s note: for my bby @prtttycocobuttvr 🫶🏾chile this has been in the drafts for idk how long 🥲 extra long for literally no reason, the bulk of it isn’t even the smut…the ending is so abrupt 😭 but I really needed this out my drafts

wc: 3.7k

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Every now and then Chifuyu thinks back to the day the two of you met.

He fucking hated you at first, he’s ashamed to admit. Was it really hate though? Could’ve been annoyance, jealousy maybe? A lil bit of both is what he’ll chalk it up to. It was love at first sight for him, meanwhile you never gave a second glance in his direction.

He started seeing you more as the weeks passed, the two of you had no classes together, but he still saw you around far too often. You smelled just like marshmallows or vanilla, something sweet that demanded his attention every single fucking time you strutted past him. 

It became a routine—class, cafe and lastly the library where he’d find you doing anything but reading. 

Once a quiet safe haven for him to relax with a good book, now overtaken by the clicks and clacks of you touching up your makeup, or the rustle of a potato chip bag while you sit there with your pink Hello Kitty headphones watching some Netflix drama, even the constant sucking and the jumbling of ice as you slurp down every drop of your boba coffee while waiting for your newest minion to finish your homework.

That day was supposed to be no different. You and one of your minions were heading to that same table, around the same time you always arrived. You looked so damn good too. You always did. 

He was obsessed with your new hair color, black girl blonde is what he learned it’s called. Ash blonde with dark chocolate roots and it’s just so damn pretty he’s losing his fucking mind. Your face is fresh and bare, no makeup aside from a dark blackish-brown lip liner and gloss. Lashes full and fluffy, you must’ve gotten them filled over the weekend.

His eyes are trailing your every move, waiting for the glimpse of your backside that never came.

“Hiiiii Mitsu & friends!” You leaned down to drape yourself over the lavender’s shoulders. Chifuyu tries to keep his cool, brows furrowed and eyes almost as wide as saucers as he watched this strange display. 

And friends? How fucking pathetic is that. Granted, he didn’t know your name either, often referring to you as “that pretty girl” when he spoke about you to Baji’s grave but fuck, that made him feel like shit. 

It’s the first time he’s heard that cute voice of yours and it’s when you’re greeting Takashi fucking Mitsuya?? You guys seem well acquainted and it burns Chifuyu up inside, when the fuck did you two get all buddy-buddy? And what the fuck did Mitsuya have that he didn’t? 

He wonders who initiated the first contact, wouldn’t be surprised if it was Mitsuya, he’d always had the confidence a loser like him lacked. He was also very good with women, unlike Chifuyu. Then again, you seem very bubbly and outgoing so it very well could’ve been you who approached him.

“Here are those fabric swatches I was telling you about. If you decide to use any just let me know! I have tons of rolls and I can bring you some yards.” You hand him a couple of squares of fabric. At least ten 4x4 squares that you took the time to cut and string on a little o-ring like paint swatches. So cute. 

“Thank you, y/n!” He smiles. “I’ll surely let you know.”

Just like that, you’re heading over to your table, minion hot on your heels. 

It’s a quick exchange, and it should’ve been harmless, but boy does it boil his blood. God, did you speak to everyone but him?!

“Y/N,” Damn, he learned your name, heard your voice and watched you diss him all in one sitting. It was insane. “You know her?”

“Yeah, we’ve only spoken a few times but she’s super friendly. She’s an exchange student from the states, a fashion major too, we have classes together.” Mitsuya spoke as he sketched out a few designs for a project. 

“This would make a nice jacket.” He shows Takemichi the blush pink corduroy square for him to feel. “Maybe pants too if she has enough. It’d look nice on Koko, he’s my model.” “It would! It’s nice and soft, like velvet! Koko’s super pretty too, it’ll look great.”

He steals glances at you every now and then. 

“Just talk to her dude, she’s literally so sweet.”

He doesn’t raise his head, still sketching away, but it’s clear who his words are directed to. Mitsuya has known him for quite some time, of course he knew how to read his pragmatic friend. 

“Yeah! Unless you’re scared.” 

He cuts his eyes at the crybaby blonde. Of course he wasn’t scared, just a bit apprehensive is all. 

He looks your way one last time.

Your back is to him and you have your MacBook open in front of you watching a recap of celebrity metgala looks. You’re enamored by your fashion content, even taking notes in your cute notebook with your adorable pom-pom pen. You’re too oblivious—too much of an airhead in your own dumb little world to notice that simp eye fucking you. 

Dude’s practically drooling while staring at your tits. It’s disgusting, enraging even. It boiled his blood, so much that he’s scooting his chair back to approach the both of you. Takemichi and Mitsuya watched him with careful eyes, since he didn’t say a word before he made his move. Fuck it, his pride was already shot and he didn’t have shit else to lose. 

You didn’t even notice him at first, both airpods in, now staring into your hello kitty shaped compact mirror while reapplying that sticky beauty supply lipgloss all over your plump pout. 

Before he could even stop himself he’s snatching up your homework sheet, scanning his eyes over this chump’s work. Wrong. Wrong. Most were either fucking wrong or incomplete! Complete bullshit and he was gonna let you turn that in?!? 

“Get the fuck outta here.” He’s speaks so calmly, it’s all the more sinister. 

The four-eyed geek is snatching up his bag and calculator so damn fast you’d think Chifuyu had a gun to his head. 

It pissed him off so bad! But why did it piss him off so bad? 

Probably because you’ve approached everyone but him as if he’s not one of the smartest people on this fucking campus. Probably fucked them all too, so why were you being so damn stingy with him? And why the hell was he so worried about it?

Chifuyu motions to sit down next to you, thighs spread with his hands clasped between them. He run’s his sweaty palms along his pants every now and then, trying to build the courage to speak to you. 

You give your lips one last smack, capping your lipgloss and shutting your compact. “Hey, you’re Mitsu’s friend! Do you know where…nevermind. I don’t even remember his name.”

“He said he had something to do, I don’t know. Doesn’t matter.”

“Oh okay. What’s up?” You finally give him your undivided attention, dropping your stuff into your little designer baguette bag, turning in your chair until you’re facing him. You’re almost instantly entranced by those striking eyes, iris’ the color of sea glass. The dark locks of his undercut styled messy and wild. He’s cute. Real cute. 

“I like you.” Chifuyu has never been one to beat around the bush, even though his heart was nearly beating out of his chest right about now.

“You don’t know me to like me, so if you wanna fuck me, just say that.”

You say it like it’s nothing. Must be used to it by now, constant fetishizing instead of genuine attraction. But the way he’d been pining over you was much deeper than someone who just wanted a quick fuck. You plagued his mind—his thoughts, all you.

He runs his tongue over his lips, not in a creepy way, but because he’s nervous and they’re dry. Either way you still notice it, it’s kinda hot honestly. 

 “I do. I mean I would, but I don’t want to-I don’t have to,” He’s stumbling all over his words and it’s fucking embarrassing. Word vomit, is what Mitsuya calls it, it starts and there’s no telling when it stops. 

“Regardless, I wanna know you–I think you’re so pretty, I like your style, the way you dress and stuff. And I’ll do your homework, if you want. Or I can actually show you how to do it, cus’ if you turn this garbage in you’re sure to fail.” Chifuyu tosses out. He barely wanted to do his own, so why the fuck was he offering to do yours? Was he that desperate for your attention? 

You’re twirling your hair around your finger, head tilted. You’d never had one of them offer to teach you, just always offering to do it just to be in your space. 

“Hmmm..so you wanna be my tutor. I guess, but what’s in it for me?”

The blackette could feel his eye start to twitch, there’s no way you were serious. “I’m doing your homework and tutoring you for free, what the fuck else do you want from me?” He scoffs. 

Greedy bitch. 

“Boy please, I can have any of these other guys doing my homework. You obviously want something from me and I just wanna know what you’ll offer me in return.” 

“I don’t want anything from you, I’just want you.”

You stare at him and he stares back, that adorable face of his morphed into a slight pout. He holds eye contact the entire time, it’s almost intimidating, but his aura is so light and genuine. 

He’s a strange boy, you’ve concluded, but it’s intriguing. 

“Why?” 

“I don’t fuckin know,” He truly doesn’t know, you’re just a dumb girl he happened to see at school. Not the first and definitely not the last, but you’ve been on his mind since he first laid eyes on you. “But I like you, a lot. I’ll do whatever you want.”

He was infatuated and he didn’t know why. 

You divert your eyes, tapping your puffball of your pen against the wooden table. “What if I want you to fuck me?” 

There’s a pause, you look at him and he looks at you before he sucks his teeth. “You’re joking.” Even still, he feels the blood rushing from his cheeks to his cock.

“You said whatever I want.” He needs to make sure he heard that correctly. Was it a test? A prank? Because you’re obviously just fucking with him. “But if it’s too forward, we can just study I guess.”

He’s silent and so are you but the way he’s boring into your soul makes you wish you never brought it up at all. “You serious?”

You nod, batting your fluffy mink lashes at him and as lame as it sounds, that’s all it took. 

Next thing he knew, Chifuyu was eating his crush’s pussy in one of the private study rooms. He’s almost embarrassed at how quickly he fell to his knees, eager to slurp on your pretty, plump cunt. 

The library is old. One of the oldest buildings on campus, hasn’t been renovated since it was built. A private study room was the perfect place—just a windowless, concrete box where no one could see or hear you leaned on your back with your feet in the air while he sucked on your pussy. 

Your clit is juicy and suckable, the pink nub catches his attention the minute he slid your panties down and spread your thighs open. 

He’s used to keeping his face stuffed in a book back here, now he’d much rather have his face stuffed between your thighs every second of the day. 

You’re a sight to see right now, tits spilling out from under your top, panties looped around one of your ankles and your skirt is flipped up and out of the way, away from the mess he’s making between your thighs. 

He’s so messy with it, spitting on it and slurping it back up, licking stripes up your sweet pussy until your clit is peeking out of its hood.

“So good.” He breathes out, spreading you wider. From your hole, all the way up and back down again, his tongue leaves no part of your cunt untouched. He’s dragging up one last time before sucking your cute little clit between his lips, running his hands up and down your plush thighs and belly. 

After a while you lean up and your shaky hands manage to pry those supple pink lips away from your clit, his lips leaving your pussy with a loud, wet ‘pop’. “Waittt, I never got your name.” You whined. 

As if names, or lack there of, had ever stopped you. But you desperately wanted to know his and you wanted to scream it when you came—which would be very soon if he kept sucking on your clit like that. 

He’s gazing up at you with those dazzling seafoam green eyes, silvery strands of your slick still connected to his lips when he pulls away from your pussy. 

“Chif-fuck...” He’s huffing and puffing trying to catch his breath, resting his head on your thigh for a moment. Your hand is running through his hair, back and forth petting motions until his breathing slowed. “Chifuyu. Matsuno..Chifuyu.” 

He rarely gave his full name, at least not to people he held no respect for. But you were different, he just knew you were. He’d never been this intrigued by another person since middle school when he met the infamous Baji.

“Chi-fu-yu. Chif-uyu.”

You test it on your tongue, wanting to get every syllable right. It makes him fucking melt, the sound of his name flowing from your glossy lips is so pretty. Fuck, he needed to hear you moaning, screaming and babbling it like a little slut. His little slut.

He wastes no time pressing his lips back to your pussy, licking thick stripes up and down, fat tongue relentlessly teasing your entrance and dragging back up to your clit.

“F-fuck how are you so good at this..” It catches you off guard. His head is sloppy and nasty, but not too wet with just enough teasing to drive you insane. It’s almost as if he’d been acquainted with your pussy before this, but you know there’s no way. 

You barely notice how your body subconsciously rocks against him, rubbing your pussy up and down his face, your clit bumping his little button nose every single time. 

Your question falls on deaf ears. 

The once bright-eyed boy is now staring at you, his eyes alarmingly low and glossed over as he loses himself. 

He’s too far gone now, lost in absolute bliss between your thighs—the taste of your gooey, sticky cunt, your moans, the feel of your thighs trembling. Pussydrunk wasn’t even the word.

He lets you use him. Lets his tongue hang slack against his chin for you to grind your puffy clit against it. His face is wet and sticky and he’s covered up to his cheeks in your slick. He can barely breathe, you’re rocking far too fast for him to get a breath in, but even still Chifuyu would eat your pussy until he was blue in the face if it meant pleasing you. 

Every inhale is laced with your scent and it’s like an aphrodisiac. Everything about this was so perfect. He can feel the shivers running up and down your body—you’re close, he knows it and that’s when he gets relentless. 

“G-nna cum for you baby..can I cum?”

Christ, the way his dick jumped should’ve been a sin. Chifuyu hums against your clit, groans his approval so his lips don’t have to abandon your perfect pussy again. You can feel every single lick & suck and even the puffs of air he breathes out of his nose as he slurps on your cunt, teasing your sensitive clit with the tip of his tongue.

“Oh fuck, I’m cumming Chifuyu. Mmm, I’m cumming. Chifu-” 

Your climax hits you like a punch to the gut, knocks the wind out of you and has you doubling over with your hands tangled in his dark locks, your trembling thighs squeezing against his neck. 

Your moans and pants are so sexy, he loves you like this. You don’t even realize you’re running from him until he grips your hips tighter, pulling you forward and holding you taut.

He’s desperate to drink up all you’ll give him, thick tongue gliding over your hole before he’s shoving it inside. Not a drop of your lovely essence goes to waste as you let him get his fill. 

The chime of the desk phone startles you and forces him to part from your cunt. He looks at you and you look at him, you make no move to get it forcing him to. 

“Chifuyu!” The librarian calls, he frequents this place so often that the two of them have gotten quite familiar. “Sorry to bother you and your girlfriend, but the library closes soon-“ She’s checking her watch. “In about ten minutes hun.” 

“Ah, okay! Thank you Miss and she’s not-” When he catches the dial tone he places the phone back on the receiver. 

“She says we have ten minutes until the library closes.” 

Before he can even finish, you’re already on your knees shoving his joggers and underwear down in one swift move. His dick is gorgeous—thick with a pretty pink tip. You’re not sure about the size, seven maybe seven and a half inches. Either way, it fills your mouth perfectly, big and heavy on your tongue as you lick the precum dripping from the tip.

The minute he feels your mouth on him he nearly loses all control, knees threatening to give. Chifuyu grips your jaw, popping his cock out of your mouth with an audible ‘pop.’

He notices a dip in between your brows. A frown? 

A pouty frown on your pretty face accompanied by a roll of your eyes. So cute. 

“Chifuuu,” You whining his name is tearing him apart inside, staring up at him with those doe eyes. “We only have 10 minutes. I wanna make you cum.” 

He’s pulling you back up, spinning you until your ass is pressed against his crotch. 

“I know pretty…I’m gonna fuck you.” His voice is breathy, desperate. “That okay?”

It’s soft but he hears it. The soft ‘yeah’ tumbling from your lips, the small gasps of anticipation as  you raise up on your tip toes to meet his height. He’s sliding his length through the junction of your thighs, coating himself in your slick.

It’s so good, this little crevice between your thighs and cunt feels like heaven. Like the warmest hug embracing him with every push and pull of his hips.

He has to force himself to pull away. He wouldn’t be able to face you again if he came from fucking your thighs. 

Blunt fingertips melt into the plush flesh of your ass, spreading your cheeks to watch as he slides past the tight ring of your entrance, a loud squelch greeting him when he bottoms out. 

You’re the epitome of enticing, a pretty bitch with a perfect pussy, and honestly he feels undeserving. He feels his infatuation for you growing deeper, except this is something he wants, no, needs forever.

He’s so gentle, stroking slow and stretching you out just right cus it’s a tight fit. 

Despite the wetness dripping down your thighs, you feel every single inch of him. The burn of the stretch, the slight ache as he kisses your cervix with every clumsy thrust. Your pussy feels so good around him, like it was made for him. Made to take his dick. 

“I didn’t—I didn’t think you’d be so b-big.”

Snaking his hands around your neck, he’s pulling you up so your back meets his chest, rolling his hips so the thick head of his dick mushes against the gummy walls of your g-spot. Your legs are trembling but he holds you up. Heavy breaths against your ear as his chin rests on your shoulder.

“Mmm, yeah? You don’t think much of me at all, do you? Think you’re too good for me?” 

“Noooo! I don’t think that.” He’s not letting up, stroke after stroke, until you’re creaming all over him, and even then, he still doesn’t stop. “W-would never… think that.”

The thick white fluids settling at the base of his cock, the slick gush of your pussy every time he fucked into you. It was driving you mad. 

“I don’t exist in your world,” Thrust after thrust. “But you consume mine, I want you so bad.”

Your brain is fuzzy, just barely able to make out what he’s saying. “I-ah want you tooo…y’know just h-how to handle me baby.”  

“Yeah,” He breathes out. “Of course I do.”

You’re not sure if it’s the sureness in his voice or the sweet kiss he presses against the bare skin behind your ear that sends you over the edge but your climax hits you like a train carrying the sweetest bliss. You don’t utter a word, just deep breaths and pants, a quiet belt of his name towards the end as you melt into him with every buck of his hips. He feels it—the spasms, the trembling, the cozy warmth you coat him in, an impromptu reminder that he’s unprotected inside of you. Still, he fucks you through it, just until he’s close enough-

“F-f-fuuuck.” The groan rips through his throat as he reaches his end, the grip on your neck loosens as he pushes you down and spills his seed all over the cheeks of your ass. 

He’s so unprepared it’s a shame, forced to use the inside of his turtleneck to clean the mess he made, even going as far as to place you up on the table and wipe between your thighs.

“Oh you didn’t have to- I have wipes..” 

“No big deal, didn’t wanna dirty your skirt. You made this, right?” He rubs the hem of the frayed pink denim, recall’s seeing a square of this same fabric on the ring you gave Mitsuya. 

“I-I did. How did you know?” 

 “I remember seeing you sketching it out. Glad it turned out nice enough for you to wear. It’s cute..” He trails off when you avert your gaze.

“Thank you. I’m glad too…” You trail off and you avert your gaze.

“Don’t go acting shy on me, y/n.” It’s the first time you’ve seen it, something akin to a smile on his cute little face, his eyes are as bright as stars as he stares down at you. It’s odd, almost as if the roles had changed.

“I’m not!” You whine. “It’s just strange, you’re strange Chifuyu.” 

[20-th-centurygirl]

bribery

jude bellingham x fem!reader

warnings: smut, fluff

a/n: another fic inspired by the beloved hey jude tag on @judeswhore 's account because it means the world to me <333 inspired by this ask. i used a gif for the first time and i'm really liking it so far 🤭 also the ending for this is very very rushed and i'm abit :/ about it so i can only apologise if it's cringe

masterlist

𖡼.𖤣𖥧𖡼.𖤣𖥧

Jude let out a rather frustrated groan as you led him into yet another store. You'd dragged him out shopping, he had the day off and you wanted to spend time together so you decided to take him out to get advice on new clothes. "babe seriously? another one?" He'd stopped dead in his tracks and consequently stopped you as you were holding his hand. "this is the last one i promise jude" you tried your best puppy dog eyes at him and jude hated the fact they worked. "You said that like 5 shops ago" he grumbled under his breath. you said nothing, instead taking his hand and pulling him in.

jude had wondered off and found somewhere to sit down with the multitude of bags while you carried on looking around. You'd eventually made your way back to him. "need you to come with me so you can tell me what you think of them all" you said, nodding towards the changing rooms. "i'm sure you'll look stunning in all of them, and i love you but please please be quick so we can leave" He'd tried to sound nice but you detected the slight annoyance in his tone. "Oh stop pouting. I need to grab a bottle of perfume after this and then we can go" jude groaned loudly and threw his head back. "Promise?" He mumbled, holding out his pinky finger and you bit back a laugh. "Pinky promise baby" you linked your fingers together and your favourite smile adorned judes face.

"Right, I'm gonna go pay for these then we'll go and get my perfume, okay?" You asked sweetly. "no, I'll pay" jude said, putting emphasis on the "i'll". you shot him a glare. Of course you were incredibly grateful to have jude in your life but you also treasured your independence. "Jude, I know you mean well and I'm always insanely grateful but-" He put his index finger on your lips "nope, princess treatment only for you" He tapped your lips a few times before walking over to the till.

"so what we doing now?" Judes mood had improved at the promise of going home. "Need to grab some perfume and we can go home yeah?" He nodded as you both walked in. What was supposed to be a quick dash in and out instead ended up in you begging jude to hold his arm out so you could swatch makeup and perfumes. "baby you said we'd be quick" He whined, glancing down at his arm that had multiple colours of lipstick on it. His other smelt strongly of at least 5 different perfumes. "jude, if i promise to give you head when we get back will you stop pouting?" You groaned and his eyes lit up. He nodded feverishly and held his arms further so you could carry on testing.

Once you were finished jude practically dragged you back to the car. "babe hurryyyy" he groaned, half hard already just at the thought of getting head. "God you're so needy." You teased but you couldn't deny the butterflies you got knowing just how much jude wanted you at the drop of a hat. "And what about it? Not my fault you're so good" you rolled your eyes as you both got in the car. His hand immediately gravitating to your thigh, his thumb stroking it gently. His leg bobbed up and down and his eagerness both made you want to laugh and scream.

The moment you got home jude basically dragged you over to the sofa where he sat down, his legs spread wide and his bottom lip caught between his lip. You decided to keep up the irritating just a little longer "you want something?" You questioned, trying desperately to keep up the facade that you knew nothing about what he wanted. "I think you made me a promise babe" He said, convinced you were just teasing. "Huh?" You tried your best to sound as confused as possible and it seemed to be working. "You said that I'd get head if I was patient and I think I have been so" you rasied your eyebrow at him "hm, well you can stop being so vulgar first before I even think about it" "but it was a pinky promise" jude sounded absolutely betrayed and you burst out laughing. "Stop laughing and come here" He grumbled, pulling you into his lap by the backs of your thighs and you swiftly straddled him.

One of his hands trailed to the back of your neck, pulling your face impossibly closer to his as his other pulled your hips down, grinding softly against him. He let out a small moan on one roll of your hips, the pent up desperation getting to him. "Please" He mumbled against your lips. "Please what?" "Please just keep your promise baby"

You said nothing, instead shuffling off his lap and sitting on your knees, jude handing to a pillow to rest on. You stroked your hands up and down his thighs agonisingly slow, letting out a groan of frustration. You brought your fingers to delicately unbuckle his belt and unzip his jeans. Jude lifted his hips up so you could pull his jeans down but you left his boxers on, choosing to lightly stroke him through them instead. "You've put up with alot today jude. Think you deserve this hm?" Jude nodded rapidly, letting out a deep grunt when you squeezed him lightly. You smirked at the sight of a wet patch already forming and you pulled his boxers down lightly.

You took him in your hand, slowly rubbing up and down a few times and placing faint kisses just to his tip, dragging out small, barely audible moans. You stopped your hand movements and just took his tip into your mouth as he pulled your hair into a messy makeshift ponytail. Jude let out a deep groan when you swirled your tongue around him, one of your free hands squeezing his thigh. "Oh fuck. So good at this angel". You gradually took him deeper into his mouth until your nose reached his abdomen. Your other free hand moved to roll his balls in your palm and the way judes head fell to the back of the sofa gave you butterflies. His mouth fell open, a string of moans falling from his mouth.

The grip his fingers had on your scalp was getting tighter. Tears began to pool in the corners of your eyes and the gagging noises were outright pornographic. You pulled off to catch your breath, instead choosing to stroke him quickly whilst maintaining eye contact with him. "I love you baby. Don't know what I did to deserve you" He moaned out, his head falling back again when you took him back in your mouth. You knew from the way he was gripping your hair and the way his moans had gotten more high pitched that he was close and you were determined to get him there. You allowed him to start bucking his hips up into your mouth "fuck i love it when you met me use your mouth like this. So good for me aren't you?" He whimpered, his head back facing you. His mouth was wide open as a string of curses and your name fell out snd his eyes rolled back. "im nearly there" you just smirked around his cock, fondling his balls and teasing shapes on his inner thigh with your nails. His breath hitched suddenly "fuck fuck fuck" and you felt him release in your mouth.

You pulled away slowly, sticking your tongue out to show jude you'd swallowed everything. His pupils were blown and he had small beads of sweat on his forehead. You helped him to pull his clothes back up. "You okay?" You giggled at his still mind blown expression. "Yeah. That was the best head I've ever had" He chuckled, his breath still slightly uneven. "So was me dragging you round shopping worth it?" You smirked. "If I get that again everytime then yes" He breathed out, helping you back up and grabbing you by the chin to pull your lips back to his.

[stringlessau]

IT'S STRINGLESS' 1 YEAR ANNIVERSARY (+ early concept art compilation)

Posting this dumbass little video to start off the day since we have a lot of little gifts for our awesome community today.

One of those things is something i've been wanting to do for a very long while: posting a lot of the original concept art for stringless (since ive always enjoyed seeing other people's early concepts) some of these i have posted massively before, some are completely unseen, so it'll be fun

This one is the page that started it all, his design is at the same time largely unchanged and also completely different

All i have to say is that it originally said (regarding spamton and swatch) "they bicker like an old married couple" but then i thought about it and i changed it so theyre literally just married

Didnt mean to make swatchton, made it anyway lmfao

Right after that, i got working on neo designs, I wanted to make him really scary looking, the original concept was to make him look skeletal and generally for him to look insane and like he had been reanimated from the dead, but a lot of people had told me over time that they didn't really like the design, I was very defensive over it but I ended up taking criticism and i actually really like the new neo, it balances the uncanniness of the original design with the sleekness of my new art

Payton was a natural next step, without someone to sell the thorn ring there'd be no neo, so although his design visually stayed almost the same, he went through a lot of color revisions (thanks mostly to @maskedalterego, who helped me to nail his final color palette), he suggested the gloves, and helped me to balance the saturation of the design since really I've never had a good eye for color.

His final design, color wise, was just me experimenting using the colors of my sona at the time on him, which I was hesitant to do but was so happy with the palette that I kept it.

It's interesting that he was originally intended to be the pink addison (since he sells one of the snowgrave required rings), and the reason he ended up being the blue addison was corey beepington (and the eviction notice short which I have taken one too many concepts from), this still influenced me to make his outfit pink initially, which still is a huge part of his character design

That exact same night, I created concept art for Raster (weirdly, I was sure I created them before Payton, but it might be because I was generally uninterested in Payton earlier on), their design is also largely unchanged, I just got better with shapes and color, I also ended up changing their cheek markings after seeing some swatchton fanchild art by ne0nbandit

A first until now, the first concepts for payton neo were made on paper

I took very long on this design, and I only updated it every few weeks to make tweaks because I felt the concept was too good but my execution didnt make it justice

I'm very proud of how the design looks now, as of the latest neo redesigns, I feel I could finally make this idea justice

Swatch's design went through some last minute changes, I wanted to use this color palette for swatch to contrast with spamton, but decided against it, then i changed their hair to be longer, to make their Stringless design distinct from their regular Deltarune design

Historically, these two are pretty important, the first pieces of art I ever made featuring Rakhin's old design, when he wasn't part of stringless and I was just befriending rope (he made me Payton fanart first, fell in love with his style), the contrast is beautiful

Now to finish this post, here's some unseen Snowgrave route art I made over the time Stringless has been in development, they're all pretty quick sketches, but i love them nonetheless

Thanks everyone for the insane reception this AU has gotten, I haven't been feeling very good this whole year for a huge amount of reasons I can't get into, but Stringless and its community always helps me to remember why I do the things I do

Thanks for everyone's comments and everyone's kindness, thanks especially to @theropeaaa , for being the literal other half of this AU, without whom I couldn't have ever done the Stringless pages, @maskedalterego for helping me and listening to my ramblings since the start, @scamp-boxx for being this AU's biggest hype man (the first ever comment on the first spamton concept art was by them, and they helped me nail so much of the snowgrave route), @boykisserwoah and @weirdohno , for also being here from the start and making an absolutely insane amount of fanart oh my god, @gutamajunk , for motivating me to create Raster, and writing several story outlines on the first days of stringless that were the foundation for the pages, and diaryous milch and rory, our friends that have helped with character designs, story ideas, voice acting and have generally been instrumental to what stringless is today

THANKS EVERYONE <3

-Nick

[forgingtheblade]

DID YOU KNOW THAT MINECRAFT HAS LOOMS???, aka, THE WEAVING WRITEUP

part 1: prep work—did you know how much you have to do before even touching a loom? me either

part 2 part 3

all the way back in october of last year, I was in a weaving class and was tasked with conceptualizing a project for my final using some of the techniques we had been learning through the semester. being the person i am, my immediate first thought was what if i recreated a minecraft banner on a real floor loom? wouldn’t that be fucking cool?

thus was borne what eventually spiraled into this project!

i figured out how wide i wanted it to be, what weight of yarn i wanted to use, and did all of the weaving math to figure out exactly how much yardage i’d need. i took that to a local weaver’s studio who was selling yarn, and came looking for just about any undyed wool she had to offer.

i specifically wanted wool because, well, that’s what the minecraft weavings are made of!

i remember digging through stacks upon stacks of old cones of yarn before finding a couple bags of a caked wool yarn that was, admittedly pretty rough. after using a tool not unlike this one, we figured it was roughly 3000 yards of yarn, and i bought the lot for about 30 bucks.

photo courtesy of Miekle’s Fiber Arts

this thing is so nifty btw, you cut a specific length of yarn and figure out where it balances which is then multiplied by something to figure out the yardage—i’ve only used one this one time, but i think they’re cool!

after getting this yarn came the question of getting the colors i wanted. i’m very lucky to be studying at an institution that grows our own indigo plants, and ferments those plants into our own living indigo vats, so I thought it would be a travesty to not take advantage of the utterly beautiful blues that vat produces.

i divided up my yarns based on how long i needed each of my warp sections to be using a yarn winder measuring to roughly one yard per rotation to make skeins of the right length.

after running some test swatches i figured out how long to dip each skein into the indigo vat for to achieve the colors i wanted, and i wish i knew exactly how i did it but i don’t think i wrote it down anywhere, and its been , yknow, almost a year.

afterwards i had to turn those skeins back into cakes and let me just tell you.

i forgot to use a swift on the first one. i did not forget again.

untangling that first dark blue skein was a multi hour endeavor.

photo courtesy of . an amazon listing

this is a swift and a ball winder. the swift holds the big loop of yarn that is the skein taut and spins freely while you crank the ball winder to make those super orderly and useable cakes. without the swift, trying to wind a cake turns a nice skein of yarn into a nightmare tangle. it was not fun

ALL THAT ASIDE. after successfully detangling and caking my yarn, it was time to wind my warp on a warping board!

a warping board is used to measure out how long your threads running vertically through the loom are going to be. your warp, as it were. because i knew i wanted to weave two banners, and i wanted them to be about a yard long each, plus accounting for tying on to the loom, waste material at the start and end, and leaving a long enough gap between them to create tassels, i started with a three and a half yard long warp. each cross back and forth the board is about a yard of length.

only once i had used the warping board to measure out all 200 threads of width i was putting on the loom was i able to actually start tying the yarn on to the loom and threading it—but this post is already long enough as is, so that will be the next thing I post about!

stay tuned for prepping the loom and weaving the banners :3 here’s a little sneak peek

[olderthannetfic]

Knitting question!

Intellectually I know failure is fine. I'm a beginner! I'm learning! Mistakes are part of the process! But I find it really hard not to be demotivated by projects not turning out how I want

I spent all this time and materials on this and it's just kinda shit?

Did you experience that/have any advice?

--

I definitely experienced that when I first tried knitting. I don't remember, but I suspect it's why I drifted away from the craft for nearly two decades.

I have a couple of semi-failures from my current re-entry into knitting. I intend to frog or partially frog them and re-knit, but there are other projects I care more about that are taking priority so far.

Right now, I love watching youtube videos with little tricks to improve one's knitting or deep dives into technical matters. I find information on fiber fascinating. I think that has helped me avoid many of the problems I experienced the first time around. Even if I run into an issue now, I can probably redo the project to make it how I want.

I think the first thing to figure out is how it's kind of shit. Yes, yes, you're a n00b, but there are lots of reasons projects turn out shitty. Some issues require a lot of practice. Many issues require reading a blog post explaining some technical thing and instantly upgrading your knowledge.

--

For example:

When I first got back into knitting, I got some pretty green yarn and made a Medieval-looking hood. I had no clue how alpaca behaved or that it would be waaaay too flowy for the look the pattern was supposed to have. I was also knitting the pattern with the wrong size of yarn, needle, etc. It turned out way too big for me and a formless blob. It was also itchy.

A year or two later, I threw it in the dryer, and now it's an epic rainy day hood. It's mostly not itchy because the felting stuck down all those hairy ends. It has a lot more body now because it's felt instead of flowy hand-knit alpaca. (And, hey, it's even more Medieval since those hoods were often felt but not often knitted as far as I could tell.)

What went wrong here was mostly that I knew fuckall about fiber. I knew I was making it in some randomass size and didn't really care that it was too big, but I didn't know it would slither off of me due to alpaca's drape. I didn't need practice: I needed someone to tell me how alpaca behaves.

--

Example 2:

I knit that Owls sweater and didn't like how it had no shaping... so I winged it. I ended up with really bizarre shaping because 1. I had no idea what I was doing and 2. I didn't close the underarm holes until the very end, so the sweater appeared to fit when I tried it on.

I could open the underarms back up and knit a separate piece for them, but I realized that I dislike the fabric overall. I knit it on a too-big needle (in my opinion). I thought I liked that looseness in my swatch, but I have changed my mind. I was also worried about running out of yarn (since it's a used yarn that I won't find again), but I had tons left over. I also think I want it more cropped. The yarn has a sort of nasty texture but beautiful color, and I knit quite a tight (and thus scratchy) sweater. I don't think I wet blocked it though, so that might fix the texture.

What I should actually do here, assuming I don't just get rid of the thing in favor of better yarn, is frog it and reknit from the top down, reversing the pattern and not having a phase with the underarms open like that. I should also knit it at a tighter gauge but with a little more positive ease, and I should trust that the stretchiness of wool will make it conform to my body just fine without a lot of shaping. Before any of that, I should wet block it and see how the texture changes.

I don't really consider this a permanent failure. I like the Owls themselves. I can easily just knit this again and get a sweater I want to wear... possibly a cardigan, now that I think about it. The yarn is a relatively robust wool that will be fine being frogged and reused, and knitting it gave me more experience with finishing a whole sweater. My various fuckups taught me things about both knitting and my personal taste.

I guess it could be demotivating because it took a while, but on that bigass needle, it really didn't take that long. I would probably always have knit multiple sweaters from this pattern. I see more than one in my future anyway.

Experience was an issue here, but it wasn't experience with the literal act of knitting. My tension was fine. It was more that I fucked around and found out.

--

Example 3:

I made a self-drafted BTS sweater out of another batch of used yarn that I'll never get more of. I love the body. the sleeves are too tight in the upper arm, and my bizarre-ass design for the top of the body means that the sweater wants to be a boat neck but also fit differently in the sleeves and... gaaaaah. The tight sleeves don't feel bad, but what they do do is make the whole sleeve slide down my arm weirdly because of the fit issues around the boat neck.

Part of why the upper arm area is so tight is that I was worried I'd run out of yarn (which I did) and I wanted a balloon sleeve rather than a straight one. The yarn is so stiff that the balloon part is weird, and the two other purple yarns I added for the lower sleeve look weird. I should have reversed their order because one matches too well, and now it just looks like I ran out and had to add a last inch in a random other yarn. I have most of those two skeins left hanging around and a sweater that fits strangely.

Also... it needs hand washing but is shaped and sized to be worn against bare skin, so it gets stinky after a few hours of wear because I am a sweaty, sweaty person.

In this case, I wouldn't redo the body: this silk blend will look less nice after frogging, and I already roughed it up a lot knitting the damn thing the first time. I knit it starting at the top, so the weird fit across the shoulders is mostly here to stay.

However, I'm pretty sure the bad fit on the sleeves can be fixed by ripping back and adding a bunch of width up top. I can also start with the flowier other two yarns and maybe have bands of this stiffer one that I used in the body. I suspect the weird body fit is fixable by changing what the sleeves are supposed to be doing.

This is another case of fucking around and finding out, so I'm not too disappointed in it. I did wear it to Yoongi's concert too, and it was gorgeous, if too hot.

I do realize now that I hate boat necks, but I think I can put up with this one if the sleeves aren't constantly sliding out of place.

And if fixing the sleeves doesn't rescue this, I might attempt some surgery one of these days, but that's more of a pain in the ass, so that will definitely have to wait.

--

Now, my guess is that your "kind of shit" is not "I freehanded a sweater two seconds after getting back into knitting because I'm a crazy person, and I messed up the shaping".

The more common problems are things like:

Not realizing that you should block or not blocking aggressively enough, so your stitches look way more uneven than they need to, the shape is weird compared to the example pics in the pattern, etc.

Using assy bind-offs so the edge looks amateur instead of polished. (You can go back and fix this.)

Failing to swatch, and now you've knit the wrong size.

Picking a fiber that just cannot do what you want it to—usually seen in people trying to avoid wool and not getting that 99.999999% of trendy patterns are written specifically for wool. I have an ancient sweater from college that looks nothing like the example in the book because all I could afford was big box store acrylic. Never again the plastic horror!

Buying patterns from a size 0 lifestyle blogger aspirational knitwear designer with no boobs and a great photographer, then feeling dumpy when trying the thing on under crappy lighting. This one usually requires a little more self confidence and some bust darts.

Making things in plain stockinette in a light color and smooth yarn like cotton that shows EVERY SINGLE TIME your tension wasn't machinelike. This is unfixable. Don't do this.

--

If you're using mohair or alpaca, frogging may be more trouble than it's worth, but you often can reuse the materials. Granted, you've still sunk that time in, but the materials don't always have to be wasted. That might help it feel more like time you spent practicing and less like a complete disaster.

I'm a very product-focused knitter, so I don't really have practice pieces. I'm knitting to have a Thing and I want to wear that Thing, so I get the disappointment if you don't end up wanting to actually use what you've made.

But that also helps me not get totally demotivated. I still want that Thing and now I have a clearer idea how to make it.

So... what are these "kinda shit" projects anyway? What about them do you not like?

[nocaptainonthisship]

Something Blue

"Hal, seriously, what the fuck?"  Even whispered, the words reverberated oddly in the little anteroom. Too much emphasis on the consonants, sharp and crisp the way she'd been taught. Even spitting mad, Galadriel’s elocution lessons lingered. 

"What?" He always garbled his T's, the letter half gone and half transformed into a D until half the time she couldn't understand what he'd meant to say at all. This one was clear, though, wide-eyed, playful innocence on his face. He knew what he'd done, no matter the confusion he feigned. 

"Keep your voice down. The photographer is right out there.” She bit her lip sharply and tried to follow her own advice. “We talked about this. Months ago." 

"You're gonna have to remind me, baby." 

"A black suit is not traditional. It's not appropriate! This isn't the funeral portion of Four Weddings and A Funeral."

In the tight space, standing so close, he had to tilt his head down to give her a full once over, as if his jaw hadn't hit the floor when she walked into the room five minutes ago. Well, they'd both been speechless, if for entirely different reasons. 

"Is this 'traditional', then?" he scoffed.

"Pardon me?!"

"Gal, you look like the girl from Little House on the Prairie.”

On a different day, she might linger on the way his accent grew thicker towards the end, as if the mere mention of the prairie called him to his childhood home. A different day. Not today. She would not be charmed by him today. 

"You want to insult my dress right now?"

"I was trying to pay you a compliment. You're the one being insulting." 

"I *told you*, Hal. I don't care that you're thirty-two and still clinging to vestiges of your woe-begotten youth." Woe-begotten he mouthed, lips quirked up at the corners. "You know what I mean." 

He did, he always did. The same way he knew when she said woe-begotten, what she really meant was working class and with an affiliation for punk rock and goth and all the dark and dirty aesthetics implied therein.

"You promised me you wouldn't wear all black, just for one day. I love you, exactly as you, but just one day so my mother doesn’t freeze me out." She'd been reduced to whining and wheedling now, and it wouldn't be long before the frustration bled into tears. Nothing had been going according to plan, none of it was the way she thought it would be. Earwen had commandeered and countermanded every decision she could until it barely felt like Galadriel’s day at all. She hadn’t even brought her mother to the dress shop with her, hoping that the clothes, at least, would be them and nothing else. Her eyes started to sting. "I told you about the blue, right? I gave Mel a swatch, she said she’d take it with her to get your suit, she... You promised me."

"Hey, hey, it's ok. Have I ever broken a promise to you before?" Galadriel sniffed before shaking her head. "Right. So before you come for my head, can I show you something?”

He stepped back as far as the limited space in the glorified closet would allow and unbuttoned his suit jacket. The trousers, it turned out, weren't nearly as baggy as they'd seemed at first glance. Yes, they weren't as close-fitted as was trendy, but the wider leg suited him, counterbalancing the lankiness that made his mother call him 'string bean' even to this day. The jacket, that sea of black which had first made her see red, opened and Galadriel had to blink a dozen times a minute so her tears wouldn’t spill and send streaks of mascara down her perfectly made up face. 

The lining of his suit, which the tradition she'd tried and failed to insist on would have favored a darker fabric, was a soft, baby blue. It matched her dress, almost too perfectly. Except for the places where tiny black words walked across the fabric. 

Without conscious thought, her hand reached out to touch it. "What is this?" she asked, unable to do more than whisper. The whole thing had rather stolen her breath away.

"Emails," he said, as if she was just supposed to know what that meant. She did know what that meant. Hundreds of emails across hundreds of days after he'd finished his exchange year at Oxford and she hadn't yet found the courage to transfer to Columbia.

Hundreds of times they'd said "I love you," without ever saying the words. Both too self-assured, too self-reliant, too stupid to take a chance on being happy if it meant budging an inch. Galadriel had been the first to cave, filling out her transfer application in secret. Halbrand, of course, was the one to assign true meaning to it, a pizza box sitting on the floor between them as they laughed and caught up. He'd said "I love you" - out loud and on purpose. 

Galadriel blinked the tears from her eyes. It was such a blatant display of unadulterated affection, sickly sweet and so thoroughly American of him, she vowed then and there never to mention this to her father or uncles, lest it be the subject of drawing room ribbing for the rest of their lives. 

Privately, she’d cherish this forever. She’d frame it, if she could. “Halbrand,” she said, her voice shaky, watery. 

“There’s one more thing.” He had that gleam in his eye, mischievous, secretive, up-to-no-good in a familiar way guaranteed to make her smile. He tugged his shirt from the front of his trousers, but before she had a chance to process the way her mouth went dry at the sight of the dark hair dusting his abs, he tugged up the waistband of his pants. 

Silky soft, baby blue. 

“Now, if you’re done yelling at me and blubbering at me-” he hunched down then so they were at eye level, so she could see him eager, patient, kinder than she deserved after yelling at him in a supply closet, and just the tiniest bit lascivious - “maybe can we go take these photos and finally get married.”

She’d tell him later, that the boxer briefs he wore were a perfect match for the lingerie set his sister Mel had gifted at Galadriel’s hen do. A set she now wore under several layers of tulle. 

Maybe she’d just show him. 

🩵

For @justatinycollector and @stitchingatthecircuitboard

[journeyman-tier-fibercraft]

Oh my god... it's Wednesday... and I've done work this week.

Been chugging along with the scarf for my mom (tumblr post link) and with Cardigan S (Pattern | Yarn | Thread). Which is being weeirrddd again.

Cardigan S was allegedly written by designer company DKNY. and I guess being designer means they don't have to test knit their patterns. I already pointed out the odd "p5, p1" bit when I was charting up the lace/cable patterns but it does Not end there.

As a matter of personal taste, Why does every single cable face the same way? In the original pattern, every single cable is a back twist cable. But every single pattern piece is mirrored from the middle?? Why would you not have One cable being back twist and the Other being front twist. Which is exactly what I did. (Granted it would probably look better to have the back twist second and the front twist first...)

For the sleeve increases, it says "increase every 4 rows (so many times), increase every 6 rows (so many times)" and I was completely unsure if those two instructions were supposed to be simultaneous or not. In retrospect they probably weren't... but I knit them as tho they were and what I have done flairs way too much. Ugh I guess I will be reknitting this sleeve. All of that could've been avoid with just adding "then" before the 6 rows increase :,) (admittedly i was doing the set up for this part with a migraine but in my defense I didn't know until After that i had a migraine jdsljkdasdf)

Finally the last thing. The thing that bothered me most. Is why the fuck is the cabled not centered between the two lace patterns. There's two purl stitches between the zigzag lace and the cable. and *four* between the purl and the 4 stitch lace center. Why. Why not make it 3 purl stitches between each. The official picture of this pattern doesn't look odd but every project has this weird cable issue. Who did this to me. (I did by not swatching properly)

Despite the 4 paragraphs of complaining I'm having so much fun with this pattern. I would feel a little bad ripping apart a pattern if were made by like, a random individual who just like to knit. But this is a Vogue published pattern written by DKNY. I expect their shit to actually be test knitted.

[the-guilty-writer]

Is This Home?

Request from anon: Can you do Derek ! Daughter reader (15) she’s still getting used to savannah being there with them, and maybe she gets upset that they don’t hang out as much because of her, and reader has a breakdown and leaves the house in the middle of the night and she gets lost and hides in an abandoned house until someone finds her (maybe a neighbor of Derek’s) and they call Derek to come get reader and she’s just like no I don’t wanna talk to him and he  sits down and is like listen I know you don’t like me being with someone since your mom and I understand that but you will always be my baby, and they go home that night and she sleeps in the middle of them

Derek Morgan x daughter!reader

Summary: Ever since Savannah moved in with you and your dad, you feel like you’ve been losing him. The night he forgets about your special father-daughter time you flee to a place that feels more homey than your actual home.

A/N: I changed it up the abandoned house part just a little bit because I thought this would make it more meaningful, but overall I tried to stick as close to the request as possible. I hope you like it!

CW: I had fun with swear words in this one (I swore a lot when I was 15. Tbh I still do.), reader's mother is dead, kinda angsty with a fluffy ending. Reader loves her Aunt Penny.

---

“Alright, (Y/N). You think you can hold down the fort tonight?” Your dad, Derek, asked playfulling, putting a hand on your shoulder before leaning over the couch to look at you.

You put down your phone and made a face. “It’s Sunday night,” you said.

“Yes,” he said, drawing out the Y sound like he always did when you said something obvious. “Which means that I trust you’ll be in bed by the time Savannah and I get home from our night out.”

“But-” you started, but it didn’t matter; your dad was already headed upstairs to get ready for his date. The only way he would hear you now was by yelling to remind him that you two ALWAYS did movie night on Sunday. Your mom had died when you were ten and since then your dad had made it a point to spend as much of his free time with you as possible. Unless he was away on a case, movie nights were never interrupted. For five years that was how it had been.

And then Savannah came along.

She wasn’t a bad person. She wasn’t mean. But she wasn’t your mom and sometimes it felt like she was taking your dad away from you. The first time it happened, her and Derek had just started dating. You were so happy that your dad was happy you failed to notice that the same day he took her to the park was the day he was supposed to take you to the firing range. The second time it happened you took the metro from school straight to Quantico to show him that you’d gotten straight A’s on your report card, only to find that he had left work on time for once to take Savannah to see a play (at least your Uncle Spencer was impressed and Aunt Penny took you to get ice cream on the drive home). The third time it happened was the day Savannah moved in with the two of you. The Saturday that was supposed to be spent practicing for your judo certification was instead spent lifting and moving boxes.

Since then it had all gone downhill so fast. Dinners that were usually spent on the couch with just you and your dad shooting the shit about sports turned into dinners at the table making small talk about what everyone’s day was like. The messages he sent to you every night when he was away on a case came to your phone half the time and Savannah’s the other half. Even restoring houses with your dad wasn’t the same anymore. You loved to sit around the table with him and pick out colors for the walls from the swatches he brought home, but of course he had to show the options to Savannah first. She always seemed to throw out the fun colors in favor of more “tasteful” ones before you could give your opinion.

And now your dad was ditching you on movie night to take her out to dinner.

If she was a serial killer you wouldn’t have minded- you were used to your dad having to miss movie night to catch criminals- but he was abandoning you for his girlfriend. His girlfriend. You would much rather have been ditched because Hannibal Lecter was on the loose running wild through some town in the middle of bumfuck nowhere than be left alone so your father could go out to dinner with some woman you hadn’t known for all that long. SSA Derek Morgan would have a good excuse for missing movie night then, but he wasn’t a Supervisory Special Agent right now- he was your dad… and he forgot about you.

You went up to your room, not bothering to turn off the TV which already showed which movie you had picked for that night. Sitting on your bed, you picked up the picture of your mom that sat on your nightstand. You weren’t sure if you were listening for an answer from her spirit, or if you were just lost in the moment of missing her, but it felt like you looked at her picture for hours.

There was a knock on your door. You put the picture of your mom down before calling, “Come in!”

Derek was dressed up a bit more than normal- he traded his typical leather jacket for a blazer and his jeans for casual slacks. “So?” He spun in a circle. “How do I look?”

“Like you asked Uncle Dave for fashion advice,” you told him- if there was one thing you were in the Morgan household, it was honest.

“Okay, ouch.” Your dad brought his hand to his chest. “Seriously?”

“Seriously,” you said. “The slacks make you look old. Wear black jeans instead.”

Derek smiled. “Okay, well I’m gonna be late since I have to change again. I’ll see you later.”

“Bye, dad. I-”

The door shut.

“Love you,” you whispered to yourself. You picked up the picture of your mom again, gazing into her fearless eyes. Oh, mom, you thought to yourself, or maybe you were praying to her. You really didn’t know which one. What am I going to do?

---

You rolled over and looked at the clock- unable to sleep. It was nearly midnight and you dad still wasn’t back yet. How long was dinner supposed to take? How had your dad forgotten about movie night? How had your dad forgotten to tell you he loved you? The questions spiraled in your head over and over again, anxiety building in your gut until you burst into tears.

You couldn’t do it. You couldn’t be in your room, or the house, or anywhere that made you think about how your dad had forgotten about you. You were still in your clothes from the day, having been too upset to change into pajamas. Silently crying you ran down the stairs and out of the house- needing to get as far away from it as possible.

The logical part of your brain knew that this was the best possible way to get kidnapped- a young girl running down the street alone in the dark was the start to just about every horror movie ever. But the logical part of your brain wasn’t working. All you knew was that you had to run.

You were lost in your thoughts and high from the adrenaline that you lost track of where your legs had taken you. Your vision adjusted to the dark and you looked around. You were somewhere you had been before, but you weren’t sure exactly where. If it was light outside you might be able to pinpoint a landmark or a trail and find your way back, but the night was dense. All there was to do was walk.

Your head was starting to ache from crying and your legs were beginning to feel weary. The taste of copper filled your mouth from running in the coolness of the night. You needed a place to stay but you didn’t want to go home. In the distance you spotted street lights- they were dim but it was better than nothing. Maybe from there you could find a metro stop to take you closer to your Aunt Penny’s- surely she would let you stay with her for the night.

The closer you got to the lights the more you recognized your surroundings. The neighborhood was older, but still in a safe location. The houses were charming on the outside, with wrap-around porches and large grassy yards. You knew the place because Derek had bought a house here years ago, when it was just the two of you. It had always been part of his dream to restore a house like it so he insisted that he would wait for the perfect time to start the project.

Of course there was no such thing as perfect timing. Maybe that’s why he hadn’t touched the house in years. Most of his other restorations were bought and sold within months, but this one just sat. The only evidence that he owned the place at all was that he mowed the lawn every two weeks.

You walked up to the front door and pulled a bobby pin from your pocket, picking the old lock with ease and making your way inside. The house was bare of any furniture or decorations. Paint was flaking off the walls and old plastic covered the hardwood floors. You walked around the house, imagining what it would be like to see the place restored in all its glory- with new crown molding and fresh hardware on the doors. You imagined it with a fresh coat of paint and pictures on the walls.

But at the moment it looked abandoned, withered, and unloved- just like how you felt.

---

It was 1 AM when Derek got a call from an unknown number. The first time he let it go to voicemail, but when the same number called him two more times he had to pick it up. At first he thought it was a prank call- some kid trying to mess with him that one of his houses had been broken into by his own daughter- but when he got home and saw that you weren’t in your room he knew it was true.

He was sure that he broke every speed limit getting to the house, but he didn’t care. What was so wrong that you felt like you had to run away? What had happened and how had he not seen it?

Derek pulled into the driveway and jumped out of the car, Savannah right behind him. His neighbor was standing in the driveway holding a flashlight, waiting for him to arrive.

“Thanks for calling,” Derek greeted the woman- she was a nice older lady. “I’m sorry if she bothered you.”

“Oh it’s fine,” the lady said. “I’ve raised three teenagers myself. I know how they are. She says she doesn’t want to talk to you, but deep down she really does.”

Derek sighed. “I appreciate that. If there’s anything I can do to return the favor, please let me know.” The lady smiled and gave him a pat on the shoulder before walking away.

Derek sighed heavily and turned to Savannah. “I’ll be back.”

Savannah rubbed his shoulder supportively. “You’re a great father, Derek.” He took her hand and gave it a squeeze before letting go and making his way into the house.

It didn’t take him long to find you. You were curled up in a corner, legs pulled up to your chest with your face buried into your knees. You didn’t even look up when you heard his footsteps. He came closer, kneeling next to you so he was on your level, and reached out to touch your hair. At the contact, you quickly leaned away.

“(Y/N),” he said, his voice full of concern. “Please talk to me.”

“I don’t want to talk to you.” Your words were sad with a slight venom behind them. “Just go away.”

Your dad sighed and sat down on the floor in front of you. “I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what’s wrong.”

Suddenly, all the emotions from earlier came flooding back. You couldn’t help it- sobs racked your body as you pulled your limbs tighter towards your body. You kept your head down and your eyes shut tight, not wanting to even get a glimpse of your dad.

“You forgot movie night-” you managed to choke out between sobs. “You have Savannah now. You already forgot about mom and now you’re forgetting about me too.”

Derek felt his heart crack. He really had forgotten movie night- the one constant promise that your mom would always be a part of him and you. He took a deep breath and pulled you into a hug.

“I’m so sorry, (Y/N),” he whispered. He felt his eyes begin to water. “I did forget about movie night.” He pulled back to look at your face. You had grown up so much so fast. JJ was always telling him that if he looked away for too long he would miss it entirely and he almost had. “But that doesn’t mean I forgot about your mom and it sure doesn’t mean that I’ve forgotten about you. I know it’s hard to see me with someone who isn’t your mom- I get that- but Savannah isn’t replacing her. I will always love your mother and you will always be my baby girl. No matter what.”

The mention of the nickname he only ever used for you and your Aunt Penny brought the tiniest smile to your face. Derek pulled you into another hug.

“Can we go home now?” you asked quietly.

“Of course.” He kissed your forehead and pulled you to your feet, holding your hand as you walked out to the car. Savannah was standing there, a sympathetic look on her face. Your dad helped you into the back seat first before helping her into the front. You were so tired from the emotions and adrenaline that you fell asleep before the car even pulled out of the driveway.

---

Derek gently took your seatbelt off and pulled you out of the car in an effort not to wake you up. He was thankful that Savannah was there to lock the vehicle after him and open the front door so he could carry you up the stairs and towards your bedroom. If working out was good for nothing else but still being able to carry his baby girl at 15 years old, it was worth it.

“Derek,” Savannah whispered from behind him before he opened up your bedroom door. He turned to look at her. “Let her sleep in our room tonight. She’s your baby, but she isn’t going to be for much longer.”

Derek smiled softly and walked to the main bedroom, laying you down in the middle of the mattress. He looked down at your face, sleep softening your features. Changing quickly into his pajamas, he snuggled next to you, pulling your body closer to his. Savannah laid down on your other side, a gentle smile on her face as she watched the two of you together.

For the first time since your mom died, Derek felt whole- like the wound to his heart had healed over with a faint scar to remind him of what was, but allowing him to move forward.

“You know,” Derek said quietly. “I’ve let that house sit for a few years. It is kind of a dream project come true so I’ve been waiting for the right time to work on it.”

“Oh yeah?” Savannah whispered.

“Well it’s bigger than this place.” He ran a hand down your hair. “And there are more kids around (Y/N)’s age. The neighbors are nice and the school district is the same. It’s about 10 minutes closer to the hospital and Quantico.” Derek sighed. “I guess I was waiting for a time when the house could become a home.”

Savannah smiled sleepily. “You think you could make it a home?”

Derek’s smile grew. “I think we could make it a home. Together.” He still had his arms around you when he fell asleep that night and by the morning, Savannah’s arms would be around you too.

Soon there would be a restored house, with more dinners on the couch, nights you could spend with your friends when your dad and Savannah went out, a park nearby to walk in, and a large grassy yard to practice judo. But ultimately, it didn’t matter because the three of you would always see one another as home.

[tacosaysroar]

SEVEN

I’m finally painting the living room. I stalled out when my first round of potential colors was too dark, but I got an email yesterday about a 40% off sale at a local paint store and that was just the kick in the butt I needed. Painted two more swatches, picked the one I liked best, and bought two gallons of paint today. Et voila.

Adelaide had her first unchaperoned DATE last weekend: Kung Fu Panda 4. This new boy is into acting instead of sports like the previous boy. The one before that was a musician. Seems like Adelaide is sampling all the different sorts of boys. And why not.

I need to buy a new bathing suit before this summer, probably before Las Vegas next month, and ooooof. I don’t wanna. Ugh. The worst. I think I’m going to order a few different options online so I can be horrified in the comfort of my own home.

Speaking of, I went dress shopping today for that Vegas wedding, and dear god. We MUST all band together and fix dressing room lighting once and for all. I mean, do you want me to buy something or spend the rest of the day despising myself? It’s very unclear.

Last night, a VERY large spider crawled over Adelaide’s book as she was reading it and then ran across her bed and under her pillow. She . . . was not brave about it.

I made a very impulsive decision yesterday. A jewelry store here was having an inventory reduction sale (moving locations) and Saturday was an additional not-insignificant percentage off on diamond stud earrings. So I bought a nice pair in a very respectable cut and clarity to save for Adelaide’s college graduation or when she turns 21, etc. It feels a little silly considering she’s only 13, but it was a good deal (according to my hasty googling) and I figure by the time she’s done with college I may not have much money for an expensive gift. Now I just have to figure out where to keep them until then.

NFA is the absolute best. (And yet somehow keeps getting better?!) He’s ruining the curve for all other men. Absolutely destroying it. I get to see him in Vegas in three weeks, here and Asheville at the end of May, and then (as a post-birthday present) he’s taking me to St. Martin/Maarten in July and I. CANNOT. WAIT. There will be monkeys (MONKEYS!!!) and tropical birds and nude beaches and we’re staying in this beautiful little place way up in the rainforest with amazing views and have I mentioned how excited I am?!?!

[ivory0]

# betty

♫ You heard the rumors from Inez You can't believe a word she says Most times, but this time it was true ♪ plot : A figment of Mile's worst intentions.

1 → 2 ( coming soon )

"Are you really sure about this?" Gwen Asked Mile's in a soft and crisp voice looking hesitant of herself when she thought of you.

It was summer, august to be exact. Mile's was on summer break as his school year had ended. Mile's hand traveled from Gwen's hips to her waist as he held her close to him.

"Yeah.. We weren't really serious about the whole thing.." Mile's breathed out slowly as his voice was pushed to a little whisper.

Before the could get any closer, Gwen's dimensional travel watch flickered, indicating another call from another dimension as Gwen sighed.

"See you soon.. Spider-man..?" Gwen asked with a light giggle at the end of her sentence as Mile's lips curved up into a grin. "Yeah." Soon enough, Gwen had sneaked out of Mile's bedroom through his window as Miles sighed.

Time went by as Miles laid on his bed, scrolling through his phone until his fingers clicked on Spotify. As he scrolled through his playlists, one playlist stood out to him the most, the one you had made just for him as his mind forced him to think about the infidelity he was participating in as his mind geared to a few memories.

"Do you think this would look good on me, Miles?" You asked as you put swatches of a dark lipstick on your skin, thinking deeply about your choice as your eyebrows scrunched up.

Miles noticed how concentrated you were in your thoughts before he squished on of your cheeks with his free hand, the other holding your shopping bags as he chuckled.

"You know my answer already, Ma." Miles said with a grin. "Anything and everything looks good when you wear it."

You playfully hit him with a smile creeping up on your face due to his words. "Don't play 'round with me too much, Morales."

Then she showed up, Gwen stacy. Mile's soon-to-be dilemma. They clicked instantly, I mean- who else could you talk to about this kind of top secretive spider stuff to? Each other right?

Gwen is one of the only people who actually know about Mile's true identity, one could even say that she practically knew everything.

But she didn't really do anything to personally help Miles whenever he was actually going through something. Or at least she didn't patch him up like you did.

That's right, You snuck him a literal eraser including a math's formula during a test because he didn't know there was gonna be a test.

You silently patched him up whenever he was injured from his duties as spider-man, not asking him questions about how he received them as he asked you to stop worrying, you did.

You waited patiently for him to open up to you, not wanting to make him feel pressured but will he ever tell you what was actually going on?

At first, You were oblivious to the summer affair Miles had going on, chasing two girls at the same time. You and your friends were on facetime talking about anything until suddenly one of your friends mentioned a certain rumour about Miles, Mostly about his affair as you slowly connected the dots from his unresponsive and strange but nervous behavior towards you to many more antics.

Usually you didn't believe in the rumours you heard from this particular friend but you had a feeling- No, knew that this time, it was true.

Summer had passed by as it was time for a new school year, Miles's face was currently in a merged expression of surprise and bewilderment as he stared at Ganke. "She changed her homeroom?" Miles finally asked as his voice sounded surprised and disappointed.

[milkweedman]

Howdy! I'm so glad the bag is going well. Do you have a post where you talk about how you go about felting them?

To be entirely honest, I just throw my soon-to-be-felted object in the washer and dryer. I've found that unless its very large it needs other things in the wash with it, so i usually add in a towel or two. The washer in my current place has settings for water temp (I choose the hot then cold option for maximum felting) as well as settings for agitation level (I usually choose the most agitation).

When it comes out of the washer its rarely fully felted and will look limp and not great if you dont also run it thru the dryer, or else continue felting it in the wash. For the dryer, it again needs other things in the dryer with it. Towels are great.

Sometimes I will run an object through a full wash/dry cycle and then decide it could be more felted and throw it in again on the same or gentler settings, depending on how much more it needs to felt.

You might be concerned about over felting your piece and ending up with a hard tiny piece of wool...I would certainly test your washer/dryer setup with a swatch at least the first time to see what it does, but in my experience felting a piece takes a lot of time and energy, way more than you'd expect, and none of the washer/dryers ive used have taken it from "beautiful airy piece" to "hard lump" even after repeated washes. Im sure it depends on the machines to a point, and on the wool.

The other thing of note is that while you CAN call it day after washer/dryer and still get a much more robust piece, theres additional steps you can do to further process it--brushing it and then ironing it again. That's how any sort of hard felt is usually made. Lots of steam and pressure with an iron after pulling extra fibers to the surface. I don't often do this so I don't have much to say about it.

Also--knitting likes to lose its stitch structure during felting, meaning it will often turn out without much visual texture. Weaving can do this as well. Not as practiced a weaver so I don't want to say too much, but it seems both wool knitting and weaving can lose visible stitch structure.

Crochet on the other hand does not do this. Because it is made of small knots rather than a flatter, more web like structure, what happens is that the knots tighten and get smaller, but typically the holes do not fill in. Maybe they would do that with brushing and ironing, haven't tried it on an open crochet piece. But felted crochet has a pretty different feel from felted weaving and knitting. I like to crochet wool bags because they're easy to make and strong, and felting them adds further strength and durability, but it doesnt turn them into solid objects like felting a knit bag does. Even single crochet (us terms) will kind of just get smaller and a little harder but not necessarily more solid. Just something to keep in mind.

[irisintheafterglow]

More Than It Seams (Chapter 3)

summary: you're a hero costume tech working for one of the biggest fashion companies in quirk society, and the days until the most important fashion event of the year are dwindling fast. if you weren't stressed enough, a certain half-and-half hero keeps appearing with rips in his suit. (pro!todoroki x reader)

word count: 3k

cw/tags: swearing, mentions of needles, probably inaccurate fashion design vocabulary, strangers to lovers, no specified pronouns for reader, mentions of food/eating, mention of character death/disappearance, arguing, working to exhaustion, hurt/comfort to angst

note: ohoho rising action + sassy shoto

likes/reblogs/feedback are appreciated :)

You spend the weekend texting back and forth with Shoto, with most of the conversation revolving around his Hero Ball appearance. You’d send a design sketched on a coffee shop napkin or an embroidery swatch held up to the light of your apartment with your pajama-clad roommate in the background; initially, he would respond with several messages detailing his thoughts on your idea, but it soon devolved into a one-word acknowledgment followed by a picture of a cat he had seen on patrol, or a flowerbed he found pretty. Eventually, your text chains stopped becoming work-related altogether, replaced by “Look at this cat,” “Have you eaten yet?” and “Let me know when you’re home safe,” and you weren’t sure who’d sent what message first. To date, one of your favorite interactions with him began with a message reading “Can I call you real quick? I have an important question.” Standing in the kitchen prepping dinner, you tuck the phone between your shoulder and your ear. 

“Shoto?”

“Hi,” he said softly. It sounded like he was smiling, and imagining the little quirk in the corner of his mouth made your heart feel light. 

“What’s going on? Are you safe?” 

“I’m fine, I promise. Do you know anything about cats?”

You leaned against the counter, throwing a hand towel over your shoulder as you reached for a spice from the top cabinet. “I mean, my roommate has one, but I don’t take care of it much. Why?”

“There’s a stray outside your office. It looks sad.” 

“Oh, poor baby. Does it have a tag?”

There was a slight crunching noise on Shoto’s end and you held back a chuckle as you heard him whisper gentle encouragement for the cat to come closer. “Uh, no. No tag.” 

“Okay, do you think you could call someone to bring it somewhere safe, then?”

“Why do you think I called you?” You blinked, dumbfounded. He wanted you to take care of the cat? The realization must have dawned on him at the same time it did for you. “Actually, I’m not sure why I called you.” You couldn’t help laughing as you imagined the puzzled look on his face, head tilted and staring down at some random cat in the alley by your building. “I’m sorry for bothering you, I don’t know why I–” The phone nearly drops from your grip as you panic to keep him on the line. 

“No, no. Don’t be sorry. It’s alright. I like listening to your voice.” The last part slips out before you could stop it, and smug pride radiated from the other side of the phone. “Shut up.” You pinch the bridge of your nose. 

He gives you that choked laugh and you grin like an idiot, covering your face even though you’re the only one home. “I didn’t say anything.”

“I can hear your stupid smirk.” 

“Would you prefer to continue listening to my pleasing voice, then?” He must have left the cat by your office, as the phone picked up a noise that sounded like the blowing wind. You figured he was probably heading home for the night or grabbing dinner. 

“I’d prefer you get your head out of your ass and answer my question from earlier,” you quip, pulling a knife from the block and chopping carrots into small chunks. 

There’s a moment of silence from Shoto, and you worry that your service is starting to glitch out. “What was the question?”

“If you could come in Monday afternoon so I can measure you real quick for your Hero Ball suit.” 

“Does Monday at 1:00 work?”

“Sure, but if I can ask, why so late? You tend to show up around 11:30.”

Oh, he was definitely getting a big ego now. “Do you pay attention to the exact time I arrive?” The chopped carrots aggressively plop into the pot as you all but throw them in at Shoto’s sass. 

“Only because you appear at the same time on the dot, like some weirdly programmed cyborg.”

“I assure you I am not a cyborg. But I would like to take you to lunch again on Monday, the same place as Friday.”

“Is that gonna be the first date, then?” Waves of heat brush against your hands as you stir the pot with a wooden spoon. 

“Absolutely not. It’s another–”

“Business meeting. Got it.” The spoon clanks against the edge of the pot as you rid it of excess sauce. 

“Are you cooking?”

“Mhmm.”

“What’s for dinner?”

“My roommate got these, like, free instant curry packets from work, so I’m trying one of those tonight.” 

“Huh. Sounds…interesting.” Your face is hit with hot steam as you pop open the lid to the rice cooker and scoop yourself a serving. 

“Are you making fun of me for eating junk food, Shoto?” 

“That’s not what I said.” 

“Responding with ‘interesting’ is a kind way of telling me you don’t approve of my meal choice.”

“Well, that I could have just told you outright.” 

“Go away and leave me to my curry.” 

“Don’t you mean your processed powder with enough fat to warm the North Pole?” 

“I didn’t ask for your sass tonight, Todoroki.” A low hum is all you hear from the other end, and you smirk at your temporary victory of catching Shoto off-guard. “Now, if you’ll excuse me. I have some very pressing streaming service matters to attend to.” 

“For your sake, I hope it tastes good.”

“I hate you.”

“No, you don’t.” You roll your eyes and hang up on him, snuggling into your couch and fighting down the overwhelmingly happy feelings in your chest. 

Monday morning, the elevator doors ding at 11:30 exactly, and you can’t help but raise your eyebrows in amusement at him. He’d stopped bringing in parts of his suit for you to fix, and your staff came to expect the sound of the elevator every day like it was part of their routine too. The doors would sound, and your designer would swear under his breath, remarking how late in the morning it was already without looking at the clock. 

“You ready?”

“Yeah, just give me one sec. Need to finish this panel.” You glance up at him briefly with an excited look in your eye as you nod over to the sketch of his trenchcoat. Without any direction, his long fingers stretch themselves next to yours as he holds down the template panel you’d been cutting into the sleek black base fabric. Careful to account for seam allowance, you finish the large panel that would come to be the back of the coat. 

Lunch is just as easy and comfortable as it was on Friday, and you spend the entire time talking about mundane things that had no connection to your work. It was nice, spending time with him and being allowed to talk about other things besides work. You’d told him how your roommate was speechless that he’d taken you to lunch, and he needlessly corrected you when she said you’d gone on a date with a pro hero. 

“I know you don’t consider it a date, but everyone else in society would beg to differ.”

“Let them beg, then. I’m still right.” He sat back and crossed his arms, and it took all your willpower not to stare at the corded muscle pressing out from beneath his suit. 

It was much harder, however, a few hours later when you had to run measuring tape on them, close enough to Shoto to smell his rich cologne. He’d agreed to help you keep track of the measurements so you didn’t need to keep running back and forth to your pen and paper. A measurement would come out of your mouth and be repeated like a broken record by Shoto until you’d successfully scribbled it on a Post-It. 

All was going well until you had to measure the length from one shoulder to the other. He’d been the model of a perfect listener up until that point, when you were eye-to-eye and close enough to feel each other’s breath. You stutter out some number in inches and briskly walk over to your Post-It note, only to find Shoto frozen and slightly pinker around his high carved cheekbones. 

“Shoto? Did you hear me?”

“What? Sorry, I was…distracted.” You huff out a sigh and stand near him again, focusing on trying to read the number ticks and ignoring the way Shoto’s breath had sped up when you were nearer. He was so warm, and the muscle beneath your fingers was so sturdy that you wanted to bite it. You blinked the thought from your mind, trying not to think about being in Shoto’s proximity like this all the time. He wasn’t helping much, either. Unconsciously, his hand brushed up to pick a stray hair from your face and tuck it behind your ear, before clearing his throat and repeating the measurement you announced. 

“Perfect. That’s about all I need then if you have any other questions for me?”

“No, I believe that’s it.” You head toward the gate to walk him to the elevator, but you hear him rummage around in his belt for something behind you. “Wait, I almost forgot. These are for you.” He hands you a small box, and upon opening it you’re hit with the enticing aromas of curry, true curry– the kind you get in restaurants, not from a packet your roommate stole from her office. Tiny baggies of turmeric, cumin, garlic, and pepper sat neatly in the box with a card detailing different recipes and how much of each spice to use. 

“Shoto, this is– I can’t accept this.” 

“Why not?”

“You didn’t need to buy anything for me.” 

“I know I didn’t need to, but I wanted to.” You stutter out a thank-you and he gives you that small smile, eyes soft. “I figured that it’s better than what you were making the other night.” It surprised you that he’d remembered such a mundane conversation, much less would buy you something because of it. As he left and shot you that same dumb thumbs-up when the doors closed, your staff gave you knowing looks that you purposefully pretended not to see. 

Tuesday sang the same tune, Shoto taking you to lunch and shooting the shit for a needed break, but you’d started staying at work longer and longer into the night to get looks done on time. Though it was efficient to keep working outside of true opening hours, you knew it was getting extreme when both your roommate and your other designer said you look like a ghoul. It wasn’t that you wanted to work yourself to near-exhaustion; it was the only way you could have the pieces ready for Saturday without all of M’s vast resources. Your team was working themselves to the bone, too, and as the one M left in charge, you felt responsible for taking care of whatever they missed. 

“Hi, this is the stand-in supervisor for M; please give our office a call at your earliest convenience. Thank you.” You set down the phone and rubbed your eyes, leaning against M’s desk made of ridiculously vibrant bright pink plastic. Wednesday had proved to be chaotically uneventful, and you fought the urge to throw one of M's fake gold plants through the window. M’s office was separated from the rest of the work area, a small room with a closable door for privacy and a soft couch for when she needed “me time.” There were two soft thuds on the door before the other designer peeked his head in. 

“Knock knock, your boyfriend’s here.” 

You elected to ignore his implication. “What are the chances he brought the food here?”

“Very likely. Take a look.” As the door fully opened, you took in the sight of Shoto in his pro costume carrying a plastic take-out bag. The smell wafted to you and made your empty stomach rumble. It was like he’d read your mind, like he’d known that you couldn’t be pulled away from work for lunch anymore. He was so thoughtfully good. 

“Hey,” you say, giving him a tired smile. His eyebrows dip briefly as he takes in the bags under your eyes and your sore voice, but schools his face into blankness as he raises the bag of food. 

“I figured you wouldn’t have time for lunch.” 

“You figured correctly.” 

“Is it alright if I stop by and drop this off, then?” 

“You can’t stay?”

“Unfortunately not. My agency is preparing a raid and it took a lot of string pulling to get away for an hour.” 

“I appreciate you thinking about me.”

“Of course.” His hands delicately untie the knot of the bag handles, placing separate containers of soup and cold soba noodles on top of each other. “It’s your usual.” 

“Thank you, Shoto. I’m really happy you had time to visit.”

“What time do you get off tonight?” 

“Technically 5:00–”

“But they’ve been staying later!” Your fellow designer’s voice calls out from behind you, and you resist the urge to scold him for eavesdropping. You give him an incredulous look and are met with nods of sympathy from the rest of your seamstresses. 

“I’m fine! It’s not that late, a few hours at most–” 

“You texted me at 11:00 last night saying you were finishing up, and you clocked in at 6:40 this morning” his voice called again and you sighed in defeat. Whatever he was doing, he was determined to expose your messed up schedule to Shoto, who was looking at you in a way where you could see the gears in his brain turning. 

“I have to go. I’ll see you at 5:00.” His voice almost sounded…frustrated?

“Wait, no–” 

“Don’t. It’s not safe for you to go home alone at that time of night, and you look like you need rest.” 

Maybe it was the lack of sustenance in your stomach or maybe it was the restless night of sleep you’d had, but your words had more venom laced in them than you ever intended. “You don’t get to tell me what to do. This is my job.”

“And it’s my job to make sure you’re safe. We’re not having this conversation right now.” He turns sharply on his heel, avoiding eye contact with you infuriatingly as you fight back the urge to cry. 

For the rest of the day, you isolate yourself and disassociate into your work, running your thumb along fabric edges until it’s red from overuse and then switching to the other thumb. The world becomes white noise while you hand-sew beading, embroider great blue waves, rib corsets, and trim tassels. The quiet goodbyes from your staff run through one ear and out the other, including the apology from your other designer. You merely nodded, refocusing on the flowing ruffles of Pinky’s sleeves. 

The elevator dinging is louder when you are the only one in the office, and Shoto’s steps echo through the space as he approaches you, on the ground with your head in your hands as you mentally work through how to add sheer detailing to Dynamight’s jacket that had already been finished days ago. His stylist had finally left your office a message, communicating that Bakugo wanted something more breathable that could show off his muscles. Your face scrunched in dismay at the sudden change in plans, and you’d sat on the floor for ten minutes just imagining how you could pull it off. 

“It’s 5:00.” Shoto’s voice is even and patient, with no indication of your earlier confrontation. 

“I know,” you breathe, your voice barely a whisper as you shake your head. 

“I’m gonna take you home.”

“I know.” You finally look up to see his hand stretched out to you, helping you off the floor and allowing your hand to rest on his arm as he walks you out. The walk to your apartment is mostly silent, and you let your eyes take in the fading lights of the sunset, and how they reflected off Shoto’s face and hair. 

“I’m sorry for snapping at you earlier,” you say as you approach your apartment complex.

“It’s alright. I’m just worried about you. Like it or not, it’s my job to keep you safe; mentally, physically, emotionally, anything.” Despite your exhaustion, your heart still flutters at his concern. “Can I ask why you’re so worried about the ball, anyway? What you’ve created for me and everyone else is awe-inspiring.” 

You give him a wry smile. “I appreciate your appreciation, but I truly thought this year was finally gonna be the year I split off from M since I’m designing most of her stuff anyway. But I’m scared that if I form my own company, all our clients will stay with M because she’s a more established brand.”

“You have me.” He stops, turning to look at you on the sidewalk outside of your building. 

“Thanks, Shoto, but I–”

“I’ll tell my friends to work with you, too.” 

“No, wait, you don’t need to do that–”

“I know I don’t. But I want to.” You laugh in disbelief at his childish insistence, and his mouth quirks in that way you’d fallen in love with. You’d fallen in love with him. 

“You know, you’re really stubborn sometimes.” 

“I’m not stubborn; I just get what I want.” His eyes flick down to your lips and his fingers brush another stray hair from your face, gently tucking it behind your ear. Delirious, you unapologetically scanned his face, committing it to memory. You could tell he was doing the same to yours. Tension stretched between you two the longer you stayed there, unmoving on the sidewalk. There was an urgent need in your heart to kiss him, hold him close until you fell asleep with nothing to worry about but each other. 

But, that isn’t how life works. 

An alarm sounded from his phone in his back pocket, and he looked back up at you regretfully. He opens his mouth to say something, but you beat him to it. 

“Go. It’s okay.” Your hand gently caresses the side of his face, running your thumb over his scar. It was like his body was torn between staying with you and rushing to whatever emergency was happening. “I’m okay,” you assure him, sticking your thumb up encouragingly. What began as an embarrassing reminder of your first meeting had evolved into a secret joke between you and Shoto, guaranteed to make both of you smile and feel better every time. Without another word, he takes off down the street, ice blowing a frigid wind in his wake. You fall onto the couch in your apartment and cover your eyes with your forearm, finally processing that you could be considered close friends maybe even more with a pro hero.

But Shoto doesn’t come in at 11:30 on Thursday. 

Shoto doesn’t walk you home at 5:00. 

Shoto doesn’t answer any of your calls or messages at any point during that day. 

Shoto doesn’t see you crumple to your knees when you read the headline on TV:

“Pro Hero Shoto: Missing, Presumed Dead.”

[theplottdump]

📩 Simblr question of the day: It's time to appreciate the small things! What's a small detail from one of your posts that you love? Could be a small tattoo on a sim, specific clutter in a sims' room, a little detail in a render or screenshot, whatever is applicable to you

(p.s. I've been scouring simblr, and I've noticed people don't like how picky SQOTD feels, so please! Share around SQOTD asks, anon or not, I'm only one person and can't find and ask every person on simblr ~ 💛)

First off- Bless you anon for spreading so much love. You're seriously a joy and I can't believe you're getting flack for that. I'll see if I can slip some more of these into some more inboxes for you.

Secondly- AHH like A LOT OF STUFF wehh I'll stick it below a cut cause its dumb, specific and I'm not going to be normal about it and also old spoilers for past arcs!

MUSEUM HEIST

Leanne's lil transition from- 'there's a man watching you' to 'oh you know him' 😏😏😏

Throughout their first confrontation I slowly had the boys get closer and closer together as they spoke.

I converted, cleaned up and retextured this pistol for this arc and I have used it incessantly since as my main spy pistol. I wanted a vintage WW2 pistol similar to the one Lupin the Third uses.

CONSEQUENCES AND FUNERALS

LOL at tiny background Val and Leanne being dramatic creeps

HAPPY WINTERFEST

Leanne jumpscare that scared the pants off me in real life taking these pictures. She had an action queued up to talk to Chad so whenever he wasn't in the middle of an action she'd get steadily closer like a FNAF animatronic

but from her perspective ^

this sequence is actually a giant dumb animation I made, the first one I ever tried! I wanted to do a soft lil yearning scar touch.

HANDS!!

CASINO HEIST

I had to handpaint every shot this ring appears in at the beginning cause the accessory I had in was sooooo thin and shitty (before and after ^)

Chad mentions Poppy needs to stop telegraphing her moves so clearly after they have a conversation about UNIT always getting the leg up on them.

I liked this final shot as a transition into the main story as well as a way to highlight the principal cast for the arc! (Also like, so many hand placed pins. AND Chad and Poppy's sexy calendar (which should be set to feburary but the feb swatch has her mother on it sakjdkajd))

Shots with both sets of characters in them my beloved. ( I never ended up using that last one tho rip )

When Poppy mentions she has some errands to run you can see the UNIT building in the background of the shot.

Val mentions thinking he's losing his mind because he swore he smelled Chad's cologne the day before the party- because they were in the same elevator minutes apart!

Not only is the Starlight drop dead gorgeous and a whole chunk of @doctorsimcraft's soul, I also made a custom animated sign, portraits, ceiling lightbulbs and room numbers for it.

Oh god I ran out of picture space. I'll probably do a part 2 then ahh- theres still some fun stuff. SEE I TOLD YOU I WASN'T GONNA BE NORMAL ABOUT IT

PART 2 👈

[annakie]

Fixing The House Part Eleven - Big Bang Room (B)

ICYMI, Part A was posted Yesterday. This is just a continuation of that post. Sorry about the split!

So when we last left off...

It's August, 2024

Turning things into a full house renovation took awhile, honestly we just kept adding one more littleish thing... but then OK one more big thing.

It had started in this room with just getting some lights put in. I think I said it before but here, in this front room, the ONLY LIGHTING was the ancient ceiling fan in the dining room and a single lamp on my desk.

So Arturo first put in the can lights with a dimmer switch, hell that was in late July.

Early August we made the deal for the new ceiling fan for free when he put in the can lights in the dining room, removed the ancient fan, and also I paid him to put in the ceiling fans in the bedrooms/living room.

It was real weird having light in here, especially when the windows went in.

IGNORE THE CHAOS, it's gonna get BETTER.

For awhile, I was trying to decide between replacing the old laminate from 2009 and getting new kitchen cabinet doors.

Both were in about the same state, still functional but with alot of problems. The cabinets wouldn't cost as much buuuuuttttttttt...

I'd settled on doing the floors, because in the hallway, at the intersection of the kitchen and living room/old office, that little bit is so heavily trafficked that the 10-year lifespan on the very cheap laminate had long expired and the planks were separating from each other. I wish I'd had taken a picture.

Also, a couple of times when the AC had frozen over, plus the AC problems that were detailed out way back in Part 5, water had seeped into those planks and they'd swollen and warped a bit, there was obvious damage and it had just gotten worse the previous month with all those problems.

So I decided to get new flooring over new cabinets*. (Remember this asterisk, we'll get back to it in like, two or three updates from now.)

Arturo had the HOOK UP to get me some high-quality flooring and a steep discount. Labor would cost about as much as the flooring itself.

Spent about a day mulling over my choices in flooring.

Decided on the greyish one right in the middle there.

I wanted something that would go with everything, and most of my house was done in colors from the "Neutral" section of my BFF, the Sherwin-Williams Color Swatch Book. I wasn't a huge fan of grey laminate before this, but honestly, I am now, at least this one.

After I picked it, Arturo turned and looked at me very seriously, then said "What are we going to do about this?" and pointed at...

See those paint splatters on The Thing? When my 2nd roommate lived here around 2004 the day I was painting the inside of The Thing yellow, her cat Felix somehow jumped into the paint pan, got paint over about 25% of himself, and then ran through the house before I could catch him.

I DID catch him, and spent the rest of the night bathing the paint off of him for like hours, until he stopped cooperating. I called pet poison control to make sure he wouldn't die. It took DAYS to get all the paint off him after it dried. He ended up fine! But the paint on The Thing had long since dried by the time I gt back to it. I didn't have any black paint at that point and would have to get some. Anyway, 20 years later, and the yellow splats were still there, a reminder of Felix. He was a good cat.

----

I mean, I already knew the answer to Arturo's question, no doubt, but the way he was looking at me was like "If you don't tell me we're knocking this abomination down then I'm going to be very mad at you."

"YES. GET RID OF IT, PLEASE!" I told him. "Quickly, get it out of my siiiiiiiiight!"

Well it took a little bit of time, we were in the middle of a lot of other things.

Then August 23rd came. Arturo showed up with a van full of flooring, a couple of boxes and a stack of newspapers. He brought 3 of his guys with him, a father and his two sons, and also his usual painter and apprentice, Janarie.

The four of them spent the morning emptying out my office and dining room around me while I worked at my desk. They took great care in wrapping up all my dishes in newspaper, not a single thing was harmed in the process. They moved all my furniture except my work desk and chair into either the garage or living room.

Cleaning out the garage halfway back in July was a lot of work but... such a great decision. Could not have done this without all the work I did back then. My dining room table did have to live on the patio for a couple of nights, but it came out of that experience fine.

I remembered what a pain in the ass it had been when I got new flooring back in 2009, so I took a few precautions like labeling the from and to for every wire in and out of my receiver/stereo system. Honestly I did quite a bit of work the day or two before they started, but had limited time.

I'd packed and moved all my RPG books from that bookshelf.

And...

Why was that one part of it smooth? We don't know. The bricks were whole there, they just like, started sanding them down then stopped for some reason, maybe? IT IS A MYSTERY.

Also, yeah, I really needed to dust, but dust was EVERYWHERE during the renovation all the time so I just let stuff pass. Especially putting in the new windows, they had to grind down some of the brick on a couple of the places so there was pink brick dust especially in the Living Room and Guest Room.

I had packed up The Thing and moved all its stuff to the Living Room.

The next day, August 23rd, like 21 years and 2 weeks after buying the house...

The shelves came off first. You can see the peach the wall originally was there on the side, that was the color the holes were before I painted them to match the DR walls. The top of the brick was also painted that peach. Which tells us that rather than knocking The Thing down, the shelves were a LATER ADDITION TO IT.

Why, just whyyyyy?

But the guys took such good care with knocking the Thing down. No debris went flying.

We'd left my desk still in the room as you'll see in a minute, and they were super careful to not let anything fly at it and hit it.

I just sat there and watched the guys work with a grin on my face the whole time. :D

Y'all.... look at that beautiful pile of BRICKS!

The first pic I took of the room... being ONE ROOM.

The guys took the bricks outside. One tiny little annoyance is that the city wouldn't haul bricks away, and honestly, fine. Some pickers came and took most of them, which is also great.

But like, there's still a few out by my curb and I've asked a couple of Arturo's guys to make sure they get hauled away and uh, they haven't yet.

Anyway,

It was super fun when the guys left that night and the cats came to investigate What's New?

They were both PERPLEXED at the lack of not only the stuff, but The Thing! They both ended up hanging out in the brand new empty space that night. :D

The next day, Arturo filled the empty space with cement.

We discussed what to do with the walls. Arturo said if we wanted to get rid of the paneling it'd delay things a bit and add on a cost to fix the walls and make them look good again. Or we could just patch up the newly exposed wall where the Thing was, and paint the paneling.

TBH, I'd spent the evening while the cats were enjoying the new space literally staring at the room for an hour or two deciding what to do.

We'd do this.

---

The flooring started going in, just right on top of the old flooring.

Yeah, I started to love it when I saw it come together.

I brought my laptop into the bedroom and worked while they did this. The electronics on my desk got unplugged and the desk moved to the Dining Room side while they put in the flooring on the Office side, then moved back.

A few other little improvements happened around this time, too.

I'd talked before about my lack of storage causing a clutter problem. One of those things as not having space for my small appliances, so they were either cluttering up the countertops or some were living on the dining room table. I took care of that problem.

The wood thing is my cat food storage area. It had been against another wall, but fit here well, that's where it lives now.

I also bought a new shoe rack for the entryway so they wouldn't just get kicked into a big pile, and I now drink like, a lot of protein shakes For Reasons, and they get stored on top of the rack, though I might let them live in the garage now that it's cooling down.

Also at this point decided to get rid of the green coat rack in the Dining room entryway, and the green shelf I'd put up had fallen down in the middle of the night after 20ish years of service and hadn't gotten put back up. It never would.

New stuff was bought.

Really, I made a decision early on in the process to start confronting all the Little Problems About My House that Made Life Suck a Little More, and either see if Arturo could fix them or find a way to fix them myself. And all of the things I just talked about were indicative of those Little Problems. I fixed the small appliance and shoe piles myself, and put up a nicer coat rack. A lot more Little Problems got foisted to Arturo for more skilled solutions required.

I ended up calling these my "Arturo, can we...?"s

Hilariously, the curtains had come down in order to paint the walls and not get in the way of the flooring going in. the curtains and rods were buried where I couldn't get to them, and new rods were going in ANYWAY. I realized when everyone left the night the flooring went in that my front windows were wide open to the world.

Luckily, we had lots of extra newspapers laying around.

Was literally like this for like 2 nights, haha. Eventually all the things here that need painting got painted.

---

The day after the new flooring went in, the room got painted.

I was really nervous about my color choices. The thing is that these colors had to work well with the darker wood of my furniture, the copper dishes and such I had, and the pink that the office was painted, which we're about to get to.

As soon as I saw the colors together, I knew I'd done well.

Rainwashed on top. Underseas on bottom. Blue-ish greens with water themed names.

Painting was still in progress at this point, but honestly every time I turned around and looked at this, my breath was taken away.

It was so different. So light. So fresh.

SO NICE.

When Arturo got there later that day he walked in and was like "You know, I thought maybe we were making a mistake not getting rid of the paneling, but this was the right decision. This is really nice."

I thought so, too.

It's so BRIGHT in here. Not dark and muted at all. Windows that light get through. Overhead light that works. Bright colors.

I already loved it so much.

The other half of the room....

OK look, before I'd decided on the flooring, Arturo had had Janarie re-paint the pink of the room. We'd fixed the wall with the weird line and had painted it, then finished the repaint like a week prior to this. Same pink.

We'd also repainted the "Star Wars Poster" wall, the one that had been the Blue-Silver (Silver Trophy) color in here that day. This pic was taken before the office flooring was finished, you can see way at the end there, and the Silver Trophy is still on the wall on the right. So at first I thought we'd just paint the walls that had been yellow to the new greens.

As soon as I saw the green next to the Silver Trophy, I asked them to keep painting.

But I really loved the pink in the office half, and despite Arturo near-begging me to paint it green (Rainwashed), for a few days I told him no.

But then, every time I looked at this, or even more so at the reverse angle with it green on one side of the door and pink on the other, which was the view every time you walked down the hallway... my stomach churned. Yeah, it didn't look good.

But also I wanted my pink.

A day or two later, I made a decision.

A compromise. I look at that wall (and now out that window) all day. I'd keep my one pink wall, everything else went Rainwashed.

A controversial decision, and I don't think Arturo will ever QUITE be over still having that wall pink, he's still hinted at me we could paint it Rainwashed still... but nah. It's how I want it. :)

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It took a few days to get everything back into the room, and that was partially because I took the time to declutter as we went.

Some stuff I set aside for friends who could use it. A lot of stuff got left out on the curb and taken by someone before trash day. And every week the city large / overflow trash truck has stopped and hauled extra junk and/or construction materials away for the last several weeks.

And also, this space also just became the Project and Storage Room.

Sometimes there were so many boxes in this space that walking through it was a maze.

What IS that huge Box Fry is on, anyway?

We'll get back to that in a post or three.

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This is FINE. I could live like this a couple of weeks. New coatrack went up (I did it myself!), new floating shelves. The three china cabinets rearranged to new positions without having a stupid Thing to work around. The little hutch covered up the old Thing wall. Arturo did a good job, put paneling all the way to the door, and patched the wall. He had to use a different little rail at the top of the paneling, for some reason he couldn't find an exact match to the 60 year old trim that was there? Huh. You can still tell a little that something is wonky there, but you absolutely CAN'T with a hutch covering the spot! More on that later.

On the reverse angle, I put the nice speakers my dad gave me up on shelves on the wall, out of the way. The bookshelf got sorted through and a bunch of trashy novels got tossed out of it. Some I didn't watch anymore, plus a few box sets of TV shows got put into a new CD wallet and their cases tossed to save space.

My D&D 3.0, 3.5 and 4e books got moved into the big bookcase. so my more modern-era gaming books could be on the main gaming bookcase.

Ah yes, so much cool gaming stuff. So little of it have I used for gaming.

And as you can see, a new little media shelf and the stuff from the Thing got moved here. I think Arturo hated this too, haha, but it's my stuff and I want it out where I can appreciate it. Every one of those stuffed animals was given to me by someone special, every knick knack also given to me by someone I'd want to remember or has a significance attached to it. And of course, pictures of my family.

The surge-protected plug on its own circuit that my PC and work laptop are plugged into are behind there, which is why there's wires coming out at the bottom center, a hole was cut in the backing so the shelf could be pretty flush with the wall.

And... what is that on the very bottom left corner?

Yeah... I kept one brick of The Thing, to remind me always of what was and what never shall be again.

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TRIM TALK TIME!

Now, let's talk about the world's most exciting topic... the trim going throughout my house. YEEEAAAAAH! Time for TRIM TALK. You can see a bit of it in the pic above! And if you scroll up to the empty room but my desk pic a few pics above that! And in lots of other pics in the last couple of posts!! TRIM TALK TIME.

OK so when the new flooring in went in here, near the end of the day Arturo was all "You need to pick some trim, I have time to go pick it up before the end of the day."

It was like 3pm on a workday, I had shit to do for work and it'd been the kind of day where I'd had to make a ton of other choices. Remember that every day it wasn't JUST one room that got worked on, lots of rooms were being worked on at the same time, so like that day also I think the master bedroom got painted, I'd had to make some big choices for the kitchen, and I'd been picking out the yellows for the guest room.

My brain was tired of making choices.

I pulled up either the Lowe's or Home Depot website and searched for flooring trim and filtered for what was in stock at the one near me and still saw a shitton of options. My brain short circuited as I stared at the first page.

"Arturo, I do not care about the trim," I turned to him and said. "Can you just pick out something inexpensive that you think would look decent? It doesn't have to be fancy, just not ugly."

Y'all, Arturo and I built a trust really early on. I'd said awhile ago I liked him immediately. And I very quickly trusted his taste. There were several things that I thought I wanted one way and he talked me into doing it another way and in the end, he was right. Like painting most of the room Rainwashed. He was right. There were a couple of color choices he nudged me on and I agreed when it was done. He wouldn't be a dick about it if I made a choice that he didn't agree with, it's my house after all, but also he's been doing this a long time and does a lot of house flips for some of his other clients and knows what he's talking about.

I consulted him and his taste with most everything, and there were some things, like the pink wall, where he knew to just say "not what I would do but it's your decision." and some things he gave me nudges at. It was a great working relationship.

So yeah, I don't give a shit about trim, Arturo. I'm tired. You do it.

He came back either later that day or the next time he was here with this trim and at first I was like woah, that's HUGE trim, but he was like "Trust me."

A few hours later the hallway and then the Dining Room/Office were done and... holy crap it looked GREAT.

The last couple of times I'd gotten new flooring, the company I used just put in the smallest, thinnest, cheapest trim possible. One just used quarter round after putting the trim that was already there back. I didn't care, to me, trim was a non-issue. You barely notice it.

But as soon as I saw the trim Arturo picked out and put in I. FREAKING. LOVED. IT.

After looking at it for like a day I asked him how much it would be to put it in the rest of the house, the ENTIRE HOUSE. Get rid of the old shit, give me THAT. It just subtly elevated the room in a way I didn't expect at all.

So yes, every room has the new trim and all the time I see it and am like "Man, that looks great!"

As the trim went in, Arturo asked me about what color to paint it. At this point I was like "Oh, well, I like the Navajo White cream color that all my trim and doors is painted, just do that again."

Arturo made a face at me, and asked if I was sure, and I was like "Yeah, I like it."

So he went and got one gallon of the special kind of paint for trim and windowsills and stuff.

The next day, his guy Jorge as here to paint the trim. It had come white but Arturo said we wanted a layer of paint on it for protection. So Jorge started painting the hallway trim while I was working. An hour or two later I walked down the hall and was like uhhhh.... he's painting it white? What happened to my cream?

I called Arturo, and told him it was the wrong color, and Arturo called Jorge and pointed him to the right paint. So Jorge had to start painting the hallway a second time.

In the next hour or so, Arturo got here and then went to work in the master bath. A little while later I went to ask him a question and walked down the hall....

....annnnnnnd.... oh shit. The trim WAS now the right color, the creamy white...

...and it looked like shit.

Like just absolutely terrible. Gross. Weird.

It was exactly what I asked for and it was BAD and Arturo was RIGHT.

So I went and got Arturo and we looked at it together and I was like "I hate it."

"I do too."

"So uh......."

"Jorge's going to repaint it white again, yes?"

"Jorge, por favor no muerta me, lo muy, muy siento."

Jorge did look a little bit like he did want to kill me but we also laughed about it.

So for the THIRD TIME that day... Jorge repainted the hallway, white this time.

And then Arturo and I discussed money for repainting every bit of trim, and door, and anything else white. (Except the ceiling.)

And that is how everything is now white in my house once again. And how unless it was something I felt really strongly about, I came to trust Arturo's opinion on pretty much everything.

(The only exception to the white was the Master Bathroom, which we talked about already. Also I should mention that Arturo re-repainted the windowsill and inside of the window hole the Navajo White cream without me asking when he saw it and realized he hadn't told Janarie to NOT paint that after I'd painted it myself, lol. So all is back to being right in the master bath.)

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Knocking on My Front Door

Yeah so the front door was super ugly, as discussed. Pretty early on a new front door was on the docket. Arturo got the door from the main place he got the windows, but when he went to get the front and side windows he didn't make it there until they were almost closing, and so he just snapped a few pictures of doors for me to decide on.

I picked one the next day, but he didn't make it back to the door and window place for a month or so. I was real anxious for the new front door. I had the hardware and smartlock all picked out and ready to go for weeks.

When it got here, I loved it immediately. We had to swap the door to open on the other side since they didn't have the side I had used before in stock, which I was annoyed about until the door got put in and then immediately I realized I liked it better on the left side anyway.

It's SO pretty. It came white but we painted it the same white as the trim for perfect matching.

The glass is triple-paned, one on either side of the star. The star felt like a subtle touch of Texas flair, the only nod to state pride in my house at this point, purposefully. You can see outside and thus inside in a distorted way through the glass so I now have some curtains on the window with a magnetic curtain rod that match the new curtains on the other windows. It's open during the day for more light getting in, and they get closed at night.

Security has been another area the house has had major upgrades. That triple paned glass would be a real pain to get through but not impossible. But it'd be annoying to reach through to unlock the door. I have plans for reinforcing the glass both on the windows and the door even more.

So there's two deadbolts, one of which is a Smart Lock on the door. I also have a doorstop you can see that goes on the door every night.

The door also got Door Armor, which is plates that go over the hinges installed with very long and thick screws, and another very long and tough strike plate on the other side, also reinforced with those really long and tough screws. Makes doors pretty kick-in proof.

Past that, another post I have planned is for general Outside Improvements, including the patio, fence and the other stuff that happened out front.

I love, love, love the new door. The old screen door from the 60s came off, and a Future Plan is a new glass screen door, but the money has run out so that's a thing for the future. This is still a massive security improvement over the old wood door that had a window which already been punched through at least once.

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Couple of other changes.

The green hutch was like, definitely not the right color for this room anymore, so the boxes of my copper dishes sat in the dining room for a few days until I decided what to do with the hutch. I had several ideas on what to paint it, or if I'd just leave it but I knew that would just needle me. Was maybe going to do it white, but that felt like too much white in this room. It was already against a wall with Underseas so I didn't want to add MORE of that color and it didn't feel right for the copper dishes. I thought maybe a grey, but I spent like an hour looking at 49 shades of gray (ha ha) and couldn't pick one I liked well enough.

Finally I went to the Sherwin-Williams website to see what IT thought would look good with Underseas & Rainwashed and both said that this other color, Window Pane would be compatible with each. Honestly, seemed like an even lighter shade of Underseas. Screw it, I decided. I'd get it.

I just went to Sherwin-Williams myself for the first time instead of Arturo going, this was my project. But I did use his account to get the contractor discount on the paint (especially when they tried to sell me a $150 gallon of paint first... lol no. Arturo had told me a gallon was like $30.)

I still paid almost $40 for the gallon and Arturo was annoyed i didn't call him to make sure I got the paint he wanted me to get (but it was like 6pm when I went and I tried really hard to not bug him off-hours, I'm not that kind of client!). I painted the hutch myself the first time and I did it on my own this time, too.

Arturo, Janarie and I all agreed, this color was perfect and the copper dishes look amazing with it. Blends into the room so well while still being a little different than the existing colors, a really nice bridge.

I also painted the little console table that's under the Star Wars poster Underseas. The table itself was looking pretty rough, and I think that also bridges the paneling color into the rest of the dining room well.

I am planning on painting the low-rise RPG bookshelf either Underseas or Window Pane (Probably Underseas) as well, since it's a light color wood and doesn't fit in with all the dark color wood I have. Just haven't gotten to it yet. The paint is on the table still. Maybe next weekend.

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So I'd been planning on posting this tonight because Arturo was supposed to come today and make another couple of small improvements. This is literally the last day he's coming (FOR NOW!) to do the last few bits. When I save back up some money things like that new front screen door and a full ceiling repaint are going to happen.

But stuff happens and Arturo can't come til next week, which is also fine, nothing left is urgent. He has other clients that he makes more money on than me and are way more demanding than me. If I was a jerk I could have hounded him more to get things done faster, normally people were only here working 2 to 4 days every week (including Saturdays but never Sundays), but honestly I liked having 3 or 4 days a week to myself to get work done at work, do my own projects, get the house back in order, and just, you know, rest.

He found a second ceiling fan just like the one he put in the dining room so he's giving it to me (and I'm paying for the install!) so the room is more balanced. There's a few small projects left for him and a few for me and I'm still using the dining room table as the staging area. And my desk is always a bit messy, sorry not sorry. So these pictures below are of the whole thing, and they're from today, but there's still a bit of clutter, as you'll see. But this post is gargantuan, so let's wrap it up. :D

Whew! That's 30 pictures in this post! I wanted to post one or two more gratuitous cat pics but there's no space! Maybe later.

The floating shelves became my little area for tribute to my pets. The picture frame has pics of them all, from my childhood cat Target, to my first cat on my own Sampo, my dog Cebu, My black beauties Jim and Leela, one of my white calico Patchy, and my remaining two, Fry and Pemily. there's one empty slot for a picture of Jim and Leela that printed badly I need to reprint. Sampo, Cebu, Jim and Leela's ashes are all on the floating shelves. Patchy is in the master bedroom where she belongs.

So yeah, still a fan to add over the desk, and if you look way over by the coat rack, there's some wall patching to be done. I need to do something better with the stuff on top of the secretary. Pics of my Niblings on the now-Underseas console table have been blurred on purpose.

This space started as a cramped, dark and divided with the ugliest room divider ever to exist, with old dirty windows and no lighting at all. I never opened the curtains because I didn't want to look at those windows. I was just... kind of ashamed of it all, even if the dining room was... decent... when a bunch of stuff wasn't piled on top of the dining room table.

It's now this big, bright, light space that feels so welcoming and happy. The curtains get opened every morning and stay open until it starts to get dark. I'm excited for people to see it. And in a week or two went the rest of the little projects get finished, the table will be empty, or at least decorated appropriately.

(The dining room chairs have been a bit destroyed by the cats over the last 20 years. That's something to work on fixing in the future when money has recovered, tbh. But I can live with it, for now.)

As far as quality of life improvements go, this and the master bath are the big ones, with the hall bath in third. But none of them are still yet my favorite place in the house now. We'll get to that, eventually.

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Gonna be a few days til my next update, busy end of week and weekend ahead, but I can't wait to show off the rest!