mamaalanna

LITERARY Lolcats!

2008-04-23T03:48:10Z

mamaalanna @ 2008-03-29T19:54:00

2008-03-29T23:55:24Z

see more crazy cat pics

mamaalanna @ 2007-10-24T11:59:00

2007-10-24T15:59:39Z

You are The High Priestess

Science, Wisdom, Knowledge, Education.

The High Priestess is the card of knowledge, instinctual, supernatural, secret knowledge. She holds scrolls of arcane information that she might, or might not reveal to you. The moon crown on her head as well as the crescent by her foot indicates her willingness to illuminate what you otherwise might not see, reveal the secrets you need to know. The High Priestess is also associated with the moon however and can also indicate change or fluxuation, particularily when it comes to your moods.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

mamaalanna @ 2007-05-10T22:13:00

2007-05-11T02:15:47Z

Got a nice check in today's mail. My short story "Child of the Father" will be in the next Sword and Sorceress anthology, due out in late Fall.

You are The Empress

Beauty, happiness, pleasure, success, luxury, dissipation.

The Empress is associated with Venus, the feminine planet, so it represents,
beauty, charm, pleasure, luxury, and delight. You may be good at home
decorating, art or anything to do with making things beautiful.

The Empress is a creator, be it creation of life, of romance, of art or business. While the Magician is the primal spark, the idea made real, and the High Priestess is the one who gives the idea a form, the Empress is the womb where it gestates and grows till it is ready to be born. This is why her symbol is Venus, goddess of beautiful things as well as love. Even so, the Empress is more Demeter, goddess of abundance, then sensual Venus. She is the giver of Earthly gifts, yet at the same time, she can, in anger withhold, as Demeter did when her daughter, Persephone, was kidnapped. In fury and grief, she kept the Earth barren till her child was returned to her.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

Mermaid quilt pictures up

2007-03-10T01:20:56Z

http://home-and-garden.webshots.com/album/558080361FhyAga

This is a quilt for Melisant. I think I've been working on it off and on for three years.

mamaalanna @ 2007-03-04T13:29:00

2007-03-04T18:29:47Z

Check out my Dark Ages profile!

DM of the Rings

2007-02-17T02:09:37Z

It's not finished yet, but what there is is hysterical!
http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?cat=14
Lord of the Rings is more or less the foundation of modern D&D. The latter rose from the former, although the two are now so estranged that to reunite them would be an act of savage madness. Imagine a gaggle of modern hack-n-slash roleplayers who had somehow never been exposed to the original Tolkien mythos, and then imagine taking those players and trying to introduce them to Tolkien via a D&D campaign.

Quilts of Valor

2007-02-01T18:13:07Z

This is a movement that I will be supporting! I have two quilt tops currently in production that I didn't know what to do with when I got done, since they're too big for baby quilts.

With Gratitude In Every Stitch
Supporting our troops with quilts
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dy...3001871_pf.html

With Gratitude In Every Stitch
At Walter Reed, Wounded Troops Find Comfort in Donated Quilts

By Jura Koncius
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 31, 2007; B01

The carefully packed boxes stack up daily in the chaplain's quarters at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, about 50 a week. The instructions read simply: "Please give this to a soldier." Chaplain John L. Kallerson, an Army major, gently opens each one and places the contents around his windowless office. Then he lays his big hands on the piles and says a blessing.

His is the ministry of the quilts.

A phone call to the chaplain four years ago has created a national movement to say thank you to soldiers wounded in the war on terror.

More than 7,900 "comfort quilts," each carefully stitched with love and gratitude, have been sent through the Quilts of Valor Foundation to the wounded soldiers at Walter Reed and 70 other U.S. military medical centers. Kallerson prays over and hands out quilts from church groups, schoolchildren, quilting bees. Quilts made from accomplished artists whose designs sell for thousands. Quilts with bears, fish, basketballs. Quilts with hot-pink flowers for wounded women.

Amish and Mennonites have sent them anonymously. Children at the Colorado School for the Deaf and the Blind have created Braille quilts for soldiers who have lost their sight. Some donors, such as Native Americans who sent quilts bearing warrior symbols, have requested that their quilts be given to kindred spirits. Many have special messages: "You are our hero." "You are very brave."

Some arrive with letters, tapes or prayers.

"This is a gift from the heartland," Kallerson said. "Soldiers get CD players and iPods and DVDs, but this is the greatest gift of all. It comes from people's hearts. This is a simple thank you for your service."

Deborah Francisco, a defense contractor from St. Leonard, spent a year making one with the black and gold Army 1st Cavalry logo. "I hope the soldier who got it feels like someone is thinking of him," Francisco said.

This is how it got started: An accomplished Delaware quilter, Catherine Roberts, contacted Kallerson. She wanted to sew a blue and white Ohio Star quilt and donate it to a wounded service member. For every soldier killed, she knew there were 10 wounded.

"I had this vision in my head of a soldier waking up with horrible flashbacks," said Roberts, 57, a midwife and a quilter for 25 years. "I saw him wrapping himself up in a quilt."

Kallerson talks to a lot of people who want to donate things, but the hospital doesn't have the space or staff to handle them. Still, he was intrigued by Roberts's offer. He had someone in mind, an amputee from Minnesota, who was experiencing phantom pain. He gratefully received the quilt.

Then Roberts realized that she needed to reach more soldiers. "I got all my quilting people together and told them we had to start making quilts for all the wounded. Plenty of people were sending goggles and rat traps and things like that to the soldiers in the war, and there were programs for the families of our fallen heroes. But I didn't see anything targeting service members who had been wounded."

She put out the word online to the 19 million-strong quilting community. E-mails started flooding back. "Many quilters remembered Vietnam days," said Roberts, whose son, Nathanael Vinbury, served a year with the Army in Iraq. "They didn't want our troops coming back to that kind of reception."

Today, comfort quilts are part of the fabric of life at Walter Reed, helping to humanize the 308 government-issue beds, overlit hallways and hushed visitors lounges. As soldiers are wheeled to physical therapy or the endless tests, there is a rush of color from hand-stitched covers as they roll by. Many of the 600 wounded who come in daily for outpatient treatment have quilts folded under their legs or tucked around their bodies. Soldiers clutching the quilts have turned up at inaugural balls and Army-Navy football games.

Daniel Peters, 22, an Army combat engineer from Goffstown, N.H., received his red, white and blue quilt three months ago. It rarely leaves his side. "I use it every day to prop up my foot," he said. All the toes on his right foot were severed in Afghanistan when the Taliban shot a rocket under his Humvee; he has had surgery to reattach them.

"It brought him a lot of comfort," said his mother, Beverly Peters. "It showed him that someone cared."

Quilting has been part of wartime America since the early 19th century. "It's always been in the nature of quilters to have the urge to make something to cover soldiers, warm them and give them comfort," said Karey Bresenhan, a nationally known quilting expert and co-founder of the Alliance for American Quilts.

During the Civil War, soldiers used quilts as bedrolls. Supporters of the Union Army banded together to send quilts to their men, and Southern women cut up their dresses to make quilts for Confederate soldiers. The Smithsonian's National Museum of American History has 400 quilts in its collection, including one made in 1863 by Mrs. Gilbert Pullan's Sunday school in Augusta, Maine, for Union soldiers in Washington hospitals. The Maine quilt is inscribed with Bible quotations, recipes for medicines and jokes.

In World War I, the Red Cross sold quilts, and in World War II quilts were sent to Europe to be given out to the wounded.

Today, soldiers aren't taking quilts to war as much as using them during recovery. Kallerson conducts his wartime ministry from a cart. He loads it up and wheels it down Walter Reed's halls. If men are skeptical about receiving a quilt, he approaches their wives or mothers. Many soldiers ask if the quilt is free. "They are shocked that someone has gone to the trouble of making this for them," he said.

Eric Frazier, 20, of Altamont, Tenn., a Marine lance corporal, doesn't even remember choosing a quilt because he was on morphine. He was wounded in October in Fallujah and lost both legs, one above the knee and one below, and suffered a head injury. "He could have chosen a pink one, he was so out of it," said his father, Kary Frazier. Eric's quilt is waiting for him at home, on his bed.

One person sent a Purple Heart quilt. Kallerson handed it to a decorated double amputee. "He told me he wasn't sure he deserved it," Kallerson recalled. "I thought if you don't deserve a quilt, then I don't know who does."

Some of the quilts are becoming family heirlooms to be passed down to future generations.

Quilting groups across the country have used Roberts's Web site -- http://www.qovf.org-- as a clearinghouse for information on comfort quilts. Roberts has made it possible for the groups that piece together quilt tops to connect with longarmers, people who own large machines that efficiently stitch the tops to batting and a backing. Hand quilters can take hours and hours to do this; by machine it takes three to 20 hours, depending on the design.

Lisa Langlais, a longarmer from Springfield, said she has donated her services for more than 60 quilts, including 30 she pieced herself. Longarmers can make $75 to $400 for machine-finishing a quilt.

Langlais has never met any of the service members who have received her quilts.

"This is an anonymous project," she said. "I don't expect a thank-you card. I just put all of my good, positive thoughts in the quilt."

Kallerson has personally distributed 3,069 quilts. "One father brought me to tears," he said. "He brought a quilt back to me because his son did not survive."

Kallerson placed the quilt back into the father's hands.
Reply With Quote

mamaalanna @ 2007-01-01T22:47:00

2007-01-02T03:47:29Z

Your LiveJournal Pirate Crew
LiveJournal Username
Fifteen men on a dead man's chest!
Cutlass or pistol?
What is the name of your pirate ship?
Where is your secret pirate base?
What kind of loot do you prefer?
What do you and your crew prefer to be called?
Parrot or monkey?
Argh!

Your capable first mate	thor_bound_one
Your bumbling cabin boy with a heart of gold	pedropadrao
The aloof, yet honorable, pirate with a mysterious past	sister_devora
Is always the first one into the fray	ulfrslady
Is the naval officer who ruthlessly pursues your ship	herveus
Is the comical pirate who is always drunk on grog	killernurd
Is currently in Davy Jones's locker	hrj
The amount of money you make as a pirate	$64,811


This Fun Quiz created by Lynn at BlogQuiz.Net

Leo Horoscope at DailyHoroscopes.Biz

Memage swiped from Montuos

2006-06-09T23:58:59Z

Here is Alanna's map -- considerably different from Ivan's!

create your own visited states map
or check out these Google Hacks.

States and Countries visited

2006-06-09T23:56:31Z

Here are the States and Countries that Ivan has visited and/or lived in.

create your own visited states map

create your own visited countries map

mamaalanna @ 2006-03-26T14:19:00

2006-03-26T19:23:57Z

M a m m o g r a m

GO GET YOUR MAMMIES GRAMMED

This is hysterical! Make sure you read the whole thing.

There is a serious message at the end, but you get to laugh on the way there.

For years and years they told me,
Be careful of your breasts.
Don't ever squeeze or bruise them.
And give them monthly tests.

So I heeded all their warnings,
And protected them by law.
Guarded them very carefully,
And I always wore my bra.

After 30 years of astute care,
My gyno, Dr Pruitt,
Said I should get a Mammogram
"OK," I said, "let's do it."

"Stand up here real close" she said,
(She got my boob in line),
"And tell me when it hurts," she said,
"Ah yes! Right there, that's fine."

She stepped upon a pedal,
I could not believe my eyes!
A plastic plate came slamming down,
My hooters in a vise!

My skin was stretched and mangled,
From underneath my chin.
My poor boob was being squashed,
To Swedish Pancake thin.

Excruciating pain I felt,
Within it's viselike grip.
A prisoner in this vicious thing,
My poor defenseless tit!

"Take a deep breath," she said to me,
Who does she think she's kidding?!?
My chest is mashed in her machine,
And woozy I am getting.

"There, that's good," I heard her say,
(The room was slowly swaying.)
"Now, let's have a go at the other one."
Have mercy, I was praying.

It squeezed me from both up and down,
It squeezed me from both sides.
I'll bet SHE'S never had this done,
To HER tender little hide.

Next time that they make me do this,
I will request a blindfold
I have no wish to see again,
My knockers getting steam rolled.

If I had no problem when I came in,
I surely have one now.
If there had been a cyst in there,
It would have gone "ker-pow!"

This machine was created by a man,
Of this, I have no doubt.
I'd like to stick their balls in there,
And see how they come out!!

Which Norse God or Goddess are you?

2006-03-24T01:14:31Z

You scored as Freya.

</td>

Freya

80%

Odin

80%

Frigg

70%

Bragi

70%

Freyr

70%

Sif

60%

Balder

60%

Hel

40%

Loki

30%

Heimdall

30%

Thor

20%

Skadi

20%

Njord

20%

Tyr

20%

Which Norse God or Goddess are you most like?
created with QuizFarm.com

Muppet Movie Mania!

2006-03-16T15:23:54Z

Instructions: Choose a movie classic and recast it with Muppets! Muppet Show Muppets and Sesame Street Muppets are all eligible. Cross-dressing is permitted.

Movie:
Gone with the Wind

Cast:
Miss Piggy as Scarlett O'Hara. ("As God is my witness, I'll never be hungry again!"}
Kermit as Rhett Butler
Link Hogthrob as Ashley Wilkes
Prairie Dawn as Melanie
Gonzo as Mammy
Fozzie Bear as Charles Hamilton
Dr. Bunsen Honeydew as Aunt Pittypat
Rowlf as Frank Kennedy
Animal as the Yankee soldier

roflmaopimp!

2006-03-14T04:15:30Z

Go to http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=275284. Read the thread -- the whole thread. Then look at the ads at the bottom. That was what had me peeing my pants from laughing so hard!

OK, so I've got a weird sense of humor...

Meme Tag

2006-02-28T23:11:30Z

Guilt	What is yours?	Explain yourself
Culinary:	oatmeal-raisin cookies	the ultimate comfort food, especially when eaten hot out of the oven. Few ever live long enough to get cool
Literary:	Mercedes Lackey	Fluffy but fun, and SO full of adolescent angst!
Audiovisual:	any movie where someone dies, or almost dies.	I cry like a baby. My children even make fun of me, just because I cried when the Beast told Belle "At least I got to see you...one last time."
Musical:	Filk	Strange music by strange people
Celebrity:	Ignorance	I have no idea who most of these "celebrities" are or what they are celebrated for. Many of them seem to be famous for being famous.

Now I tag:-

montuos herveus pedropadrao bunnyjadwiga and nostasia

to complete this same Quiz, Its HERE.

The Tale of Animal and Alanna

2006-02-26T20:20:12Z

I have been performing surgery. tygrkatt had this enormous stuffed "Animal" -- you know, the thing from the Muppet show. Anyway, Animal had lost his arm; the arm was OK, but poor Animal had a gaping wound in his side, and was leaking his stuffing all over.

It would not have been so bad if he had been stuffed with polyester stuffing -- but he was stuffed with those styrofoam 'beads'. And the damn things stick to *everything*. You can pick up a handful of them, but when you go to stuff them back into Animal, they all stick to your hands! And the rug, and your hair, and Animal himself, who is rather fuzzy. And the vacuum cleaner, when you go to vacuum them up. Little teeny tiny ones, too, about the size of peppercorns. I don't know how they got him stuffed in the factory. And he *needed* more stuffing, since his chest had lost a lot of beads. I had a sheet of styrofoam that was very loosely compacted, easy to break off chunks of it and then rub the chunks into the component beads. So I broke off chunks about the size of the first joint of your thumb and tried to stuff *those* into Animal. That worked...kind of. See "sticking" above. Larger pieces worked better with less sticking, so Animal finally got stuffed. I figure that after the grandsons waller him around playing with him, the chunks will break down just fine.

Then I sewed him up. Closed the seam partway, sewed the arm into place, then closed the seam. That was the easy part.

Remember the damned beads from a couple of paragraphs back? I had a small blizzard of them on the living room rug. All over the rug, all over poor Animal, all over me. DH brings me the vacuum cleaner, and I start to vacuum Animal. Got his head all clean, and then realized that there was no 'clean' place to put him! Switched to vacuuming the rug. Got it about half clean when I realized that having put Animal down, he was still shedding beads onto the rug. This called for drastic measures. Animal went out the window to waft in the breeze; his head and one arm still inside as if he were crawling in through the window while I vacuumed the rug. Now vacuuming the rug made more of the damned things stick to me. So I vacuumed me, with help from DH. And my hair. This of course made about half of the beads fall off me and land on the rug, so I vacuumed the rug again. Do you see a pattern here?

It took me FORTY-FIVE MINUTES to suck up those beads, even before I got back to poor Animal. In the end the vacuum cleaner had captured maybe enough beads to fill a cereal bowl. Ghu knows how I'll get the things OUT of the vacuum cleaner; it doesn't have a bag, but a plastic collection bin. The sort of plastic that is a static magnet. It's likely that the damned things will just stick to it, giggling and mocking me.

But Animal is now in one piece. Took him over to tygrkatt's house in the back of the pickup, a concrete block on his chain keep him from blowing away. They weren't home, so I set him on the sofa with his legs crossed comfortably and one arm draped casually over the back. He looked quite comfortable.

Gakked from Montuos

2006-02-24T16:30:41Z

Ten Top Trivia Tips about Mama Alanna!

Mama Alanna was originally called Cheerioats!
Oranges, lemons, watermelons, pineapples and Mama Alanna are all berries.
Mama Alanna can smell some things up to six miles away.
Mama Alanna can live for up to a week without a head!
Mama Alanna was banned from Finland because of not wearing pants.
If you chew gum while peeling Mama Alanna then it will stop you from crying.
Mama Alanna is the last letter of the Greek alphabet.
It takes a lobster approximately 7 years to grow to be Mama Alanna!
The word 'samba' means 'to rub Mama Alanna'!
It's bad luck to whistle near Mama Alanna.

Word of the Day

2006-02-17T22:31:13Z

Today's Word: Nympholepsy (Noun)

Pronunciation: ['nim-fê-lep-see]

Definition 1: Frenzied emotions resulting from being captured by nymphs or, for weaker souls, simply seeing them. Hence, emotional anxiety brought on by attempts to attain the unattainable.

Usage 1: A person suffering from nympholepsy is a nympholept and the adjective is "nympholeptic."

Suggested Usage: Today's word may be used metaphorically, "Years of work on his electric fork left Fitzwalling in a state of nympholeptic angst that no psychiatrist could dissipate." It may also be used literally (believe it or not) so long as "nymph" is assumed metaphorical, "Conrad left the topless bar with a nympholeptic beam on his face so distinct it raised suspicion in the eyes of every policeman he passed on the way to his hotel."

Etymology: Greek nympholeptos "captured by nymphs, frenzied" from nymphe "young bride, low-level goddess" + leptos "seized," past participle of lambanein "to take, seize." Greek "nymphe" shares an origin with Latin nubere "to cover, veil, marry," nubilis "marriageable," and nubes "a cloud." Another word in this family is Greek nephos "cloud."

I Are A Elf! Wheeeee!

2006-02-17T16:48:08Z

ELF

You are an elf. An elf is like a

human but much fairer and pure. Elves are

usually tall, with pointed ears, and resemble

humans very closely, but elves are usually

much more beautiful. Elves are a distant

race. They prefer to keep to themselves,

because often, many of them feel that their

race is superior to humans. Elves symbolize

wisdom, prudence, love, and hope. They are

very merry and happy. They are forever young

and delight in music. They are natural

artists as well.

Which mythical creature resides in your soul? (11 Results + Pictures)
brought to you by Quizilla

Now if I could just combine it with yesterday's I could be a PORCUPINE ELF!! Wouldn't that be SPESHUL!!

Memeage

2006-02-16T15:20:27Z

Gakked from montuos:

Your Mood Ring is Purple

Sensual
Clear mind
Purpose is known

Mood Ring Generator

And one she somehow missed:

Your Mood Ring is Purple

Sensual
Clear mind
Purpose is known

Mood Ring Generator

mamaalanna @ 2006-02-12T19:49:00

2006-02-13T00:50:56Z

You scored as Elf. You are an Elf.. Not as wise as a wizard, but wiser than any other race. You are respectful, graceful, and pleasant. Your main power use is magic but you are good at fighting and ranging too. (Ranging being your specialty in fighting) which is one thing you have over a wizard.

</td>

Elf

96%

Wizard

92%

Dwarf

75%

Human

63%

Nymph

58%

Dark Magic User

17%

What Mystcial Medieval race are you?!(Kool Pics!!)
created with QuizFarm.com

mamaalanna @ 2006-02-10T16:43:00

2006-02-10T21:43:17Z

You belong in I Will Fear No Evil. Your body is

your prison, and you would trade everything

you have, even your sex, for a new lease on

life.

Which Heinlein Book Should You Have Been A Character In?
brought to you by Quizilla

And fairies!

2006-02-03T21:28:59Z

You are the primrose fairy

Which Amy Brown fairy are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

Star Trek Memage

2006-02-03T21:01:35Z

Your results:
You are James T. Kirk (Captain)

James T. Kirk (Captain)		65%
Deanna Troi		55%
An Expendable Character (Redshirt)		55%
Will Riker		50%
Chekov		40%
Jean-Luc Picard		40%
Spock		35%
Geordi LaForge		35%
Uhura		35%
Beverly Crusher		35%
Data		30%
Leonard McCoy (Bones)		20%
Worf		15%
Mr. Scott		5%
Mr. Sulu		0%

You are often exaggerated and over-the-top
in your speech and expressions.
You are a romantic at heart and a natural leader.

Click here to take the Star Trek Personality Quiz