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scifrey · 1 year

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Hold Tight (6/6)

Status: Complete. Unbeta’d, we die like Hob doesn’t.

Series: The Hob Adherent series.

Fandom: The Sandman (TV 2022) Includes some comics canon, and some cameos from the wider Gaiman-verse, but it’s not necessary to know to enjoy the story.

Rating: Mature

Warnings: Discussions of grief and in-canon character death. Also includes some erotic content. Please curate your internet experience accordingly.

Relationships: Morpheus | Dream of the Endless/Hob Gadling, Past Eleanor | Hob Gadling’s Wife/Hob Gadling (past), Hector Hall/Lyta Hall (past)

Characters: Dream of the Endless | Morpheus, Hob Gadling, Matthew the Raven, Desire of the Endless, Lyta Trevor-Hall, Daniel Hall, Rose Walker, Jed Walker

Summary:

Hob is tasked with his first quest as Vassal of the Endless, Morpheus is bad at using his words, Destiny thinks he’s so clever, Desire makes a confession, Rose Walker meets her Uncle’s boyfriend, and Lyta Hall punches Dream of the Endless in the nose. Or, the one where Hob Gadling turns into everyone’s therapist, and honestly, he ain’t mad about it.

Set at the end of Cling Fast - after the premiere of “Elizabethan Manor”, but before the Epilogue.

READ ON AO3 or below:

Chapter Six

A year and a bit later, as the Endless and Immortals reckon "later"…

Rose Walker's debut book tour takes her to London, which means, of course, Hob has to throw her a little party at the New Inn to celebrate. Hob invites his Elizabethan Manor compatriots, Rose’s UK publishing team, and those few distant relatives to the Kincaid side of the family Harri could abuse her position at BBC Historics to track down for Rose and Jed.

Hob had also invited the Walker's granduncles, grandaunts, and grandparent, but asked them to come after dark, when all the normal humans had come and gone.

Lyta and Daniel Hall, enticed with promises of meeting the extended family and a free trip to England, have joined them. Which means the party has become a lax outdoor affair in the private back garden of the Inn, with lots of sandwiches and lemonade, and far too many gift-wrapped toys for young Daniel to gleefully tear open from pride of place on his chequered picnic blanket.

Filled with fizzy pride as he watches Rose and Jed begin to open up to her mother's long-lost family, Hob takes advantage of the guest of honour's distraction to herd Morph into the shaded corner of the garden furthest from the back door. He'd hidden a kraft-paper envelope in the brambles here earlier, and now he risks blackberry thorn scratches to retrieve it for Morph.

"Happy anniversary, duck," Hob says, handing the envelope over.

"Happy anniversary," Morph replies with a sly smile. "Though I believe you are early by two days. It is only the fifth."

"Yes and no," Hob says. "I wanted to give this to you now, because we'll be travelling on the seventh."

"Oh, we will, will we?" Morph challenges playfully, one eyebrow raised in question. "And where will we be travelling, Hob Gadling?"

"Open the envelope and see, Morph Gadling," Hob teases back.

Morph breaks the wax seal that Hob had used in a fit of nostalgia, and slides a packet of glossy photographs and creamy thick paper into his hand.

“What is this?”

"I… bought some land," Hob says, as he helps Morph make sense of the wad of papers. "Well. Re-bought, really."

He pulls out and then drops an aerial photo onto the top of the pile. It's painted-over with red surveyor's lines, which sketch out the boundaries of a piece of wild woodland, a meadowed slope, and two stone-bounded little fields. If you look closely enough, and maybe turn the picture a little, you can see that what originally appears to be an organic cluster of ancient fruit trees resolves itself into man-made lines of a severely overgrown orchard. And just up the slope from that, the grey-green lumps of tumbled slate walls outline a centuries old foundation for a little four-room cottage.

Hob pulls the deed out of the pile next. It's computer-generated but with Hob's tell-tale signature and handwriting proclaiming the parcel to be henceforth known as New Glade Estate.

Hob is many things, but a poet is not one of them.

That's his husband's job.

"Hob," Morph says, swallowing hard. "What is this?"

"Ours," Hob says, with a gallic shrug and a tug of his earlobe. "I thought… I built it once. I could build it again. Only this time there will be the two of us. We can do it together. Make it our own little haven away from the city. Give Matthew a rookery. Add a guest bedroom for Daniel, for when he’s old enough to come visit for the summers. Install real plumbing and a drawing room. I could reclaim the orchard from the forest, add in some garden beds, and… well, what do you think?"

Morph looks up at his husband and grins. It is a delighted, carefree expression that Hob has had the privilege to witness on his husband's face more and more since the honeymoon. It never fails to fill Hob with gratitude and relief.

"I think it is a splendid idea," Morph says.

"Thank fuck," Hob says, heaving a sign of relief. "Because I've already spent a tidy fortune to have the land surveyed, and the old forest road cleared and re-gravelled, and the first draft of the blueprints drawn up. Obviously they're not final until you've worked your creative magic on them, but I—"

Morph silences Hob with a kiss, which is par for the course.

What isn't par is the hissed little " Ew, don't do that in front of me," that someone says directly into Hob's ear.

"Gah!" Hob yelps, jerking away from the painted lips beside his face so fast that he nearly topples into the hedgerow.

One red-taloned hand grabs him by the shirtfront and keeps him upright, though.

"Thanks Desire," Hob gulps, heart racing from the surprise as he gets his feet back under him. "I would have preferred it if you didn't scare the shit out of me first, though."

"Oh but I couldn't help it, Handsome Hobsie," Desire purrs. "You're just so pretty when you're flushed and panting."

"Desire," Morph growls warningly.

"Oh, untwist your panties, Mope," Desire says, waving off his ire. "I'm just having fun. Speaking of fun, swell party, little brother."

"Thanks," Hob says. "Though, I think you're a bit early. I said after dark."

Desires waves that away too, as if Hob's request to keep the Endless and Mortal sides of the Rose and Jed's family nominally separate for the first meeting was just silly nonsense. "I am their grandparent, I deserve first dibs."

"Demand and deserve are two entirely separate things," Morph shoots back. "Will you not give Rose the courtesy to—"

"And who are you to speak of my granddaughter as if you were the protector of her heart—"

"The only one among our family who cared for it," Morph hisses back.

"Hey now," Hob says. "Come on now, we're going to draw a crowd. Let's not throw vitriol around quite so freely.”

"Only because you saw Rose Walker as your duty," Desire shoots back, utterly ignoring Hob's plea for peace. "She would have meant nothing to you had she not threatened the Dreaming."

"As she meant nothing to you until you could weaponize her?"

"Oof, enough guys, c’mon—"

Anger flashes in Desire's honey-gold eyes, strong and sudden enough that it startles both the immortal humans. "Unlike you, Moron Morphy, I am here to accept my responsibilities, not run from them."

"Whoa now," Hob says, putting a steadying hand on Morphs' chest, which was starting to puff up like an angry pigeon. "Where is this coming from?"

"You left us!" Desire accuses, and Hob whips around to check the rest of the partygoers, but it seems like either they're very politely ignoring the shouting, or are magically oblivious to the mounting domestic squabble happening in the back corner of the garden. Well, that's one blessing, at least.

"Yes?" Morph says, tilting his head corvid-like, clearly confused about why that fact should upset Desire two years after the fact.

"You left! Just like Despair, when she died. Just like Delight, transmuting into Delirium. Just like Destruction! Death doesn't like me, Destiny is too busy for me, and now, now you're just … gone!" Desire shouts.

For a moment it seems like that’s where it will end, but then, out of nowhere, Desire’s whole face crumples. Tears as red as blood well in their eyes, rolling down their gaunt cheeks, and they suck on huge gouts of air. They seem as surprised as Hob is to find themselves crying. "Why does everyone leave me?"

Oh, Hob thinks. Oh, poor creature. This has been a long time coming.

He wraps gentle arms around Desire's shoulders and pulls them into his chest for a tight, grounding hug.

This family really, genuinely, honestly needs some hardcore therapy.

"My leaving was… was not about you," Morph struggles to say, meeting Hob's gaze over Desire's head and very clearly at an utter loss at what to do or say.

"Of course it wasn't," Desire sniffles. "You didn't even consider me. You always thought me lesser. But I am your sibling! I am just as important as you! I am just as powerful as you! And you… you cut me out of your realm, of yourself. But Desires and Dreams, we are so closely intertwined. I was your favourite. You doted on me and I…”

Morph tips forward, the creeping horror brought on by Desire's unexpected but nonetheless heartbreaking confession moving him to wrap himself around Desire's other side, sandwiching the Endless in the middle of a comforting Immortal group hug. Hob is so, so grateful that Harri has subjected Morph to enough of them over the last year that Morph feels comfortable initiating one.

Hob is reminded sharply of Morph's own tears, not so long ago, when recounting how cruel he felt his sister Death's attempts to understand his own mental anguish had been. One glance at his husband makes it clear that Morph is likely thinking about the same.

"Oh, my sibling," Morph croons into Desire’s ear, petting their destroyed pompadour back off their sweaty forehead. "I am sorry I made you feel lesser. I am sorry I did not treat you with the respect and care you deserved."

Hardcore, super epic, weapons-grade therapy, Hob thinks morosely. As Vassal I can ask favours of my lieges in return. This is gonna be my first one: Group. Fucking. Therapy.

"I'm sorry too," Desire hiccups, like the words are being torn from their guts by a hot poker. "I made a mistake with Killalla, and I admit to it now. It was cruel and malicious of me, but I truly did not understand the consequences of the game. I was young, Dream. I was a child. Her desire was but a toy. Anyone's desire, not just hers and yours. I did not comprehend, then, that desire denied becomes despair. I did not realize that in breaking your toy you would refuse to accept any other I handed you."

"Killalla was not a toy," Morpheus growls.

"I know that! I know that now, " Desire amends, frustrated. They push back from Hob's chest, jaw set with determination to be understood. "But I was young. I was stupid! I was little more than the sum of my Function. You remember what that was like, what it meant to be consumed only by what you were, and not who you are."

Morph hesitates, and then just nods, slowly and sagely, and only once.

"I tried to make it up to you, but you spurned desire. You spurned love. You spurned happiness. You hurt Nuala, and Calliope, and Hob." Desire cuts a hand at Hob, who blinks in stunned confusion. "Over and over again, you spat on my gift! On me!"

"Morpheus never spurned me," Hob protests. "I mean, I never made a move on him. And he barely liked me until the last few decades, right?" He turns to Morpheus, who looks equal parts guilty and hurt. "Wait, right?"

"Oh, Hobsie, you're an idiot," Desire sniffles, wiping their face clean and laughing at him all at once. "I was in that tavern too, that day. In my way. I felt the way he looked at you, the way you looked at him. If you'd both been human, you'd have fucked in the alley behind the White Horse within the hour!"

"You what?" Hob asks, feeling a bit like he's been struck between the eyes with a wet fish. He turns his dazed attention to his husband. "You wanted me, even then?"

"Physically," Morpheus says. "I see no point in denying it. I found you attractive, in your brutish, smelly, hairy way."

"Oh, gee, thanks," Hob gulps out, wondering if a time will ever come when he isn't going to have his whole understanding of the universe tipped on its head every time he hangs out with a different celestial or infernal or Endless being.

"Animal lust," Morpheus dismisses. "Easily ignored."

"Wow, babe, that makes it so much better when you put it like that."

"Except it wasn't easily ignored," Desire says, hands flying through the air as they describe patterns that Hob could never hope to comprehend. "I could see it all, laid out clear as a star-chart. Robert Gadling, human and so curious, so hopeful, so full of sunlight—streaked in his hair, kissed on his skin, streaming from his soul—"

"Hey now, I'm right here," Hob mutters, feeling his ears burning.

"And you, big brother, too stupid to know a good thing when you saw it. I could see how this would end. Here. Like this. And Death agreed with me. So we—" They snap their fingers. "Destiny took me through his garden, you know, while you and Death were visiting humanity, we walked the labyrinth and he told me of the possibilities. Of what would happen to Dream of the Endless, if Hob Gadling died with a mugger’s sword in his gut on the road to Essex."

Hob's stomach roils. Is that the death that had been meant for him?

"Or, if Hob had been granted his wish, but you two dunderheads hadn't acted on your mutual desire. If Hob remained only your friend, met and desired and resisted every hundred years. It was… it is not a good ending, Dream. It's not a good ending for… for a lot of people," Desire finishes on a contrite whisper. "Instead of leaving, you died. You died stupidly. So Hob was my peace offering. But still you turned away from your desire for him, and from me."

"Wait, you giftwrapped me for him?" Hob asks, his blood running cold all of a sudden.

"I was, what, a kitten you picked out of a litter and put a bow on? Did I have any say in this? Did you make me fall for him? I… mean, I—"

"Oh, for god's sake," Desire snipes. "I can't make people love where they don't already feel attraction, any more than Death can take you before your time. All that lust you suffered all those years, banked or otherwise, that was all you, Hobsie Baby. Everything you feel now, that's you.”

"That's a… that's a relief," Hob admits.

“All I did was make sure you two simpletons actually did something about it.”

“How?” Morph asks, an adorable look of confusion wrinkling his forehead.

Desires snorts, throwing back their shoulders and preening at their own cleverness. “Did you really think all those flowers spontaneously blossoming all around you without your conscious directive was an accidental side effect of you realizing you were catching feelings?”

The shock, understanding, frustration, anger, and then acceptance that chase each other across Morph’s face is both amusing and worrying. Hob wonders if he’s going to have to literally get in between them to prevent an all out hair-pulling, claw-raking cat fight. Morph’s expression, however, settles on tender gratitude.

"Then I thank you, my sibling," Morph says, voice a strained rumble. He reaches blindly for Hob's hand, and Hob obliges. He squeezes three times— I love you. Morph squeezes three times in return. "I should hate to begrudge or resent my greatest joy because of your interference, sibling."

"No, no, of course not," Desire hastens to reassure them. "I didn't want that. I've never wanted that. All I wanted is for you to respect me, to respect what I do, to accept the gift of my function the way you forced me to accept yours. You shut yourself away from desire forever and you left me alone to dream about a day when you'd just pay attention to me again.” They huff. “And of course, you took the easy out. Now you’ve left and I'll never—you'll never—"

"Hold up," Hob entreats again. "You're forgetting that Dream of the Endless isn't gone, though. He's right there."

He gestures across the yard to where baby Daniel is gleefully banging together two wooden blocks, to the accompaniment of Harri and Lyta singing a little ditty about a family of sharks.

"Erasti, what are you…?"

"Look, for my first quest as Vassal, Destiny told me to fix the bonds of family." Hob confesses. “I haven’t said anything before because I didn’t want to jinx it.”

Morph looks thoughtful. Desire just nods, not entirely sure where Hob is going with this.

"Well, you're part of this family, Desire. You deserve to have a bond not only with the Walkers, but with the Halls, too. Daniel is Rose's godson, which makes him your honorary great-grandchild, as well as your new little brother.” Hob grins, feeling very clever indeed. “In which case, Desire of the Endless, I bet you that you are going to be the best older sibling an Endless could ever want."

So it’s a bit dirty, to challenge Desire to a wager, but Hob thinks it’s totally fair to pull out all his big guns if he’s going to have to keep playing shrink. Forget ‘vassal’, call me Hob Gadling, Family Therapist of the Endless.

Desire's eyes grow wide with understanding, and they whip around turn to stare hungrily at the toddler.

"Dream will need your help, sibling," Morph adds persuasively. "And your support, if he's to avoid our errors, and become a good balance between who he is as a person and the sum of his Function. You must, ah, set him up for success."

"That is true," Desire says, their swaggering self-confidence surging back. “And I will be very good at it.”

The shark song complete, Morph takes the opportunity to break out of whatever protective bubble Desire had cast over the three of them. He sweeps over to the picnic blanket and scoop Daniel into his arms. This causes the little boy to accidentally drop his blocks. Which, in turn, causes Daniel to burst into sudden, red-faced tears.

"Wait, little Prince," Morph sputters. "I did not mean to—"

“You really do have to ruin everything you touch, don’t you Morphy?” Desire teases, sashaying over to pluck Daniel out of Morph's arms. Desire plops inelegantly onto the blanket between Lyta and Harri, legs splayed and baby cuddled close before Lyta can even react.

“Excuse me!” Lyta gasps, “Who are–”

“It’s okay,” Hob says hastily, rushing over to reassure. “It’s okay. They’re one of us. One of them.”

Lyda stops mid-lunge and settles back, sparing a glance at Hob.

He's fine, Hob mouths to her, and she takes him at his word.

Daniel immediately stops crying. His eyes spark emerald in the way that Hob has come to learn means that Dream is closer to the surface of his Waking mind than usual. Clearly Desire catches the spark of Dream surfacing to peer through Daniel's eyes, too, because their chin starts to wobble.

"Oh," Desire says, heartsblood red tears springing up along their bottom lids, absolutely verklempt. "Hello, little Dream." Daniel places his chubby palms gently, solemnly on Desire's cheekbones. Desire sucks in a shaky, hopeful breath. "My name is Desire, and I am your older sibling. Don't tell any of the others, but you, little creature…" They nuzzle their red-red-red lips against his sweet plump cheek and whisper: "You are going to be my favourite."

The End

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pityroadart · 1 year

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Hey, what is your process when making collages? How do you collect things for them, how do you decide on quotes and what to draw/paint on and such? I really enjoy them :)

Hello! That's a very good question, I do it so automatically that I'm not entirely sure myself — but since I caught myself in the middle of a cut-and-stick sketchbook session, let's dive into it.

First up, I collect scraps like a trash magpie. Always have done, always will. Any paper items that I enjoy the colour/shape/texture of. Nowadays I tend to enjoy things with bold primary colours or black and white, pages from old maths textbooks or encyclopedias, flyers from local exhibitions, fragile tape and shipping labels from parcels, scraps found on the floor, old shopping lists, slips of paper from inside medicine packets or covid tests etc, anything that jumps out at me.

I collect these things in the pocket at the back of my sketchbook, or in a drawer (I have a whole drawer dedicated to scraps — some picked up from six or seven years ago, and some from last week). I hoard them like some sort of paper-loving dragon.

Other things I like adding are washi tapes, stickers, cinema tickets, drawings (whether straight in the sketchbook or stuck in), and anything else flat enough to fit in there.

Here are a few older sketchbook pages (from about 2014) showing some other types of scraps I've collated and used, and I think you can see where my current style has grown from.

The second part of your question is: but how do I put them all together? Again it's pretty much instinctive by now, but here are a few things I look for:

- Do I have a theme for the page? Is there a central object I want to build around? For the recent star trek pages I shared here, I'd been to see TMP and TWOK at the cinema and glued my tickets into my sketchbook, so I knew I wanted to theme the page around them

- Is there a colour palette? Either I pick colours from my central object, or I decide on a colour palette myself. Nowadays I keep my colour palettes very limited - one or two bolder colours and a range of cream/white/black/grey - but previously I've set the palette as pastel rainbow colours for example, when those were the colours I was more drawn to

- What words, symbols or drawings do I want to add? This can be lyrics that have been stuck in my head or that fit the theme, phrases I've come up with, fragments of found poetry clipped from textbooks, drawings that fit the theme (e.g star trek screencap thumbnails in the first example), etc. They don't have to fit the theme perfectly, or make sense to an external viewer - the important thing is that *you* want them on your page

This image below is a fragment of an as-yet-incomplete page - in which I swatched some leftover watercolour paint onto the page, found it complimented the colour of a sticker from a parcel perfectly (the small circular sticker), then I added an interesting-looking image from an old encyclopedia, which reminded me of a line from a Mountain Goats song: "the low pressure system brings the breezes in", and I wrote out another line from that same song on kraft paper and stuck it in. So it makes sense to me, or maybe someone familiar with the song, but to the average viewer it just looks kinda cool and/or they enjoy the line I've written out.

Then the next thing is to stick everything together! I'll confess, I rarely do this in one sitting - I currently have multiple pages I'm working on, one started the other month and almost complete, one started two weeks ago, and one just started today. I add to it whenever I get an idea or find a scrap that fits. But I used to do the pages in one sitting, and that absolutely works too.

As to how I decide what goes where on the page, that's just intuitive! I've made collage-y type art for at least fifteen years now (and longer if you count playing 'cut and stick' with old magazines as a kid), and I've very much learnt what sort of compositions please me, and how to tell if something feels too cluttered or lopsided or too spacious. But the beauty of this part is it's all personal preference! Shuffle your scraps around before gluing them down, and see what works for you.

Sometimes I add text or drawings first and use scraps in between, sometimes I stick the scraps down first and fill the gaps with text or drawings - there's no one way to do it! And hey, if there's something you don't like, you can always tear it out or stick something over it, that's the joy of mixed media.

Anyway this was a bit long-winded but I hope it makes at least a little bit of sense. Go forth and play with scraps!

#ask #art tips #mixed media #collage #sketchbook #faq

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fourseasonsfigs · 1 year

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Time and Space Folding

The title of this fig comes from Zhehan's beautiful unreleased song, "When Glaciers Disappear" that he sang the first part of on the Elizabeth Arden livestream. Very suitable for this fig set, where we have Zhang Zhehan and Gong Jun in their Word of Honor styling with modern clothes.

The lyrics to this song are hauntingly beautiful. The first line of the song is, 如果时空折叠街景后退, which roughly translates to, If time and space folds and the streets go backwards

For Junjun's look here, we have these shooting photos:

Pre-wig, but with the apple!

And for Zhehan, I can't find this specific photo and this specific outfit! I searched through all my pics (which are badly organized and not at all thorough, clearly), and have disappointed not only you but myself. In recompense I can only offer these ones of him in his wig and hairclips in modern clothes.

Thanks to the clever and talented Ennis, the inspiration for Zhehan's fig styling has been found! I will leave my other Zhehan pics here because they are too beautiful to delete, but continue on...

The last one is a screenshot from his behind the scenes walkthrough of the costuming room from Youku, similar to the one Gong Jun did.

Finally, here's the pictures! This was a fan visit during filming. Zhehan's look here is really such a fun blend of the ancient and the modern - no wonder the fig maker found this so inspirational.

So cute. We see them here with their socks and slides, which never fails to make me giggle.

The white rose is the white rose we see in Gong Jun's assistant's bag:

It found it's intended target here in this fig!

I'm so happy I have the inspiration pic for these figs now - I can really see all the details the maker put into it.

Everyone loves white hair Junjun. Every time I see him with the white hair I flash back to the BTS of Zhehan fascinated by his wig. It really IS a crime we didn't get more airtime with white haired Wen Kexing.

Better view of all that luxurious mass of hair being held back by the hair clips. I actually love all the BTS shots with their hair neatly clipped and also when they tie the hair back in ponytails. It just seems like such a wonderful sneak peek into all the behind the scenes TV magic.

Not a whole lot to see from this angle other than the full shot of the apple and Zhehan's socks.

I bought these off Xianyu since I missed them the first time around. The boxes came in good shape, but no cards were included. These boxes are quite unique - no other figs have come in kraft-paper boxes with these string ties. I like them!

Very cute.

Material: PVC

Fig Count: 176

Scene Count: 13

Rating: What is the best kind of love? Unchanged and firm.

[link back to Master Fig Index for more posts]

#junzhe #word of honor filming #gong jun #zhang zhehan #word of honor merch #figthusiast

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pretendcottagelady · 7 months

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Weekly Journal Spread

A simpler journal set up than I did the past week because again, I just needed to be quicker about this. So using a paler colour to indicate where the lines to write are makes it easier than drawing borders. There’s also less decoration, but that’s because I’m planning to decorate it with teddy journal stickers as I journal.

Though I did put a journal and snack tray in the corner because my page tore a bit when I was trying to lift up some of the washi tape. I’ve mentioned this before, but kraft paper used in journals, or at least this journal is not my favourite. I’ve worked with kraft paper before (primarily for cards) and never had this issue before, but working in this journal has been kind of difficult because I have to do my cutting before I lay down the tape and once I put it down, I have to commit because it will damage the page lifting it up.

I don’t know if this is an issue with the Notebook Therapy journals or if it's just a general journal thing, but it’s kind of irritating.

#stickers #washi tape #junk journal #washi tape art #bullet journal spread #bullet journal #bujo #bujo spread

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shoshiwrites · 2 years

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while spring is making promises outside — a flower shop AU featuring my OC Jo. Chapter 4/9. Some chapters a little NSFW.

His phone buzzes.

There's a little leap in his chest, of dread or anticipation, before he can see who it is and his body knows what to do.

did you do the pages today?

Relief. He can't pretend about it. He stabs out a thumbs-up emoji with his thumb, as is their routine, movement unrefined with the drowsiness of an afternoon nap. Or a crash, depending on what you wanted to call it. He never naps, unless his body schedules it for him. Which it occasionally does. Math problems will do that to you, she'd say. The margins of GED Prep Plus are tangled with pencil lines. U?

The three dots bounce, only for a moment. day 11

The little smiley face, the one with the noisemaker — that one seems appropriate. I'm proud of you, he wants to say, feels the faint press of the consonants in his mouth. But they never get that far. She'd taken the Nicorette, though. He falls back asleep thinking about the flowers she'd been sketching yesterday on a scrap of kraft paper, the white pencil in her hands.

Most of the time, his phone isn't Jo. It's Bill or Allie or someone wanting a reduced quote for a piece he's already generously discounted, given that he's not making a whole lot of money off of this, a guy who polishes up old shit in his garage for fun.

It was supposed to be fun, at least.

He doesn't know whether to laugh about it, that the statement could theoretically apply to furniture or to Allie. His ex-girlfriend, a label that itches with how terribly it fits.

What are they?

He wants them to be exes. Exes would be so much easier than whatever this mess is, this thing that has them broken up but still texting him whenever she feels like it. This thing that means she can call him over at any hour and he just goes, wanting whatever it is they have over being alone. The sex, mostly, which is an acknowledgement that feels about as comfortable as a cavity. It's...it's not even that good, for him, most of the time, but if she ever notices she doesn't say anything.

Someone should confiscate his phone, at some point.

Today at the shop he'd caught Jo singing to herself along with the radio. She'd looked swallowed by the giant old sweater she'd been wearing the color of milky coffee, bopping along to Paula Abdul. Her dark curls had fallen from her shoulder as she turned. The kind of shit that only happened in movies. It was like he'd blinked and here he was, hopeless or close to it. Bill had taken a special delight in telling him, pacing around the garage while Joe worked and drinking Joe's beer. That he was a goner, that Jo was the kind of girl you didn't fool around with.

"You're full of it," Joe had said, brain fizzing on the words fool around and immediately forgetting what it was he was doing with the dresser's hardware. "Bill Guarnere telling me what's what about fooling around. Weren't you still-"

Bill had scoffed. "Listen, I'm done with that shit now." And the craziest part was, Joe knew he was right. He and Fran are saving for a goddamn house together. She's about to have a baby. "Josephine's not the kind of girl you fool around with," Bill repeated, the same kind of tone he used when he talked about his sisters or Frankie or Clara. The kind of person who checked up on you. Who cared. Like Bill, but less annoying. Joe opened the ancient fridge for a soda and saw that it was nearly empty.

"Hey, I'll buy you some my next run," Bill said, conveniently forgetting he was the one who'd emptied it in the first place. "Don't look so burnt up."

"I kind of hate you right now," said Joe.

"But you know I'm right."

Her eyes, he never forgets, are that warm light brown, that color that makes him ache.

Tonight, though, he's woken up on the old couch feeling lost in the evening, and cold. There's a few snowflakes swirling outside in the hazy purple of the streetlight against the sky. Spring needs to get with the program too. He's sick of this weather. He wants a cigarette. His phone buzzes.

"I don't see what you're so worked up about," Allie says, stretching herself across the mattress. She looks blissed out of her mind (you're welcome, he thinks pointedly), rolling over to tap the ash off the end of her cigarette. Of course she's smoking. Of course she doesn't care. Somehow it bothers him more that she's noticed the tension in his face. That must mean it's bad.

Even if he does tell her, about the doubt creeping in, about the fact that he hasn't talked to his sisters in weeks, his brother or his ma even longer, he can't very well tell her about Jo. He should tell his family at least, that he's working on his degree. He can hearing something like a scoff coming from Ma, something about it never being too late to finish what you've started, some rambling story about when he'd dropped out that would sound like a scold and a eulogy at once. But he knows she'd be proud, deep down.

He humphs something that sounds like a dismissal, and she's back to the face he knows, the one that's already moved on.

"You're coming to my friend's show," she says. Her voice is a little hoarse, from the smoke, from the fact that in his attempt to forget whatever had been going on earlier he'd been...more generous than usual. Hoarse and on the quieter side, but it's so loud in that moment, the way he knows it's never a question with her, and won't ever be.

He squeezes his eyes shut, rubbing at his face with his palm, like that will make the cigarette smell go away. "Gotta work." He doesn't know if he has to, actually, but he'll figure something out.

Allie rolls her eyes, but she starts tapping her fingertips against his hip. Her straw-brown hair brushes against his shoulder. There's a tug inside of him that feels like something important, but then it's gone.

#while spring is making promises outside #jo's tag #shoshi writes #my sick obsession with commas continues #this one is...nsfw adjacent #shoshi's au problem

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princesskoriandr · 1 year

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How did you make the nightwing suit?

Dan and I used a pattern block from Etsy—which is highly customizable and easy to hack (if you have time…we didn’t)—for the base of the suit. Dan got a black matte moleskin four way stretch spandex which we used for the base of the suit:

the chevron took a little extra time and I patterned that directly on Dan:

I taped a rectangle of brown kraft paper to him, used his old suit and his new design as a reference, and traced out the general shape we wanted then I took the pattern to the table and cleaned it up with my ruler. I cut that chevron on the fold of the blue spandex (an electric blue milliskin four way stretch from Blue Moon Fabrics) and used a temporary fabric spray to attach it to the front of the bodysuit before sewing it on with a lightning stitch (which is a good alternative to a zig zag if you want a really stretchy stitch but you don’t want it to be visible from the outside of the garment).

for the back I folded the top points on the pattern down and cut two separate sides of the chevron and laid them down on the two separate back pieces, attaching them with the same adhesive and then sewing them on.

I then sewed the zipper in, attached the front to the back, added a long line of blue spandex to each arm following the same steps as the chevron pattern on the suit and started on alterations!

#nightwing cosplay #sorry this is as detailed as this one gets bc I took less time to do it and didn’t document as much

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raemissigman · 1 year

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Today is day 3 of our creative challenge - USE PEN & COLOR Today I’m using a gray pen and my beloved watercolors🎨✍🏻 Don’t forget we love seeing what you are creating. Use #postitnotechallenge and tag myself, @raemissigman and @sandikeene to share. If you’d like the deets on these post-it notes just message me with LINK and I will reply with the link to the awesome 6'pack of Kraft and White post it's with grids and lines. In case you missed the CHALLENGE DETAILS POST I’m adding the details below. This 7 day (short), post-it note sized (easy), simple challenge with open ended prompts (fun) that allow you to do YOU! Use whatever medium you love for color, the subject that is your go-to and follow our 7 guiding prompts of: 1. Use Pencil 2. Use Pen 3. Pen & Color 4. Pen, Pencil & Color 5. Marks 6. Skeleton Lines (sketch lines - think coloring book) 7. All of Above + Collage Join us as we practice making art on a post-it note (or a small square of any paper) just for the joy of completing a piece in about 5 minutes. #artchallenge #dailysketching #dailycreative #dailycreativepractice #dailyartchallenge #mixedmediaonpaper #createeveryday #twotakes #collaboration #inspiringeachother #smallbeautydaily #lovingbeautyandjoy #watercolorbotanicals #artchallenge #artchallenges #artstudio_post #penandink #pencilsketches #postitnotes #postitnoteart #postitnotesketch #postitnote #5minutesketch #5minuteartistchallenge #pocketjournal #artjournalpage #mixedmediaartjournal #artjournal #artjournalpages https://www.instagram.com/p/CoZqwsirk6u/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

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jerzwriter · 2 years

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How do you compliment someone's fic when it isn't good in terms of their writing ?

Hi Nonny,

This is an interesting question. Here is what I think.

I love food, and I'm lucky enough to live in an area with some of the best dining options in the world around me. I'm also blessed to have had numerous grandmas and aunties of various cultural backgrounds who were phenomenal cooks. So, I know QUALITY food.

But, sometimes, my child will whip up a batch of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese - that's not highbrow for sure - but when we share it together, it takes us back to a different time when we'd sit and watch cartoons together, and we enjoy it so much.

Sometimes, if given the choice between a fine Angus beef burger or McDonald's, I'll just happen to be in the mood for McDonald's. And my ex used to pop out those 25-cent blocks of ramen noodles when he wanted to remember the simpler days of being a college student.

My point? It doesn't have to be the greatest quality in the world for it to be something that is enjoyable or something you can love.

Share what the story meant to you or how it related to something that's happened in your own life.

Talk about how they interpreted a character or created an OC.

Did a specific line make you laugh, cry, or cause you to think? Mention it.

Did your favorite character mention something you'd like to read more about? Tell the writer.

There are always ways to bring out positivity. I'm a firm believer that there are no bad works of art, and writing is an art form. If someone took their vision and transformed a blank sheet of paper or computer screen into a story they wanted to tell, we can find something to celebrate within it.

Thank you for caring enough to want to reward all writers who work so hard to create. We have many talented writers of every level, and I like to keep it real. We're writing fanfic; we're not Tolstoy. So let's all celebrate each other as much as we can. THANK YOU.

#asks #asks answered #fandom stuff #writers #saying thanks

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wynterrrrrrrrrr · 7 months

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#Packaging Paper Kraft Paper Making Line Equipment #our email: [email protected]#whatsapp: 8613782999672

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chubsonthemoon · 1 year

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Finished binding @that-banhus's fantastic King of Infinite Space today! You ever get into a pairing fresh out of binging a series and read a fic that just solidifies the characters in your head? Like, they go from "funny lil guy I enjoyed watching on TV" to someone who could be real, someone you could know. That was this fic for me--banhus's Hob is such a delight to read, so vibrant and funny and optimistic. And of course Dream's voice in this is just *chef's kiss* pitch perfect.

Some process chatter, under the cut! <3

SIZE

So this was my first go at a quarto size on legal paper (8.5" x 14"), and I LOVE it. This size is perfect for that 10k-15k range, and with the community imposer designed by the lovely folks at @renegadepublishing (thank you, @simply-sithel and Cocoa!), it was such a breeze to figure out the formatting. (Printing, on the other hand, was a bit of a mess since my printer doesn't do duplex for legal sizes, but I figured it out in the end. And hey, I got a bunch of waste sheets out of it! XD)

BINDING

I did a variation of the paperback format I've seen floating around in the Renegade discord (@ashmouthbooks kindly explained it a few months ago, thank you so much!). French link stitching glued with PVA as per usual, although no tapes or mull.

The cover is made of scrapbook paper and is glued directly to the flyleaf (flyleafs? flyleaves?), although as you can see below I added an extra layer of kraft paper to give it more of a "board" feel:

The pictures in this post are of my second/author copy, with an added a half-centimeter hinge so the spine can open more easily. My first copy did not have a hinge so it's a little stiff when you open it, but it gets the job done baha. Now I know for future binds in this size: hinges are the way to go!

DESIGN (or, as I call it, VibesTM)

The first line of this fic has lived rent-free in my brain for months now: They sat at the New Inn until the afternoon melted into evening, the sunlight thickened to a rich orange, and the late crowd began to trickle into the inn in chattering groups. I remember reading it late at night and immediately sitting up and going "oh hell yeah." This fic gives me that "walking to class in the fall semester and feeling the whole world passing you by and you have books to read and papers to write but you see your friend from across the quad and they wave at you and you wave back and everything is okay, maybe, because the leaves are turning and you're going to make it, dammit, you are going to make it" vibes. So the cover paper is from one of Michael's paper packs, called "Autumn Blaze."

HOWEVER, Banhus also mentioned that the paper looks like a sandy beach, and I'm smacking myself over the head for not doing that intentionally because yes! There's a lovely lovely scene at the end where Dream and Hob are lounging on the shore of the Dreaming and are finally, finally figuring it out, and it's wonderful and so atmospheric and I am 100% going to pretend that my paper choice here was tailored for that scene specifically XD

Titling is permanent adhesive vinyl cut by my Cricut, Charlotte, with hand-drawn "bolding" around each letter done with my uniball Signo white gel pen. And since I've been trying to get better at documenting my fonts, the titling for this one was Perpetua Titling MT, and the body was my go-to Garamond my beloved.

As a bonus, here is my first go at binding this fic, but in quarto letter size instead of legal! Smol :3

And that's all for today! Thank you so much, Banhus, for letting me bind your work! It was a pleasure, and I can't wait for you to receive your copy <3

All my love!

#the sandman #dreamling #dream of the endless #hob gadling #bookbinding #fanbinding #ficbinding #not my fic #King of Infinite Space #Banhus

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creativeboxesblog · 9 days

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Grab Attention with Bespoke Kraft Candle Boxes in the UK

In the vibrant UK candle market, where competition burns bright, attracting customers requires distinctive packaging that ignites their interest. Here's where custom Kraft candle boxes become your secret weapon. Crafted from eco-friendly, natural Kraft paper, these boxes offer a blank canvas to showcase your brand's personality and elevate your candles from ordinary to extraordinary.

Why Choose Custom Kraft Candle Boxes?

The UK consumer is increasingly environmentally conscious. Kraft cardboard resonates with this sentiment, projecting a natural and sustainable image. But beyond eco-friendliness, custom Kraft candle boxes boast several advantages:

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Examples of Compelling Kraft Candle Box Designs for the UK Market

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Watercolour Delights: Capture the essence of British gardens with beautiful watercolour illustrations on your Kraft boxes. This design is perfect for floral or nature-inspired candle scents.

Humorous Touches: The British love a bit of wit! Don't be afraid to incorporate humorous messages or playful illustrations on your Kraft boxes. This will make your brand stand out and leave a lasting impression.

By implementing these ideas and tailoring them to your unique brand identity, you can create custom Kraft candle boxes that grab attention and turn lookers into loyal customers.

Remember, the key is to be creative, informative, and engaging. Let your custom candle boxes become a silent ambassador for your brand, whispering tales of quality, sustainability, and the beautiful world of handcrafted candles.

#custom Kraft candle boxes #custom candle boxes #candle boxes #Kraft boxes

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