LydMc

Happy Halloween 2014! One of my favorite October pastimes  (besides busting out my coziest sweaters and fluffy socks)   is drawing fun costumes from the annual Halloween catalogs. Each year, I have friends pick out their favorite costumes and then I assign them to my crew of fictional characters.  The picture above is fresh off the sketchbook for Halloween 2014, and this year, the costumes were chosen by my brother, my mom, and my boyfriend (who was also kind enough to lend me some of his Prismacolor markers). Can you find the Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 cameo...? Ghosts, pirates, and fairies of Halloweens past abound in my binders of old drawings, and I dug out some of the more entertaining pictures to share.  While most aren't quite as polished in the quality department, they do a great job of showing the progression of my art skills, and of costume catalogs.   Crazy as it may seem, this picture was from 10 YEARS AGO... Spooky! I had ...

Yum Yes! Fancy that, the Sushiwoks are on an infographic featuring Sushi Around the World! Visit the CheapFlights link below for full resolution! They thought I/the Sushiwoks were Canadian at first (perhaps I'm just that nice, eh?), but it all worked out in the end.  ...Eh? Thanks to Cheapflights.com.au for including Sushiwoks in the tour of international delicacies!

Shark Bark Attack! It's that time again... Shark Week is upon us and that means feeding frenzies! If you need a clever, simple, delicious treat for your Shark Week viewing party (or if you've got as many sweet teeth as a shark), check out the latest in specialty themed party food: SHARK BARK!  Just like the typical peppermint bark, each of the four flavors of Shark Bark seen here is super simple and delicious. Since they all have essentially the same foundation, let's start with the basics. White Chocolate Chips, Ahoy! First thing's first: melted chocolate. The traditional way (some might say "right" way) of melting chocolate is to use chopped up blocks of chocolate in a double boiler. If you don't have a double boiler or the patience to use one, there is another, simpler method that yields the same results. We're going to need a bigger bowl... Simply add one cup of chocolate chips (semisweet, white, etc.) to a microwave safe ...

Just add water! In honor of Comic Con 2014 and Throwback Thursday, I think it's about time to showcase another one of my cosplay adventures! While I've already posted some of my comic con adventures in  A Link to the Blog: The Legend of Zelda Cosplay , this costume is the title character from Ranma 1/2, an anime/manga popular back in the 90s.  If you're not familiar with the show/comic, it's pretty simple:  While training in martial arts with his father , the main character, Ranma, fell into a cursed spring which turned him into a girl. Each one of the many pools carries a different transformation curse, activated by cold water and fixed by hot.  What with a dozen different love triangles, blood feuds, and unexpected dousings, antics ensue. Ranma, Shampoo, Mousse, and Ryoga in a rare moment of peace! The character I cosplayed as was female Ranma, a.k.a. girl type Ranma, a.k.a. pig tailed girl. My cohorts cosplayed as other cursed charact...

The Sushiwoks are back and puffier than ever! Today is a very special day for the LydMc blog: it is officially the One Year Anniversary of the first blog post! Huzzah!! One whole year of delightful, nerdy, and often delicious forays into creativity!  In honor of this momentous occasion, I would like to celebrate with a craft inspired by the blog that started it all: The Sushiwoks! Yub nub! Not only were these Star Wars themed appetizers the first post on the LydMc blog, they were also the ones that put it on the map. Thanks to the awesome sharing of fellow nerds, cooks, and craftspeople (thanks, all!), the sushiwoks started making the internet rounds and page views climbed to the hundreds.  And then, one fine day when I just so happened to get my wisdom teeth out, I sit down on the couch to recover and see the views have jumped to the thousands! As it turned out, ThinkGeek posted the sushiwoks (sushi ewoks) on Facebook making the blog go viral,...