gretchensinister

[gretchensinister]

YOU.

THERE you are! You, who is responsible for filling all my thoughts with BlackSand! You've rekindled my ROTG obsession and given it SUCH a lovely new flavour, like golden caramel and lemon drops and black licorice. And raspberry daiquiris. And two eternal beings eternally in love with each other. I'm going to lose my mind, you're officially my favourite person in the entire fandom, I cannot gush enough about the THINGS you do with WORDS.

Anyways, looking forward to finding out what other wonders you have stashed here on tumblr!

Ehehehe I think this is the first time I've gotten large text in an ask, I didn't know people could do that now

I am so excited and happy that you are having such a good time with all the things you are finding!

An important thing I want to mention is that when the RotG fandom was most active, there was a notable cluster of blacksand artists and writers bouncing ideas off each other, and while the artists are easy to find in my blacksand tag, I know I wasn't as good about reblogging fic back then.

So here's some more leads--

@marypsue, @emeraldembers; @queerpyracy, @tejoxys, @bowlingforgerbils (if I'm forgetting a writer I shouldn't I'm sorry guys it's pretty late)

#blacksand #blacksand brigade? blacksand brigade?

[gretchensinister]

#video #tumbleweeds

[gretchensinister]

#you know the $10 chevy forf would kick every cybertruck's ass #attic objects

[gretchensinister]

So, a while ago I started getting into perfume. And so I started acquiring perfume samples. Soon enough I needed to contain them in a box. Unfortunately the only nice, sturdy box of about the right size I had was this snowman box. And then it shortly became not the right size, and also it was hard for me to find anything in it.

It was time for a PROJECT. My concept was a pretty, sturdy box with two layers of foam inside to hold all the different perfumes in place. I first had a shoebox that I was going to decorate with a collage, but that would have required a lot of work to design, totally hide the shoebox origin, and end with a pleasing texture. Which is why I thought of it in November 2023 and then didn't do anything except put some materials on my craft table.

But then! I got a box of Christmas cookies! And I ate them very slowly. But I noticed that the tin was not notably Christmassy, and it was the right depth and also wider than the shoebox. The PROJECT had now gotten much simpler.

The gold swirl is the scent of perfumes floating through the air~

That is 1-inch thick black polyethylene foam, BTW, if you need to find such an item but don't know the search terms, as was the case with me. It cuts easily with an exacto knife and will stick well to cardboard with hot glue. The ribbon handles are full sewn-together loops under the base cardboard layer. Anyway, that is the top layer of the perfume box, with all the little samples.

It lifts up to reveal all the larger vials, which just have to rest on top of the foam. This foam is also glued to cardboard and just rests in the tin; there was no need for it to be glued in when it's not going to be subjected to a lot of force.

And thus the perfume has been contained. And alphabetized. (Except for the actual bottles which don't fit but there are only FOUR of those so shh.) It has to go decoratively on my bookshelf now instead of in my bathroom but that's okay!

I will answer any questions about process or the perfumes :)

#crafts #perfume #organization #storage #rambling

[gretchensinister]

Daily Fic Highlight: The Dark Watcher

Oh, this is so exciting! Today the kudos email winner is:

"The Dark Watcher" is a Pitch/Sandy fic that is one of an extensive number of blacksand AUs. In this one, Sandy is a young man who is being sacrificed to the local monster to ensure winter will end and spring will begin. Pitch is that local monster, not really human-shaped at all, but in possession of many, many tentacles. Pitch doesn't really know what to do with a sacrifice that isn't afraid of him. But Sandy has an idea. 6815 words, E, M/M.

I had better not be coy at all, these days. The purpose of this story's existence and the majority of its wordcount is enthusiastic tentacle sex.

Fun fact: I once asked people to anonymously tell me if they'd ever used any of my stories to get off, and I got two different anons telling me yes, this one.

Sample (from the beginning, for courtesy's sake):

The Watcher arrives silently. Sandy becomes aware of it as a black void in the sky above him. The narrow shape stands impossibly tall, its edges rippling with slow movement. A dozen bright, shining eyes look down at him from the heights of its form. Sandy shivers as it moves ever closer, blotting out more and more of the sky as it approaches. He can’t tell where it touches the earth, and its utter silence prevents him from guessing how close it already is. As it nears, Sandy’s thoughts race, skidding and sliding on dreamwine in his mind. He thinks that the Watcher looks almost like a man in a cloak, save that the cloak is—what? Wings? Other, stranger limbs? He can’t see a face, other than the starry eyes. Where is its mouth? There doesn’t seem to be any texture to the thing, as if it’s nothing but a shadow. And yet—and yet! Faced with this creature, he is not afraid! He is a good sacrifice, he has no regrets; a proud pleased smile spreads over his face as the Watcher folds itself in half, bending its face towards Sandy’s, making a cage of boneless but powerful arms around the altar. With the eyes only a foot or two away from him now, Sandy notices first that they don’t all blink in unison, and, second, that they seem somewhat confused.

#pitch black #sanderson mansnoozie #blacksand shipping #rise of the guardians #rotg #daily fic highlight #winning with a comment today!

[gretchensinister]

I'm so sorry if this is irrelevant but LOOK AT BELLE'S BEAUTY AND THE BEAST DRESS IN JAPAN I NEED TO SHARE IT WITH SOMEONE !!

twitter(.)com/shiki_jp/status/1581927605808562177?t=y3Gl7DkNwO5M8arnlF35nw&s=19

Uhm... OMG that embroidery??!??!?!

( Clickable link here for those who wants more photos )

THANK YOU for sharing!

#now that's a dress #beauty and the beast

[gretchensinister]

#omg there is #if I watch one episode of Supernatural I guess it has to be that one #poll

[gretchensinister]

its quail season here

#wizard

[gretchensinister]

I've seen too many discourse posts about what people should be allowed to wear in public that are super boring. Come up with more fun examples. Is Morticia Addams allowed to speak French in public when Gomez is with her?

#rambling #I hope the secret foot fetishists enjoy my flip flops IDGAF

[gretchensinister]

#with enough audacity and correct scheduling the speech could be the least time commitment #no one said it had to be good! #poll #I'm confident I could do the engineering one and it might lead to an interesting new career but I would need way more details

[gretchensinister]

Daily Fic Highlight: Aw, You Do Care

Today the kudos'ed fic I want to highlight is:

"Aw, You Do Care" is a Bunny/Jack short fic I wrote as part of my project to fill all unfilled prompts in Round 1 of the Rise of the Guardians Dreamwidth Kinkmeme. It's pretty simple: in a random human AU, Jack is sick, Bunny comes over to grumpily take care of him, and Jack reveals his feelings. 1373 words, G, M/M.

I wouldn't have thought to write this without the prompt, so I was surprised at how much I liked it when I reread it.

Weirdly, this fic reminded me that I haven't had a cold or anything in a really long time (knock on wood that it stays that way).

Sample:

“Hey! Open up!” Bunny knocked rapidly on the apartment door. “Your boss called me because you left him a voicemail that said you were fucking dying! What the hell are you doing?” His phone buzzed. “Spare key under the mat” read the text. “You’d better be joking, you had better be joking,” Bunny muttered to himself as he lifted the mat. It said “Ice to see you!” while also depicting the cheery face of a snowman, in the brightest colors possible. Jack had had it in front of his door for about ten months straight now, and it had been inappropriate for nine of them. And it did conceal a spare key. “Damn it, Jack, we’re in a city,” Bunny said to himself as he unlocked the door.

#jack frost #bunnymund #jackrabbit shipping #rise of the guardians #RotG #daily fic highlight #another winner today!

[gretchensinister]

venom big unnaturals. nothing normal abt those thangs. downright dastardly dobonhonkeros.

#venom

[gretchensinister]

reddit is having a glitch where it puts the wrong captions over photos and it’s the only thing i care about right now

#the burrow one seems like a Reductress headline #I have not stopped thinking about the 'dinner for my 2.5 year old' yard mushrooms since I saw it #you may wonder what my blog is about

[gretchensinister]

this looks like the opposite of fun to me, to each their own tho

#I would pass away #video

[gretchensinister]

One day you'll grow old and 

You won't recognize your hands and 

The world will become too loud and 

You'll see a stranger in the mirror who whispers 

To love yourself 

Keep loving yourself 

Dear God please 

Don't stop

Loving 

Yourself 

#poetry

[gretchensinister]

young artist posting your work online, heed my warning. im holding your face so gently in my hands, you have to stop caring about numbers right now and start caring about making the weirdest and most self-indulgent art you possibly can

[gretchensinister]

Daily Fic Highlight: Wish Granted!

Today there were two fics that had two kudos each, and I am choosing:

"Wish Granted!" is a Jack/Bunny ficlet that I wrote for a prompt in Round 1 of the Rise of the Guardians Dreamwidth Kinkmeme. Jack makes a wish and gets turned into a pooka. Jack has to explain himself to Bunny, and there's fur brushing. 1908 words, T, M/M

It's somewhat similar to "Wrong One Wishing" which was highlighted on 1/31/2024. Sometimes prompts had premises that were close to each other. This was one of the more fun ones.

One thing you will notice about me is that I love brushing/combing/grooming as an intimate thing for characters to do.

Sample:

Well, Bunny had been around for a long time, and he knew enough that even if there was no way of telling how a situation had come to be, there was no use in denying what it apparently was. No real pooka would have wandered around looking like that, but since he had Jack’s clothes…

#jack frost #bunnymund #jackrabbit shipping #rise of the guardians #rotg #daily fic highlight #another winner!