bright eyes + blue eyes

pumpkin's ATCs

 
 
 
 
 
 

 

superboy's ATCs

  
  
 

 

hoop art swap

I recently participated in a hoop art swap, hosted by Heather at Live Made Lovely.

Each participant had the fun task of making a "hoop art creation" & mailing it to her swap partner. Any design, any size hoop, any type of fabric or embroidery, any embellishments...the type of hoop creation was completely at the discretion of the ar-teest. ( <--- Fancy Nancy would tell you: that's a fancy way of pronouncing the word "artist.")

I was matched up with Maegan from The Firefly Lantern.

(I completely forgot to take a photo of my own hoop before putting it in the mail. It was an applique design of hills, sky, and sun.)

Here's the lovely hoop which I received from Maegan.

 

I especially love this little leaf. So pretty!

 

Thank you, Heather, for hosting the swap! It was fun. And as an added bonus, Pumpkin (my 6 yr old little girl) has really become infatuated with embroidery. She now has her own little hoop, and has all kinds of projects she wants to try.

 

small people who like to draw

My children have really been on a drawing kick lately. Which is great. I enjoy watching them put so much effort into translating ideas from their brains to ink-on-paper.  

There are lots of great things about all the drawing going on.

However. There's one downside.

I noticed, a few months ago, that they were leaving stacks of paper all over the house! A pile of drawings in the bedroom. A pile of drawings in the living room. A pile of drawings in the dining room.

I realized that we didn't really have a "system" for cleaning up the drawings.

When it comes to housekeeping, here is one thing I've learned over the years:

When there is an absence of a system, that basically means this: it all falls on mom.

Whose job is it to pick up and sort through the drawings? The artist.

Who was actually the one picking up and sorting through the drawings? The mom.

Basically, I found myself collecting their drawings & putting them in a stack in the sunroom.

Every week or so, I would flip through the drawings and recycle most of the stack. I would keep some of the ones that stood out to me.

The problem is, to them, EVERY DRAWING was very, very special. If they happened to see a few drawings in the recycle bin, they would flip.

Then we'd have to have a conversation about how we can't keep everything....yada yada.

But try as I might, that lesson was not sinking in very well, because the genesis of the conversation was always the shock and agony (!!) of finding a precious drawing in the recycle bin.

Not good.

One day I came to a very important realization: I am not doing them any favors.

Doing the clean-up work for them? Not doing them any favors.

Making the decisions about keep vs. throw away for them? Not doing them any favors.

I remembered my OWN soapbox about putting the decisions into their hands whenever possible. If it is something that my children CAN POSSIBLY do for themselves, then they should be doing it for themselves.

Part of life is to realize that you have to make decisions about what to keep and what to get rid of.

Part of learning about creativity is realizing that, often, you have to produce drafts of an idea before you finally get *it* to look the way you want it to look. (drawing, painting, photograph, writing....the list goes on.)

Subconsciously I'm sure I was thinking something along the lines of "They don't really like to make decisions about what to throw away. If I leave the choice to them, they'll just keep everything. Therefore I'll have to make those decisions for them."

Wrong.

Not doing them any favors.

They need to learn how to make those decisions on their own.

SO: here's what I came up with.

(This "solution" is probably so obvious to anyone reading this post. I'm sorry to say it took me a while to realize we needed a system like this.....)

 

I bought two plastic containers. One for him. One for her.

I sat them down & talked about how we can't keep everything in life. I told them that ALL their lives they would have to make decisions about getting rid of things. They need to start learning those lessons now.

I showed them the containers. I told them that ANY time they finish a drawing session (no matter where they are in the house), they must do four things

(1) Throw away (or recycle) trash. (paper cuttings, etc)

(2) Put blank, unused paper back in its place.

(3) Recycle any drawings that they don't need to keep.

(4) Store any "keeper" drawings in the plastic container.

I told them that this container is for 2011. They can put as many drawings in it as they want, as long as the lid still closes.

When it's full, it's full. That's it for 2011. You'll have to throw more away if you need more room.

OR: if you really, really want to, I'll let YOU buy a second plastic container with your allowance money.

{...Introducing the concept of storage units at a young age. Ha! It's the American way, right?}

So far, the "drawing boxes", as we now refer to them, have been a big hit. 

I think they've even come to enjoy having to make decisions about what to do with what they produce. Also, the drawing boxes have made them slow down and put more thought and detail into each drawing.

It'll be interesting to see how those boxes look at the end of the year....And also interesting to see if they're able to make it on ONE box per person!

 

 

 

ladybug family

We made a ladybug family.

 

I was inspired by Angie's post -- Blonde Designs : Making Pet Rocks

You'll find all of the instructions & details in her blog post. Have fun making your new pets!

 

butterfly collage

Butterfly Collage:

This project is very easy, very affordable*, and very fun.

*especially if you take advantage of 40% off coupons at Michael's or Hobby Lobby.

Pumpkin completed this project last year, when she was in kindergarten.

We spent several days doing her collage...doing just a little bit each day.

 

Materials needed:

(1) Blank Canvas

(2) Acrylic Paint

(3) Watercolor Paper

(4) Watercolor Paint

(5) Paper Punch (We used a butterfly punch from Martha Stewart's paper punch line.)

(6) Pop Dots (or other adhesive)

 

Steps:

(1) Using acrylilc paint, paint canvas. Use several coats of paint for best results.

 

(2) Using watercolors, paint splotchy bits all over watercolor paper. No rhyme; no reason. Just paint.

 

(3) Let watercolor dry. (Completely. Overnight is best.)

(4) Using paper punch, begin punching shapes.

 

Here's the punch we used. Martha has some really great punches. (Way to go, MS. Butterfly Paper Punch: It's a good thing.)

 

We discovered that it was easiest to cut the watercolor paper into strips and THEN punch out the shapes.

 

(5) Adhere punched shapes to canvas. For our butterflies, we did a *slight* bend in the middle of each butterfly. Then, we attached a tiny "pop dot" (which is sticky on both sides) to ONE of the wings. We alternated wings. This gives the effect of the butterflies flying around in all directions.

 

 

There you have it! A beautiful butterfly collage. 

Here's a short video of Pumpkin telling us more about her collage:

butterflies in the morning from ellie and abbie on Vimeo.

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Related:

 

When Ellie lived in DC, I got to visit her twice. (Once for a fun visit, and once for a fun wedding! {hers})

On the first visit, we did lots of museum hopping. Here's one of my photos (above): a butterfly collection from the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. Aren't butterflies beautiful? All the colors...all the symmetry....I just love them.

Also, here's a little photo group I made from flickr photos which feature butterfly collages. The sky's the limit on this concept.

 

1. butterfly - free, no copyrights, 2. Butterfly collage, 3. weekend creative : punch collage, 4. white_butterflies_02, 5. Butterfly Escort Cards, 6. Paper butterfly collage, 7. butterfly collection, 8. Butterfly Picture, 9. Butterfly collage

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Related Links:

Ali Edwards : Butterfly Punch Collage - Ali's post was the original inspiration for our butterfly collage. Wonderful idea. (Thanks, Ali!)

The Idea Room : Butterfly Collage

Papers and Plus : Butterfly Art

LollyChops : The Butterfly Project

doors, windows, and awnings

Paper Bag Village

(1) Put a few pebbles (or a bit of rice) at the bottom of a paper bag. (To give weight to the bottom of the bag.)

 (2) Loosely stuff paper bags with crumpled up tissue paper.

(3) Attach doors, windows, and awnings.

We made ours with doors (etc) supplied by High Five magazine. (Excellent magazine, by the way.)

However, I think it would be just as fun, if not more fun, to create your own doors and accessories. Use cardstock.

 

 
 

 

project life : getting started

This year, I'm using a scrapbook system called "project life." The system is basically a kit with coordinating accessories and divided page protectors. Most scrapbookers who use this system do a 2-page spread for every week of the year. (!!!) At the end of the year, the family has a nice summary of the year's events. In addition to the photos, most people incorporate lots of journaling and info into their scrapbook.

I'm doing a much more scaled down version. Two pages per week is more than I have time to keep up with. My personal goal is to do a 2-page spread for every month of 2011. If I like this system, I'll keep going in future years as well.

 

I've completed the bare bones version of my January pages. I have other bits & bobs that I'd like to add. Also, I have some journaling that I plan to include. I'll post again when I'm completely finished with the January pages.

Hopefully this little kit will result in a fun family album, full of 2011 memories. I hope my hubby and children will enjoy flipping through it.

 

 
More about Project life can be found here. {My particular version of the kit was purchased in 2009 and isn't available anymore. But there are current versions available.}

goodbye, efficiency (part three)

goodbye, efficiency (part one)

goodbye, efficiency (part two)

And now, without further ado, I bring you the conclusion to this series:

goodbye, efficiency (part three)

So, there I was as a young bride, trying to get all of my systems on to the computer to make them all more efficient.

But here's what I've learned over the years: There are a few downsides to having everything on the computer.

(1) When there is a computer problem, EVERYTHING in your life is affected. All of your daily productivity is tied to the healthy functioning of your computer.

(2) Computer programs tend to have issues now & then. For example, my lovely recipe software has crashed at least twice over the last decade. When it crashed, it erased all of the recipes that I'd entered. Yes, I had a back-up of the recipes, but there ended up being problems with the back-up as well. (I'm sure some of this might've had to do with user error--but still, it's a huge hassle, no matter why the crash happened.)

(3) {I saved the biggest downside for last} Going to the computer every time I need a recipe, and every time I need an address from my personal address book, and every time I want to listen to music, and every time I need to enter an item into our family budget is a huge distraction in my day-to-day living! While I'm at the computer, I end up checking "just one other little thing", and suddenly I've blown 15 minutes instead of 15 seconds. Add up all those 15 minute chunks over the course of a week, and suddenly efficiency doesn't seem quite so efficient anymore.

Here's my metaphor:

Time = A gallon of milk

Small dishwashing sponge = Computer

Imagine pouring a gallon of milk out onto your kitchen floor. Then imagine dropping the little sponge right into the middle of the puddle.

Slurrrrrrrp.

Before you know it, quite miraculously, the little sponge has absorbed ALL OF THE MILK.

{conclusion of metaphor.}

SO: about a year ago, I said "goodbye to efficiency," and decided to use the computer only for things which required a computer (i.e., email, blogging, digital photo storage, etc.)

I now have paper-based systems for my calendar, my recipes, my addresses, etc. {My recipe system is definitely still a work in progress. I'd like to crank that system into a well-oiled machine, but haven't been able to carve out the time as of yet.}

Sidenote: Also, over recent years, I've developed a new appreciation for the art of handwritten "life details." For example, if you close your eyes and think about it, you can probably envision the handwriting of people who you love. I can immediately call to mind the distinct handwriting of all four of my grandparents, my parents, my siblings, my husband.....

In fact, just the act of remembering handwriting characteristics of people I love makes me happy. (Which is sort of amazing in and of itself--how is it that the inky curves of particular lines can bring to mind the essence of a person I love? Pretty nifty.)

Whenever I'm at my grandmother's house, one thing I like to do is go in her kitchen & open up the built in drawers to the right of her refrigerator. They're little drawers (one drawer? more than one? I can't remember) about 6 inches wide--perfect for her collection of handwritten recipes. There are TONS of recipes in these drawers. Many of those recipes have been in those drawers for decades. They're well-loved and yellowed with age. And they're precious to me. I flip through them with appreciation for all the love and care which has been experienced in my grandmother's home. I think about all the thousands of family meals which have been enjoyed around her table. I think about the friends and family members with whom she's shared recipes, and how many of the cards in her collection carry stories of their own. I flip through my grandmother's recipes, and I'm inspired.

A year or so ago, when I was looking at those recipes, was when I decided that I'm done with efficiency. I'm currently working on editing/refining my handwritten recipe collection. 

As an added bonus: Now, instead of someday handing my grandchild a jump drive with all the family recipes, maybe I'll have some yellowed-cards-with-stories to pass along.

A few related books/links:

The Hidden Art of Homemaking, by E. Schaeffer

Script and Scribble, by K. Florey

Hamlet's Blackberry, by W. Powers

NPR Morning Edition: Hamlet's Blackberry, To Surf or not to Surf {mom, remember when you told me about this interview? I haven't read the book yet, but I want to.}

Letter Writers Alliance

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unrelated photo:

A couple of years ago....

Riding bikes and playing football at the high school track/field...

 

 

 

 

 

weekend homework

Superboy had the task of re-writing a familiar story. He was required to use interesting adjectives & adverbs. Here's how it turned out:

ants and grasshoppers: a familiar story re-told from ellie and abbie on Vimeo.