Now We Have Button Eyes

I've been a fan of Neil Gaiman since my undergrad days (see this ode to Sandman that I sold on my pumpkinbear etsy shop a while ago?)-- --and when I was studying for my Master's in Library Science and took a class in children's literature, I developed an appreciation for his children's books, too (although I'm pretty sure that they're completely inappropriate for children-- --
*shudder*).

Anyway, Coraline is awesome. And creepy. With a kid who is just the way I was as a kid (also creepy). And the Other Mother? Her eyes?

Are buttons.

Crafty, right? And creepy-crafty, which is even better than crafty.

So even though Matt and I likely won't see the movie version until it's out on Netflix (and he has to read the book first, which is my one inflexible rule about that whole movie/book business), I was goofing around on the Coraline movie web site early this morning (I was supposed to be doing some etsy stuff, but there you go), and guess what I made?In the Other Mother's Workshop you can upload a photo into a frame and the photo's all antique-y and scratchy, and then you can choose from a whole bunch of buttons to make your loved ones look creepy. The cat looks creepy:And the baby looks really, really creepy:Now if you could just add some creepy crochet hair, we'd be all set.

My Apprentice Crafters of Kid-Friendly Crafts

Most of my regular writing assignments are "lifestyle" assignments, I guess you could call it. I write about such-and-such, and maybe it's a tutorial or a project to do with children or something that we've done together, but regardless, I only photograph the kids as they are in their natural habitat. I don't pose them, or fix their hair, and you know by now that I certainly don't clean the clutter out of the frame. I just sort of follow them around, and take photos of what they're already doing as they do it.

It's the same, of course, when I write here on my personal blog. It's memories, or projects, or lesson plans, or life, but it's not staged.

Every now and then, though, I score a bigger writing assignment, in which staging is called for. When I need to do that, and I need to have the children's assistance--if I'm writing about kid crafts, for example, or something from our schooling--then I call them my assistants and I pay them.

Actually, I pay the kids for a lot of stuff around here when it's not part of their regular chores, and I pay them a kid-negotiated wage that's probably more than what most kids earn for chores, but the major benefit to that is that when I'm paying them for a job, I expect that job to be completed professionally, with an appropriate attitude, and just the way that I've specified, or the kid doesn't get paid.

Try nagging them to do that kind of job without paying them! Seriously, yesterday Will mowed over two acres of lawn, and she picked up the garden hose and extension cord and outdoor toys first, and she didn't run into any trees, AND she put the mower on the highest setting even though she deeply enjoys mowing the grass down to the bare earth, AND she did it without complaining.

More than worth the seven bucks that I paid her.

So for my latest big assignment, an article on kid-friendly crafts for the Fourth of July, my two assistants were required to put on clean clothes, wash their faces, brush their hair, and do some projects while I photographed them. They were paid a negotiated wage, quite a lot of which Will lost when she pulled a tweeny bad attitude on the job site, and had some art direction, mostly involving keeping themselves in the frame so that I didn't have to crawl around on my belly on the dirty driveway *too* much.

Here's Syd demonstrating how to make melted crayon canvas art:

The biggest challenge of this photo shoot was cutting the chickens and cats out of the frame.

I wanted some good action shots of drips and splashes, but they were so fast!

 The photo shoot for the film canister rocket project was even more challenging, because I really, really, REALLY wanted a shot of the rocket taking off, but it happens in a fraction of a second, and I just couldn't seem to luck out. I kept getting this--

--and this a quarter of a second later:

This--

--and then this:

I finally settled on an image similar to this--

--but with a kid in the background to add interest.

Will got her salary docked during this job, but what she doesn't know is that it's all going to her, anyway, as my salary is what's making the budget for her birthday this year. She gets spoiled a little more than her sister does on her birthday, since she doesn't like parties, and that's what most of Syd's birthday budget goes towards. The kids also really don't receive anything new unless it's a holiday, so I probably enjoy the tradition of giving them two brand-new presents for their birthdays as much as they enjoy receiving two brand-new presents for their birthdays. Unfortunately, Will is the hardest child on the planet to shop for. Reading is an all-consuming passion for her, but she rarely re-reads a book, so I tend to not buy her books, preferring to inter-library loan more esoteric stuff as a treat for her. She disdains clothing. She only plays with toys when her sister can wheedle her into it. She'll immerse herself in art or engineering or robotics or anything, really, when she's encouraged to AND is in the right mood, but I'd love to find her something that she would choose to engage in all on her own, to rest her eyes from reading, if nothing else.

She has asked for (and will receive) a "real" dagger; Syd is going to do the paracord wrap on the handle, I'm going to construct--somehow!--a sheath and belt loop for it out of leather scraps, and Matt is going to burn something cool onto the leather.

Other than that, though... Maybe a LEGO-compatible programmable robot? She really enjoyed Robotics Club, until she dropped it for fencing.

A soapstone carving kit? She really enjoyed her limestone carving class a couple of years ago, but now only picks up her tools when I have a design request for her.

A ceramic skull hanging planter? She likes skulls and decorative things, but doesn't have a good track record with plants.

I had been considering a box set of the Sandman comics, but Matt doesn't think they're appropriate for children. I'd also been considering the D&D red box, but it's awfully expensive.

Ancient coins? Chemistry card game? Balancing cats?

Ugh!

Okay, if YOU had a hundred bucks, what would YOU buy for a tween like Will?

Buying and Selling (and Buying)

I try to buy locally, but for all that, I've been indulging a bit in online commerce recently, and of course I quite encourage the online purchase of high-quality handmade fangeek goods from my own online shop, so there you go.

I don't know if you do this, but when I'm preparing to go on vacation with the family, I tend to use that time to buy a bunch of stuff. You know, stuff like the baby wears her really ratty swim trunks that used to be her sister's to the local pool every day, but she certainly can't wear ratty swim trunks on vacation, so let's go shopping! And the girls have tons and tons of art supplies and small toys here at home, but I'd bet they'd behave so much better on an airplane if they had all new art supplies and small toys, so let's go buy some! None of those previous items have yet to be purchased, although they're all on the dream list, but this week I did buy a few extravagances for our upcoming trip.

Although I have successfully made my own mei tai, I found it bulky and awkward. The straps crossed right over my quite substantial breasts, for instance, and although that was nicely supportive, it leaves something to be desired aesthetically, I believe. I just can't get the use out of something if I don't really love it, so I never did wear Sydney in my home-concocted mei tai as much as I would have liked to, and so recently I broke down and bought this awesome mei tai. It's pink with skulls on one side, you see, in case I'm feeling fancy, and plain black on the other side in case I need to blend. The straps are long enough so I can tie them backpack style instead of across or under my breasts, which is comfier on us more ample figures, and it's way trimmer than my bulky old tai. Although mei tais, especially in a back carry, have a learning curve (it takes me a few tries still to get the mei tai pulled up around Syd's back without catching her butt on the top and thus sitting her on it instead of in it, which makes me swear), and although I have a couple of personal preference mods to make on it, such as padding the straps where they sit on my shoulder and the back where it catches Syd's thighs, I love, love, LOVE it. Love it.

This year Willow is old enough to carry her own backpack with her own and Sydney's things inside, toys and snacks and etc., and so I decided to buy the girls and myself some nice, reusable water bottles. I'm not a fan of the whole commercial bottled water concept, nor do I approve of the long-term re-use of an old commercial water bottle for your own water needs. That cheap plastic leaches, which you ought to be able to tell from the way that the really old bottles of really dedicated re-use types look all discolored and yellow-brown. There will be no phthalates in my breastmilk or my kids' bloodstream, I say! That's why, even though I disapprove of the willful misspelling, I bought us some Klean Kanteens. They're food-grade stainless steel, nice and light and non-leaching. The bottle mouths are wide enough to pour ice cubes in, and you can buy sippy spouts for them, but we like sports caps because they're also relatively non-spill. I bought the plain silver 27-ounce for myself, Matt didn't want one, Willow chose the blue 12-ounce for herself, and Sydney chose the pink 12-ounce. Oddly enough, I didn't actually buy these from the Klean Kanteen site, because this Greenfeet site was about twenty dollars cheaper for our order. Weird.

In other news, it's finally time to say goodbye to my Sandman soldered glass pendant, which hung around on my etsy shop for months even though it had tons upon tons of hearts. It will be happily wending its way to its new forever home tomorrow.

If you're wondering why I haven't been showing off my crafting lately, it's because it's a secret! I'm tootling along on my Christmas in July Stashbuster swap on Craftster, set to send out before we leave on vacation, but hopefully I'll finish tootling this weekend and then I have lots of other wacky crafty ideas to try out and post after that.