My Latest: Bookmarks and Pot Holders

the felted wool pot handle covers from Wise Craft

and a round-up of DIY bookmarks

The kids and I also made a bunch more bookmarks that follow my comic book bookmark tutorial, but instead use printable bookmark images that I found online. For myself, I made a Sherlock bookmark, a Doctor Who one that I colored with our Prismacolor markers--

I may be still working on my art skills, but Drawing with Children has definitely improved my coloring ability!

--and these two Supernatural bookmarks (I lost the Dean one, which was my favorite, at the theater during the long Trashion/Refashion Show day--boo!). I also wanted to make a Hunger Games bookmark, but finally I was like, "Dude, you have GOT to stop making bookmarks! There are other things to do with your life!"

Syd made this one, because the kids looooooooove Garfield:

They also love the Avengers, so I think we're going to make some of these popsicle stick Avengers bookmarks for them, too (well, I'll probably keep Iron Man for myself, but they can have the others). 

And then if we're already making bookmarks, I might as well go ahead and replace my lost Dean one, and make a Hunger Games one while I'm at it.

And if I'm making more bookmarks anyway, maybe I'll do just a couple more Doctor Who ones...

2014 Trashion/Refashion Show: Upside-Down Orange

In our four years of creating for and performing in our town's Trashion/Refashion Show, my kid has learned a LOT about being a fashion designer, a makeup artist, and a model, and, yes, I have learned a lot about being a stage mom.

I have actually said the following words to another human being, and MEANT them: "Please go full glitz on her, with super-dramatic eyes." We again owe the kid's beautiful hair and make-up to the students of the Hair Arts Academy, who always generously donate their time and skills to making all the models runway-ready.

I have become adept at packing a full day of nourishing kid food, none of which will stain one's clothing: hard-boiled eggs, string cheese, graham crackers, tangerines, granola bars, baby carrots.

I carry safety pins in my pocket.

I also carry tiny toys:

I photograph the dress rehearsal, since I can't sit in the second row during the performance:

The kid's signature move this year was a kind of jump+spreadeagle pose. She spent a lot of time airborne.

In fact, I spend most of the performance standing right here, just behind the curtain at stage right. It's a great spot, since the kid and I can watch all the activity behind the curtain at stage left, consisting of the stage manager and all the models about to walk:

I also know that there's no point in even trying to leave the theater for the two hours between dress rehearsal and our final call-time. Much better to hang out in the theater, reading or playing with tiny toy dogs in the balcony, watching the aerial silks and hula hoop teams at their own dress rehearsals:

Four years into this fashion show, I am well into the realization that this kid loves the stage. I am always so, so nervous for her that one of these years I may well have a pre-show heart attack, but as I'm sitting here at the table writing, with the kid sitting next to me working on her cursive/geography, I just asked her if she ever felt nervous before she walked.

"No." Didn't even have to think about it.

"Well, what do you feel?"

"Excited. And as soon as I'm done, I wish I could do it again ten more times!"

There you go, then.

Fortunately, aerial silks always opens the show, and their performances are so awesome (in the literal sense of the word) that my pending panic attack gets settled down enough that life can continue. I have to share both of these performances with you, both because they'll make your jaw drop (seriously, watch them full screen for the full effect), and because this is the group from whom the bigger kid takes lessons. These strong, brave girls and women are her role models:



Side note: While chatting with an acquaintance yesterday, I discovered that his daughter was the star of last year's aerial silks performance, the one who did all the impressive spins and falls and so stunned my daughters that they immediately asked me to find someone to teach them how to do this amazing thing, whatever it was.

"Ah, YOU!" I said to him. "You are THE reason that I've spent hundreds of dollars on aerial silks classes in the past year!"

The little kid, as she's been every year since she was four, was the model who opened the show. I love simply watching her performance, of course, but to me it's even better knowing all the work that she put into it, the way she has her marks and her cues memorized, her well-rehearsed routine that she practiced and timed and perfected over many weeks, the way she smiles openly at the audience:

And yes, she seriously would have done it ten more times, just that way, although I was pretty happy to be done with it after the once:

Much better, to me, to sit in the audience and watch the hula hoopers--

--and the Trashion runway walk, and to follow the Jefferson Street Marching Band up and down Kirkwood afterwards, random sidewalk cafe patrons taking cell phone videos of us as we passed:

And that's it for this year! The kid has her memories to sustain her until next year, and I have the happy satisfaction of a job well done, a major accomplishment accomplished, and the knowledge of a well-deserved rest from this particular project for the next several months.

Although... as I was chatting with my acquaintance about the show, he said, "Just imagine next year. Not only will you have one kid on the runway, but you could also have two kids in the silks performance."

I just...

I can't...

You know, I simply won't think about that for a few months.

P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, road trips to random little towns, looming mid-life crisis, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page!

Work Plans for the Week of April 28, 2014: Geography and Government

Even without formal work plans, last week turned into a very productive school week. We had one inspiring morning at the Indiana Statehouse, followed by an enriching afternoon at a museum of Native Americans and the West (where the kids were introduced to, and LOVED, the work of Ansel Adams!). Will discovered Scrabble. We spent a morning exploring our possibly, depending on contractor bids for crucial repairs, new house and property--

view up from the root cellar

--and have been building many castles in the sky regarding this potential adventure. The kids attended 4-H workshops on geology and recycling, and experienced their first Color Run. Will had chess club. We watched Breaking Away, a movie that is filmed in our hometown (much of it blocks from our house), and had some interesting conversations about what the movie portrays vs. our personal experiences, particularly in regards to the Town and Gown theme--side note, but one of my major fascinations (I have many) is the phenomenon of the "college town." The kids began learning dressage in horseback riding class, and Will had one fabulous morning helping to film some promotional/marketing material for the IU Art Museum, although she claims that the cameras were NOT focused on her when she accidentally dropped a cup full of red paint onto the floor and it basically exploded all over her--seriously, she had red paint inside both ears, and up her nose.

The biggest event of the week, however, was the 5th Annual Trashion/Refashion Show! I have to process my thoughts AND my photos and videos later, but I'll just say that it was, once again, a wonderful experience for us, and the show was the most splendidly produced that it's ever been. Syd had a wonderful time and did an amazing job--seriously, that kid has great stage presence. Right this minute, she's just finished sleeping off our late night (culminating in an honest-to-gawd parade led by a local, indie, honest-to-gawd marching band), and then we're going to make yet another attempt to wash off all that hairspray and mascara before we head over to our volunteer gig.

And that brings us to this week's work plans! We're still on an alternate school schedule, although we should get the answers that we need this week to decide whether or not we'll actually be moving next month. Daily work this week will consist of Kumon math drill workbooks (got to use up those consumables if we're moving!), journaling, and A-Z Mystery Flags:

Even though I got Will's buy-in before I bought this, she still doesn't *really* like it, nor did getting her buy-in reduce the complaining as I'd hoped, BUT I can't deny that it's great cursive writing practice, which is why I bought it. After completing this, there's surely no way that the kids won't be proficient at cursive...

Surely?

Special projects this week include prep for the kids' Iceland project for next week's International Fair; a Girl Scouts anti-bullying program for Will, as well as work for both kids on their various Girl Scout badges; a social event at the place where we volunteer; a ballet performance to attend; math class and horseback riding class and nature class; more study of American government (I think I'll have them make this branches of government lapbook, for starters); and wildflower botany--I want to make wild violet jelly!

And don't worry--when I no longer have a spiky ball of anxiety in my belly (house buying is so anxiety-making! And did I tell you that Grumpy Neighbor, whose complaints to Animal Control about us are never heeded on account of they're all false, has now apparently taken to complaining to Housing and Neighborhood Development about invisible trash in our yard? And someone from HAND actually came out and left a warning on our front door to remove the trash that doesn't exist, because... I don't even know why? And then Matt took photos of our yard, and I sent them to HAND and asked them to tell us what specifically about our yard is not in compliance so that we can fix it, even though there's no freakin' way that there's anything in our yard that's not in compliance? And I'm anxiously/eagerly waiting to see what exactly they're going to have to say for themselves? And wondering what Grumpy Neighbor is going to do to us next? And wishing that someone offered anti-bullying seminars for grown-ups?), I'll have a little celebration for myself.

Okay, a big celebration. 

With balloons. 

And brownies.

And crazy dancing, although that's pretty much a given daily, celebration or not.

Easy Dyed Wooden Easter Eggs

The little kid and I fell out of the mood for Easter crafting early this season. We didn't even make the toilet paper tube Resurrection scene that I had SUPER wanted to make, if only for my partner's absolute "WTF?!?" look when I showed him the project.

Ah, well... I never did score an empty tissue box for Jesus' tomb, anyway.

But last week on Good Friday (we should at least have done the toilet paper tube Jesus on the cross! Shoot!), while the big kid spent the whole entire solid afternoon at the library, the little kid did finally put down her horse and Barbie fashion design work for long enough that we could make one last Easter craft that we'd been wanting to do, and fortunately it was a super quick and easy one.

You will need wooden eggs, liquid watercolors, and small Ziplock bags.

Just as we do to dye other unfinished wooden objects, the little kid popped a wooden egg into a Ziplock bag, added in a couple of squirts of color, and squidged the color all around the egg, all safe and tidy inside the bag: 

As she always does with color mixing, the kid had a ball with this project. She experimented with design and color, ending up, of course, with lots of brown-that-we're-choosing-to-call-golden eggs:

For extra shine, you could rub some homemade beeswax wood polish into them, but we usually like them just fine just the way they are (well, those "golden" ones might get redecorated next year...). 

The egg hunt was EPIC this year--52 eggs hidden for these two kids!

So there was an epic egg hunt, the Easter bunny brought us candy and books, and my partner baked lamb for dinner.

Festive enough, I'd say, even without TP Jesus...

P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, road trips to weird old cemeteries, looming mid-life crisis, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page!

Work Plans for the Week of April 21, 2014: Actively without a Plan

It's Trashion/Refashion Show week! Syd will be walking the runway wearing her original design, Upside-Down Orange, at 7:00 pm on Sunday; they also make all the designers walk at the end of the show, so I need to buy some jeans that fit before then. And figure out the kid's hairstyle. And her make-up. And her shoes. And practice, practice, practice!

We've got a busy week even without fashion show business. We're heading up to Indy tomorrow, where the public tour department of the Indiana Statehouse has invited us to jump into a schoolchildren's field trip tour of the building, and then I'm hoping to head from there over to the Eiteljorg to enhance the Native American portion of our Indiana history unit.

On Thursday, Will's been asked to participate in the filming of some promotional/marketing material for the IU Art Museum, so Syd and I will work puzzles at the Lily Library, tour the Jordan Hall Greenhouse, and perhaps bowl in the IMU bowling alley while Will is learning more about art, advertising, and the film industry.

Over the weekend, both kids have 4-H workshops on geology and recycling, and then Will has an additional workshop on bottle rockets (must remember to arm her with a plastic 2-liter soda bottle from somewhere) while Syd and I are at Trashion/Refashion Show dress rehearsal.

And that's not to mention, of course, a full week's worth of volunteering, extracurriculars, play dates, Park Day, and chess club.

So the academic plan for the week is to bow to these activities, really immersing ourselves in them and allowing ourselves to focus on them. When we're home, the children should be steadily working on their International Fair project (I need to make an assignment sheet for this today, with a list of the required components), and Will has some work to do today concerning state government, so that she really understands the information in our tour tomorrow. I've also got three written assignments that they'll need to complete each day:

1. Two units each in a Kumon math drill book--word problems for Will and geometry (which also covers measurement and time telling, oddly) for Syd. The subjects are pretty much review, because the kids will need to be able to complete these assignments independently on a couple of days, but they'll reinforce concepts and keep them thinking mathematically.
2. One page each in A-Z Mystery flags--Syd happily does cursive copywork, but Will can't be forced into it, so I bought this book, with her pre-approval, as an attempt at mediation. I'm going to start one kid in the book back-to-front, so they can't tip each other off about the answer to each day's mystery flag. 
3. One page in their journals--The kids each have this journal, and for now I just ask them to write *something*. Syd does like to draw a picture and write about something that she's done that day, but Will mostly does lists--books she's read that day (a shocking number, every time), items received in a package from a pen pal, gifts in her Easter basket, etc.

With a few hands-on projects strewn in, plenty of outdoor play, and always more gardening to do, that will be our week!

The Best Way to Hike

Leave your mother and the trail far, far behind:

Get frightened by a goose, find a beaver dam, collect an unidentified skull, make sure lots of briars get stuck to your pants:

Go to the water:

Ensure that you will absolutely, "accidentally" immerse yourself:

Because if you don't come back so wet and muddy that your mom makes you strip before she lets you into her car--

--are you totally sure that you had enough fun?

My Latest over at Crafting a Green World: Kids Can Upcycle

an article about NBA Green, which encourages kids to upcycle

and a round-up of upcycling projects for kids

In other news, we're again deep in the middle of fashion show season. The masking tape runway is on the living room floor, the giant chalk runway is on the basketball court, Syd and I are spending hours at rehearsals, and make-up, modeling, and dress-up play occupy much of that kid's free time. Seriously, I wouldn't be surprised if the mom of Syd's bestest little buddy doesn't allow her to come over here anymore if I send her home one more time wearing eyeliner. 

It's a lot of creative expression, though, and the processing of a big event--Syd's inspired, clearly, and gets a lot of enjoyment and fulfillment from the process (even if so much of the rehearsals involve so much tedious waiting around!). And my little fashion designer keeps leaving surprises like this one around for me to discover:

It's a very elegantly refashioned pony outfit, don't you agree?