Once Upon a Time, a Princess Studied in an Ivory Tower

Photo credit: RC Designer on flickr.com/creativecommons

This first paragraph of this article by Katy Waldman sums up a frequent fantasy of mine: 

In my alternate life, I am applying to grad school. Not so much to individual programs as to a singular gleaming citadel called Grad School that perches above the workaday world, winking at passersby. It has a library and dining halls and courtyards filled with colored leaves. Unless those leaves are surfboards or cross-country skiers. I’m not picky about location.

The rest of the article doesn't really hit home for me but it brings me back around at the end:

Going to graduate school is no longer a way of opting out of the endless search for a better job, the best job, any job. It’s become an element of—a strategy to be deployed in—that search. The escape I dreamed of is only an illusion. Airy academia will not save me from the grind of being an adult. Rather than magic citadels where you can weather the recession and mute its related stresses, Grad School is now part of a larger calculation—one in which love of learning defers to crummy real-world concerns, just like in the rest of post-college life. 

If this dream is gone then what is left for we pseudo-intellectuals to fantasize about in the fleeting moments between worrying about pre-school admissions and paying the mortgage?

Dude. Why Have I Not Seen This Yet?

Photo: shutterfly.com

coolmomtech, I am disappointed that I found this on my own and not through you! This adorable photobooth strip plus 10 other designs. And they have free shipping right now if you spend $30.00. Mothers' Day is coming.

*This is not an endorsed post. I just think this is neat - and supremely accessible.

Rock, Scissor, Paper - SHOOT!

Photo credit: Meme! on flickr.com/creativecommons

Last night when I was sneaking in one last smooch while tucking in the Boy for the night we had a conversation that went kind of like this:

BOY: "Mommy, let's play 'Rock, Scissor, Paper, SHOOT!"

ME: "Okay."

BOY: "Rock, Scissor, Paper, SHOOT!"

I put out a fist for Rock. The Boy put his thumb straight up in the air, pointed his index finger at me and curled the other three fingers on his hand back towards his palm.

Photo credit: TheChanel on flickr.com/creativecommons

Apparently, SHOOT beats Rock, Scissor, and Paper.

"My daughter just thinks that all moms fly the Space Shuttle."

quote attributed to Air Force Col. Eileen Collins, first female Space Shuttle commander, 1999.

So Bonnets for Boys are much more difficult than Bonnets for Girls. I offered Dinosaurs, Bugs, Lizards, Jungle Safari (thinking hot glue, faux leaves, bags of plastic animals - see where I'm going with that? Nice ideas.). But nay, the Boy picked "SPACE" for his hat. And somehow I got the cockamamie idea that it would be awesome if it had its own light source. Yes, I did just write that.

Okay then - off the dollar store (and the $1 bins at the craft store):

1 "straw" fedora

1 bag mixed size foam balls (8)

1 paper mache orange

1 star garland

1 2-pack foam discs

hot glue gun/glue

bamboo skewers

glitter glue - assorted "planety" colors

yellow poster paint & brush

scissors

garden clippers

1 LED book light

When I bought all of this stuff (and there was more that I didn't use but that will get shoved in the craft bin to maybe be used another time or purchased in triplicate every time I think I need something like it and then thrown away) I had no idea how I was going to assemble this hat. So I started with what I knew I needed to do no matter what, which was to turn the foam balls into plants. I tried covering them in felt, thought about painting them with poster paint and then stumbled upon a few bottles of glitter glue. DING DING DING DING DING! Winner, winner, chicken dinner (and all that foofaraw).

So, anyway - hooray for Google Images - I looked up pictures of what the planets look like and approximated same on the foam balls with glitter glue and a few bits of felt for Jupiter's spot and Saturn's ring(s). First though, I speared each ball with a skewer and set up a foam disc as a drying station.

Then, for the next two days I thought about how to make the sun light up, what to use for the sun, and how to put the whole thing together.* The Man suggested mounting the planets around the sun - cutting each skewer to a different length. I really liked this idea but had not yet determined what was going to be the Sun and I had not painted the planets with that orientation in mind so I was concerned about how that would play out (FIRST.WORLD.PROBLEM).

So then it was 10:00 the night before the hat needs to be brought in to school and I still have no idea what I am doing - although earlier that evening I had decided on using the papermache orange for the Sun and I painted it yellow so at least there was that.

I started playing around with the hat band. It was glued to the straw part of the hat and easily separated when I used the blade of the scissors to pry it open. 

This was in the center back of the hat and I clipped the book light there and bent the neck so that the light was parallel to the top of the hat facing up.  Then I opened up more sections the same way around the band and figured I could stick the planets around the perimeter of the hat. A trial run showed this to be too unstable. So I stopped goofing around and admitted that the Man was right - mount the Sun to the hat and then mount the planets to the sun (I hate when he is right!). 

To mount the sun, I put two skewers into the bottom of the now-yellow orange like the legs of a capital "A" or a lambda for you ancient languages nerds out there. I touched up the bottom where the original skewer had been but I recommend waiting until everything else is done before putting wet paint on the center piece of your solar system that you need to touch continuously during assembly. I still needed to figure out how to mount the dang thing to the hat. First I stuck the skewers right through the straw on the top of the hat but again, stability seemed like it was going to be an issue so back to the hat band. I determined where the skewers should be mounted by using the uber-scientific method of folding the hat in half and then squeezing it together between my fingers so they could be mounted evenly. 

I inserted the Sun's skewers into each opening and squirted a bunch of hot glue into the pocket between the straw and the ribbon. I ran a bead of hot glue along the inside of the skewer to connect it directly to the hat. 

Then, using the garden clippers, I cut down the skewers to different lengths starting with Mercury and then adding 1/2" to 1" in length to each successive planet. Each plant got jammed into the Sun. I wrapped the star garland around the whole thing and turned on the light. 

VOILA!

Then I washed the paint brush and ate a cupcake while I waited for the hot glue gun to cool.

Other points of interest: 

1) To be a better parent, I would have done this and the Butterfly Garden hat WITH my children instead of FOR them. But I love this shit and don't want it to get messed up.

2) I know the title quotation is about a daughter's perception of her mother and this post is about a hat for my son but I would be happy if either (or both) of my kids thought I was as cool as an astronaut.

3) I chose not to include Pluto as a planet and this makes me a little sad not least because the Boy's preschool teacher allegedly told the class that Pluto is no longer a planet because it exploded.

* I did other stuff too. Maybe I will blog about my knitting escapades soon.

In A Butterfly's Garden With You

Bonnet contest at school. Bonnets and girls are easy. Flowers? Butterflies? Fairies?

The Girl picked butterflies. Off to the dollar store!

Materials:
1 craft foam cowgirl hat
2 shower scrubbies (green)
2 4-packs of glittery foam butterflies on sticks
1 10-pack of glittery foam flowers
1 6-pack of cello butterflies (in my craft bin)
Needle & thread
Hot glue gun/hot glue
Scissors
Garden clippers (or something comparable to clip the bamboo skewers)

First I released the mesh from the two scrubbies. The mesh was attached to the handle with zip-ties which were easily clipped with scissors. This left me with two long tubes of mesh.

I draped the mesh around the ultra-pink cowgirl hat and decided to use a running stitch to attach the mesh to the brim of the hat. Hot glue would work well too. Use low temp with the craft foam!

Now I had a big fluffy net around a hat. I started sticking the skewered butterflies and flowers into the mesh. The skewers were too long so I had to trim them - I found that garden clippers made short work of the task.

So the sparkly flowers and butterflies are in the "grass" looking like Peeps to me! Now the hard part - hot gluing the bits in place. This is "hard" because you need to be quick enough to get the bit in the mesh before the glue dries! If you are brave and don't need a preview you can glue right after you trim the skewers.

I found these more realistic looking butterflies in my craft bin and decided to stick them on too. They started out on skewers but the glue attaching them had dried out so I pulled each off before artfully placing them in the mesh grass.

And . . . Hat!

The Next Crazy Thing

Solar system "bonnet" for the Boy. Butterfly Garden hat for the Girl.

More soon. Must go hot glue gun all the things so they can be ready for the kids to take in the morning.

Near a Year

So much, yet nothing, has transpired since last St. Patrick's Day.

This year the kids both had green to wear. I knitted a wee leprechaun hat and "hid" it in the kitchen for the kids to find. The boy spotted it right away and near about freaked that an actual leprechaun had been to our house.

He said if we put the hat in the fridge, the leprechaun would turn the milk green when he came back for his hat.

And wouldn't you know - that's just what happened.

Baaah-rrettes

Being totally oblivious to the contents of the Girl's wardrobe, I panicked and thought she had no green to wear for Saint Patrick's Day.  So being a supremely lazy overachiever (that should be one of the types on the Myers-Briggs test, don't you think?), I decided to finally get around to making the lovely felt barrettes I saw on the purlbee and adapt them for St. Patty's day.

Here is where the lazy comes in: 

I did not trace and cut clovers from gorgeous wool felt - I bought a bag of 300 craft foam shamrocks on sale at the craft store for $1.79.  

I did not lovingly hand stitch the pieces together with silk embroidery threads and an ivory needle - I used white glue.  I didn't even use a sharp scissors to cut the slit in the bottom piece of the decorative appliqué - I just jammed the end of the hair clip through the craft foam.

And then I took really badly lit photos with my phone using a plastic bag as a backdrop to reinforce the low-rent, down-market techniques used in this project.

So I opened the girls drawer today and pulled out her blue and GREEN striped shirt.  And then I stuck the small hair clip on her two strands of hair and called it St. Patrick's Day! Oiy (said like I am a fan of the Drop Kick Murphys not like I learned how to say it in Yiddish from my grandma - hey, everyone is "Irish" today so don't judge me)!

 Oh - and Rancor says, "Happy Spring!" courtesy of the Boy for pulling the ONLY living flower out of the bed in our front yard!). Sláinte!

The Future

Somehow I think I will deal with my children in a similar fashion:



Source: http://parentsshouldnttext.com

Something Comforting

Through a link in a thread on a networking site*, I came across a tumblr (is that the right way to reference something on tumblr? Does one even say, "On tumblr?" I have no idea.  I am a tumblr Luddite.) called "hippy kitchens."  It is generally pretty cool but this particular image:



I found to be really striking.  I instantly thought of Vermeer.  It was a refreshing way to start the day.

See more cool photos of hippies and kitchens here: http://hippykitchen.tumblr.com

*This is the new, "The girl friend of the best friend of the nephew of my hairdresser's cousin . . . "


And sorry for that book thing - I clicked something and I can't figure out how to make it go away . . . ah.  

I Want To Wear A Starbucks Gift Bag

I saw this gift bag at Starbucks before the holidays and I fell in love it the buttons.  My photo there isn't very good quality so you will have to take my word on it - the buttons are pretty cool.

As the winter progressed, I was working on a sweet little short-sleeved, swingy cardigan for the Girl.  It is yellow with red buttons (see crap photo below):

I started thinking it would be sweet to make it in red with yellow button for me (even though I will have to do some math since this pattern is for kids only and, if you have read any of my posts about the Urban Aran, you know that isn't my strong suit . . . ).  Then, I couldn't stop thinking about the buttons from the Starbucks gift bags.  But no way was I going to spend that much on buttons.  From a gift bag.

Flash forward to after the holidays, sale area of Starbucks.  Giant stack of gift bags - 50% off.  I buy three.  Now I have my buttons.  I have the yarn too.  But now I want to incorporate the green from the gift bag into the design somehow.  I even have yarn that is the right color . . . this is getting crazy.  I want a sweater that looks like a holiday gift bag from a coffee shop.

I should be casting on this weekend - for real (not like the Urban Aran pipe dream/mistake).  So we shall see how it works out!

Gabba Hats!

Here's looking at you . . . 

I'm sure my readership (hardee, har, har, har) has been waiting for this post with bated breath . . . ere are some photos of the hats I made for the family to go to Yo Gabba Gabba Live! back in August of 2010.

Inside the creative process.

 Plex with fabric paint on felt for eyes.  This ended up looking awful so I re-did them in all felt and it looked AWESOME! (you have to say that in DJ Lance's voice, of course).  This was a $0.39 cent bucket hat from the craft store, black & white felt, black pipe cleaners (or chenille craft wire or whatever PC nonsense pipe cleaners are called now - I remember the old white prickly ones my dad had to clean his - wait for it - pipe!  Ah - I digress), and red craft foam.  I did have to reinforce the top of the hat with additional craft foam because it was difficult to get the antenna to stand up without otherwise causing the top of the hat to collapse.  Also, inside the bucket hat is a yellow craft foam visor (like the Foofa, below) so that the hat would fit on my 3 year-old's head and not fall in his eyes.  This hat was a big hit with the Boy and he couldn't wait to show the real Plex at the after-party!

Muno, for the Man, pre-iris.  I figured I could convince him to wear a baseball hat (craft store: $2.99) - and he did!  I traced around a glass onto the red cap and then painted two or three coats of white fabric paint.  I used a quarter to trace a circle for the iris and filled it in with a black permanent marker.  At the post-show VIP party, DJ Lance told the Man that his hat was AWESOME!

Brobee.  Cheap green bucket hat.  Black pipe cleaners.  Red craft foam.  Black marker.  Hot glue gun.  This was my least favorite of the four - poor Brobee looked alot like Oscar the Grouch with Wile E.Coyote type bumps on his head.  I would have liked to have done a happy mouth on the brim in the down position and a frown-y mouth for a flipped up brim but time was not on my side.

Nurse Foofa.  This ended up being my favorite.  White and pink craft foam visors.  Black craft foam.  White self-adhesive craft foam.  Yellow craft foam.  Figuring out how to form the flower so it looked like Foofa without covering the pink visor was the toughest part.  The eyelashes were a bit tedious to glue on as well.  I think I did a good job.  More than one person asked to buy this off my 8 month-old's head.

Brobee and Muno completed (and my messy kitchen in the background).

Plex and Foofa complete.

Greetings and Ribbit

I don't have much to say.  I haven't been to into blogging lately.  I have been very into knitting , thinking about knitting, and looking at knitting related things on ravelry!

I am overwhelming myself with knitting projects and ideas (as usual) and my brain is so swimming with thoughts and ideas that I have been making tons of mistakes - from gauge being waaay off on multiple projects, to just plain old sloppiness and missing stitches, etc. on very simple patterns.

Must focus.  FOCUS.

Hey - right here - look here - FOCUS.

Better.

Oh - and happy new year!

Photo credit: Blog*Bittersweet*Blog

Pumpkin Time

This is my favorite time of year.  And it is becoming my even favoriter time of year now that I have the kids to share it with.  Look at how freakin' cute they are yesterday at the pumpkin patch.

The weather was gorgeous.  Everyone was in good spirits.  The pumpkins were abundant.

Makes me wish everyday was yesterday.

Photo credit: Blog*Bittersweet*Blog

Its Fun To Go To the Craft Store. Its Fun To Go To the Craft Store.

Photo credit: blog*bittersweet*blog

My plan was to post about knitting I am working on and failing to work on and knitting mojo and blah, blah, blah.  But on Sunday, the family is going to see Yo Gabba Gabba Live! and I just got back from the craft store.  Oh, baby!

My first thought was to make t-shirts for the kids.  Felt cut-outs glued on cheapy craft store t-shirts.  No - felt  is too thick/ bulky, can't be washed, glue might not hold . . . so fabric paint on cheapy shirts.  And maybe I can try out freezer paper stencils (which always look awesome on other peoples' blogs).

When I rolled up to the sale bins in front of the store, the whole thing started to go off the rails.  Bucket hats - $0.79.  There was a little green one.  And a yellow one.  So crazy-train in my brain takes me to the place where the Man and I have on Brobee and Plex bucket hats.  OK - shirts for the kids, hats for the Man and me.

Inside, I start picking out a shirt for the Boy - they don't have toddler sizes so even the smallest youth shirt will be too big.  They only have onesies for the Girl and she ALWAYS has a blow out if she's wearing a onesie and I am NOT having that at an all day event when she is supposed to be in the carrier - that I am wearing. But I pick up shirts and paints and brushes anyway and move on.

Some felt to make the red points for the Brobee hat?  Hmm . . . felt is kind of droopy.  What about craft foam instead?  And now is where it gets really fun (at least for me).  On my way to the foam aisle, I see a red baseball hat.  MUNO.  The Man is much more likely to be caught alive in a red baseball hat with an eyeball painted on it than sporting a Brobee bucket.

And then!  In the craft foam section, I find a pink visor that is exactly the color of - guess who - Foofa.  And a white one that can be inverted right on top of the pink one to make flower petals.  And a yellow one to fit inside the yellow bucket hat so it will fit the Boy and he can be Plex (his favorite).  And red foam for Brobee's pointy things.  And black and white foam for the Foofa eyes.

A final stop in the pipe cleaner - or, excuse me, chenille covered wire - section for black for Brobee's unibrow and silver stuff for Plex (but I am second guessing that choice now and thinking I should use black?).

I put away the t-shirts and all the craft paint except for the white and black - which I will use for eyes as well as a rectangle on the Plex hat.  And the extra bonus part is that fir less than $15 all four of us will look ridiculous on Sunday!

The photo above are my "sketches" - Plex looks like he is missing something - probably the side antennae would do the trick - maybe if the brim is folded up?  And does Brobee need a mouth or is it cool like that?  I think the Muno and Foofa are going to be my favorites - but we will see!

And I know - Toodee is left out.  I feel badly - and the Girl is probably a little more like Toodee than Foofa but that pink visor is spot-on.  Maybe next time . . .

What a Cool Idea!

As a parent of a toddler and an infant who thinks she is a toddler (girl baby - you are not even 8 months old! quit thinking you can walk, ok?) keeping a paper shredder out in the open where it might actually be used regularly is just not in the cards.

Behold this nifty gadget that was featured in a Real Simple Daily Email I subscribe to - the ID Blocker:

I haven't tried this.  I haven't been asked to endorse it.

But is sure is cool looking.  And could be the perfect solution to that gigantic pile of papers in my kitchen waiting for me to set aside some time for shredding.  (Did you just laugh so hard you snorted?  Me too.).

Well at least maybe it will keep the pile from getting any bigger.

Photo credit: The Spoon Sisters

There's a Place

I just returned two pairs of $5.00 shorts. They were intended to be a cheap mid-season fill-in for the growing Boy.  I felt lucky to find anything so late in the season - especially at the children's store in the outlet center near where I live.  All that being said, I would rather have an induced labor with no epidural than return something at that store again.

What is the problem you ask?

First, the sales associate was not especially friendly, helpful, or efficient.  Maybe my expectations were too high.  After all, we're talking about a Place where I can buy shorts for $5.00.  When I first walked in he was all, "Welcome to the store.  If you need any help please let me know. Blah.  Blah. Blah."  I did need to ask for help. It went something like this:

"Do you have more little boys' socks?"

"Um.  Where did you find those?"

After showing the young gentleman where in his store the little boys' socks were located, he took a brief respite in the stock room for the duration of a good nose picking.  "Uh, no.  Only what is out."  And sure - I believed that the guy who couldn't find the socks on the floor of the store where he worked actually looked in the stock room.  Whatever.  Next item.

"Ok.  Do you have more sunglasses?"

"No."

A few minutes later, I found about a dozen pairs of sunglasses in the clearance bin.  And some little boys' socks too.

Terrible?  No.  Annoying?  Yes.  Frustrating?  Yes.

Second, I was the only person in the store.  Just me.  One customer.  Seeing as how I was the ONLY customer in the store would it be wrong to think it shouldn't take five-ever to do a return.  Seems like a reasonable assumption.

Finally - why OH why do they need my ID to process a credit card return?  And why OH why does the sales associate ask me for my last name after having had my ID.  In his hands.  With my last name on it.  Right there.  Doing its job.  Identifying me.  "Well I just scanned it so you are in our system."  It was very difficult to not lean over the counter and say "DUH" right in his face.  Maybe if I was taller it would have happened - but with the leaning and jumping and what-have-you that would have had to happen to do this the impact probably would not have been as profound (if it would have had any impact to begin with).

I did say, through gritted teeth, "You JUST had my ID for ten minutes."  He didn't seem to understand the relevance of this comment.

I just looked up the return policy (since the ID requirement is new).  According to the store's website my ID is now in their database.  The database is utilized to determine whether or not to authorize returns.  So basically, my ability to return merchandise which otherwise complies with the store's policies is now decided based on an algorithm in a database.  I decide one day after purchasing something to return it to the store with the receipt and the store could say, "No.  Sorry.  Database is saying no."  That is not going to work for me.  I almost never have my kids with me when I shop.  And if I do I certainly don't make them try clothes on in the store.  Maybe - despite being a large children's store - the policy makers have never tried shopping with infants, toddlers, children and various combinations thereof?  Returns are a necessity - not a luxury.

Retail randomness such as this does not play well with me.  This is a Place I will no longer be patronizing.

Photo credit:  Thomas Rockstar on Flickr

Twitter

I have a Twitter account.  I don't use it that often.  Occasionally, though, I feel like checking it out or sending a "tweet" or what-have-you.

I don't think I "tweet" that well.  I think what I do on Twitter is more "blurting" (which is different from "bleating").  It seems the perfect medium for shouting out to the world that I have a Stevie Wonder song stuck in my head (and that I'm glad it isn't a Hanson song instead!).  Or a good place to bemoan the usage of the (non)word "heighth" in everyday conversation (that one really gets my goat and it seems to be more and more prevalent.  Go away "heighth" you are not a word!).

For the most part, "tweeting" (or "blurting") feels so self-indulgent. It is like walking up to anyone you see, imagining they give a shit, just spewing a few sentences regarding whatever is on the tip of your tongue at them, and then walking on.  Every once in a great while someone will reply to something I share on Twitter but usually my thoughts just go out into the great void.  And that is okay.  Sometimes things just need to be said and no response is required.

If you (once again, see me assuming someone is reading this!) want, follow my blurts, click on the link on this page :D

Image credit: 7son75 on flickr