Saturday, November 07, 2009

Here comes the cold, break out the winter clothes

I am in the midst of that super crazy time of year, where one event melds into another and they all intertwine in this mixture of colors and textures and sights and sounds.

This is my brain on November:


Last week I managed to scrape together enough volunteers at the last minute to help hang artwork for the school's art contest that I am chairing. Bringing most of the entries home to catalog helped the organizational aspect of it tremendously... as there were an additional (surprise!) 25 or so entries waiting for me at the school Monday morning. Next week we announce the winners, and the week after that we have the big ice cream party celebration, and then I turn the winners in to the district level and I'm free from scrambling duties (as far as I know)

I attended the big Parent Teacher conference on Tuesday, where I was informed that my daughter has an "uncanny ability" to recall story lines. "Not just the overall idea of the story, but events, in sequence, with the tiniest of details." I hadn't realized this talent of hers was uncanny for her age, having no other children to sort of compare/contrast her personality and interests with... though I was always impressed by her ability to memorize song lyrics (and have been super careful about which songs we listen to ever since she was about 3) and her story telling has seemed to me to be an extension of that. Sometimes it is wonderful, sometimes it makes my hear sink (like when she recalls with fondness the tiniest details of the 6 days in which we had a dog, but had to take her back because I kept breaking out into hives... "Oh Mommy, remember when Gracie used to chase deer out of the yard?" Why does she remember these things with such clarity, but forgets where she puts her shoes?)

The remainder of the week was filled with catching up, working, and prepping for the Next Big Event.

G's birthday party will be next Saturday - the invites are out, the theme is picked, all we have to do is plan the games, buy the supplies, and get the house ready. We are doing Ice Age 3 Dawn of the Dinosaur (the theme picked mainly because of G's wonderful cake idea... that is to take a sheet cake, cut it into "icebergs" and have the guys from Ice Age stuck on top of the pieces) I'm excited to work dinosaurs into the party planning... there will be at least a "hot potato" game with the song "Walk the Dinosaur" playing, and perhaps a cookie decorating station, though I'll need to find dinosaur shaped cookie cutters to make that work. Or dinosaur cookie sprinkles.

Suggestions are welcome.

After that is the big Thanksgiving and Christmas RUSH. I always feel so far ahead of myself when I start to plot out ideas in September, but end up feeling so far behind when November sneaks up and bites me in the ass.

(Lyrical title: St. Patrick's Day - John Mayer)

Monday, November 02, 2009

It's a dead man's party, who could ask for more

A few fun things from Halloween good times.

First of all, in the world of costumes I decided to go practical with the school party version of the costume - mainly because I was assigned to help decorate cookies at the party and I didn't want to get my main costume scuzzied up.




Here is the costume for Halloween Night - I *love* how the bracers work with the whole thing.



One of the projects Dan made in his bottomless pit, which sat on our front porch. Made from scratch, largely with plywood... this paint job he did is made with awesome - and as a coincidence practically matches our fireplace.



Stepping up on the front porch and look down... here is the view of the pit.



Dan also put together a wicked cool ghost. The skull was a plain skull, he augmented with paint, made the jaw hinge, added LED lights in the eye sockets, built the hands from the bone up (literally, pipe and wire coat hangers, latex, string and cotton) Hooked it up to a motor, which he also rigged to make the arms and head move up and down.




I took far too many photos of all the decorations and such, so for the grand family slide show (of decorations and people's costumes) I've uploaded them to the Kodak Gallery

Biggest accomplishment of mine for the party? My bro-in-law paid me a compliment on my party playlist. WIN!

More talky talky on other goings on later, my brain is fried from too much activity lately.

(Lyrical title: Dead Man's Party - Oingo Boingo)

Monday, October 26, 2009

treasure maps and gold earrings will fill your heart with glee

D has been busy in his Mad Scientist Laboratory (the garage) this weekend, working on super fun scary spooky things for Halloween - so aside from errands and general housework, I had a lot of time in my own Mad Scientist Laboratory (the basement) to do some finishing touches for my costume.... and when I finished with that project, I just kept going.

Here is the necklace and earrings I made for the costume. The dragon pendant is something I picked up at the Pirate Festival last month in Portland, and the stick-like beads are pieces of coral.



The earrings are a little piece of 8, and a treasure map that says "property of Davey Jones" on the back. The snake is the clasp for the necklace.


Here are a couple of dangley strands I made for my skull cap - a sweet little wooden carving of a snake, and then some Chinese coins along with carved wooden beads.



While digging through my beads for the pirate stuff I came across some random pendants that I've picked up from various shopping adventures, and as I've been pondering ideas for Christmas gifts for family, I decided to mess around with other ideas.
I'm not 100% happy with this necklace - I like the sort of industrial look of the silk ribbon wound through the chunky chain, and I love the pendant, I just think I need to do something else with how it's hooked up. (Mainly I was just testing the silk cord with chain theory anyway)



With this one, I got a little ambitious. I found an "idea sheet" at a local bead shop with this general pattern (thought it used different beads and pendant) and I knew I wanted to do something sort of light for these wicked red dragonflies I found in Port Townsend, so here they are. I think this is my favorite necklace that I've made thus far.



(Lyrical title: Pieces of 8ight - Captain Bogg & Salty)

Thursday, October 22, 2009

They're creepy and they're kooky

Last weekend we took G through her very first haunted house.... (well, first haunted house if we don't count Disneyland's Haunted Mansion.)

On Sunday we had traveled a little north of our house to check out one of those super-sized temporary Halloween stores to see if they had anything new and interesting. While wandering the aisles of this Costco-sized wonderland of mayhem, we discovered the facade of a shack off to one side, signs all over talking about the rules and regulations of visiting the haunted house. In smaller print, but brightly colored fliers, we saw they had the house opened on the weekends from 2-5 in the afternoon for the "kid friendly" version... meaning the house lights were kept up, and there were no actors jumping out. Only $5.00 for kids, and parents are free.

D asked G if she wanted to check it out, and she very dramatically hid behind his leg, making herself shake with fake fright and saying "nononononononononononono!" I asked her if she would go through holding *my* hand, and she looked at me and said "O-k-k-k-kay..."

Here is an example of where the differences in our parenting styles comes in handy. Why would she hold my hand and not D's? Because from her point of view, Daddy isn't afraid of anything, and therefore will go through something like a terribly scary haunted house without any problem. Whereas Mommy has phobias and approaches new situations with a proper amount of trepidation, and therefore Mommy will accommodate her fears and wait patiently for G to be ready for something new. (In other words... if Mommy is doing it, it must not be *that* bad.)

This is somewhat true. I don't accommodate her fears by avoiding the new experiences she is afraid of, but I am uniquely qualified to listen to why she is afraid of something, and find a path for her to approach it in a way that will work for her... seeing as how I've been there.


I remember being a little older than G's age, and going to the Beaverton Mall with my sister and a few of her friends, where we could trick-or-treat from store to store out of the rain, and also visit the haunted house set up in one of the empty store fronts. My parents said my sister could go, but only if she kept an eye on me... they wanted to go in the haunted house, so I had to stay with them. I had absolutely no idea what I was in for, just that I was being dragged along.

Now, as you read this story... try to imagine yourself as me at that age. I'm sure you can all remember being 8, just do that, then take about 6 inches off your height. I'll put it this way... when I was in the sixth grade, people thought I was a first grader... that's how short I was.

The haunted house had "tour guides" taking us in by groups, to keep us moving along I guess. All I can really remember from the beginning of it was that we went from a brightly lit and cheerful mall into a place that was dark, loud, crowded, and confusing. I was shoved back and forth between my sister's friends, slammed into walls, and surrounded by screaming 5th graders trying to use me as a shield against the actors. I'd see splashes here and there of the scenes before being wrangled into the next area, until we hit about the mid-point... which I remember like it was yesterday.

One minute I was squished between too many large bodies, stumbling down a narrow passage, the next I'm thrown into a large square room painted black, with bright white polka-dots everywere, and a strobe light going at a high speed. It was the first time I'd ever seen a strobe light, and I lost the entire group at that point... the light against their shadows and the flickering of white polka-dots was disorienting. By this time I was absolutely sobbing, and I heard them yell at me to come on, but I firmly planted my feet in the ground and refused to budge... just screaming "GET ME OUT!" over and over again. There was a lot of movement, loud voices, their silloettes jumping across the room to the path out... and then I felt strong hands on my arms and I blinked...

...and I stood staring at a very confused looking teenager, applying green face makeup in the mirror of a brightly lit dressing room.

Our amazing tour guide had moved our group along and pulled me out a secret panel in the wall to their break room. He stood with me until I calmed my crying, then walked me around the outside of the mall and back to the front of the haunted house, all the while telling me that *he* thought I was *very brave* for standing my ground and demanding to be pulled out, because everybody else who got scared would just cry all the way through but not be *brave* enough to say something.

Looking back I realize how very kind he was being to me... I'm certain kids got scared in that haunted house before, but as a general rule I was wound up tighter than... I'd say tighter than 95% of the general population - and let's be honest, what he called "standing my ground" was just a gentle way of saying "have a hysterical fit"... which I'm fairly certain he didn't come across every night. But he handled it amazingly well - that poor guy.

I did not want G's first experience to be anything like mine, so I thought that a lights up and no actors situation could possibly be a good introduction to haunted houses.

To prepare her, we walked a couple aisles of the store and I showed her some of the scary displays, and explained when we go into the haunted house, it would be filled with stuff like this. We waited in a short line, and I explained there might be some sounds of thunder or a soundtrack playing, and showed her the speakers. As we made our way through the narrow passages of the house itself, we would approach a freaky looking statue or scary clown doll reaching out... G would hold my hand and walk behind me as we approached it, then we would stop so she could look back at it and see that it was just a decoration. (Somehow it is less scary once you've made it past - I'm guessing because you now know it's not going to do anything to you) She didn't like the black room with neon dots that had the strobe light going - even though the house lights dimmed the effect, but she found the blacklight fascinating ("Mommy! You have dust EVERYWHERE! Look! My socks are glowing!") The exit passage was one of those super narrow tunnels that gets narrower as you get to the end. She didn't want to push her way through until I explained it was - indeed - just like the bouncey houses she's been in hundreds of times before. She ran through, then I made her pull me through because I kept getting "stuck", then she had to turn and pull Daddy through... and by the time we made it out she was giggling.

Back through the store, she kept picking up giant - and I mean CREEPY giant - bugs and saying "we should put this over the door!" "Let's get this for the bathroom!" We ended up with some shrouds, a giant toad, and a few snakes to add to our Halloween Delights.

That night at home, while I finished applying some cobwebs to a few windows, I heard G upstairs in her room... taking one of the giant snakes we had purchased and having it slink through Strawberry Shortcake's little village.


(Lyrical title: Addams Family Theme Song)

Saturday, October 17, 2009

Dark skies fall on black earth and ivory

I can only remember complaining about the rain for one season.

In the summer of 1993, just after graduation I moved in with D. That summer, in some kind of additional act of defiance against the world of limitations and tight curfews, I wanted to just "take off and go to the beach"... just because I *could*. For almost the entire summer, however... every time I had a full day off of work, the sky would cloud over and rain.

That was obnoxious.

Other than that circumstance, though... I can't recall ever complaining about the rain. It even rained on my wedding day, and my only thought about it was "We had good timing with the pictures this morning!" I can't stand extreme heat, and being snowed in more than a couple days will get on my nerves, but it can rain for a solid month and I hardly even notice (aside from hearing the complaints of other people)

Last night we had a front move in, big pounding rain hit the roof in waves sometimes loud enough to drown out the TV. It's a soothing sound, the water rushing down the roof, the giant drops of rain pounding the skylights. I curled up in bed last night and slipped off to sleep listening to the rhythm of the wind blown rain hitting my window.

This morning I woke to a drizzle... just enough water falling from the sky to roll down the roof and into the gutters... a soft consistent patter. I poured my hot coffee and sat on the end of the couch by the big front windows, looking out into the dark morning. The yard was quite and still... bright green moss against the dark gray skies, a few punches of electric autumn leaves left on the maple tree out front.

My house is full of project opportunities... and if I need more supplies there are an endless number of places to explore outside.

I love this time of year.

(Lyrical title: Storms in Africa - Enya)