Random Facts

None of these things make a whole blog post on their own, but provide a glimpse into what's going on in our house.

1. I've been thinking about a new cat-eye eyeliner phase, so I bought some felt-tip eyeliner and tried it out.
2. I kept it on while I took a bubble bath and read the Christmas Martha Stewart Living, which - joy of joys! - I did not have to pay for. Thanks Grandma!
3. I only sort of liked the eyeliner.
4. But Martha has some great thoughts on glitter.
5. Girls' morning on Saturday - thrifting and downtown flea market. Starbucks too. Sigh.
6. I made a whole bunch of appetizers for a get-together my mom was hosting. Most of it was just usual stuff, but you need to try this: slather a round of brie (with the rind still on) with sour cherry preserves - the more natural and fruit-chunk-a-licious, the better - and sprinkle with chopped walnuts. Bake @ 350 for about 15 or 20 minutes. Serve with crackers. Holy buckets. It was good.
7. Did you notice that I ate cheese? I seem to be able to do that again. It's been a long time, but I'm really loving me some pizza now that it doesn't make me sick!
8. More cooking - I made a four-layer, vegan, red velvet cake for my brother Jon's birthday party. With cream cheese frosting (see #7).
9. I knitted him some bike helmet ear warmers. He seemed to think they'll be useful. I can't find a good link to them to share with you, but you can find them on ravelry if you're a member. Suffice it to say that they slip over the helmet straps and just, well, keep your ears warm. Genius!
10. I volunteered to cut out felt pieces for the Third Grade nativity set project. They all make a nativity set by gluing felt pieces to chunks of 2x4 lumber. It's cute. Andrew made one in third grade. I cut out the pieces that year too.
11. I forgot how long it takes to cut out 48 tiny, pink, round-tipped triangle shapes to go in the ears of the cows.
12. Also, there are pink nostrils to be cut out.
13. I am soooo going to be done with my mandatory volunteer hours for Emma's school after this.
14. Christmas is coming and I'm freaking out just a little bit.

Multi-tasking

Eating a leftover-chili-dog supper
in the (oh-my-aching) back-soothing bath
while hubby listens and sorts
my pro-and-con thoughts
on taking another photography class next semester.

Three birds, one stone.

Bam.

More Portraits, Anyone?

Mindy was kind enough to swing by my house today so I could try to finish up my portrait assignment for tomorrow's class. The weather has not been cooperative - we've had heavy clouds for something like 4 days now! I had a 30-minute time slot, so we had to really slap-dash some pictures together under less-than-ideal conditions.
Surprisingly, these came out really nicely!
Batteries ran out and babies fussed and all sorts of other little things went wrong. Some of these look very different from the others, as I was really looking for a sweet spot in the camera's settings. And once I found it, well, like I said before, the batteries died. So then I spent a while with the next camera looking to get it just right.
In the end, though, in spite of the very different looks some of these have, I really love them all. There were so many good ones, Mindy. I promise you copies of all of them!









Thank you. So. Much. Mindy Sue! You are so beautiful and so is that baby. It was really fun and I can't wait to do a "real" shoot with good lighting! Soon.


On a funny side note, we were really having trouble coming up with an idea for dinner tonight. I haven't been shopping in just forever, I was coming home late from my piano lessons and various other reasons happened that dictated an easy, low-dirty-dish-quotient meal. I had been thinking chili (the cloudy weather has really got me wishing for winter) but the kids all overheard the phone conversation and complained. Somehow, I landed on chili dogs. I was really feeling guilty for picking something so unhealthy. I mean, normally we eat lots of veggies, whole grains and lean proteins. I cook from scratch, for Pete's sake. But I felt a little better when I arrived home, grocery bags in hand.
"What's for dinner, Mom?" is heard even before "hi, Mom!" is heard. I told them we were having chili dogs.

And neither one of them knew what a chili dog was!

Ha! Much less guilt now. I told them what was up. And Emma said it sounded interesting. Of course, they both loved dinner.
Good stuff.

Words

How about a few words today and no pictures? I mean, I've still got the car show pictures to post at some point, but c'mon. This isn't a photography blog, now, is it?
With this tropical system - what is it, Ida? - in place, there has been no light for doing any more of those portraits. I'm starting to get concerned that I won't have what I need for my homework! Aaak! In the meantime, though, I'm building a PVC structure to hold my black backdrop so that I can take it anywhere, baby! Just like I'm some kind of real photographer!
We went to Home Depot last night to buy the pipes for it and the kids were very complain-y. They really hate going to those types of stores. They were behaving in ways that I don't normally see from my children. I was getting a little embarrassed. Then I showed them how the plumbing aisle works. How the boxes of fittings are all color-coded to indicate size and how all the fittings work with all the pipes. Like giant white Legos, kind of. Let me tell you, Emma's eyes lit up. She had Big Plans flooding her little head. It's really fun to find those random objects that spark imagination in your kids. It turned an obligatory, dreary task into a moment of fun and learning. Like magic.
We are finding our magic wherever we can these days.
Chris and I watched a little movie called The Brothers Bloom the other night. I don't typically endorse movies and I don't mean to do so now, but I rather enjoyed it and thought it was imaginative. Here's the thing I really loved about the movie: it presents a question that I ask myself often (not out loud or anything, 'cause people would think I'm nuts) - if you live your life like a story you are writing, is it really authentic? If your actions are dictated by the story you're telling, the character you're playing, instead of arising organically out of who you are, are you being real?
I mean, I live my life like it's a story all the time. I sometimes decide what I want to wear or listen to by deciding what kind of story I want to tell on that day. And I wonder if those things that I do, making decisions like I'm writing fiction, make my life less real. If my actions are dictated by an imaginary storyline, are they really, truly mine? Or are they just part of a character I made up?
It's not like the question really, truly bothers me. It was more like, I was watching that movie, identifying strongly with the female lead character (she's eccentric and she collects hobbies! hello, me!) and thinking, "Hey! I totally get what they're saying here!" in a way that doesn't usually happen.
So. Anyway. Cute movie.
My neck MRI turned up little more than normal wear and tear, which is a good thing. Just a little smidge of something that was caused by the accident, but overall, my biggest problem will be that herniated disc in my low back. That was a relief. It looks like I'll only be in physical therapy another couple of weeks at the most, which is also a relief. I'm looking forward to having my life back. I'm even looking forward to the schedule I'd originally worked for this fall, thinking at the time that it would be nearly an impossible schedule to follow. Turns out, it would be almost a vacation in comparison to what life has brought us.
I don't mean that in a bad way, a woe-is-me-way or any kind of negative way at all. I'm just tired. I'm ready to find my mojo again. I want to feel like I'm creative and spontaneous instead of feeling like I'm ruled by the next item on my list. Constantly. And I want to breathe. I want to have time to shave. Big-time. I want to look forward to Christmas this year instead of dreading the stress and hassle.
Will the End of Physical Therapy mean all those things? Nope. But right now, it feels like a step in the right direction.

Daily Bliss: blossoms on my bean plants and a tomato plant that's thriving!
Wake-Up Playlist: Coldplay, The Scientist

Portraits

My other photography assignment this week is window light portraiture - black background, black clothing, diffused window light. Simple and lovely.
Check this:

I love this photo so much that it makes me laugh uncontrollably!

Light Painting

My assignment for this past week's photography class was light painting. Sort of like the little pumpkin shot in my Halloween post. The idea is to take a picture with a long exposure and "paint" the shot with light - illuminating what you want and sort of drawing, too, with smaller lights. This leaves a very wide range of creative options, to be sure, and my brain was on overload trying to decide what to do! I borrowed Mindy's super-awesome camera and called up my brother Jon and his wife Sarah to help me out. We trekked around for hours having fun and collaborating. Here's what I came up with.











Some of these are edited a bit to take out, er, mistakes. Some of them are edited better than the others. I don't know that I feel 100% confident about these, so please...I could use some feedback. I'd like to feel finished with this assignment and move on to my next one - portraiture.
What do you think? Which one is your favorite? Which one is just not workin' for you and why?

Giant Post #1

I'm vegging out, nursing some sort of sickness and watching movies. But I've already seen this movie, so I thought I'd post one of those big giant posts I promised.
How about some pictures from last weekend?
We spent the early part of Halloween working a fundraiser for Andrew's TSA club - a bake sale at an outdoor event called Water, Wings & Wild Things. Of course, I baked a little something.


The boys helped set up the booth,




and Chris won a coffee mug shaped like a toilet from the utilities company.

Classy, huh?
Emma made a ladybug cookie,





but we didn't stay very long. I'm trying desperately to volunteer in moderation.
Before leaving, however, we walked around and visited some of the wildlife. There was a butterfly tent!







And the Audubon Society had some beautiful birds there.






But most importantly, though I haven't any pictures to prove it, I met Pockets the Cross-Eyed Opossum. He lives with a local rescue organization whose card I picked up but don't have near the recliner, so I'm going to be a good girl and stay put and not look for it. You can live without the link for now, right? Because I hope you'll hear more about Pockets on this blog. While I was standing there, I heard one of the organization's volunteers mention that they would love to find someone creative who could write a book about Pockets. My hands, of their own volition, flew to my mouth, making it very hard to pretend that I wasn't interested. The director saw me. She said that actually, she only needed an illustrator. I mentioned that I'm a photography student and I'd love to do photographic illustrations. There seemed to be interest. I promised to email. And I'm trying to decide if I'm brave enough to email. It's something I would really love to do - I was so very taken with Pockets - but I don't know if it will work out. I'll let you know if anything comes of it...

Daily Bliss: my hubby took the day off and took good care of me, even though i had to work
Wake-up Playlist: Rossini, William Tell Overture