A Happy Surprise

 

I have been feeling guilty that the girls haven't had their pictures taken, professionally, for quite some time. Those feelings gnaw at my sense of motherhood, eating it away and screaming about how horrible I am.

 

I have found a cure to this ailment. I didn't even know it was happening, it just appeared before my eyes! Izzy will be taking a digital photography class this fall and wanted to test out my camera before hand. I said sure, handed it to her and she took off. I didn't explain anything about what metering, shutter spead or f-stop meant. Nadda.

 

She took off with her sister and came back some time later asking how to download the pictures. I was pleassantly surpirsed. I guess she was born with some sense of SLR knowledge. Is there a strand of DNA for this?

 

Thanks Izzy for catching these moments of your sister at 12 years old. Your mom is suddenly not so sad that her girls are getting older. Teach me everything you learn at school. Please and thank you.

First Week of School

 

Most of the pictures I have seen on facebook about the first week include captions about families that will miss the beach, vacations and camping trips. I am just plain sad that my kids are getting so old. As a matter of fact, I think I need a weekend vacation to the beach, just to mull it over.

 

Isabelle gets up and leaves way too early for these kinds of pictures now. Humph...10th graders! But Maria is still a good kid and lets us squeeze her as hard as we want to.

 

 

 

 

 Izzy had her first week of school as well as her first 2 high school soccer games. Very exciting for this mom to be able to attend. Last year I missed all but one of her 9th grade games. She not only won her games but actually seriously got to score a goal against one of the rival schools.

 

Every fall, her club team members scatter to the various schools in our area and we get to bump into them during the high school season. They love eachother an awful lot and even though they wear different uniforms in the fall, they still squeal and scream when they see one another. (It's only been 3 weeks since they all practiced together, but evidently it feels like a lifetime)

 

 

 

* I feel the need to point out that I took their picture on the bleachers, and they are really all the same height. My camera can't actually make those kinds of adjustments.

 

 

 

Pinterest- An Epic Craft Journey

 

I love Pinterest. I don't love thinking a certain project will be a breeze and then finding out it is much more of a hassle than I originally thought. Take melting crayons for example. I have done it once before and thought we could step it up a little the second time around- instead of using a hair dryer, we were going to dry glue gun melting. Looked very cool. We decided to make a birthday present for someone. This story is based on actual events and unfortunately, all TRUE.

 

Step 1) Place duck tape along outer edge of canvas. Easy enough.

 

 

Step 2) Place large letter stickers on canvas. Realize that the letter stickers you purchased are not sticking to the canvas AT ALL. Substitute much smaller letter stickers instead. Ponder if anyone will notice.

 

 

 

 

Step 3) Unwrap crayons for melting. Use xacto knife. Poke yourself 3 times and conclude that your 12 year old is doing a much better job of unwrapping crayons than you are. Hold paper towel on thumb while daughter finishes up the rest.

 

 

Step 4) Create staging area for melting with drop cloth. Unwrap BRAND NEW mini glue gun- all the blogs say to use a mini glue gun for this project. Turn on glue gun. Try to place first crayon in mini glue gun and realize that crayon is TOO BIG. Try to think of alternative. Get out regular glue gun, and conclude that it will not work. Try mini glue gun again. Still not working. Sigh heavily.

 

 

 

 

Step 5) Scrap mini glue gun idea. Decide to use hair dryer. Create newer and larger staging area for melting. Glue crayons to scrap peice of cardboard. Realize that you don't have enough and throw on extra crayons. Do not unwrap extra crayons for fear of more holes poked in fingers from xacto knife. 

 

Step 6) Hold carboard of crayons over cranvas while daughter melts crayons. Realize this is causing huge mess. Realize wrapped crayons do not melt as quickly as unwrapped crayons. Calm 12 year old as she gets upset that the yellow and green are merging into a gross color. Start ripping crayons off of cardboard and hold over canvas to melt one by one, thus filling in blank areas and remedy the yellow-green color debacle.

 

 

Step 7) Let artwork dry and harden. Get excited about removing stickers. Use xacto knife to carefully cut around stickers and remove. Realize that melted crayon has seeped under stickers and created a peice of work that looks nothing like Pinterest. Calm upset 12 year old. Again.

 

 

Step 8) Spend 2 hours gently scraping off colored wax where stickers were, in hopes that you save the project for the birthdya party the next day. Upon reaching the hour of midnight, decide that it is as good as it is going to get. Cross fingers.

 

Step 9) Show 12 year old the next morning and sigh in relief as she exclaims how awesome it is.

Step 10) Remember to never do this project again.