Perfection in Small Things

It's been a while since I tried to sit down and write anything.  The addition of our floppy-eared, furry-tailed fifth child to the rest of the family chaos has eaten up pretty much any time I had to spare.  But today we bewail celebrate the first day of summer vacation, so it seemed like a good occasion to risk a chewed throw pillow for the sake of a post.


Last spring I came across a pot of hydrangeas that were so blue that they haunted me until I went back and purchased them.  Florist hydrangeas are about as disposable as cut flowers (they're not bred for hardiness) and I am not usually one for throwaway purchases (too many years feeding a family on a graduate student stipend has ingrained in me a certain parsimony.) But they were just so... blue.  A genuine blue, too, not the dye-in-the-water blue of carnations around Independence day and moth orchids at Home Depot.

So after a glorious month of blooms, I trimmed the dead blossoms, watered it occasionally, and hoped for the best.  It survived the mild Florida winter in the screen porch, and I was excited to see flower buds a few weeks ago.  But as you can see, it's a shadow of its former self.

But thank goodness for bud vases.  I love bud vases, because they are so much easier to fill than large vases (remember, I don't buy cut flowers... I could pretend it's because of the pesticides, but really, I'm just too cheap).  And because it's just a single flower, I don't try to keep it around past its prime and watch its sad, slow decay (can you tell I have issues with cut bouquets?)  Perfect for blooms from my orchids, and now perfect for this hydrangea:

Which is a good life lesson to help me survive the summer.  I love for my kids to have the down time of summer vacation, and I love the freedom it gives us to fit in the unscripted - the impromptu picnics and fishing trips, the Ninja's random science experiments and the kitchen upheaval when the Eldest decides he wants to make a sachertorte, the late night swims with Little Sister and walks to the park with Little Brother, past all normal bedtimes.  Which all sounds idyllic until the kids wake up crabby at 7am (why will they never sleep in??) and I realize that the day hasn't even started and the house is already completely trashed and my life looks something like that scraggly hydrangea.  It's then that I need to reframe the picture, cut off a pretty branch, stick it in a bud vase, and zoom in.  Enjoy the small perfections, so intensely beautiful that it can carry us all through the laundry, cooking, decluttering, hollering, and squabbling that ties it all together.

Horse Art



 

I got the idea for an art wall in Baby Girl's room when I discovered Costco Photo Center's gallery of free art images.  We had a fun afternoon of browsing through and picking her favorite horse pictures, then I added a few more images from other sources (like the Uffington and Lascaux horses) and had them all printed on photo paper for under $15 (considerably cheaper than the framed canvas option).

With the help of a hand-me-down workbench from a friend and a circular saw, a few sheets of MDF scrap were soon cut into the right sizes to back these photos.  I painted the edges of the MDF with an off-white to match the room's trim, used a thin layer of wood glue to fix the photos onto the boards.

Then of course the pictures sat stacked on her dresser for months until I finally got around to hanging them up today.  But I do have an excuse:



Introducing Barclay, here at 11 weeks, the newest member of our family

May cause unexpected twirling

With physical therapy and doctors' appointments added to the usual round of activities, there has been little time to tackle the project backlog.  So this less-than-ten-minute project was particularly satisfying.  The materials were lying around the house, but I hadn't had the time to put thought into just how I was going to make Baby Girl a canopy so she could have a real princess bed.

This is what I used:

• Pair of sheer curtains (LILL from Ikea, at $4.99 cheaper than I can make 'em)
• Pair of bracket curtain rods (old ones I had in the garage, you can find them here)
• 4 binder clips
• white plastic tape
• ribbon
• screw hook
• drywall anchor (something like these)

I took apart the curtain rods (each pulls apart into 2 halves) and joined them bracket-to-long-end to make a square.  A bit of crimping with the pliers, and the long end slid into the end bracket up to the bend pretty easily.  Since this doesn't need to be particularly sturdy, I just crimped it tight and taped it to hold it together (something like duct tape or electrical tape should work well).  Before closing the last joint, don't forget to thread on your curtains.

A binder clip in each corner serves to both hold the curtain in place and also to be an attaching point for hanging.  I had a garland I'd made for a party years ago, which dressed it up easily, slipped under the edge of the binder clip to hold it in place.

Loop 4 equal lengths of ribbon through the binder clips, gather them together, knot off, and hang from a screw hook.  There wasn't a joist where I wanted to place it, but since this whole thing is less than 5 lbs, a drywall anchor was a sturdy enough mount for the screw hook.

I think it's calling out for a little more embellishment - maybe some ribbon streamers, or some flowers.  But this isn't a bad start for 10 minutes... especially judging from Baby Girl's reaction:  she jumped on the bed and started twirling, because words failed her.  And then lay down to show me just how a princess sleeps.

Acorns and Pearls

Years ago I saw an idea in a Better Homes & Gardens holiday book, which is just too good not to share.  And yes, it is now February, and this is a decidedly autumn project, but I thought I'd post it so you can have it in mind for future broken pearl necklaces or stray acorns.

For a candle ring, you will need a 6-8" grapevine wreath, lots of acorns, and assorted pearls to fit the acorn caps.

The acorns can be gathered from your neighborhood oak tree in the fall, and the wreath can be made from stray grapevine (around here it is everywhere)... but if you gather your own, be sure to bake it in the oven at 250F (after you've shaped the grapevine) for an hour to kill any larvae within the the wood or acorns.  Not only are exiting insect holes unsightly, wood boring insects like powder post beetles can set up shop in your home and invade your studs.  Don't ask me how I know this.

Once you have your materials gathered and prepped, the assembly is easy.  Cover the wreath uniformly with acorns, some of them with the nuts replaced by pearls, glueing it all in place with a glue gun.  A word of advice:  if the nuts did not fall out of their caps during the baking process, pull them out anyway and put a dab of glue under the cap before putting them back in; this will keep those acorns in place for years to come.

For co-ordinating napkin rings, cut a 12" length of ribbon, flame-seal the ends to keep them from fraying, and with a needle and thread sew on a 2-acorn sprig, with a pearl replacing one of the acorn nuts.

More fun with power tools

So much for anonymity

Over the summer I saw an idea for a  monogram photo collage on pinterest which was perfect for brightening up an empty corner of a kid's room.  With hundreds of free photo print credits at an online retailer (long story involving my bargain-hunting brother), it was a matter of minutes to get a stack of photos ordered, but it took until after Christmas (but before the broken arm!) for me to find time to work on this project.

I'd initially planned on just making a large "J", but with so many photos and a 2'X4' sheet of MDF, it seemed the best way to use up the space was to go with the whole name.


To make one like it, you'll need:

--1/4" medium density fiberboard
--photos (in b&w or sepia)
--modge podge or white glue
--sandpaper
--paint (black or dark brown)
--jigsaw & drill

I started out letting John pick his favorite font for his name.  The fastest way for me to get the letters right next to each other was to print it out and then fold the paper - I'm sure there's a more involved way to manipulate the text and print it out just right, but it wasn't worth figuring out for me.

To help me enlarge the name, I divided each letter roughly into halves, then sketched out a similar grid on the MDF.  Chalk is a nice forgiving medium for this task, followed by sharpie after you're satisfied with the result of your sketching.

If, like me, you are using antiquated (i.e. older than me) tools and a jerry-rigged set-up on clementine crates, then the easiest way to cut around all the bends and sharp corners is to drill holes ( a 1/2" wood boring bit is nice for this) at all the sharp corners or interior cuts, and then go dot-to-dot with the jigsaw:

The dots don't have to be followed sequentially or unidirectionally - the easiest way to handle an inside corner is to come at it from opposite directions.

Having the recipient there to help hold the MDF steady is a nice bonus

After the name is all cut out give it a light sanding and paint the edges your desired colour.  (If you are concerned about the MDF off-gasing, a coat of paint over the entire exposed surface of the board will help with that.)  Then comes the fun part of gluing on your photos.  I used modge-podge, but a thin even layer of white glue should work as well.  I didn't take pictures of the process, but what worked for me was to lay the photos over the name, then crease them by pressing your finger along the edge of the MDF - this will give you a nice bend in the photopaper that you can cut along.  Glue on your photos, let it dry, and if you want you can give the edges  another light sanding to distress it.

It seemed like a good idea at the time



Life Imitates Art

Yesterday Little Brother was poring over a playmobil catalog and commented "Look, Mom, this boy fell off his bike and broke his arm."  I was mildly concerned that he was so traumatized as to be projecting his own life onto an advertisement, until I looked closer and saw that our life is now indeed mirroring a playmobil scenario.

Last week, the Eldest and the Ninja managed to, with a bike, a scooter, and a tow rope, give the Ninja a compound supracondylar fracture of the humerus.  The Ninja stayed incredibly collected and calm through the whole ordeal, while the Eldest, who had cajoled his brother into this adventure (complete with a guarantee of payment if he got hurt) and who felt responsible for disregarding Dad's express orders against tying ropes to bikes, was near hysterical with grief.  Which all makes the Eldest sound worse than he deserves.  He has a soft heart and a strong conscience to balance out his harebrained ideas.  Privately Dad and I call him the Instigator... and he's also the one all the little kids flock to, because he is the most exciting playmate.

The Ninja is the contemplative, deliberate one in the family, the one who often lives in his own mind in a world governed by logic.  The risks he takes are, if misinformed, at least calculated (hence the request for a guarantee).  Once, when he was 3, and not believing me when I told him that he couldn't tell by looking at it whether the stove was hot, he watched for me to turn off the stove, and then, when I was busy with his brother, went to deliberately test it.  I had no idea until he didn't come when called to do his chores, and going to look for him I found him running his fingers under cold water in the upstairs bathroom, tears streaming down his face and crying defiantly, "I don't want to tell you what I was doing," which turned soon enough into "Mommy, why was it still hot after you turned it off?"  And so I found myself, while assuaging his wounded pride and bandaging his blistered fingers, trying to explain thermal conductivity to a 3-year-old. 

With such different personalities in the house, coexistence is not always a peaceful thing, and so often I am called in to arbitrate irreconcilable disputes.  Which may explain why I could be calm at the scene of the accident and through the ambulance ride, in the ER, and at Radiology, but narrowly escaped bursting into tears when the Ninja asked to talk to the Eldest on the phone through a pain- and narcotic-clouded haze, and said, "I forgive you.  I forgive you.  I'm all right.  No, it doesn't hurt too much."

We are home now, held together with a few pins, plaster splint, and the closeness of a shared trial.  A little frailer, a little more aware of our fragility, but oh, so much stronger for it all.

Next time I'm sticking with cupcakes

In which our heroine forays into the realm of cake pops.



A blue angry bird after taking a nose dive into the red candy melts.

 My first mistake was in thinking that I could attempt cake pops, without a dry run, starting at 10pm the night before the birthday, after a day spent assembling furniture for Baby Girl's room (so many of my fiascos seem to center around furniture purchases) and trying to find her floor again in time for the party the next day.

The Eldest is turning 11, and having heard me mention the Angry Bird cake pops I'd seen online, asked me to bring those in to school for his birthday.  I looked at the recipe - cake crumbs and a tub of frosting dipped in candy melts, how hard could it be?  Never mind that the only dipping I've ever done is into a chocolate fountain... I had confidence and to spare.



Maybe I should have suspected things were headed south when I tasted the unholy mix.  I had a very moist white cake... and it tasted like raw cake batter.  Which might be ok if you're a cake batter person.  I am not.

Then there was trying to get these balls of dough to stick to the lollipop sticks (tip:  dip the end of the stick in candy melts and let harden before sticking it into the dough ball and freezing it.  Don't know why it helps, but it does).  Maybe I got too generous with the pops - they were a good 1.5" across, and kept falling off the sticks.

No matter, I got the hang of it, and had a half dozen blue birds cooling in a block of styrofoam when they toppled over into the red candy coating.  It was about 1am by then, I was running out of steam and starting to panic.

White chocolate chip eyes, trimmed candy corn beak, black frosting details, feathers from melted candy piped onto waxed paper and cooled. And a skull fracture.

Made more red birds ... then looked over at the blues to notice their heads had all cracked.  Did the candy coating shrink when it cooled, or did the dough expand as it warmed?  I didn't know and didn't care to find out.  It would have to do.

To add insult to injury, though, the dough started extruding out of little holes in the candy coating (think of toothpaste in a tube), looking for all the world like the birds were pooping tapeworms on each other.  Yeah, you really needed that simile.

Well, I am used to cleaning up messes, so I pulled off the tapeworms and called it good.  And then went to deal with my other task of the evening, editing a 16-page computer vision grant proposal due in the morning.  While Baby Girl had a croup attack.  At about 5am I thought seriously of taking her to the ER (no, it was not epiglottitis, but I was convinced it was - I am not my rational best at that hour) but was fortunately too tired to actually follow through on that.  (She's fine, thanks).

The kids actually like the way the pops taste (they got to eat all the outtakes) so it's not a total failure:  I made a treat they want to eat but which I am not even tempted to touch.  And they are kinda cute, if you don't look too closely.