Birthday Gift

When I walked into the classroom today, the Kindergarten teacher, who is absolutely lovely, was acknowledging a little red-head's birthday. She directed all the students to take a small card and go to their assigned seats. On one side of the card they were told to draw a picture "for the birthday boy." On the back students were to write the words, "David is 6." After all the cards were drawn and written on she collected them and put them into a special blue, birthday bag. I wish you could have seen the delight in this little 6-year old's face when he grabbed the bag full of birthday cards and walked over to his backpack to carefully stow them away. He was beside himself with pride and delight. I so love my job some days.

Father and Son

This windy and chilly November weekend, my step-son spent a number of hours in our heated garage with his dad. They were working on this old truck. They are attempting to fix the gas tank. They have thought about it, pounded on it, fiddled with it. I guess in a moment of, "I'm going to pull my hair out, let's do something else!" they pulled out the hack saw and whacked off the sides of the bed! Alas, they will return to the project next weekend to get the old truck running. And, not to sound too much like a sappy Hallmark card, but I really love seeing how genuinely happy the two of them are working together on this old truck. I know how much they love spending time together and I am so happy they make the time to do that :)

Alice in Wonderland Revisited

Today my husband and I bought this painting. My friend who died of alcoholism this past summer, painted this portrait of a flower. The bottom is not as light as it appears - flash issues - but beyond that you can see that this is a beautiful, abstract painting. My husband commented that it was pretty "dark." "Yah, that would be Alice," I thought. She will be missed by many.

New Glass

You never know what fused glass will look like once fired. It's the part of this process I love and the part I hate. I had designed these 37 pieces and when unfired, they were all angular. I picked them up yesterday and none of them had a corner anywhere near a 90 degree angle! "Why are all the edges so rounded?" I wondered. "Hey, these are kind of cool." I thought. I label it my "Round Period" :P The minute my husband saw this batch he said that the heat had been on for too long which is why they all looked like colorful little puddles of glass. My step-son told me the heat was too high. For whatever reason, these little beauties look like shiny lozenges :) When I look at the set in all, I think are some are beautiful, some too round, some too top heavy. I see what I will avoid next time. I imagine embellishing some with wire and beads. And, I always love the pieces with some sparkle. I also see how it's hard to capture the beauty and feel of glass in a photograph.

Rockin Kitchen Tool

From Goodwill, apple peeler/corer/slicer circa 1890
powerhousemuseum.com

This is one clever kitchen tool. It's an apple peeler, slicer and corer all in one. Jacki, my sister-in-law borrowed this from her daughter so we could quickly make apple crisp today for the big post-Thanksgiving party. What a hoot. First, you turn a crank to suction the corer/slicer/peeler onto the counter. Then you pierce the apple on the stem end and start cranking the big handle on the other end. One little mechanism peels, one cores and one cuts! Fabulous! It'll make short time of our apple prepping for the crisp this morning. Who knew such a gadget had been around for 100 years!

Tale of the Deep Fried Turkey

The tale of this turkey goes something like this...take a giant turkey bought by father-in-law, inject it with Italian seasoning, pierce it with an cave-man style hook, let it hum for a day in a big vat of salty and delicious brine, fill up the outdoor cooker with gallons of oil (father of the chef and owner of the house insisted this was an outdoor project :), hook up the gas and heat up that huge pot of oil, slowly maneuver the turkey into the pot of boiling oil (stand way back), watch as the oil boils over onto the driveway and causes colorful flames to shoot up and around the pot, shoo away the Mastif (named Tinkerbell) who has taken to licking up that delicious spilled oil, let said bird cook away for about an hour (check time frequently on your fancy new iPhone), get a big pot holder and lift crispy turkey out of hot-ass oil, have chef's father carve giant bird with an electric knife (which he has never used before), and then enjoy! This was one tasty bird! Kudos to the chef Gabriel and his sous chef, Dad :) :)

Ginormous Stuffed Mushrooms

I found these huge mushrooms at the local grocery store. My husband soaked them in sherry and olive oil, filled them with sweet Italian sausage, seasoned bread crumbs, green onion and left-over mushroom and then cooked them in the oven for 1 hour. They were seriously delicious with a glass of Spanish wine for an appetizer. They went so fast I didn't get a chance to take a photo of them once they were cooked and yummy!

Be Thankful :)

Gobble, Gobble....May you spend the day around those you love!
This was a paper turkey I made last Thanksgiving....lots to be thankful for :)

Curried Split Pea Soup

Wow...delicious soup tonight. We were going to go out but given that we're going to stuff ourselves like pigs tomorrow, I decided to make a healthy soup. I cooked onion and garlic in olive oil. I added tons of hot curry powder and cooked for a few more minutes...what a smell! I then added chicken stock, carrots and chunks of sweet potato along with a bag of split peas. But THE ingredient was a left over BBQ rib that my husband suggested we plop right in the center. Wow....an hour later what an intensely flavored split pea soup! A dollop of sour cream and we were done :)

Do You Know it All?

shortnorth.com

Have you ever met a person who acts like they know everything? Such people interest me. And, I appreciate their self-esteem issues if it's at a distance. But, having to be in close proximity with such people is...difficult. First, they are defensive and with good reason; who could know everything? Second, they are quick to find fault in everybody else because, of course, it's always easier to find fault in others vs oneself. It is fundamentally such a sad situation because who really can be his or herself around people like this? Being friends is hard. Being colleagues is hard. Being family is hard. You have a couple of choices. You react and tell the person either verbally or in an obvious nonverbal way that she or he is an idiot. You get defensive yourself which only makes it seem like you are engaging in some silly pre-school game. You find fault in everything this person does just because this person is so annoying and always finding fault with you. I like to think I can find that yoga side of myself in such situations and see that this person is in my life for a reason and blah, blah, blah. I like to think I can be that self-reflective soul who is peaceful and understanding as I relate to such a person. But, honestly, sometimes I just wish this Know-It-All would find a good therapist or simply leave the room.

I am Thankful for....

merrybellspreschoolhouse.com

I was out sick from work for a full week. The first morning I returned, the students in my accelerated math group literally sat on top of me as we organized ourselves around the giant tables in the cafeteria and started to work. Guess they were glad I was back. Later that day, two of my most challenging reading students put extraordinary effort into tasks that are so fundamentally difficult for them. There was no resistance; only hard work. Towards the end of the day, one of my behaviorally challenged students was absolutely delightful and cooperative. I think in all the meetings and rush, rush of my job, the paperwork, the recess duties, the testing, I forget how much my work with kids means to them. I am grateful and feel fortunate and thankful that I not only enjoy my work (most of the time!) but I seem to impact the lives of many of the kids I work with in a positive way. Now, that's the way life should be.

Painted Shoe Artist

Custom sneaker designer, Van Monroe, painted this shoe and became famous. This very shoe is soon to be placed in the Smithsonian's Museum of African American History and Culture. A 26 year old from Long Beach (via Cleveland), he is now in partnership with Twentieth Century Fox. He started painting shoes for friends at the University of Miami. This Obama shoe idea came to him in a dream right before he thought he was going to be evicted from his apartment. He hasn't looked back :)

Painted Shoes!

How cute are these? Just a couple of hours ago I took 37 fused glass pendants into the studio to be fired and am looking for a new project. I'm thinking about painting shoes. I was actually thinking about doing this last summer so I bought 2 pairs of Dr. Scholl's sandals. They are still sitting in the closet, but look what they might turn into :)

www.mytwinkletoes.com

Little chilly for them right now....so I'm thinking of painting tennis shoes. I have to give credit to my daughter-in-law who came over the other day in the cutest pair of sparkly cheetah high tops from zappos. And, it got me thinking.....how about painting tennis shoes!
And look what I found....
the Lorax hanging out on these high tops. Painting children's characters on tennis shoes...this could be a great winter project!