R.I.P. Mango

As I've mentioned before, the sole pet the past 3 years in Robinson County has been Norah's beloved fish friend, Mango.

 Sadly, as of April 4th, Mango is  no longer with us in body, but I'm confident his memory will be well preserved for many years to come in the mind of the family members here who loved him.

I worried that Norah would have a hard time coping with the loss of her first pet.  (Yes, as melodramatic as that may sound, to be nervous at the seemingly insignificant loss of a $5 beta fish, he had resided here for 3/5 of Norah's life, and she was very attached) So, I suggested that she memorialize him in art. (You can tell she was still broken up, emotionally at the time of this photo)

As usual, I was taken aback by her attention to detail.  She got the shape of his bowl down perfectly, he was a peach fish, and had turquoise and pink glass rocks in the bottom of his bowl. The bright colored patchwork in the upper right corner is a nearly perfect depiction of her curtains. The "rainbow" that he is sitting over is her bookcase, where he lived (her books are still arranged in color order).  Note the alarm clock to the left of the bowl.  It reads "5:00"...Norah explained to me this is because that's her favorite time of day because, "that's when Daddy comes home from work!"

This is still one of my favorite photos of N with Mango.  I can't count how many times I would find her in her room, gazing into his bowl.  She loved to watch him swim. Sometimes she told him about her day.  And best of all, she loved feeding him before she went to bed at night.

All loyalties aside though, she almost immediately began asking if she could get another pet fish...and (being the suckers  caring parents that we are) we quickly consented.  Enter "Figgy".  Norah chose him for his flashy purple color, and decided that she should keep with the exotic fruit category for his name.  (It took us a while to find a suitable purple fruit which met her approval).  Sadly, Figgy didn't fare as well as our old friend, Mango.  He only lasted about a month.  Which brings us back to square one...petless in Robinson County.  And (at least for now), we think we'll keep it that way for a little while.  

Thank You Note-apalooza

One tradition I have with the kids is for them to help write/make their own thank you notes, particularly after birthdays, but also for random acts of kindness they've receive throughout the year.  It began when Norah was too young to "write" thank you notes, so I let her paint/color pictures and I wrote her words, verbatim as she dictated them.  This year, she was able to make (and write) them all by herself from start to finish.

For the writing of the notes, I started her off with a template.  It basically said, "Dear _______________, Thank you for (several blank lines). Love, ____________."  Then, I read off to Norah the list of people  we needed to thank.  I let her tell me what she wanted to say to each person, and I helped her with the spelling of words, as needed.  This process took several days.  Her list of people was fairly long, and her patience with printing could only last so long...so we broke it up into daily sessions while Eli napped one week.

She made the cards by using a spinning art kit (which just happened to be one of the gifts for which she was writing a thank you note).  Simply fasten down a note card to the tray, spin, squirt on paint, and watch it fly.  Norah loved experimenting with different techniques.  After the paintings were dry, she glued them onto a half piece of cardstock, folded tent-style.  Then, just for kicks, she titled (and signed) each work of art, based on what she thought it resembled. 

She carefully chose a card for each of her note recipients, and glued the corresponding note to the inside of the card.

I addressed the envelopes, while she return address stamped, and put postage in the appropriate corners.

And voila!  Personalized, heart-felt thank you notes!  Thank you note writing is a somewhat less practiced social grace in today's e-culture, but I hope it never will be for my kids.  t's a great way to help them realize and be thankful for their many blessings, as well as to be a blessing to others.  (After all, who doesn't like to get a little bit of fun mail from time to time?)

Norah's Art

"Visions of Sugar Plums"

This one was drawn the week of Christmas (yes, I'm that far behind on updating the blog/going through my pictures on my digital camera...am I the only one?) I love that she drew all of us in our beds (since that's when Santa would have made his visit.

"Eli's Birthday"

Eli would be the one on the far left (blonde hair, green eyes), with the big #3 on his shirt (I made him a striped shirt with a number three on it to wear on his birthday). Norah is beside him with blonde hair and blue eyes, and next to her are Helen (brown eyes, blonde hair) and her brother, Isaac (brown eyes, blonde hair), both who celebrated Eli's birthday with us.

"Snow White and a Deer" (Watercolor)

She was in Disney Princess/Watercolor mode this week....

"Ariel and Eric" (Watercolor)

"Norah Misses AA" 

(I love that they are the same height in this picture!)

"Beauty and the Beast"

I LOVE this one.  You can see Belle in the center of the "stage" holding the infamous rose.  The beast is to the right.  Also pictured, Mrs. Pots, the cheeky feather duster, and Lumieer.  All the circles are bubbles, and the round thing in the lower center is a dinner plate.  (She drew this the day after we went to see "Beauty and the Beast" at OPAS, and this is the "Be Our Guest" scene...probably the highlight of the entire show for both of us)

"The Flat Family"

I really love all of Norah's art, but the Flat Family is one of my all-time favorites.   We read "Flat Stanley" (if you're not familiar with it, it's an early reader book about a boy who is flattened by a bulletin board, and as a result is able to be mailed around the country in an envelope, be flown as a kite, and many other adventures.)  Norah was completely facinated with the storyline, and decided that she wanted to make an entire flat family...so she did.  I started her off tracing Flat Stanley from the book...that's the one on the far left...and she added "girl" features like pigtails and  decorations on her shirt.  Then she got adventuresome and free handed the rest of the family.  She even cut them out, paper doll-style (there were a couple of minor limb injuries with the littlest ones, but thankfully, nothing some scotch tape couldn't take care of!)

Norah's Art

It's been so long since I've updated, and I have TONS of photos to blog, so I figured I'd just jump in with a collection of Norah's sketches from this fall.

A few differences I've noticed in her artwork of late is that she has started thinking more about setting of the pictures (hence the grass under the princesses feet) 

This one is a "ballerina and her teacher" (this one was done after reading a few "Angelina Ballerina" books from the library--Angelina's ballet teacher always wears dresses with tiered ruffles, so I'm guessing the "teacher" in Norah's picture is the one in yellow on the right).  The faint square around them is the "stage".

 Two more ballerinas, again, on-stage.

Jesus on the cross (with Mary, his mother, below)

Norah and Eli playing catch (he's been wearing his hair "spiky" a lot lately, so she made sure to give him a few in her drawing)

This is one of my all-time favorites.  It is a jockey and a horse.  I love her attention to details (like the button on the top of the jockey's hat, and the bridle/reins on the horse...granted he's a little stocky, but still...)

She was very proud of this one.  If you can't tell, it is most of the cast from Toy Story 3.  L-R: Jesse, Woody, Bullseye, Barbie, Ken, and Buzz (Again, note the detail--Jesse's cow-print chaps, all of the colored lights and buttons on the front of Buzz's spacesuit, etc).  She worked on it for quite a while, finally dedicating her masterpiece to her Daddy (as you can see in the upper left corner).   As soon as he came home from work, she presented him with her art, and of course he praised it highly, immediately recognizing what/who it was a depiction of.  Not long after that, N was sent to her room (if memory serves, for having a bad attitude at the dinner table.  

After some time passed, I went in to check on her, to find her hard at work on this... While I knew it was done in total defiance, I was slightly amused at the facts that 1) She spelled everything right all by herself, 2) The worst possible "retaliation" she could think of for Jason's sending her to her room was to stop drawing pictures for him.  So funny.  And yet, the parent in me had to focus on the heart of the matter...or should I say the attitude behind it.  The same bad attitude that had gotten her in trouble at the dinner table.  We had a good talk.  And she quickly admitted that she liked drawing pictures for us and didn't really want to stop, and believe me, she hasn't!  

Meet the (Wooden) Robinsons!

Meet Norah and Eli, wooden sibling wonder duo, and proud inhabitants of Norah's latest artistic endeavor!  "And what, pray tell, do they inhabit?", you ask?

This stunning, pink, garden home, complete with curtains, flowers, and water hose! (you have to keep all those flowers alive in this summer heat, somehow!)

The south side of this lovely, 1-room home  boasts yet another garden (the house is surrounded by them!), and a "statue" (seriously, where does she come up with this stuff?)

But wait!  There's more!  Inside, you'll find a pedestal dining room table, four, matching stools and two, cozy beds, fashioned from jewelry boxes...

Each with it's own, custom, coordinating pillow case and blanket.  (The pillows are stuffed with cotton balls...the perfect size!)

What may look like just a box and some discarded trash to you, has opened a whole, new world of creativity and entertainment to a certain, beloved four year-old in Robinson County.  She played for literally 2 HOURS, uninterrupted on the floor like this yesterday, and went straight back to it the moment her feet hit the floor this morning.


Maybe there is something to the idea of just giving your kids a box to play with after all?

 Thanks to Miss Katie for the beautiful pink box and for helping Norah get her "fairy house" started during their final art lesson of the summer.  It was the perfect parting project, as it lends itself to LOTS of additions (Norah is already scheming about more furniture and home decor...we may even put up some "wall paper" or some "wood floors" with a little scrapbook paper and some mod-podge...the possibilities are endless!)

Life Imitating Art Imitating Life

 

This drawing was one of the products of N's recent art lessons.  I literally laughed out loud when she gave me her explanation of it.  The pink girls with the full skirts are Norah and Mommy.  (please note my super awesome platform heels and the giant, pink bows--two accessories which, anyone who knows me well can attest that I never leave home without.  And Norah wanted me to clarify that her shoes aren't showing because her "dress is touching the ground so you can't see her shoes") 

The blue guy on the right is Jason, and the blue guy on the left (in the flower-covered hat) is Eli.  What made me laugh about this picture was that Eli really has taken to wearing Norah's floral tea party hat on recent multiple occasions and Norah felt it important enough to capture in her own, personal artistic rendering.  (As I've mentioned before, I think he mainly does this to get a rise out of Norah, because she gets SO upset if he dons anything even remotely effeminate, partly because she's territorial, and partly because she thinks it completely unacceptable for boys to wear girls' attire)

 Not long after showing me her drawing, Norah called me into my room, urging me to bring my camera.  It seems she wanted to do a partial real-life re-creation of her art work. (I didn't even realize it until after I took the photo, but she even has her arm in the same position as it was in her drawing...funny girl!)  I'm telling you, some days, I laugh ALL day-long. 

Art Lessons

Jason and I have been debating for a while now about signing Norah up for an extra-curricular activity.  We had just about decided on gymnastics (Norah's choice), when Norah's drawing phase kicked into high gear.  We decided to hold-off on gymnastics (which we may start in the fall) and contacted an amazing art major friend from church, to see if she would be willing to give Norah some art lessons this summer.

Thankfully, sweet Katie said yes, and with much enthusiasm and joy, Norah had her first lesson this morning.  Her very first project?  A personalized, homemade sketch book.  Katie had her paint the cover , then stitch up the binding (which she had drilled holes for).

Norah went to work at filling it up with pictures, almost as soon as the binding's knots were tied!

Can you tell she's stoked?

I love how she sticks her tongue out when she's concentrating extra-hard on getting the details "just so".  (She is VERY particular about how she wants things to work, and as a result can be a little emotional while drawing)

She even took time out of her busy day to give Eli an "Art Lesson" of his own.

I think she had a little more control over what they drew than he did (like I said,  she's very particular)...but Eli enjoyed the attention, just the same.

Some of my favorite art pieces from this week...

"Santa and his Reindeer"

Apparently the man in the red suit really slims down in the off-season, but at least his reindeer look happy and well-fed.

When I asked her if this pretty, girl reindeer was wearing bows in her antlers, N's reply was, "No silly.  Mommy, that's her crown!  She's the reindeer QUEEN."

"A Family of Reindeer"

She is SO my daughter. She claims that pen is her favorite drawing medium (a pilot G-2 .07, to be exact...a girl after my own heart) and she is already thinking about reindeer in May.

What's Going On Around Here

I know I've been slacking on the updates. Sorry about that. So here is what you've been missing in Robinson County...

Norah is still doing great with her reading (and is LOVING sharing her new-found skill with her brother). I walked in on them the other morning and found Norah reading Eli his favorite book in his room. So sweet.



I have been sewing...a lot. Norah chose some wild peacock fabric and asked for a "twirly dress". I paired it with a tank top, which I cut off, using the cut-off lower portion to make ruffles down the front, and made the rest of the dress up as a went along. Not my normal style...I'm usually a pattern or at least tutorial kind of girl. But I think I am in love with making my own rules for sewing, so there may be more to come!


Mom and I have been churning out lots of cute dolls and other sewing projects for the Pigtails and Puddles esty shop (which I hope to open pretty soon...I just wanted to have a "semi-full inventory" at least in the beginning, so I've been holding out on some of what I've been up to...but if you're really interested, feel free to check the Pigtails and Puddles blog for a few hints)


Jason and I did a little landscaping in the front yard, and I am LOVING it. We planted 4 pink (I say they're red) knockout rose bushes, 3 "iceburg" (white) tea rose bushes, some sage (which, although it is blooming wonderfully, I disappointingly must report that it does not, smell anything like perfume), and some white verbena...which, so far, has been the only plant that does not seem to be absolutely thriving (I'm hoping after it gets established it will take off...verbena is supposed to be one of the easiest plants to grow around here).

I've been amazed at how quickly I've delved into gardening. (We'll see if it lasts once the summer temperatures hit). I love getting out early in the morning to water and weed, dead-heading the rose bushes and watching, with wonder, as they put out new growth (the red leaves) and (best of all) new buds.

The white and red roses have been alternately blooming. One week we have all red blooms, and just as they fade, the white bushes start blooming up a storm. Occasionally they will both have a few at the same time. I love having flowers to watch out my window, greet me when I get home, and tend to each day!

In other news, Norah's flamingo obsession....er...I mean, interest, continues. These are just a sampling of her portfolio (there have been many other flamingo art sightings in Robinson County. (I'm just holding my breath til she asks for a "Flamingo Costume" for Halloween...wouldn't that be a hat trick?).

And we have one other big project (it is NOT, I repeat, NOT another baby) that I hope to share photos of soon, so stay tuned and maybe I'll update the blog again soon!