the gift of creativity ...

To think creatively, we must be able to look afresh at what we normally take for granted. ~George Kneller

If you've been reading awhile, then you already know about my littlest ladybug's strong imagination.  She truly has that perfect storm of intelligence and creativity combined to create a child whose mind is never (ever) at rest ... she is constantly thinking, constantly creating, and thanks to that added pinch of resolve, nothing stops her.  Her spontaneous creations often take my breath away - no joke.  She sees everyday things at a whole different level - she'll create something from nothing every. single. time.  For Valentine's Day last week, she was told to find a shoebox at home, and decorate it as a "valentine mailbox".  Most kids wrap their shoeboxes in wrapping paper or construction paper.  If that.  Not my little bug ...

Using 3 shoeboxes cut just so, she made an exact replica of our house - with smoke coming out of the chimney saying "Happy Valentine's Day!"  Every detail of our house is in place, right down to the wreaths on the doors and the potted plant on the stoop ...

Who does this?!  Am I the only one who thinks this is crazy amazing?!  She's nine years old.  Last summer, I started taking photos of the things she creates out of the blue and by now the folder contains literally hundreds of pictures of her amazing masterpieces.

For example, you might remember her homemade butterfly lure from last summer?  Or the eggshell baby carriage last Fall?  Those were among my first photos of her creations - so was this one of her birdwatching journal and gear below ...

My favorite part of this photo is her last entry: "Nothing yet, but I still have my hopes up. I think I'm going to go play football." 

And like a proud momma with a wallet stuffed full of photos, here are some more of my favorites:

No one available to come over and play today? No problem, the sock monkeys are free ...

And why would you paint your nails one simple color when you could fashion an American flag on them instead (she did this with no help, btw) ...

And, of course, no cardboard box is safe from any child - but instead of a simple fort, my little ladybug sees 4-paned windows complete with window boxes, a chimney, and a roof deck ...

Last summer she decided to make a zoo for all of her plastic animals - she used Lincoln Logs and plain white paper to create the zoo ...

Not especially remarkable but did you notice the parking ticket on the VW bug?  It's all about the details, people ...

A few months later, she perfected the "paper structure" idea and created a PetSmart store for her domesticated plastic animals - 100% from paper right out of the printer - check out the cute puppies in the front window ...

this is the interior wall of the store ...

and, of course, the carrier to take your new pet home in ...

Her most recent plain-paper masterpiece?  A working and functional jack-in-the-box ... wait, what?!  Yes, it works.  You sing the song, the "jack" pops out after 6 slow turns of the handle ...

And on days when daddy works so late they can't eat dinner together, she still finds a way to join him ...

Is anyone else impressed with the level of detail in the BACKGROUND of this self-portrait?!

Last month, little ladybug had a book report (called IRPs - independent reading project) coming due ... each IRP has a specific creative assignment to pair with your report. This one was called "story in a can" - similar to the valentine box, you decorate a coffee can with pictures or drawings and fill it with 10 items that represent some aspect of the book you read. Seems simple enough, right? 

On the left is just the lid of her can ...

Obviously, it's a duplicate of the book cover (made completely out of Crayola model magic) ... what amazes me is that she took the time to create the same wrinkles in Clementine's clothing and even rolled out super fine threads of the clay to create the same cursive writing in the title, the hair, and the shoelaces ... what the?!  Her attention to detail is unreal.  Seriously, folks, she's nine ... little ... she weighs like 50 pounds.

My final photo to share is worth a big smile, so I hope I've still got your attention (I know, nothing worse than a mom who drones on and on about her "amazing" kids, right?!  Please forgive me!).  Last month little ladybug wanted to do something special for our 18 year old neighbor and longtime babysitter. She was home from her first semester at college to have her wisdom teeth extracted. So what did my little bug deliver to her? Four of these ...

(full credit goes to dana at bungalow '56 for this photography trick!)

Don't immediately recognize what it is? Would it help if I told you that it's a molar wearing a wizard's cap and holding a wand?  Are the light bulbs going off in your head yet?  Yup, it's a "wisdom" tooth - she made 4 of them and happily delivered them to her beloved sitter.  For the last time: who does this?!

My littlest ladybug, that's who - my super genius, super creative, super awesome nine year old ladybug.  Like I said ... her mind is constantly working, constantly in gear, constantly creating ... not always an easy profile to parent (frustration is not a good look on her), and that determination of hers makes an argument awfully difficult (man that girl can dig in) ... but I'll take our little ladybug any day of the week ... exactly the way she was made ... I love you, baby :-)

weekending ...

The kids were released from school at noon on Thursday thanks to teacher conferences, no school on Friday, and yet ironically, are IN school today (President's Day) thanks to a snow-day makeup day (we have to make up anything beyond 4 snow days) ... I'm actually really bummed to have them in school today, I was really counting on this day as a 'rest day' for all of us to just decompress - we've had another exhausting busy-but-wonderful long weekend that I'll do my best to put into list form, Pam-style ...

Thursday

bake all morning for our weekend away

noon pickup

quick lunch

off to the dentist

no cavities!

Mom has a special nighttime date in the city with little ladybug ...

The musical Mary Poppins is traveling around the country and made a stop at Boston's Opera House.  It was absolutely phenomenal - magical is a better word - literally magical, too, as Burt walked right up the stage walls and across the ceiling at one point - not to mention Mary Poppins' dramatic exit - floating right over the audience and out the backside of the theater!  But I have to tell you a crazy side story - about 15 minutes into the show, right in the middle of a musical number, all of the house lights came on.  The fire alarm was going off.  The entire Opera House (audience, actors, orchestra, stage hands, everyone) had to be evacuate into the streets of Boston.  For 50 minutes.  While the Boston FD came to sweep the building and reset the alarm.

No fire, thank goodness, but it was a painful delay for my little bug, who can hardly make it past 9 pm ... the show didn't end until 11 pm, she was like a zombie!  At least she has a fun and unusual story to retell ...

Friday

morning teacher conferences

the little ladybugs are doing well :-)

homemade quirky turkeys for lunch!

make Jess's caramel icing for the bundt cake I'd baked

YUM, the icing is to die for!

eat leftover icing from pot with a spoon

pack the skis into the car - we're headed for the mountains!

meet hosting friends in New Hampshire for the long drive north

but wait, what's up with the temperature?

Saturday

mild temps were short-lived - woke up to 22 degrees in Northwestern Maine - back to reality!

uh-oh - the refreeze has caused icy ski conditions

and only the lower half of the mountain is open due to 60-70 mph winds at the top - yikes!

tough it out with a c-c-cold ski day

turns out a LOT of fun is had by all

mom learns that both ladybugs now ski better than she can

 afternoon hot tub for the kids and dads

margaritas for four

fajita dinner for eight

bundt cake is hit!

Sunday

oh dear, now it's down to 9 degrees - but at least the winds have died down

mom opts for spending the morning at the gift shop instead

Manbug heads out with our slopeside hosts and both kids bundled tight

Manbug learns little ladybug can ski fast

lunch with our friends

hugs, goodbyes, and thank you's

3 last runs

pack up car

time for the 4-hour ride home

boooooo ...

"but mom, why do we have to go back home, isn't it a holiday tomorrow?"

tears, sulking, frowns

Hey, if it ended in tears, it had to have been a wonderful weekend right?!

the quirky turkey

I'm taking a little lunch break and thought I'd share a fun sandwich creation with you ... there's a great little coffee shop in my town that turns into an amazing soup-salad-sandwich place at lunchtime - it's a tiny little space, so at lunchtime you've got to eat quickly so as to turn your table over, but hasty service aside, the sandwiches are delicious!  Let's just say that swooper and I have rendezvoused more than once to share one of their sandwiches and catch up with one another.  My favorite is called the Quirky Turkey and at $8 a sandwich I've been determined to reproduce this hot delicious panini goodness in my own house over this frigid and snowy winter.  Prepare yourselves for the ultimate "comfort sandwich"... 

Here's what you'll need:

Deli-sliced Turkey

Brie

Honey Mustard

Granny Smith Apple

Trader Joe's Tuscan Pane Bread

(if you're not familiar with this bread, it's delicious - sort of a hearty sliced bakery loaf similar to a sourdough - beware: soft breads don't really work for this one, folks)

Heat up a griddle or pan on your cooktop to a medium/low heat.  Thinly slice the brie and apples and lightly spread the honey mustard on the insides of each sandwich slice.  Using a brush, I spread about a 1/2 T or so of olive oil on the outside of each slice and then placed the oil side down onto the hot pan.  If olive oil doesn't float your boat, you could certainly use some other oil or butter/spread instead.  From there, I layered the turkey, brie, and apple slices and topped it off with the second piece of bread.  Since I don't have a panini press and use a pan instead, it's prone to lose it's contents when you flip it over to heat the other side, so be careful!  Heat it until the brie just begins to melt and those oiled outer slices of bread are just getting browned ... it'll look like this ...

Soooo so delicious, right swooper? (speaking of which .... we're due, girl!)  Bon Appétit!

time lapse tuesday: my then and now assignment ...

I've mentioned it before, but I'm taking part in the Joy of Love workshop this month - it's a free online photography workshop that Kim over at What am I Going to be when I grow up? kindly shared with her readers when it first started.  She got a few us on the hook and I must say it's been a lot of fun to get my email each night as to the next day's assignment - I've found that I definitely don't have the time to do it each and every day and some of the assignments interest me more than others, so I've more or less been creating my own syllabus as I go!  At the end of the month, I hope to be able to share the handful of assignments and resulting shots that I think qualify as share-worthy ...

This particular assignment was from earlier in the month but it works so well with my whole "time lapse" obsession and the "time lapse tuesday" idea that I had to hold off until a Tuesday to share it ... so here goes - the assignment was to photograph a loved one "then and now".  My little ladybugs seemed the obvious subjects - they change so dramatically between a then and a now!  What immediately came to mind for the "then" were the handful of framed favorites of the girls from years ago. Then last week after school I sat down with them for a few minutes to try and get a comparable shot for the "now" part of the assignment.  And here's what I came up with.

First comes my big ladybug ...

then: baby

then: age 5

now: age 12

Now my little ladybug ...

then: baby

then: age 4

now: age 9

weekending ...

Every Sunday night, Pam at Views from my Kitchen Sink does the cutest posts entitled "weekending" where she recaps her busy weekends in the form of a list -  and by list I mean just a simple collection of words to give you the flavor of all that went on.  I love the simplicity and have wanted (and more often needed!) to condense my own recaps down to just a few words ... well, if ever there was a weekend to condense all that we did down to just a few simple words, this last one was it!  I'm not exactly known for being short on words, so let's see how well I do with it - here goes ...

Thursday after school - it's all about the Girl Scout Cookies!

Town delivery

First sort by troop

Then sort by girl

Then sort your order and deliver!

YUM!

yes, this car is filled all the way to the front seats - this is the "sort by troop" stage, thank goodness!

Friday morning - 4th grade play ... 

in front of 300 students of all ages and about 70-ish parents.

Gulp!

Despite her jitters, little ladybug pulls off an amazing performance with just the right flair and projection

... and sported a crazy blonde wig that brought on lots of extra compliments too ...

Dinner out to celebrate.

Girl Scout cookies on the couch in our pj's ...

... watching the last of the American Idol auditions.

Saturday morning: 3 hours of skate practice.

Saturday afternoon: delivery of Girl Scout cookie orders.

Early to bed for the skaters.

Mombug off to see The King's Speech with some girlfriends (soooo good - run, don't walk!).

Sunday all day ... parked ourselves at the skate rink ...

Little ladybug skates her heart out ...

Big ladybug follows with an amazing routine ...

Manbug and the other dad volunteers crunch the judge's scoring numbers all afternoon ...

Mombug mans the last shift of the sales boutique once the ladybugs get off the ice for the day.

(our skate club hosted their once/year "Valentine's" competition with a handful of other New England clubs ~who traveled from the Cape, New Hampshire, Vermont, etc~ as our guests.  135 girls (and 2 boys!) competed in 220 events from 7:30 am to 5 pm.)  

Long day ...

So hard to grab a good photo of them while they're skating, I do have great video but still need to convert it to digital for uploading and sharing.  And, yes, those are gold medals on those blue ribbons - fantastic day, they nailed their categories - way to go, bugs!

Off to our favorite Chinese restaurant to celebrate.

Hot showers to clean off stage makeup/hair.

Fresh pj's and America's Funniest Home Videos.

Snuggles and Kisses and off to bed ...

Monday morning ...

Happy Valentine's Day!  

Grouchy tired faces from the bugs, both of whom were woken from a deep sleep for school

Smiles return when they discover Mommy's Valentine's cards hidden in their underwear drawers

Off to school ...

Ok ok, so clearly I have a little work to do if I'm going to get it down the simplicity of Pam's weekending lists - but at least it's a start ...

Happy Valentine's Day!

will you be my valentine?

The eucalyptus and holly berry wreath from the holiday season has been packed away and the front door of the house (which is never ever used, by the way - it's literally just for looks) now faces the street with a warm Valentine's theme.  This wreath is made of paper (the natural, textured kind) and although it's become a bit sunbleached over the years, I still love the way it looks against the door - a match made in heaven!  When the ladybugs were little, I used to be so crafty each Valentine's season, you saw in the previous post how we made homemade valentines each year for school - we must have done those pencil bouquets at least 3 years in a row, those were a favorite.  Then somewhere along the way, the passion for Valentine's got dialed back a bit - the ladybugs got older and busier and life just got in the way.  But this year was different - I got pretty fired up after seeing so many clever ideas out there in blogland!  Gabe's Love Tree was such an inspiration (as is everything Gabe posts!) that I just had to do the same thing chez Bug.  In that same post, Gabe referenced Kim's Love Tins from last year ... more inspiration!  Yup, this year, the Valentine's love came back strong ... in the form of what we're calling "love bowls" here at the Bug residence.

While we were snowed in with last week's huge 2-day snowstorm, we made a template of smallish hearts on paper (post-it note size, about 8 per sheet) and cut out zillions of hearts.  Then we grabbed up every red and pink marker in the house.  For each person in the family, we took a handful of hearts and wrote different things that we loved about that person.  Could be something general (love her snuggles, love his scratchy whiskers) or something very specific (love that you helped your sister carry her books this morning).  And then we decorated four small bowls (about the size of a tennis ball, 77¢ each at AC Moore!) as a place to put our declarations of love.  I had originally left these bowls plain like a fishbowl, but when I saw how cute Cindy's Love Jars came out, I couldn't resist a little accessorizing of our own!  Watch the evolution of our love bowls:

It just doesn't get any cuter!  Gabe, Kim, and Cindy, thank you so much for the inspiration!  Our four love bowls are being kept on the kitchen counter with a pile of blank hearts and a fleet of pink and red markers nearby.  The idea is that we'll keep filling one another's jars indefinitely - I just did one today after school when I learned that big ladybug found a song she liked and little ladybug asked her piano teacher to help her learn the song so she could play it for her sister.  Basically, every time I get the warm-n-fuzzies from something someone does or says, any unexpected act of kindness etc,  I fill out a heart and stuff that person's love bowl!  I'm working on nudging the ladybugs toward that same reflex - a work in progress, but we're getting there!

As a final copycat effort in the name of Valentine's Day, I filled a bowl of candy hearts and took a photo that was inspired by Nicolle's beautiful photo that she took as a blog header idea for the month of February ...

What d'ya think?!  Not too bad thanks to my trusty 'nifty-fifty' lens - thanks for the idea, Nicolle!  Soooo much inspiration out there in blogland, it's been an incredible resource to have such a creative and amazing group of friends right out there at my fingertips - thank you guys - just look at the infusion of new life in our Valentine's to see how far the blog-effect reaches ... wishing you all a happy and love-filled Valentine's weekend ahead!!

time lapse tuesday: mommy's little valentines!

I have always had a weakness for Valentine's Day ... I'm a sucker for heart decor, heart clothing, the color pink, etc etc ... so when I had 2 little girls and all the energy of a young mother, you can imagine how much fun I had with each Valentine's season - I mean, please, they're adorable - why not run with it by adding a love theme?!  So in honor of my "time lapse tuesday" I give you ... my little valentines throughout the years.  I used to take a picture of the 2 of them and slide it into a heart-themed card, just like a Christmas card photo except with hearts, to send to all my family down in Florida.  I did it for 5 straight years, then gave up on the effort ... here are 4 of the 5 (not sure where 2004 went?!) in time lapse order ...

February 2002

February 2003

February 2005 - holding their 'bouquets' of pencil valentines for school

February 2006

And for good measure, a couple of extra February favorites ...

little ladybug, age 3 1/2

little ladybug, age 6 1/2

the view from my kitchen sink!

Pam and I fell into one another's circles fairly recently, I think it was around Thanksgiving or so, through mutual blogs we both follow ... and I'm so glad we stumbled upon one another because it turns out we have an awful lot in common.  We're both fellow Bay State residents (and coastal no less!), have a 'tween-age daughter almost the same age, and share a passion for photography and all things leopard.  We've emailed back and forth about everything from our crazy winter weather, to footwear trends for 12-year-olds, to full-on blog tutorials (Pam was the teacher and I was the very appreciative apprentice - have you noticed my larger 'XL' photos?  I owe that all to Pam - thanks, Pam!)  In short, I think she's great and I've really enjoyed getting to know her!

Her beautiful (and I do mean beautiful - oh, her photos!) blog is endearingly titled "Views From My Kitchen Sink" and for her recent one-year blogiversary, she thought it would be fun for her readers to post their own views from their kitchen sinks.  Fun indeed!

So, first, here's my kitchen sink ...

Now about the "view" ... I feel I owe an explanation here.  My house is literally carved into a tiny little nook of land that used to belong to part of a much larger property back in the day.  The land was divided up several ways over time and our cozy cottage-style house was eventually built in 1951 in what used to be the back half of the 'walking gardens' on the property.  The upside?  We have some gigantic crawling rose bushes and an amazing American Dogwood tree that are all older than the house - gorgeous!  The downside?  no backyard: the house was built into a hill, so the backside sits just 7 feet from a giant 8-foot retaining wall that holds back a hill that leads up to our neighbor's gigantic backyard (as in: where they hosted their daughter's huge wedding reception last Fall) ... thus, the first floor of the rear side of the house has no real "view" at all - just the wall and the hill of open space rising above it.  In the summertime, the wall is covered with giant grapevine leaves and ivy all over it, so it's quite pretty ... but in the wintertime ... well, you can see through the window that the stripped vines appear more like tangled ropes covering the wall.  Blech.  But the snow-covered hill sure beats the color of grass in February!

That said, here's the view from my kitchen sink as you look upward ...

looking up the hill from the inside out

do you recognize the "giving tree" that I recently posted about?  It sits atop the wall right in front of the sink

looking straight out the window, but on a cloudier day

looking to the right from the sink - I love that great big tree in the distance, imagine the stories it could tell!

little forest friends like to search through the vines on the wall for treats!

So that's my view!  Thanks, Pam, for inspiring your readers to join in a fun post like this!  I've really enjoyed your blog and getting to know you this winter ... and thanks again for all of your help with my technical questions these last couple of weeks - don't the larger photos look great?!  You're my hero!