Made by Lara

There's been a lot of creative energy reverberating around the house recently. Not very much of it from me, but the kids are unstoppable makers. I am always amazed at the endless production - and I try not to get frustrated at the fact that it's usually about the process, not the product. When does the shift happen when we start to fixate on the end result?

Here are some recent favorites:



Ceramic school bus. I really want to get a plate hanger and put this up on the wall.



Ceramic pinch pot - love that pattern detail. And, no, we don't have our own kiln - we are lucky enough that Lara has a clay studio in her school.



Drawing of the school's winter concert. All that red? It's the kids all wearing their school t-shirts, looking like heads in a sea of color.



And finally, something we built together - Lego horse and hippo. It was fun to try to figure out doing round 3-D out of the mostly squared off pieces!

Holiday Blitz (2)

Hanukkah in the night was followed by Hanukkah in the day. At this point, the presents-and-clues extravaganza has been replaced by a more sedate Secret Santa, but the one clue we did put together was pretty fun (check it out at the bottom of the post).

One kid was the star of the show...



...but the other one was still way too sick to do much more than sleep.



They did both get cute a couple of cute animal hats!






Lara and Em share a secret.



Jakey stays asleep, battling his fever.



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The clue for our present was this:

With a B it crawls
With a T it trawls

With a P it barks
With SM it snarks

With SL it leaves a trail
With TH it goes to jail

With CH it’s for beers
With an H it soothes tears

With DR it’s a cure
With an L it’s a boor

With SN it’s cuddle and
With a J it’s a band

With PL it’s a cork
With an R it’s knot work

With an M it’s for you…
If you can guess this clue!

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Hint: the idea is that each of the letters or letter combinations is a prefix for the same suffix.

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The answer? It's "mug". We took a couple of Lara's awesome drawings and had them printed in a pattern on some CafePress mugs. They came out awesome!

Holiday Blitz (1)

Happy New Year!

Our holidays were joyous and full of friends and family - the best possible way to celebrate. Even though in reality each of us managed to go through some kind of viral thingie or another, all that remains in my memory is the fun and the warmth of the last two weeks.

Here is a little taste of the Hanukkah party we threw last weekend.



I busted out the old latke recipe (potatoes, eggs, salt, pepper, no onions):



And of course no Hanukkah party would be complete without the traditional dreidel-shaped pinata. Oh, you haven't heard of that one? Yeah, me neither, but that didn't stop me from whipping one up from two boxes, a paper towel roll, and some crepe paper. I decided to go with the pull-the-string style rather than having a bunch of kids try to whack something with a heavy stick indoors. (The secret to tricking a bunch of little kids? Use the really boring, plain ribbon for the the one that opens the trap door. Why, yes, I am very proud of outwitting small children.)



Inside? Well-earned chocolate bounty...



...which temporarily made a super-sick little guy a little happy.