Up-Cycling... Perfect for the Growing Family

art. house. mum.

We decided to shuffle rooms again (to my Mum's amusement).  Now instead of a four bedroom house we have a two bedroom house with a play room and a piano room (over statement, but I can dream)/dress up room.  

The trick is getting them all to sleep at night and to stay resting in the early morning.  But I've been reminded that we had to train the girls how to switch off and go to sleep at night and not get up and busy before the crack of dawn...  So now we are training Little Hands in the same skills.  He does love sleeping in Miffy's room with the girls and gets a bit excited about it all!

He started on a cot mattress on the floor but that didn't seem like a good long-term solution.  And given that the room isn't a big room we were going to struggle to fit three single beds.  So I took the chance to try an up-cycled toddler bed.  

The timber which we had was a mix of old blind components, pallet left-overs and planks which we bought years ago to edge a garden.  The depths as well as widths were inconsistent so I worked on the ground building up the more thin strips and gluing as well as screwing to make sure it would be strong enough to take the brunt of three kids.  

The legs I stole off the Craft Table, where I had attached them when it morphed from a coffee table more than a year ago.  And that in turn created the problem that none of the stools now fit at the Craft Table.  So...

I bought this plank and block bench in off the deck.  And I've got to tell you that it is the best fit that we've ever had at the Craft Table.  And there is less fighting over stools of particular colour.  Always a win.  

It's amazing how full my heart gets from watching the kids enjoy something that I've made for them... whether it be clothes, cake, a new room arrangement, a healthy dinner, or a makeshift piece of furniture.  I'm sure there must be a good quote out there somewhere... Giving makes the heart grow fonder... or something like that.

And this kind of giving is soft on the wallet, but I like to think that the kids learn a few things by playing around me as I saw and drill and glue and hammer.  

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Still Searching...

art. house. mum.


I'm still working on Vespa riders... 

And this week I also added a big pan to my pantry... op-shop find which I would never remember to try to buy new.  But just what I have been needing.  Perfect for big pasta sauces.

And this weather is big pasta sauce weather.  


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Pre-school Educational Resources...

art. house. mum.

This year we've taken a fairly casual approach to our kid's education.  As in, we haven't done anything formal when the expectation is that at their age they would be enrolled in a kindergarten program which would be familiarising them with pre-reading skills and maths concepts.  

And I told myself that the important things for me to be teaching them this year were social skills and life coping mechanisms.  Largely too, it was that I just wasn't ready to give up my girls.  I'm happy to admit that... I love their company and I love the way that they help me to keep Little Hands out of mischief during the days.

But these two little minds are just plain thirsty.  So I do keep an eye out in my travels for things which will help me to be giving them the chance to be learning the pre-school skills which they would be exposed to in a formal kindy setting.  

Because I don't know much about the different learning systems out there, I have been reticent to invest large amounts of money in programs which I am not sure will suit our kids and their styles of learning.  So when I've come across second hand CD-ROMS in my travels I've bought them expecting nothing and even hesitant to introduce them to the kids... lest they be complete rubbish.

Happily none of them have been.  And while I have to limit the time spent in front of the computer screen, each of the three CD-ROMS above have been both engaging and educational.  Both the kids and I love the Reader Rabbit's Preschool by The Learning Company the best.  It works with the least time delays and mixed humour and challenges in a highly palatable way.  It took the kids through a range of activities which grew in difficulty ranging from counting to recognising the starting letters of words to predicting patterns.  As a mum, I liked that they were working towards an overall goal which they were keen to reach (they work as a team... I don't know how else to work it with them at this age) and to reach this goal they had to complete all the levels of all the games.  In the other systems they just find which games they find easiest and keep playing those ones (heck, it's what I'd do too!)

The grand total cost for these three resources was $3.  No kidding.  And as part of a much larger process of learning they are proving much more valuable.  I don't think that they would ever replace someone sitting down with the kids and going through their letters... answering "How do you spell...?" a hundred times a day... pointing out and reading repetitive signs... counting at any chance... talking about whose names start with what letter... and reading books...   But I figure that there probably needs to be thousands of hours of familiarity built with letters and words, numbers and patterns for the little minds to be able to ingrain and decode them to a useable level.  So if they are begging to use some of their screen time in pursuit of knowledge, then who am I to hold them back?

My beautiful girls, I am so glad that I've had this extra time with you!  Hopefully all these animated animals with foreign accents have taught you enough that your teachers won't  badmouth your slow-to-cut-the-umbilicle-cord mum...

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Cake Fail...

art. house. mum.

If you want to feel good about your baking skills why not upload this photo as your wallpaper...

I baked this on Saturday afternoon while the kids were watching a DVD.  We had visitors coming and I had nothing in the pantry so I thought I'd whip up a cake.  But I didn't have the right sized tin so I used a near-enough size... and I forgot to grease it.  So it sank, then stuck.  Hopeless... almost.

I thought that I'd try a cake save.  By cutting it in half to make the inside the outside so that it would be flat... 

joining the two halves with a layer of icing...

and covering it all with even more icing... and sprinkles.

Voila!  Cake save.  Matt and the kids didn't notice so I'm telling myself that the lovely guests didn't either.  Perhaps they were too nice to say anything.  Or perhaps the icing was just so delicious that they forgave me.  It's a good icing recipe that I learnt from a country cook. 

1 1/2 cups icing sugar

75 g butter (softened)

1 Tbspn milk

2 Tbspn cocoa

Beat butter.  Add other ingredients and beat.

Even I can do that!

Thanks Kerry-Anne

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Learning to Cut a Lino Tile

art. house. mum.

It's been about 10 years since I've cut a lino tile.   How can that be?  So, frankly, I'm rusty.

But I can't tell you how fun it was to break out the old lino cutters which I have been carting around since I forgot to hand them back in to my highschool art teacher... Sorry Mrs Wagner. 

I really thought that I bought a lovely Speedball set when I worked at an art shop... but no trace of that now.  So, after the first cut I did a quick print run onto computer paper using the delightfully easy to clean up water-based relief ink.  Unbelievably the kids were so caught up in finishing some paintings in the studio that they were actually oblivious to the fact that a precious art reunion was in progress right beside them...

And the first run also proved that I have a lot to learn.  The design was less than average, so I spent each moment of the afternoon when the kids were racing round outside watching them from inside carefully carving away.  They did pick up on the carving activity so I let them tag along for the second print run back up in the shed.  Little Hands was the only one who made it a stressful activity.  And again I am intrigued that as a parent with three little ones in tow I can work so much faster and under such a different kind of pressure than I could when I was a free and fancy (?) university student.

So here I am again, a student, but this time round the lessons are free but the time is priceless.

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The Art House on Made It

art. house. mum.

This week I made a little shift.  I closed my Etsy shop and opened a Made It shop.  (Did I tell you this already?)  It didn't take too much setting up, but my time is so precious at the moment that you will probably recognise some of the artworks if you've been dropping in here for a while.  Hopefully the store listings will fill out as time goes by... there's a few other things going on in the studio (okay, more in the much warmer house) at the moment  but for the moment The Art House has already gone through two shop header designs...

And you'll find the very last remaining Happy Biker...

And a chook or two...

Here's a few of my favourite Made It sellers for you to look at...

The Green Kat

Kerri's Hangups

Rosieok

If Its To Be

Hope you enjoy the mini tour of the market.

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Sunshine in Winter

art. house. mum.

I was in our bedroom doing some art homework when suddenly the sun broke through the clouds.  It was like seeing the smile of an old friend.  I grabbed my camera to celebrate the moment...  Oh Spring, where are you?  The piles of washing in my laundry are crying out for your acres of sunshine...

My kids need to run off excess energy in your evening light...

I need the warmth of your nights to get back into the studio...

But I dread your early morning wake-ups.  Let's keep the Winter sleep-ins just a moment longer.

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Vespa Rider in a Rush

art. house. mum.

Can you hear the two-stroke putting away?  This Vespa rider is pushing it as hard as it'll go.  I wonder what the rush is...  baby being born?  late for a date?  pizza order to deliver? 

Hope you had a good weekend.

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In Celebration of Our Achievements...

art. house. mum.

You know what?  At the end of a day sometimes it feels like I have accomplished nothing.  The house is messier than it was when Matt left for work. There is more dirty washing in the basket, more clean washing to fold.  More people who I need to call, and emails I need to reply to.  The kids are rattier than they were when they last saw their dad, and I am left wondering just exactly what I am teaching them... or what they are picking up from my sometimes barely coping behaviours.

And I'm not alone.  Today I heard a mum with twin babies and a toddler say how proud she was that she had gone shopping with her three kids by herself.  And that got me thinking... That is a major achievement.  It should be celebrated.  There should be an entry in a Baby's First Years book for  "I was __________ when mummy first took me grocery shopping by herself."  

So here's a few of my recent achievements and then I'd like to throw the ball back to you and invite you to leave a comment telling us one of your recent achievements.  Something that may look like nothing to an onlooker, but in your particular set of circumstances took a world of precision planning and fear-facing to carry off.

*I took all three kids to Spotlight without a stroller (and didn't lose any of them or get thrown out of the store!)

*I sewed two sets of curtains in one night

*I survived a few weeks of being a one car family

*With two dear friends I have done a Shiny Happy Art painting exercise with our kids

*I have facilitated a number of crafts with the kids... mostly from supplies found in the recycle bin... 

And that's all at the moment.  I forgot to save the world this week... maybe next week...

And you?  Please join me and celebrate the mundane achievements that build us and our families.  Tell us with a comment or a link to what you've been conquering this week...

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Ava the Elephant Giveaway

art. house. mum.

I remember my GP telling me once about a study which apparently proved that Mums could more accurately tell the temperature of their children without a thermometer than seasoned family doctors could.  I still bowed to pressure and bought a thermometer... haven't ever used it.  The moral of the story... just because a Chemist sells it doesn't mean it'll help you look after your kids when they are sick.

What will help, however, is Ava the Elephant. 

Ava talks.  And feeds the kids their medicine and supplements through her spout while they hold her ears.  She's cute.

The day that we picked up our (free sample) Ava from the post office was a conveniently sick day kid-wise.  Without being too liberal I was able to find a relevant medicine or supplement for each eager mouth which would actually help their precious little bodies.

And then they begged for more doses. 

Ava will be staying at our house.  But you know, I think that there are places where she would be even more appreciated.  We've had kids who are worryingly sick before.  When I promised myself that I wouldn't let them be admitted to hospital through emergency ever again.  At those times, with a two year old fighting for air I would have loved to give her her medicine in a loveable dispenser.  To make those hard times just a little more friendly.  To distract her from the fact that she was stuck again in a hospital bed and not in her bedroom with her other half.  Ava, how I wish I had had you to make her smile then.

You know what else I was thinking that Ava would be perfect for?  A new baby gift.  Or a baby shower gift.  She strikes the perfect balance between function and fun and she is totall unisex.  She is the item which will be stolen from the dishwasher (yes, she's dishwashable) to be played with.  She has no age limit (my nearly five year olds were just as besotted as my two year old), but I really think that she would be best as an investment for babies.  Even the fact that the dropper only measures up to 5mL makes it more suitable for little ones.

Apparently Ava the Elephant is an award winner in America.  Quite frankly, I see why.

But enough of my trumpet blowing.  The people of Fab Innovations have kindly allowed me to host a giveaway with three winners, each to receive their own Ava the Elephant Medicine Dispenser. 

I gotta say, I'd be entering if I was allowed.  The giveaway will be run using Rafflecopter, so click in the box below and follow instructions on how to enter.  The only condition is that you must have a postal address within Australia.  Have fun!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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New Vespa Painting

art. house. mum.

Recently we serioulsy toyed with the idea of buying a Vespa.  Aren't the the most lyrical little creatures on the road?  The frosty Toowoomba mornings and the hills around our home made us think twice and pick something with doors and windows.

But still, all that Vespa-gazing got right into my blood...

Hopefully I'll get the chance to channel the Vespa-love onto paper and canvas soon.  Til then, stay warm!

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Movie(s) Review... Real Steel, 17 Again, and Courageous

art. house. mum.

Seeing that Art House Mum has never hosted a movie review before I thought that I'd bite off more than I can chew and do a triple review!

But let's be honest, this is a blog... I'm the editor... so I chose the movies.  I'm not paid to do this, so the view I express is mine... and I'm not heavily into doing research, so some of my "facts" may be questionable.  But other than that, consider this a totally unbiased, reliable review...

These three movies aren't the only ones I've watched recently, but I've only watched a few others, and these three struck me with how similar and simple their message was.  Two are Hollywood movies, while Courageous is made by Sherwood Pictures, a church based company.  

Real Steel is the most recent release of the three and stars Hugh Jackman as a (slightly unbelievable) bad guy who agrees to take care of his estranged 11 year old son for a few months after the boy's mother dies suddenly.  The story goes that Hugh is a kind of street fighter... but he fights with a robot (robot love is lost on me, but I found robot violence nearly as confronting as human violence).  He is irresponsible and so gets himself into financial tight spots.  Along comes the boy who he reluctantly includes in his adventures until they have forged some level of mutual respect.  The movie's moral climax comes whith the boy's aunt coming to claim final custody of the boy.  He goes unwillingly with her, calling out to his dad "I just wanted you to fight for me!"

I won't tell you the ending but let's just say that it tasted like Disney to me... apart from the super sized robots violently ripping each other apart limb from limb... 

I've been a sucker for 17 Again since the first time I saw it.  Zac Efron does really well acting as a 40 year old man on the verge of divorce who has been magically thrown back into the body of a 17 year old.  It's Hollywood high school, complete with all the stereotypes, and the ending is a given the whole way through the movie.  But for me, it's not the restored romance and marriage which is so magical, but rather the unexpected restoration of a dad's love for his kids.  


Suddenly finding himself a peer of his own children, with them unaware of his true identity, he is forced to realise that he knows nothing of what is going on in their lives.  Unaware that his son is being bullied... by his daughter's boyfriend... who she intends to move in with after school... that his son is really quite good at basketball... and that he (the dad) has allowed his role in their lives to be a fairly insignificant one.

I always enjoy the sex education class scene, where Zac (in front of and obviously for his daughter) causes a stir by standing up and ranting about how he will not take a handful of condoms because making love is something that is to be done in a loving relationship... preferably a marriage... I think that that is when he gets bashed up... but I'm left reeling every time to think that Hollywood's best way of portraying a dad standing up and fighting for his teenage daughter is to tell her straight that she needs to take sex seriously... how surprised I am that I agree with Hollywood.

Matt saw Courageous before I did and he said that he found it inspirational and challenging.  The question which is often asked about the movies that come from Sherwood Pictures is "was the acting awful?"  My answer for this one is that some lines were delivered quite stiffly, but most of the major actors did a great job.  The kids especially were superb.

Courageous makes no apology for being a Christian movie.  It presents a really well written story from a strong Christian viewpoint, but it's message is strikingly similar to the first two movies.  It is kind of more admirable for not trying to disguise its message behind robot violence or a far-fetched story-line.  It's a movie which says on all levels Men you need to step up and work hard at being the best dad that you can be for your children.  What's not to love about that message?

It follows the lives of five men and their families as they are faced with various hurdles (I don't want to give too much away) and at each point I felt the question be posed "did he do the right thing by his family, himself, his colleagues and his faith?"  I'm a Christian and I believe strongly in the value of family, so I'm hardly a critical audience, but I think that for all parents this movie is worth watching.  It throws out some solutions to some situations (eg. teenage daughters wanting to date) which I found sometimes relevant, sometimes far-fetched, and sometimes definitely worth thinking about.  And if nothing else, you have to admire that this group of mostly volunteers has had the strength of heart and mind to create a full length movie which is able to be marketed and sold worldwide for cinemas and DVD.

So there you have it, my Dad Triple Play...  Have you been hearing this message anywhere else lately?   


And you know what, I think that the message goes for mums too... we all need to fight for our kids.  Lead them and love them.




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Three Things... Agave Update #2

art. house. mum.

Food for the bees...

And the birds...

And moving towards the end of its life.

Anything exciting happening in your garden?

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An Evening of Colour

art. house. mum.

A very nice way to spend a cold winter evening...

I'm not at all sold on the colours I chose to use. But I sure am glad that I tried them out.

And I am looking forward to completing this little coloured sketch painting.  It's got me intrigued, even if it doesn't sit quite right as it is.

So here's to looking forward to another cold night in with brush in hand.

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