The kids were intrigued by the lychee shells that mama peeled for an after dinner snack. We filled up a bowl to float little pink boats. A miniature ocean for little folks.
Bear-Bear took a nap in a cozy bed of stuffed slippers with arctic seals and bears in overalls. They novelties came from our cousin in China when they were roped into an ill-fated retail venture. It’s not great to find shoes on your bed (I suspect the boy), but it’s impossible to get peeved over this!
As she was heading to bedtime, the girl handed me Daddy Bear. In the morning I found him on the floor next to my bed. I tucked him back in bed for extra rest before starting my morning.
The kids caped up and whirled to programmed songs on the keyboard. After she was dragged off to study Chinese, he ran around the house as a ghost. The beanie-veil combo is a fresh innovation in our house.
My parents dropped by our place in the morning to give the kids polished stones from a roadside stand on the way to the Grand Canyon. After they left, the girl sorted the collection before coming inside for breakfast.
Last week, our daughter designed and built a roller coaster from materials at home. Watching the girl press against her 3rd grade deadline surfaced messy memories of late night college studios.
Many years ago, a BoardGameGeek user in Australia asked me to receive several shipments before his arrival in Vegas to attend a friend’s steampunk themed wedding.
When he came to pick up the games, his wife gave me this pink handmade pillow with chibi Star Wars characters for my newborn daughter.
Last year, I joined Post.news. The open and accepting crowd inspired me to start drawing again after years of fearful, constipated dormancy.
I started a series of hand sketches forming the ASL manual alphabet. After a few letters I started adding alliterative sentences. A month into this exercise, I was forced back into the office.
Reinserting a commute into my routine was so disruptive that I dropped the project before completing it.
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A couple weeks ago I also joined Substack Notes. One of the first folks I met was Charlene Storey, who started a weekly ritual to share pictures of “everyday magic”.
Given my interest in the mundane objects that surround us (I earned my 2003 NaNoWriMo by writing about the stuff in my tiny garage apartment), it’s a perfect way to jump into the new stream.
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I should finish the alphabet series, but I also like this new weekly thing and I don’t want to wait half a year before archiving these memories.
So for the next 26 weeks, I’ll be doing a series of unplanned diptychs. Let’s see how it goes.
