One Billion Rising

Today is the day!

Esther and I are taking the train into Philly so we can stand (or sit in a stroller, we'll see) against violence against women.  Check out their website for more information.

A lot of locations are doing flashmobs, but Philly is doing Zumba together. The dancing is an empowering way to channel the emotion around the topic, while displaying to the world that women are not going to take it any more.

If you're not attending an event (some locations do have events throughout the weekend), I encourage you to watch one of the many events worldwide on the website. There are live feeds there, and I assume lots of videos will be posted to YouTube later.

Another way to contribute to the cause: call you congress person and remind him or her to vote for VAWA. The Violence Against Women Act made it through the Senate, but we're waiting on Congress.  Here's some info here.

She likes it!

Esther found her party activities! "Dum Dummy," she said, and went over to the monkeys.

 We talked about "rings on fingers" and she played with it a bit.

 She suddenly started pointing out the monkeys and said, "Book?" She looked worried. I told her the book was ok, they were just pictures. She went back to playing.

Didn't take long for her attention to go to the rings...

I think she likes it!!

First real haircut

My BFF from high school cuts hair, so of course I go to her for myself and for Esther's hair. Tina is the best and we always have fun when I go in there.

Esther has been getting her bangs cut since she was nine months old, when her hair first started getting into her eyes a lot. Sometimes I have been the stylist, but Tina has been the primary trimmer.

E's hair has gotten kind of stringy and tangly, probably time for a trim. So I finally took her in to Salon DeSante for her first real haircut.

She looks so small in the chair!

Tina is trying to tell her how cool the cape is. Look! Bears! (Esther rejected the cape. After E's cut, I had a bit of a trim and wore the cape. When we got in the car, E tried to pull her blanket up over her shoulders like the cape.)

The amazing Tina hard at work on a very wiggly client!

Finished product!

I'm feeling lucky

I have Picasa, Google's photo-editing app. It's easy and as far as I can tell, it gets the job done.
There's one button on there that  basically does all the functions at once: color, contrast, lighting, etc. It uses Google's "I'm feeling lucky" and every once in a while, there's a picture that makes me say, "Yes, yes I am."

Today it was Esther's grin during her haircut.

She is totally cheesing for the camera.

Party Prep II

The other game... a cheesie poof toss through the mouth of a smiling monkey!

To make:
1. Scan image of choice.
2. Crop photo to face.
3. Check your printer's poster settings. I made mine three sheets by three sheets. Print. (I was apparently running out of yellow ink as this was printing.)
4. Mount the printed sheets onto cardboard.  (I used an old Ikea box and Elmer's spray glue.)
5. Using a utility knife, cut around the image and cut out the mouth.

6. Finally, use another cardboard box to make a kickstand.


I figure folks of all ages will have fun throwing cheesie poofs at each other... I mean, in the monkey's mouth.

Party Prep

Esther will be 2 on Monday. I can't even believe it. Her party will be this Saturday, and I've been doing all kinds of stuff to get ready. (Unemployment is good for something, anyway.)

I've tried two different recipes for banana cakes to make the monkey cupcakes. This one won.
I tried two flavors of icing: Nutella and chocolate/peanut-butter. Nutella won.

I've been working on a sweater for Esther. (A few more inches to go!)

And a dress. (Still need to finish the bottom hem, wash, and press. I'll show you in a few days.)

And today I finished the games. The first is a ring toss, inspired by "Rings on fingers. Rings on thumb."

I scanned the page from the book and added the text in the corner.  It's a decoration/sign to identify game.

I assembled and painted a "hand" from dowel rods and wooden ovals from A.C. Moore.

Then I made some rings. I used shower rings and tied some big shiny beads to them with wire.

It will be quite a feat for anyone to actually ring a finger with these, but I figure it will occupy the menfolk for a bit.




The other game posts tomorrow!

Grossness update

Last night, I was putting lotion (called, "shoshi") on her. Her eczema is pretty bad right now, so her lotion is a big tub of glorified Vaseline. She likes to dippy dip her fingers in the tub and rub it on her hands, belly, in her hair...
Well, last night she pulled out a big ole glob of it and stuck it straight in her mouth.  Gross.