Another day entering in to worship – in our living room, but in the company of many. We had an early church service at 8.30am, then I logged on to an evening service at 5pm – I’m loving the feeling of connection I get from these online services.
In the meantime I was finishing some submissions for a couple of projects I’m participating in. The first was recording videos of a couple of choir parts for an online choir – it was originally a pub choir, but because of restrictions is now a couch choir. I had until 7pm tonight to submit, and managed to get them done this afternoon. They’re not great quality (my cough made it hard to hold notes or get any power into them) but I’m excited about being part of it!
There are quite a few videos of past collaborations on their Facebook page, but here’s my favourite at the moment – it makes me smile!
I also wrote an entry for Furious Fiction – every month there’s an email with prompts, and you have just over a weekend to write a 500 word story. I’ve only done a few, but I’ll keep on and get better as I go.
It’ll probably be an early night tonight. Last night I was kept awake by a fast moving, flying cockroach that seemed impossible to kill. Thankfully, it has been disposed of now.
Sleep will be sweeter knowing I’ve finished what I set out to do today!
Finally finished some projects that have been hanging around for a while 😀
This was a flat pack I got early last year… finally got around to decorating and putting it together. It took this long partly because of the logistics (lack of space and not enough hands to hold it all), but in the end I did it with a tiny bit of help from Sweet Bean holding a side piece for me.
Another project that’s been waiting – not as neat as I’d like, but done! Two mugs with disappearing script, and some porcelain paint from the Art supplies shop. They’re supposed to be dishwasher resistant now.
Last year, around this time, I participated for the first time in GISH – the Greatest International Scavenger Hunt – one week during the year where normality falls away, and kindness rules, and where our entry fees and other fundraising during the week goes towards helping people around the world. This year entry fees went towards protecting people in Laos from unexploded bombs and providing prosthetic limbs for those who have lost theirs.
It was a week where I figured out how to do stuff I hadn’t done before, and remembered skills I hadn’t used in a while. It was also a tiring week
Obviously, I had to sign up for this year!
For this last week I’ve been painting, drawing or shuffling like a zombie, while other members of the team I was a part of did their items as well. Not only did I happen to have a team this year who were creative, inspirational, and participated enthusiastically, I also had my Babe and Sweet Bean on the team. What a busy, amazing, fulfilling week 🙂
Here’s my items, in order of completion…
“Write your resume as a haiku”
It’s amazingly difficult to sum up enough information for a resume in three lines…
“A tiny painting of Misha and the Queen on a coin, made using toothpicks instead of brushes. “
I was quite pleased with this one. It’s not perfect – I was going for Wedgewood, but ended up with Splodge… still, I think it worked well.
“I’m not saying Jared Padalecki is a big softie, but here’s a portrait of him toasted onto a marshmallow. Just the way it should be.’
There were tears over this one… I had a great idea for the method, but the execution of it didn’t quite go to plan. It involved twisting wire into shape, heating it over the stove ring, then pressing it into the marshmallow. Sounds great – but didn’t toast at all. Melted marshmallow is stickier than I’m happy with. Still, I’m fairly happy with the finished result. Here’s the wire stamp I used –
Next item – “Make an Assbutt of yourself in public. Literally.”
This wasn’t actually my item, but I took the photo and submitted it 🙂
The next two are a family collaboration, with the help of a friend with amazing make-up and camera skills.
“FAST-MOTION. Everybody always thinks zombies are after their brains, but they’re just really into “tag”, as evidenced by the 3 zombies playing slow-speed tag in your local mall, then speed it up and send it in”
It’s strange wearing zombie make-up, but it also becomes strangely comfortable after a while (at least, it’s easy to forget it’s there). We went in to d’Arcy Doyle place for this one… we didn’t seem to be noticed by most people, but some had a laugh – except for one kind person who wanted to make sure Babe was OK when he went to top up the parking meter. He was able to assure her that he was fine…
After our gruelling time filming we needed a coffee, so went down the cafe, where they certainly practise what they preach…
They were very welcoming, although we were a bit worried we’d leave bits of ourselves behind…
“Spoiler alert! Nobody has time to really sit down and read anymore. So, bring the stories to them. Recreate major plot points of classic books by acting them out at your local library. But in deference to library “rules”, you must be silent, so you’re going to have to use interpretive dance on this one. Note: If you’ve submitted a photo, you will still get credit.”
We were flagging a bit by this stage, but the local library was open late on Thursday, so we became lovelorn teenagers for half an hour. We messed up the order of events in the death scene, but I don’t think it matters.
“Create a haiku for an animal on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species that tells of the animal’s plight and why we should protect it. Next to the haiku, include a hand-drawn picture or origami sculpture of the animal.”
“Create a HairBnB for head lice. Showcase all the amenities in photos. But don’t post it on AirBnB! Instead, hang your flyer where your clients will see it: at a local hair salon.”
The local hair salon was very helpful and understood that scavenger hunts can be quite strange…
“Tatsuya Tanaka creates miniature worlds with everyday objects. His scenes are whimsical, which is how the world should be… but is not always how tiny-world actually is. Create a miniature, dismal and tragic scene using small reimagined objects.”
Good thing I saved all those dead insect parts…
“You know that this is the 50th anniversary of Woodstock. But did you know that Woodstock the bird from Peanuts first appeared 2 years earlier? In 1967? So actually Woodstock the bird is 52. He’s drunk a lot of beer over the years and can’t hide it, but he is vain, so he’s had lots of work done. Tons of collagen and botox. He wears a toupee. He dyes his feathers. Show us what he looks like today.”
I enjoyed this one, and it came out better than I thought it would.
“PUZZLE. New Item, Who Dis? 3×3=9, null=0. And that’s the Tea. Don’t get your wires crossed! When you think you’re done, the fun’s just begun…”
This was the last one I did, or at least partially did. The strings of numbers below translated to clues using a T9 cipher, but I only worked out some of the answers to the clues… It was about Pierre Frederic Sarrus, who created the Sarrus rule (mathematics), and involved General Sarris, the villain from Galaxy Quest. I didn’t get much further than that, but others solved it, so I eventually found out that I should have done a cross stitch of Sarris calculating the Sarrus rule.
Here’s the original crossword –
Here’s my response –
My Babe also did his items – the first two were done on the same day as the zombies.
“You’ve been out fishing for compliments, and you just snagged a whopper.”
He thought the best compliment would be a proposal ❤
“We’ve seen the pictures of dogs catching treats by German photographer Christian Vieler. Let’s see a high-speed photo of your teammate catching treats in the same style and photographic detail.”
This one was done with the previous night’s mashed potatoes, to help it hold together a bit.
“TIMELAPSE. This means something… Subtractive food sculpture. Start with a block of cheese or a massive mountain of mashed potatoes and without using tools, eat your way to an ornate re-creation of a famous statue.”
The last one was designed and created by Sweet Bean. He worked very hard, and I think he enjoyed his week 🙂
“They say stepping on a LEGO is the greatest pain one can experience. We Gishers laugh in the face of pain. Make shoes entirely from LEGOs – no fluffy socks or insoles allowed- and demonstrate them in use. Post it to social media and tag the LEGO accounts and @GISH.”
I’m proud of the work we got done, and awed by the work done by the others in the team. We’re definitely looking forward to next year!
Last week I participated in GISH – the Greatest International Scavenger Hunt.
It’s an annual event, run by Misha Collins, and attended by various people worldwide. The registration fee for GISH goes to charity, and the hunt itself consists of a list of items (over 200 this year). The items can be weird artistic endeavours, charitable acts, acts of kindness, or frequently a mixture of any of these… participants organise teams or are put into teams, and then collaborate to complete as many of the items as they can. The winning team goes on a trip; this year’s winners will go to New Zealand.
As this is my first year I did not know what I was getting myself into. I started confidently, though, until I came down with a virus towards the end of the first day… it’s possible that a dash of fever/delirium helped with brainstorming interpretations of items!
Here’s my efforts, in order of submission.
Item 27 – Beard garden
Biggest boy was very patient with me – it’s harder to thread flowers through a beard than you’d think. As he gave me the virus, though, I considered he owed me some patience…
Item 99 – Let’s see a close-up picture of your bowl of cereal (at that point when somehow you’ve managed to eat most of the floaty cereal and there’s only weird tasting milk left and a few odd shaped cereal pieces). But in this milky-sea, let’s see a scene from a hollywood movie: A tiny pirate ship battle ala Pirates the Caribbean, a bloody shark attack from Jaws, or that scene in the Titanic where Jack decided there was no way for him to get up on the piece of plywood with Rose (even though there clearly was).
Lego mini-figures don’t float. Surprisingly, neither do jelly babies.
Item 154 – A carnivorous plant, a severed finger or two on the ground nearby, and an adjacent sign that shows us the thought bubble of what the plant is thinking.
…involving a quick visit to Bunnings for a loan of a Venus fly trap.
Item 52 – Helicopter parents.
A visit to a friend – we told the boys to look exasperated. I think they did well.
Item 129 – Remember your favorite childhood book? Get a copy, write a note on the inside cover explaining why you loved the book so much, and gift it to a child
Borrowed a child from another friend – she liked her new book.
Item 88 – Banana blacklight messages. As all gishers know, bananas emit fluorescence as they decompose. Score the skin of a banana so that when it starts to brown, the edges, under blacklight, reveal a portrait of a really rotten political figure from history.
I don’t have a blacklight – this was rigged up using coloured sticky tape over the flash on my i-Pod camera. Not sure it worked completely…
Item 16 – Mis-quotes are so embarrassing! Everybody thinks Darth said, “ You are a part of the rebel alliance…” But what he really said was, “…the rebel appliance.” Show us how your toaster or vacuum helped vanquish the Dark side.
I had to google a lot to work out how to do some of these. This is my first attempt at editing a YouTube clip and adding music/sound.
A caesar shift cipher, two letters back, which translates to –
Unto Caesar, lettuce render. Not many people know this, but romaine togas were all the rage in Caesar’s day. Luckily, you just found a page from an ancient Roman fashion catalog. Model a Romaine lettuce toga.
Lettuce is very difficult to sew or pin – it’s quite brittle and easily torn. This was achieved by pushing a straight pin through the spine of each leaf and the material, and being very careful draping it.
Item 164 – Bake a cabbage pie, then calculate volume of a single slice of the cabbage pie using Pi. Show your work.
Item 155 – Using only the contents of your spice cabinet, create a portrait of one (or all) of the Spice Girls.
For future reference – when “painting” with pepper and paprika, try not to inhale.
Spices used: Sporty – cinnamon, Ginger – satay (I didn’t have any ginger, and the colour was close), Baby – Himalayan salt, Scary – paprika (because it’s a scary spice!), and Posh – black pepper.
Item 92 – Chocolate love. Miniature chocolate bust sculptures of Misha and the Queen.
This is one of the items I’m most pleased with. I took ages to start it because I couldn’t quite figure out how to do it. My initial attempt was by melting the chocolate into two small glasses to serve as a kind of base and then carving it, but the chocolate was too brittle. I found a recipe for modelling chocolate which was fairly easy but very messy, and modelled the figures like clay. Just for reference –
This is Misha
This is the Queen
The likeness is uncanny 😀
Item 84 – It’s time we brought fore-edge fresco landscape painting into the 21st century. Create a fore-edge painting on a book’s leaves that is invisible normally, but at the proper angle reveals a scene from Supernatural.
For comparison, here’s the scene.
Item 153 – As you know, the latest nail trend is the Jared Pedi-lecki: paint your big toe to look exactly like Jared Padalecki, complete with tufts of real hair. Or, if this seems vile to you, you may do this with any of the Supernatural cast or any prominent politician or musician.
Now this one was… not good. It was a hurried, end of day thing. I had to chop off a chunk of hair, too!
This is Jared Padalecki – he’s an actor in Supernatural (as is Misha).
Final submission – done about midnight on the last night. I’m quite pleased with this one, as well, even if it’s not perfect. Castiel is Misha’s character on Supernatural.
Item 162 – A painting of Castiel alive in the time of dinosaurs. (You may do this with traditional media or digitally.)
Pretty much every item started with me thinking it was terrible and wondering how I was going to finish it. I originally thought I would only be able to do about five, but that expanded over the week. I’m pleased. And tired.
Time for some sleep!
…the evening, at the moment. Also the event we went to today, near the Art Gallery. We went last year, where it was part of The Big Draw – not sure this was official, but the same concept.
We did some drawing – there were old-fashioned flip books for animation, so I did one of those. Sweet Bean was reluctant at first, but soon got into it. Biscuits (and a cup of coffee for me) certainly helped! It was good to give him the opportunity to try something different, and I can also add it to his school work for the year. Here’s his “Persian rug”, made with cut out paper “mosaic pieces” 🙂 .
Despite the rain, we were glad we went. Looking forward to next year’s!
My camping chair is not too old (or too cheap) but that doesn’t seem to have saved it from splitting…
I felt like I was about to fall through the seat at any time… I didn’t really want to throw the chair away, though – such a waste! The frame is fine – it’s just that the fabric round the front part of the seat has been stretching, and finally tore. Time to sew on some patches!
🙂
I thought it would only take an hour or so… it’s hard to manoeuvre round the frame. I had to take frequent breaks, because it was making me use muscles I haven’t had to use for a while. I kept sticking the needle into various fingers, as well – visibility was not always good. Time will tell whether it holds – there may be a weakened bit in the middle that needs patching.
My patching adventure didn’t really have much to do with my reading of this book –
Didn’t hurt, though!
It’s not about skimping and saving, so much as changing the way you see the world, and reassessing your priorities. Interesting, and inspiring! 🙂
A couple of days ago, we all went to the homeschool group’s Christmas Fair, where the kids (and parents) make things to sell. We went to the last one (the Winter Fair) and the boys enjoyed it, so we decided to plan a bit better for this one…
My Little Bean has spent a large part of this term writing a book. He’s very interested in finance, so he researched and wrote “Cash in Hand – Basics on Making Money for Kids”, which he sold for $3.00 each. Here he is in front of his stall –
He also sold cars and bits and pieces, and walked up and down from time to time with his basket of books or my basket of biscuits, selling from stall to stall. He was also hired by Biggest Boy (for 40c) to take his basket of Lego around for sale. 🙂
He sold some books (yay!) but has some left – if anyone wants one, just let me know!
Biggest Boy sold bags of Lego, hot wheels tracks, and set up containers of Lego minifigure parts so that the kids could pay their money, then take a piece from each container to build their own minifigure – very popular…
We found out last time that Lego is a popular toy, and he was selling the bits even before he finished setting up. Here’s his table –
They had a good day, and built on their knowledge of business principles from last time.
Waiting for more customers… 🙂
We didn’t have to take much home, although we bought a few things. And somehow we managed to win the top tier of a decorated wedding cake, by guessing the closest weight of the whole cake. It’s in the freezer now…
There’s been a YouTube clip going round, with a recipe for “Japanese Cotton Cheesecake”. I don’t usually watch those sorts of things, but it said only three ingredients were needed (eggs, white chocolate and cream cheese). Sounded easy enough, so we made it yesterday. The boys learned how to separate eggs, and how to melt chocolate in a double boiler.
It turned out really well – not too sweet, but you can’t eat too much at a time.
That little bit up there is all that was left to photograph. I meant to snap a picture both times I had some with French Vanilla icecream (yum!), but I was too busy eating it to remember…
Biggest Boy has been making music videos. He hasn’t finished the one he’s working on at the moment (it’s using clips from one of his favourite anime movies) but he gave me permission to link his earlier ones here. 🙂
Cooking day again. 🙂
Biggest Boy was inspired by Nigella Lawson to try an egg risotto. The boys had to write the recipe down while watching “Nigella Bites”, which sounds easier than it was…
Here it is – it was gorgeous!
I helped Littlest Bean to make a recipe from an old Coles free magazine called “Lemon Delicious”. It was the first time he’d tried separating an egg, and he did very well 🙂
The recipe was one of those puddings that separate as it cooks.
a bit of creativity, a bit of eco consciousness, a bit of inspiration.... hopefully not a lot of pompousness and blathering :D
i'm not entirely sure what's going on here... let's travel along and see...
1000 Fields of Roses 