Plaster cast christmas decorations

I love plaster casting.  It has that 'wow' (or 'oh dear' for that matter!) reveal moment, like printmaking, which gives me a bit of a thrill.  Found moulds are one of my favourite ways to cast.  There has to be some good come out of all the weird and wonderful plastic packaging we find ourselves with.  So when I saw this at the bottom of a rather gooey cheesecake we consumed at the weekend, I thought only of filling it with plaster.

Then I remembered we had this, from some crayons that Beth has (don't recommend these ones by the way, they are difficult to use and too hard, stockmar are what we love).   I wasn't sure that all the crayon shapes would cast as there was no 'base' between some of them, so I was figuring I could cast every other crayon shape... if you can get my drift.

 

We prepared the materials.  Plaster of paris for casting, water, mixing sticks, one Boo.

 

Mixed up the plaster to a lovely creamy consistency.

 

And poured in.  It's best to pour gradually and tap the side of your mould frequently so that the air bubbles rise to the surface and don't spoil your cast (more important if its finely detailed).  

 

We left the casts for a few hours, then carefully removed from the moulds (which can be reused).

 

I suspected all the crayon bits around the side wouldn't cast,  but I poured plaster in them anyway.  Sure enough, in the removal of the mould they broke away, but this is what it would have looked like.

 

However, I think its fine without all the bits, and makes a pretty good star... or is it a snowflake?  There is a lovely flat tile-like bit in the centre... I'm thinking of painting an image here or collaging something on... not sure yet.

Anyhow, they need a day or two to dry out completely now, then I can sand off the rough edges.  You can paint plaster of course.  I kind of like materials in themselves though, so I think I'll leave the round one white and put it on the nature table.  The 'stars' might get an image in the centre as I said, but I'm not sure I'll paint the rest.   
 
 
 
 
 
  

First Snow

We have been Bisy Backsons this weekend.  Boo was mesmerised by the magical puppet show and the gnome-sized creations in the 'winter wonderland' at the Vancouver Waldorf School's Christmas fair Saturday morning.  In the afternoon we headed to some open studios at the Eastside Culture Crawl .  Apart from visiting a few galleries it was the first time I'd seen local artists work in Vancouver, and it was pretty much like many open studios I've been to in London, with a few more misty landscapes thrown in (with conditions being as they are I'm finding myself falling in love with the misty vistas arounds us).  I'm always interested in seeing work in paint, printmaking and the like that I've made work in, but what we really loved was the handcrafted wooden furniture, like that at Hartwood Creations.  Dadda Boo is inspired to get into his wood workshop and get sawing and sanding.

It may be wet, but there is beauty to be found in the dark.

  

 

Sunday I finished painting Boo's room and moved her back in (pics to follow), so reclaiming my studio.  Its just the beginning of development for each room, I have tons of ideas for making Boo's room magical and my studio inspiring and functional.  

Work done, it was time for play.  Snow play.  Our local ski mountains have opened a month earlier than last year, so we glided up Grouse Mountain in the gondola with Boo padded up in her new snow gear.  Dadda Boo started to ease himself back into snowboarding with a few bumps, and Boo just took it all in.

 

 

 

Potato Printed Christmas Wrapping Paper

With the current relentless rain, toilet training and levels of unsociability only a 2 year old could muster, we are spending a whole lot of time at home.  Christmas is starting early here in an effort to keep us both entertained, and today we made some homemade wrapping paper using potato prints.

I used some mini christmas cookie cuts to cut the shapes into the potato, pressing the cutters in with the aid of bit of bashing from a rolling pin, and then cutting around them using a sharp knife.

 

Then I laid out a roll of kraft paper onto the floor, some kids paint and a sponge brush for applying, and we got printing.

 

I guess you could achieve some more professional looking prints using printing ink, but I rather liked the decidedly hand-done/imperfect results.

 

Just a little shopping now... so that we have something to wrap with all this paper.

Painting Party

The decorating continues.  After the laboursome task of papering and painting the studio, Boo has decamped into said finished room to allow for the painting of her room, in a calming (hopefully) salmon pink tint.  Several coats are required to cover the blue that we started with, and all we all muck in at various points in the proceedings... muck being the operative word with Boo of course, who decides to participate in her dressing up clothes.  I did snap a pic of her engaged in the activity but I would like to point out that this lasted all of a minute, before the walking disaster area was encouraged to leave the area, meanwhile trampling out a touch of salmon on her slippers.  

Things are much calmer of Sunday evening, with a bottle of vinto tinto and a more efficient painter in the form of Dadda Boo, although he should learn to bend over with his knees not with his back, which was suffering at the end of the activity.

Just also wanted to show you this bit of creativity, which emerged from Dadda Boo's  workshop at the weekend, newly equipped with a woodworking vice.   

I love this little boat, which Boo has been enjoying sailing in her bath and along the hallway during the daytime.  This is just the prototype apparently, there are plans for trying out different specifications in future models.  I love it when things are being made in the house, especially when its not just me making them!

I am celebrating my return to yoga classes this weekend, now being able to drive myself there as I have a driving licence.  Life looks a whole lot different in North Vancouver when you can get yourself around and I returned to the Body Harmony yoga studio with a feeling of returning home, and of finding the link that's been missing since we moved house a few months ago.  Maybe yoga and knitting will ease my passage through this period of frustration I am experiencing.  I came across Bad Annas, a knitting shop in Vancouver that does mum and kid knitting time, which I would really like to try out, and a teacher likened knitting to yoga, a moving meditation.  For me its a slowing down and a  focus, perhaps taking oneself out of the chattering mind a little.   

A Betty for a Boo

First Charlotte, now Betty, who's next Edith or Mavis?  I refer, of course, to apple dishes.  Following my last post on apple creations, a big thanks to Nicola for sending me Nigel Slater's recipe for Apple Betty.  I was slightly shocked by the quantities of butter (and sugar, and syrup, and chocolate, albeit the 'healthier' dark stuff) but why not go out with a flourish (or a coronary) for the last of our apple harvest?!  I substituted maple syrup for golden syrup (well I do live in Canada) in some skewed idea that the 'natural complex sugar' would somehow offset all the other gloop in there.  Ha ha.  There was no disguising the serious gloop factor, but it was absolutely to die for (and perhaps we will!) in the tasting.

 

Betty Boo enjoyed it too of course.

The lady has just recently stopped napping most days and I find myself stretched out as the days go on.  I am of course proud of her advanced language abilities, but the incessant questioning every minute (and her dislike of most of my answers, so repeating the question ad nauseum, or just erupting into tears) is testing my patience when there is no respite throughout the day.  Added to this that the lady has suddenly decided, after months of resistance, that we are doing toilet training (the 'big toilet' has won her favour, no pottying for this one), and the requirement for constant vigilance (and mopping up) and you have one tired mama.  I miss Boo the moment she's not with me, but some days she gives me no breathing space and I feel suffocated.  I find myself becoming snappy and feel like a terrible mother momentarily before moving into a more positive space.  We are transitioning, and will no doubt a new rhythm will soon emerge from these long days soon.    

   

Bring it on

Already?  

 

Well, actually it was heavy hail yesterday afternoon, but everything turned white for a short time and it felt decidedly wintry.  How apt that this was the day we had our first set of winter tyres fitted.  Last year we slipped and slid around in our little metal box on the unprecedented amount of snowfall, and there is no way I wanted to go there again.  We live half way up a mountain now as well so there's no question of our not having snow tyres this year.  Phew, last year we were so ill-prepared; Beth had no snow clothes, we never got a sledge because they sold out, we borrowed our landlord's snow shovel.  But we are (almost!) ready this year.  There's snow on dem dere mountains and our thoughts are turning to the season ahead.  I am musing on...

• the ski/snowboard season. I had two encounters with the experience of hurtling down a mountain last year (it has to be said I generally avoid 'high octane 'activities!) - my first lesson was great, the 2nd experience (with Dadda Boo) was terrifying and I had a nasty fall from which my hand has still not quite recovered.  Boo can start next year so I really want to try again this year, but I think lessons will be the best bet for me.  


• the Olympics here in Feb... will we get tickets (on sale on Sat)?? Will Vancouver be gridlocked for two weeks?  Will Dadda Boo have to cross the bridge to work at 4am and return at 2pm?  


• Other fun winter activities.  Would like to try snowshoeing this year, and take Beth on ice skates for the first time (ok we can do that any time of the year here, but winter seems appropriate)


• We ARE going to get a sledge this year and Beth can be pulled along snowy paths, which she is bound to love


• Walks on crisp winter mornings, taking photographs


• The whole Christmas thing with a little girl who is so much more aware of everything than she was last year, and getting into the whole christmas story side of things, and of course the santa thing


• Christmas with the family in England, our first larger family gathering since BB (Before Beth)


• Dreaming and planning for the garden next year


• Cosy fires in our new home, with our new sofa which we are expecting to arrive any day


• Kitting out the new studio (pics coming soon) and getting started on my next project


• Crafting, knitting, cooking.  Do I dare attempt a gingerbread house from scratch this year, or will I opt for an 'easy kit'?


• Making things with love for Beth, family and friends


• Sleeping bears.  Do raccoons hibernate?


• Looking forward to the new year and attending a 'Childrens Book Workshop' course at the university to help me present my book to publishers.  I am quite insanely excited and thinking of ideas for my next book already.

And here's some lovely baby cashmere yarn on my needles for some teensy tiny things (for others I hasten to add!).  I can't believe my baby will be 3 in a few short months!

What are you looking forward to this winter?

Home Comforts

The rain beats down relentlessly on the skylight above me in the kitchen and I'm grateful to not have to leave the house today.  We have continued to enjoy the fruits of our apple picking fun.  There has been a whole lot of this:

and this...

We are onto our final tray of apples now...

There has been a whole lot of apple compote and multiple apple crumbles.  But I wanted to try something different so I made an Apple Charlotte, with a recipe from BBC cooking available here.  It couldn't be simpler really, an apple sauce in a toasted bread shell.  The apple sauce has juice and zest from a whole lemon which makes it lovely and zingy.

 

We have also been enjoying our homebaked wholemeal bread on a regular basis.

 

Boo, meanwhile, has made an exciting transition, to her own 'big girl bed'.  I was going to hang back a while on this one, but she became a little too eager to fling herself out of her cot, so we made the change and she is thoroughly pleased with it.

 

Apart from climbing on and off her bed and rolling around on it, her other favourite pastime right now seems to be putting on various items of clothes in an 'unusual manner'.

Rainy days ain't so bad are they?



 

Mycological mayhem

It's pretty evident from a couple of my recent posts here and here that I'm a fungi fan, so I was pretty excited to come across these blighters on our side path...

However, I was a bit shocked when I discovered the extent of the growth on the lawn, seemingly loving the organic fare on offer from some old tree roots...

 

 

 

Now, I am more than happy to marvel at fungal outcrops out there in the forest, but when its within the grasp of the small one, it must be razed to the ground.  So they were raked and pulled and removed... for now at least. 

The small one is not to be trusted, as became clear with two incidents today.  On both occasions I had thought she was playing happily in her room, as she loves to do, but what was I to find..

1. Boo has let herself into the studio (seems she can open doors easily now) and has found the little ink pads she loves, and has stamped herself on the trousers, and underneath on the knees and shins, oh and the floor too. Thankfully she didn't make it to the freshly papered walls before I caught her in the act.

2.  Boo has found her Daddy's wallet and has removed all the credit cards and hidden them underneath the mattress of her bed.

Not to be trusted.