A gift for my dad

My dad is an amazing man. He is a daily example of unselfish love. 

Over the years he has spent countless hours helping me with my art program, tackling chores that most people not only don't want to do, but never see. For example, just last week he sorted, washed, dried and stored a thousand soiled flag blanks for me. And these weren't just dirty.. they were rodent soiled from being in cardboard boxes in a storage building. UGH! 

So anyway, I wanted to do something to show my appreciation and I've been wanting to try a new art project, so I figured this would be a good time. When I think of my dad, I think of music and art. Specifically, screen printing... and I just happen to have access to some of the screens that he used in his business for twenty plus years!

I pulled this photo off my dad's facebook page. This is so him!  In fact, this was him in his early twenties.

I took the picture and edited it in photoshop and used it to draw on the silk screen. I used a couple of different kinds of sharpie markers as I found that the plain sharpie dried a grey color, but the one that was created for fabric dried black. You can see the difference in the two below.

Here is the piece in process. I ended up going over the entire thing a few times as I liked the dark contrast on the screen. (If I had time, I would have used both shades to create more depth.. but no time!)

Here is the piece complete.

It was so much fun giving him the gift. 

I have to say, this was one of the best gifts I have ever made. I loved creating it and I loved giving it! I know that what made it special was the meaning behind not just the piece but the screen as well.

A new tradition, the interactive Christmas Pageant

Last Sunday we had an "Interactive Christmas Pageant" at church. It was so much fun and was such as success that we have decided that it is our new tradition!

So what did we do that made it so successful?

We took the stress out of it!  Instead of practicing for weeks and stressing everyone out about learning lines and making it to practice, we embraced our need for flexibility and said to everyone, if you can be here on Sunday for the pageant, great! Bring a soup to share and let's spend time together.

And that's just what we did.  I found a script that I tweaked for our church and we ran through it a couple of times with the kids during Sunday School, but we didn't ask anyone to learn lines, and no one was required to do/say/wear anything special.

We arrived early and got out all of our props.. fabric, a baby doll, some angel wings and some left over costume parts from a local elementary!

Yes, we really were that rag tag.

Here are Kylie and Kai... Mary and Joseph. They were absolutely adorable.

We had different youth read various parts of the script that outlined the story of Jesus' birth.

But those are the normal things...  what made this pageant special was we invited the adults to join the pageant as the "extras" and during each song (the congregation sang the songs to set the scene such as "Go Tell it on the Mountain" and "Infant Holy, Infant Lowly"), different adults would come to the back and we would dress them as animals, shepherds, angels, wise people and so forth!

Below is a picture of the "animals." 

And as angels. Those little wings were hilarious on the adults!

and as Shepherds.

For the ending, the kids sang "Happy Birthday, Jesus."

Then we had our soup supper!

We had a lot of varieties!

This event was a lot of fun and I really think a huge part of it was the fact that families weren't stressed about it for weeks.  It was also great to watch different people get up to be a part of the service that don't usually volunteer.

So will First Presbyterian Church, Stephenville do this again? Absolutely! I'm already making a list of props I want to get for next year!  And Doug will be making a larger batch of his chicken and dumplings!

Jingle is back.

Jingle is back.

Doug did it. Not me.

Our kids have him totally wrapped around his finger.

Lexi asked if Jingle was coming back and lo'and behold, the next morning he arrived.

A Simple Christmas

With life absolutely nuts, I'm purposefully taking things a little easier for Christmas. This means fewer decorations, fewer gifts and fewer obligations.

In fact, while I had already explained to the girls that we were going to be doing the 4 gift Christmas this year (1 gift you want, 1 gift you need, 1 gift to wear, 1 gift to read), I was reminded tonight of why we all need to refocus.

Because you see, while Kylie and Lexi were decorating the tree, Kylie thought it was fun to place the little elf figurines with the nativity scene. And that BOTHERED ME!! 

I am completely aware that my sweet girl had no disrespect in mind, but really? Is this were we are at? Has elf lore taken over my home?

NOT THIS YEAR!

I quickly called on my pastor/husband to explain in a calm fashion that the elf means nothing. In fact, the elf isn't making an appearance at our house this year. "Jingle" is needed elsewhere.. and that's cool. We have Jesus.

Anyway..

As I worked on my digital portfolio for my class, Maddie finished off the decorations for the tree.

 Thanks Mad.

And there you have it. Our decorations. DONE.

I'd say that was more than enough to celebrate the birth of Jesus.

Art and Soul Painting Class

On Saturday afternoon I had a painting class at church (First Presbyterian Church, Stephenville). I invited my friends to come paint a nativity scene. And boy did they show up!

I had 40 people painting. It was so much fun!

We had moms and kids, friends and church members. 

Here are a few pictures of everyone painting.

It was a little crazy.

Thankfully Doug and Maddie didn't paint and helped by taking care of refreshments and ran interference with Kylie!!

And here are some of the finished products.

Everyone did great!!

I LOVE this picture!! :) :)

I realized this morning at church that I didn't get a picture of Lexi and Kylie together with their finished pieces, so here they are.

This event was such a success that I can't wait for the next one. 

I'm thinking February...