the big bad blessing of school

ever wonder if school is going to be the death of you? and you're not even the one attending? ahhhhh... the joys of parenthood! i have two precious girls in school, they're both wildly talented in very different ways. not just that... they also come at life from opposite ends of the spectrum. for my baby girl, our nightly homework routine is myriad of emotions from joy to frustration, coming sometimes at rapidfire pace but never knowing where the next one's gonna hit. this week it was a report on a penguin of her choice. and her choice was the little blue fairy penguin. a perfectly fitting penguin to choose, with her favorite color being blue & and she loves all things little.

we were off to a good start! after printing some info off the internet, she muddled through the reading with periods of rabbit trail tangents. nothing too unusual, and so far no tears. heck, we even made it through the rough draft of the report in super speed. then came the dreaded final draft. the pressure of a correctly spelled and neatly written paper proved too much for her little heart to bear. it started with some aggressive erasing and ended with tears. with firm yet loving mommy-ing, the heat of the moment usually passes quickly with her. (that's one of the beautiful things about her, i think. emotions often come on strong and suddenly, but they seem to dissipate almost as quickly as they came on. then she talks through the aftermath, and goes on her way with no ill-feelings reserved a later date.) once the wave had passed, and the final draft of the report was done we were on the path to better days... crafty penguin poster sort of days, that is.

the rest of the evening flew by in a flurry of paper snips and a sea glue. when the last of the snips were picked up i was left to wonder if i'm managing the roller coaster of daily life the right way, or if i'm making a mess of it all. one never really knows till later, i guess. but somehow i believe that it'll all pan out, and they'll be happy productive members of society despite my shortcomings. plus, as a side bonus, they'll have plenty to talk to a therapist about later on, right? {ha}

the payoff  in the end, of course, is this video of the final project. gotta love that definition of monogamous! {hee hee}


ok, enough rambling for one night. one last picture (from this morning) and a quickie digital layout on my missing shoe. i'm still reveling in my love affair with paislee press and liz's minimalistic fabulous-ness.

first the picture - emma checking out the mountains this morning before school.

Jouraling:
twenty hours
after a wild adventure spinning out of control on vail pass into a snow bank, where our luggage was shot from the car into the snow... we arrived at home and began digging through the snow packed stuff to find out just what exactly we’d deposited in the snow bank.
one glove
two shoes
from two different pairs. this was one of them. it always has to be one of your favorites, doesn’t it? but more than that, i now have a very cute, pink-buckled reminder of just how blessed we were to come away from our misadventure with only a couple of missing shoes. God is good, even better than cute, pink-buckle shoes with studs.  01.02.2010

supplies:
Patterned paper: Paislee Press - Midwinter's Flight, oscraps.com (grey), Taylor Made - Indefinitely, oscraps.com (pink); frame, tape & word art: Paislee Press and Amy Martin - Midwinter's Flight, oscraps.com; butterfly: Taylor Made - Indefinitely, oscraps.com; damask brush: Joanne Brisebois - Family Tree, oscraps.com