One of the best parts of summer is the constant parade of farmer’s markets in our area. If I put a little effort into it, I bet I could go to at least one a day (and two on most days). Unfortunately, just because food is fresh and local and organic and free-range doesn’t make it calorie-free. Which is totally, totally unfair. If I’m going to make an effort to eat natural, real food the payoff should be automatically fitting into my jeans. Why doesn’t science work like that?

The kids love the farmer’s market(s), although I’m sure that has more to do with the fact that the majority of the vendors we visit sell things like kettle corn and maple cotton candy. (Getting any ideas why my jeans don’t fit?) Plus our favorite – the Bozrah one on Friday nights – is like an automatic playdate. We always run into people we know, the vendors are all super nice, and there are tons of free samples. There’s a whole corner of cheese merchants, which might be Caroline’s idea of heaven. Who knew my 2 year old would go nuts for a fresh chevre with herbs de provence?  Last week there was a barrel train pulled by ponies. PONY. TRAIN. It was almost too much, and I don’t mean for the kids. I might have actually squeed over the ponies.

There are a lot of disadvantages to living in a state we don’t technically have any connection to. We are not from here. We don’t have any family here. We’re transplants and no matter how many of my children are born here or how long I live here I will never actually think of myself as being “from Connecticut”. I don’t feel the same deep obsession and connection to this place that I did when I first set foot in Charleston during a college visit. But after 8 years in New England and 7 in this town, I do love it.

We live in Connecticut. It’s the only home my children know. It’s become a huge part of our daily family affirmations: “I’m Evan and you’re Mommy and sister is Caroline and we live in Norwich!” They can both tell me exactly how far down the road to school the town ends and are always asking if we’re back in Norwich yet any time we drive more than a few blocks.

I think home is a confusing thing when you’re little – you know your house is home, but what’s outside that? Your yard? Your street? Your town? Your county? I tried to explain America to Evan yesterday because he wanted to know why there were so many Captain America flags. (He called the American flag the “Captain America flag”, because obviously identifying superheros correctly is a more important skill to teach your children than real facts). I told him we lived in a town, in a state, in a country called America and sometimes people live in other towns in other states in other countries. He was fine with states, but didn’t like the idea of something bigger. I told him his Aunt Carolyn used to live in France, which is a country across the ocean. He said “I would be sad if I live in France.” I told him he didn’t have to move to France and could stay with me forever and I really truly meant it.

Although I’m sure if he knew he could have baguettes for dinner every day in France he’d get over it.

This was his dinner request. A whole loaf of bread. He ate more than half.

We got Mango Tango

Buying it his own self.

Not our pizza, although my kids ate half of it.

New York City twice in one week! Which means on the non-busy days we were extremely non-busy.

Sunday:

Still not sure about this car wash thing.

1 kid + 1 pair of scissors = 30 minutes of silence for me

Unimpressed with Brooklyn

Monday:

It turns out the only reason my fridge looked full was all the expired stuff.

I have no idea who this is, but she looks SO uncomfortable.

Still recovering from Sunday

Tuesday:

6:22 am and a full bed

Millions of peaches, peaches for me

Also still tired from Sunday.

Wednesday:

Hello New York

Gary works for Disney, so he was REALLY enthusiastic, even at 8 am.

Caroline always reads the menu, even though she ALWAYS orders a cheeseburger.

Thursday:

I don’t even know HOW the cereal ends up all the way over here when she sits on the OTHER side of the bowl.

Twinsssssss

Perfect park day

Friday:

Helping me get the oil changed on the van

I tried to talk the kids into this one, but they picked Peter Pan. Again.

Writing my last Arrested Development review for TVFanatic while the kids watch Justice League.

Saturday:

Holding hands

I swear I didn’t spike his sandwich with sleeping pills

Happy Girl

  This week is vacaaaaaaation! And so is next week!  There’s going to be so much beaching and swimming and laking and eating and sleeping. I’m doing it on my own with the kids again, but we’ll have a large assortment of fake aunts and uncles plus a real aunt and uncle plus my parents at various points to help keep Evan and Caroline alive, so hopefully I can manage. Expect the blog to be 90% photos until we get back.

So sorry, so late, so not really caring because of the holiday weekend.

Sunday:

Toast on the couch

Naps on the couch

Bath…not on the couch

Monday:

Rockstar #1 at the dentist

Rockstar #2 at the dentist

Rain-shmain, it’s playground time.

Frozen yogurt as a reward for being a rockstar.

Tuesday:

Summer has officially started

PRETTY EXCITED ABOUT THIS SUMMER THING.

I’m pretty excited too.

Wednesday:

This is how mommy sleeps in.

Cartwheel practice

She insists on reading in bed, even after I turn the light off.

Thursday:

My little thrift shoppers helping me pop some tags.

Poison dart frog in yo face

Oh look, I found my fisheye lens.

Friday:

The cutest matching not-twins ever.

Caroline disapproves of the commissary.

Judgy cat is judging me for…whatever. Everything.

Saturday:

The best part about going to birthday parties is playing with other people’s toys.

Welcome to my tent. Please take your shoes off and bring me a cookie.

This is Evan’s idea of being helpful when I try to take his picture. So helpful.

It’s 9 pm Monday night, which means the long weekend is officially over. E actually got 2 full days off and we fit in as much fun as possible – TWO parades on Monday! I also took pictures for two different friends and I’m buckling down to get my editing done. I’m actually HOPING for rain at least one day this week so I don’t feel bad keeping the kids inside. I’ll make up for it with a beach or two when it hits 85 later in the week.

Almost half-way through May? How is that even possible?

Sunday:

When the weather is this nice, it’s hard NOT to go to church – we can almost see it from our yard.

Carrying 40 lbs on my back definitely counts as a workout.

Explaining to Daddy that quesadillas are the best.

Monday:

READY TO GO

Hats

Spring cleaning my favorite room of the house

Tuesday:

Good morning!

I think this sign is in the wrong place.

Thinking about running away, as usual

Wednesday:

CANONBALL!

Good listener waits his turn

Sleepy girl

Thursday:

Rain isn’t so bad when your raincoat is this cute

He already thinks balls are hilarious

Cheeseburgers are always the right answer.

  Friday:

I don’t even know what this thing is.

Caroline’s definition of “playdate” is “push me on the swing for two hours”.

This does not seem fair.

Saturday:

Caroline has joined a penguin colony

I’M THE KING OF THE WORLD!

And then I died of cuteness.

It’s been pouring since about noon and I have a serious case of the “I don’t really want to do anything”s. Luckily tomorrow is Sunday and I can tackle the laundry, dishes, piles of toys AND get my plants in the ground. Probably.

I bought this huge canvas at A.C. Moore a few months ago. They were running an great sale on canvases – I think I bought it for less than $20 – and I’ve been looking for something large to hang over the fireplace basically since the day we moved in 6 years ago. I’ve hung collections of things, put giant vases on the mantel, made banners and art before but nothing has ever really filled the space the way I wanted. I knew a 3×4 canvas would finally be the right size but it’s been sitting in my basement for weeks now while I brainstormed what exactly I should do with it. I am decidedly NOT an artist, and although I found some cool DIY art on Pinterest I wasn’t in love with any of the ideas (and wasn’t confident in my ability to execute them).

While I was talking with my IBFF (internet best friend forever) Amy, she suggested doing silhouettes of the kids. She actually made one and blogged it almost two years ago (and shouts me out in the post, because seriously IBFF!) so I used the same basic idea – took a picture of the kids’ profiles in front of a window, printed them and cut the shape out carefully. But because I wanted to make GIANT painted silhouettes I had to figure out the rest on my own. I had once bought some beautiful City Skyline Silhouette Prints from Fine Line Art Co. I loved those colorful prints of cities.

Supplies:

Canvas
Spray paint
Craft paint
Paint brushes (at least 1 small and 1 large)
Cardstock
Printer
Scissors/craft knife
Box
Pen
Clothespin/tape/paperclip/whatever you need to get the angles right
Smartphone with flashlight app (or a very strong flashlight)

Instructions:

I took my canvas outside to paint it, which wasn’t the best choice because it was pretty windy and I ended up with spray paint on my back door. Eh, not the first time.

Ignore the tree shaddows

I picked blue for my background colors since I was hanging it in a blue room but any colors would work. In a kid’s room a whole rainbow would be really fun. If you were just doing 1 silhouette instead of two you could do it vertically.

From top to bottom: white base paint for a picture frame, kitchen stool, nursery project, picture frame, kid-size cabinet, and failed lamp shade project. All found in my basement with enough left for this project.

I lined them up from darkest to lightest and worked from the outside in on the canvas. Then I went back and used the white to lighten anywhere it felt REALLY uneven. This is what it looked like in the bright outside light:

I’m not going to win any painting contests but I like it (and E was surprised I had made it myself – he thought it was actual art). I let the spray paint dry for a few hours – there wasn’t a lot of paint so it didn’t take long – while I talked the kids into posing for their profile photos. They were both in cooperative moods so it didn’t take long.

Try to get a picture where your kid’s nose DOESN’T blend into the background. It still worked fine.

To make the cutting edges more distinct I lowered the blacks slider and converted the pictures to black and white in Lightroom (totally optional). Then I printed them out on cardstock (I happened to have brown, but the color doesn’t matter) and cut out just the silhouettes as closely and cleanly as possible.

Then came the hardest part: figuring out how to get that cut-out silhouette big enough to trace onto the canvas.

My first thought was I’d just hold one up next to a lamp and trace the shadow, sort of like a super-simple version of a projector. Unfortunately, a regular light bulb doesn’t direct the light strongly enough to make a crisp shadow. I tried to make a DIY projector with a cardboard box taped over the lamp but it still wasn’t clear enough.

I tried asking the internet and my husband and they both suggested I find an overhead projector so I called the library and after a lot of shuffling departments and waiting on hold they said yes they DID still have a projector and if I wanted to bring my canvas in they could set me up in one of the conference rooms on Wednesday. That would have been a good option if I hadn’t figured out an at-home solution. I got impatient waiting for Wednesday and during a little more Googling I found a tip that the flashlight app on a smartphone makes a really bright, direct light.

So I made this:

That’s my iPhone with the flashlight app turned on, propped up against a book inside an empty box, with the silhouette clipped to the end with a clothespin. I set it on the coffee table and pulled it back until it the shadow was the right size on the canvas. You definitely need a dark room to make it work right, but luckily the sun goes down around 8 pm (I think it’s called “night”?) so I didn’t have to move the canvas.

I traced it with a regular ballpoint pen, being careful not to move the canvas. I should have used a level and a measuring tape to space the two silhouettes exactly right, but I just guessed based on the color stripes on the canvas. Then I switched out Caroline’s silhouette for Evan’s, moved the canvas (it seemed easier than moving the light projector set up) and traced Evan’s. I adjusted the distance a little to make his silhouette slightly bigger than Caroline’s but not so much the finished product would look unbalanced.

I used black craft paint to fill in the silhouette shapes. I used a medium brush to do the major edges and a tiny brush to do things like their bangs and Caroline’s eyelashes. I filled everything in with a medium sized brush and went back over the edges to make sure they were colored in fully. I messed up both their noses a tiny bit and noses are very important in making a silhouette that looks like your child, so be extra careful. I did NOT wait long enough for it to dry before I propped it up on the mantel, so I got a black paint drip on Evan’s side. Luckily the cheap craft store brand of paint was easy to peel off the spray painted canvas so I fixed it. The other option would have been taping up the silhouette and spray painting over the mistake.

The last step was finally taking down the train station banner from Evan’s birthday party and putting a nail in the wall to hang it up!

Aaaand then take some pictures. I’m happy with how it turned out. High fives for easy, inexpensive artwork!

Ta-da! I’m so excited to finally have something to fill that space after six years. Total cost: $25 for the canvas sinceI had everything else on hand and approximately 45 minutes worth of total work. Let me know if you try something similar, I’d love to see your spin on it!