dear sisters & cousins

In response to posts including adorable photos of your enchanting smiling children, and to requests for posts including photos of mine, I present: 

The boy who will not remain still for photos. 

I did with sincerest intent, 

take these photos to share with you 

the wonder which is here in yonder North. 

And I got this. 

Yeah!

That shiny stuff on his upper lip is Protectamun Jelly.

In other news:
Today we had a funeral for Cuddly Cousins. First there was the headstone. 

"Mom, how do I spell Cuddly Cousins? Because he is dead."

"I took the gun from the one that shot him. Do you have any flowers? 

He's in the grave and we need some flowers."

 

 The deceased.

The mourner. 

 Later I was on the phone with W. and told her about the funeral.
So she thought, well either this is a symbol of the end of his childhood and he's thinking he's too old for teddy bears. Or he's dealing with death or something.
So we asked about how Cuddly Cousins is doing.
Oh he's out of the grave.
Is he a vampire now? W. wanted to know. Will he be reincarnated?
No, he's a ghost, said C. What did you think he would be? 
Is he still dead?
No, it was a sleeping dart from that gun.
Oh. Well that's a resurrection befitting a soap opera.

This morning arrived too soon and I did wake disappointed in the brevity of the night. 

I went to the high school for secondary art practicum and had some more fun with the special ed class. I learned that it is best to teach slab rolling and box making in groups of about 4 students in special ed at a time. If over the past several visits I had taken four students per visit, made some really impressive big slabs, like we used to do at NLU,  and then cut out our patterns, (4 sides, 1 bottom) textured, blah blah blah, on each consecutive visit we could have 4 doing stuff with the 45 degree angle, scoring, etc.4 rolling slabs and texturing, 4 moving on to the next project. I don't think there are more than 12 students, and I belive there are two special ed teachers there, as well as Mr. A. and me. The way I/he did it with this class, I'm not sure the consecutive steps are very clear the way we did it this time. They are happily scooping up clay, slapping it down. I'm trying to get them to use their muscles to really slam the clay and smack it and smush it. Then someone runs the slab roller, depending on whose turn it is or whatever. They all behave better than the gen. ed. students. They have better manners, better sense of humor, and they're more self assured and comfortable in their skin.  By sense of humor I mean, not only are they themselves funny, but they appreciate in an easygoing manner when someone else is funny. Some of the gen. ed. students are poised and comfortable but others aren't. This is incredibly interesting for me. 

I've been trying to make my bed lately. I've been keeping the kitchen sink clean. I bought ColdWater Tide because it says I can save money by using cold water. Perhaps ice-cicles have special cleansing properties. Anyway the jeans seem clean. J. will NOT approve of using cold water but he doesn't do my laundry either. 

The kiddy cat ate some roses. I'm not sure roses are natural prey for cats. She seems to have an upset stomach. I gave her some brown slime cat medicine and she licked it off my finger. Then she got bored with that so I shoved it in her mouth and she spit it out on the floor. Then I slicked it into the roof of her mouth and she gave me a look. The look that says I will puke this up on your bed later. 

I cooked chili today. I called my friend Marcy and got her recipe because it is the best chili on earth. So that's what  I made. I meant to go to the elem. art practicum too but  got some calls that someone didn't have his meds today. I can't figure out how that happened because the otherone says he had his, and behaved accordingly all day. So then I figured out I needed to head North to get some other things done in town. I paid my late water bill. I picked up C's thing he needed. I should mark these things off on my list. I shopped for chili stuff. Yum. I think my chili powder is wrong but otherwise it was good stuff.


I got home and made the chili and was absolutely exhausted after that. I talked to W. on the phone and then L & C & I lay down to listen to L. read Junie B. Jones. C. fell asleep, I fell asleep. It was great except my feet were freezing. It was 70 in this house and I was freezing to death.




I love album cover artwork!