Largerphone - Tuesday Treasure

A jingly banger stick made with beer caps is called a lager phone -

i guess its a play on the word xylophone.

I found a wicket stump on the beach when walking and carried it home thinking I could use it for something.

I have issues with beer caps being left randomly where they fall when a beer is opened in the house, they get stuck in the vacuum and now recently Lil' miss grabby hands loves ittle things like that.

My passive aggressive streak likes to re-home said beer caps by posting them in the guitar sound hole and random shoes or in a pocket of the car to make an irritating rattle. Beer caps are very difficult to get out of the acoustic guitar.

I decided a more positive thing to do was to collect them, recycle and reuse them.

I remember playing with a rattly beer cap shaker in my childhood, so thought we could make one.

I pondered holes and how to make them once i had enough offending beer caps. Decided that we would try brute force.

Bang holes into caps, We used a big roofing nail to do this. Dylan totally enjoyed this part talking about the colours of the caps and organising them into groups as he banged holes in them.

I bravely held the nail while he used the hammer - his accuracy astounds me. He has had plenty of practice just banging nails into wood.

Then use a smaller nail to attach the caps to the wood so they will be free to move more. Don't put too many on your nail they need room to move. I put a different amount of caps on each nail.

We discovered that the wood on the stump split when we hit it, i wonder if a broom stick would have been a better choice. we changed our tactic to pre drill / tap the holes first then bang the nails with caps on into the wood.

leave a gap at the top of the wood for hands to hold.

Bang it on the ground so its a percussion instrument and or hit it with a stick and bang the ground.

noni x

posted on its playtime linky and mommy club linky and tgif

moments ~ noni

noni moments

moments - sassy

how did my hubby get 2 extra arms?? very handy

saturday scribbles

Birthday Cakes - Friday Finds

yum yum yum

Ok so this week im cruising the net thinking about Flynns 4th birthday thats fast approaching and what kind of cake i should make. I like to make the cakes despite the fact that im just a very average baker. The womans weekly buttercake is a great cake to use as a base for birthdays or if im feeling really lazy i will go and get some sponge cake from the supermarket and pop some jam in the middle and diy the decorating. Its the decorating i enjoy. So im on the look out for an easy but impressive cake for a boy this is the inspiration i have found....i wish i could have all of these cakes, good thing they will have many more birthdays. I ahve included a few girl cakes too, i can dream.

road cake from cakes by caralin 

rainbow cake 1 from kidspot

rainbow cake 2 from baby lifestyles

apple cupcakes from ivillage

 (dream) castle cake from parenting.com

Spider cupcakes from .taste

i think i could do this in spiderman colours and add a spiderman figure

lollipop garden from martha stewart

this is so cool, dinosaur from deshays desserts

Flynn like the car cake, im very open to ideas if you  have a great boy cake ideas please let me know :)
love sassy

Squirt the Flyer - Thinking Cap Thursday

Earlier in the week i had a play date with another almost 4 year old and they both like the angry bird game (grumpy birds Flynn calls it) on the ipad. Thinking about this and wanting to make a game they could play outside that had a similar feel i came up with putting some angry bees on my washing line. I cut them out of cardboard and added some yellow stickers for zing and handed the boys water free water pistols to pretend blast the naught angry bees.

 I left them on the line and today i thought i could turn it into a more exciting and potentially educational game. I cut out some other flying things, birds butterfly's and bats and hung them from the line. All were different colours, with different coloured stickers and I attached them to the line using a pipe cleaner, so they slide a bit in the wind. This time we filled the water pistols with water, and Flynn had to squirt at the ones we called out a colour or an animal. He had to think quick and observe which animals were there what colours they were and what colour spots they had, then co-ordinate that with squirting. He had to count how many were say blue and squirt them all. The more he squirted the more i pretended the bees got angry and i shook the washing line making it harder to squirt them, he giggled and laughed, i got squirted and so did he, it was fun. He had no idea that i was honing his skills of observation, a perfect game for a hot sunny afternoon.

sassy
p.s next time i might add some plastic balls to throw at the flyers.

When are supermodels rubbish models? - only human on humpday

Video from you tube - "women in art"

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When so supermodels make bad models? When they are art models. I don’t want to offend any supermodels that may be reading this but what you have to offer is just no good for art, your way way to thin for anything but an anatomy study of bones and your legs are comically long when put down on paper. Ok I may be going over the top but real life everyday women make superb art models. I see women all the time I think would make wonderful artist models; I’m never brave enough to suggest it as it would take most people off guard. Feel free if you know me or meet me go ahead and ask what it is about you that I would enjoy drawing.                                        

Anyway, I think we all know that fashion models and movie stars are enhanced, modified and photo-manipulated to fit a certain ideal of beauty. It’s not an achievable beauty, it’s a cruel and taunting beauty one that has stolen the confidence of so many women, and it’s a beauty that is so unkind it makes us question even the bits of ourselves that we like. I am no supermodel not by a long shot, my legs are long but not like Giselle, I’m thin but I’m no twig, my hair is healthy but apologetically wild, my eyes are bright but they aren’t movie star blue, but that’s ok because I know I make a good model -  A good art model.  

Last Wednesday I had a gig as an art model, something i do from time to time. I get paid to take my clothes off and I love it. This job rocks, because it is super peaceful unlike most of my life that’s noisy and busy and hectic. It also has the benefit of showing me something new every time about me, it’s my body through the eyes of someone else. It’s like putting rose tinted glasses on and examining yourself.  Artists make me look so lovely, soft and feminine and it has really changed how I think about myself. I’m not big headed I don’t think I’m an extra-ordinary beauty but I do think I’m beautiful.  I am grateful that after having 2 kids modelling restored my confidence when the mega machine corporate version of beauty was trying to stamp on it. I often look at other  women and see how beautiful they are, I have drawn many other women, i have been on the flip side of this equation and know that to be feminine and beautiful doesn’t mean you have to be any particular shape or look at all. Actually what beauty boils down to is how you look at something, it’s as the saying goes 'in the eye of the beholder'. I like the artist view because mostly they are looking for your beauty they are searching it out and doing their hardest to put what they see on the page. 

The women of art history are a varied bunch and they are hauntingly beautiful. We should look back and see ourselves in them and not compare ourselves to magazine covers at creatures who do not exist without Photoshop. Long live real bodies with curves and tummies! Hooray for women with interesting features, eyebrows, defined noses, thin lips, fat lips, freckles and quirky smiles. I for one don’t want the shifting face of a supermodel that can be shifted to suite a company; I want to look like me all the time, everyday. Next time you look in the mirror remember the women of art and say to yourself, “I am beauty”

This is a look at western women i would love in the future to take a look at beauty and different cultures, but i will save that for another humpday. Send me any ideas on this, and what is beauty to you?