d.Sharp Journal

Valentine's Giveaway!

Isn't this a fun way to declare who holds the key to your heart? My handmade glitter heart box comes with a vintage skeleton key and is ready for you to fill with confections or a small gift to make someone's Valentine's Day extra special.

NessPace Photography

So, rather than divulge who holds the key to your heart I am going to turn that question on it's side - what is the key to holding your heart? Is it a sense of humor? Trust? A steady stream of wonderful meals? Leave a comment for this post anytime between now and Monday 9am {PST} to enter to win this d. Sharp glitter heart box.
Good luck!
Best, Denise

List of ten random observations on parenthood.

1. All those things you hear are true -it makes you a better person, it is the hardest job you will ever love, it makes your heart grow three sizes, etc.
2. You cannot take a business call wearing one of these and remain inconspicuous, they are loud.
3. A napping toddler is like a gift Fed-Exed from heaven.
4. For ads on Craigslist looking for childcare - the number of adjectives used to describe the child is in inverse proportion to the age of the child.  i.e. We are looking for a nanny to take care of our sweet, precocious, engaged, active, 6 month old girl who enjoys blah, blah, blah vs. We are looking for a babysitter. Our child is 6.
   
5. I read somewhere that children are like computer software, you have Baby Version .01 and just when you figure out the keyboard shortcuts and start to become adept and skillful you are sent the upgrade, Toddler .01, and so on it goes. The thing is, when you have another child, the next Baby .01 is a different brand of software -  so while knowing something helps, the new version may require a whole new skill set.
6. You can  have moments when you wonder what you did for aggravation before children. {Did you just go stand in line at the DMV for the fun of it?} But you know that it is the most wonderful and gratifying aggravation you will ever experience and you are one lucky person.
7. A pair of these on a little one is like adorable in overdrive.
8. You really do gain perspective as to just how much your parents loved you.
9. Kids tell it like it is. After an excellent dinner at a restaurant last summer a member of our family hyperbolically remarked that they felt full and 'had the biggest butt.' M. corrected them and said, "No, you don't, Mama does."
10. Ideas about parenting and child development are continually changing. Visual reminder? From my collection of vintage flashcards, I give you exhibit A:

Jack Peñate - Torn on the Platform

Remind me to buy brads at Office Depot so I can make a paper theater like this.

No. 9

Wow, I now have a nine year old. It really doesn't seem that long ago that we were trying to coax M. to blow out the candles for these photos  { and not stick his entire hand into the cake as if it were a chocolate mitten.} M. was about 2 and a half , Brandy and I did the kid wrangling and the smoothing over of frosting, and the endless singing of the birthday song to try to entice the extinguishing of the candles and Brad took the best pictures as usual.

I remember at that time, M. only referred to himself  in the third person. He would declare : M. wants blank, M. says blank, M. loves blank. Or the most memorable and at the loudest volume - M. CRASHING INTO WALL! - as his tricycle gained speed recklessly careening down the ramp of the park's play structure and headed straight for a building.

Honestly, so fast. I read somewhere that parenting is a time distortion - one single day has the capacity to last for-ev-er {you know those days, right?} and a single year can pass in a flash. This growing up thing is bittersweet. But speaking now in the third person, Mama loves M. and Mama wouldn't change a thing.

New Soul

Jordan at Oh Happy Day and Rachel at Black Eiffel posted Yael Naim's New Soul video during the holidays and I am reminded again by how much I like the song - it is on the new MacBook Air commercial.

Behold - Hope

Hope is the thing with feathers

That perches in the soul,

And sings the tune without the words,

And never stops at all.

I collect quotes, just like I collect a lot of things. And that first line{by Emily Dickinson}, Hope is the thing with feathers, is one of my favorite lines of poetry and this little trophy reminds me of that, without words.

I have been tagged.

1. My nickname as a baby/toddler was The Mad Hornet.
2. My husband and I have been together for over half my life. I feel so fortunate and grateful for the depth of our relationship.
3. If I had a third baby, with the way things were going, the baby would have weighed like 12 pounds at birth. C. weighed over 10, so I'm done, thanks.
4. When I was a kid my mom worked at Nike when it was still Blue Ribbon Sports and there were fewer than 50 or so employees. At school I was teased for wearing Nikes - no one had ever heard of them, yet.
5. I loathe American Apparel ads.
6. There are moments when my 8 year old makes me feel like I am a contestant on Are You Smarter Than A Third Grader? Yesterday I was quizzed on how old Julius Caesar was when he became the leader of the Roman Empire.
7. I have an irrational fear of accidentally being served Blue Cheese at restaurants.

In case you were wondering what caused that sudden outburst of seven random things about me - I was tagged by Uncle Beefy, or as he prefers to be called UB, at his blog TBOB. Wink. Now according to the rules I need to subject 7 other people to this, but really they should feel free to sit this round out {if they want}: Ulla, Pam at Housemartin, Alyson at Unruly Things, Ink and Ginger, Kelly at Design Crush, Stella at Finding Zen, and Dorian at Uncommon Ephemera.

Revivals and Speakeasies

You reach a certain age {cough} and it seems like everything from your childhood is being remade, revived, riffed off of. This can be good - the ultimate 2 disc DVD set of Schoolhouse Rocks - and it can be very, very bad -  like the current revival of 80’s fashion or The Dukes of Hazzard. Once I had kids I naturally started gravitating to those things I remember fondly from my own childhood: favorite books, movies, toys. It is sweet to revisit something this way, to share it with your kids. It can also be a walk of shame - it makes you examine just what you were into way back when. Like Dance Fever {do you remember Danny Terrio?}. It also, of course, has the ability to make one feel very old - especially when typing the word vintage in front of Fisher Price when scouring Ebay for that favorite set.
I think as a generation ages, this same desire for a childhood revival happens collectively and is seen as a huge commercial boon and everything, EVERYTHING! is dragged out and remade. This is nowhere more evident than tv and movies. Have we scraped bottom yet?

M. is now old enough to watch my favorite movie from when I was a kid, which we watched at Christmas time. He really loved it. Don’t laugh, because it has Scott Baeo in it. But, it also has Jody Foster  - so that has to count for something. The movie is Bugsy Malone - a prohibition-era gangster musical played only by children. Bugsy finds himself a player in the fight for power between two mob bosses, Fat Sam and Dandy Dan. The gangsters wield cream pies and splurge guns that shoot whipped cream and much dancing and singing ensues.

This is one of my favorite parts:

{on the subject of riffing, this tune was sampled by Dizzee Rascal and Lily Allen}

SPOILER ALERT : this is the end, great song.

Says it all - You give a little love and it all comes back to you. I am just asking for most of the 1980's to stay put.

C is for Character

Our 2 and a half year old, C. really loves food. Loves it. He has been spied carefully spooning rice and Korean beef into his empty sock. He has been seen observing dinner wearing a corn tortilla yarmulke fashioned from his taco. And just today my darling child wedged sesame crackers between each of his toes - then ate them.

All drawn up

Absolutely adore the styling on this feature in Martha Stewart Weddings.  Inspires me to get out a sketchbook -  I have never felt very confident about my drawing but I know if I put in the time I can reap the rewards of improvement. Lovely, lovely lines - illustrations by Mariko Jesse.