Can She Sell an Apple Pie Billy Boy?...On the Road to FUN-draising...Part 1

  This is the story of a little girl who wanted to play the drums.  Her mother would not let her play the drums.  The drums were too loud.  The drums were too big.  Boys played the drums.  So although this little girl still had the chance to be in band, she was doomed to life with a flute...a small, light, wind instrument.  Indeed...the girl felt lightheaded and winded when she played it. She was sad. 

A few years later, the beginning of her 7th grade year I believe, she became sure that becoming an average or even a somewhat-less-than-average flautist didn't seem to be in her destiny.  Demoted to banner carrier and later band manager,  she carried flags during parades, and ran out onto the football field, running like a wanna be professional tennis ball retriever...(those guys move like monkeys) to place the correct flags before the silk squad at the correct times, and then collect them again before the next song.  She didn't like to tuck her shirt in, but band managers tucked their shirts in. She did get to march beside the drummers and their drummings.  She also got to sit with her band friends and watch her football-playing friends play at Friday night football games, and well, that even makes tucking a shirt in worthwhile.  

Flash forward twenty some years later. 

don't be scared...it's only imaginary and there are no explanation marks

 The little girl had grown up, and now she had her own little, band-entering aged girl.  This child narrowed down her instrument preference to two...the clarinet or the drums.  The mother, recalling her own missed childhood opportunities, determined not to interfere with her daughter's instrument-playing decisions.  And so then, you can imagine the happiness that welled up within her motherly self when the daughter independently chose to live out her mother's dreams become a girl drummer.

But now.  How to we go about this?  Do we encourage this new thing that everybody else is doing by buying her the needed practice drum set?  (oh.  right.  this story is about us)  It was 95 dollars, much less upfront cost than the other instruments (sigh of relief)...but could this be an opportunity to teach the lesson of investment and responsibility?  Why yes.  That is what this could be.

The daughter had 24 hours to write out her reasons for wanting to join band.  She also wrote out her reasons for her instrument choice.  Then she proposed to her parents, who were presenting a united front, a few of her ideas on how to go about buying this drum kit set that was such a must have, and yet has only been pulled out of its bag once this week.

One of those ideas was pulling off a bake sale.  Now it just so happened that the coming weekend was the first of two weekends this fall for a huge car show here locally.  These two weekends, as well as two more in the spring, bring lots and lots of car-loving people and their colorfully-happy cars to our area.  Once they arrive, they park the vehicles along the main road, and out come the lawn chairs.  There they sit, directed towards the road, or they walk up and down the street, socializing and looking at one another's cars.  Some of the cars are for sale.  Some work on their cars while they're there.  Imagine a huge, long parade with an anticipating audience lined up and ready.  That's what it's like, but there's no parade.  Sure, many of these cars are also driven around, so you do see some pass by when they're not parked , but mostly the cars are parked and folks just sit lined up on lawn chairs along the road.

  

This gave us an idea...

What if we take our baked goods to them?!!  What if we put our baked goods on wheels, and travel up and down the line of cars and people, and Sara can ask them if they'd like a water or something to eat.  Brilliant, right?  Right.  It really really was.  More brilliant than we could have imagined at the time.  So, we got to work making apple pies...

...and these cute packages of animal crackers and lemon cookies. Super easy and fast to put together. Apple pies, not so much. 

 For Sara's cart, I used a laundry basket after removing the lining.  Then I took an old, worn suitcase/ bag and removed the handle/wheels.  The basket was attached to the suitcase wheels with twine.  Easy enough.  The crackers and cookies on top were also attached with twine, so we could open and close the lid, without them falling off.  They added fun and color to Sara's business start up.

 We carefully loaded her cart up with brownies, pies, and water bottles.

 Sara added fun and color simply by being her Sara self.  I made a few extra felt flowers for her headband, and we had felt, apple name tags.

 She picked out this light blue, reversible apron from my vintage collection, so I chose the pink matching one.

Happy with this excuse to wear vintage aprons and flowers in our hair,

off we went to hit the road together.

 In no time at all, she charmed those men with her "excuse me...I'm working towards buying a drum kit, and was wondering if you would like some apple pie", and with each sale, she grew a little more confident asserting herself.  I walked alongside of her, offered some guidance, but then let her do her thing. 

She was fabulous, sold out quickly, paid back her parent-lenders 90 dollars to cover supplies, bought her drum kit, and still had cash left over for something fun, like buying her and her mother some ice cream. (I may have "offered some guidance" in that direction.)  Pretty sure if she were selling dirty, stinky sneakers, those men would have bought them from her.

She did work very hard.  It was one of the hottest, most humid days of the summer.  We took small breaks here and there, but the promise of an ice cream stop and a few short, motherly pep talks saw her through to a successful sell out.

  With it being such a successful day, I began to think....

(again)

We are regularly looking for good ideas to raise funds for Siri's medical expenses and needs.  Simple is best.  "What if we simplify this idea by making only brownies, and do a similar type of fundraiser for Siri at the car show events and possibly a few others?" I pondered. We would need to go bigger...meaning more product.  At the beginning of the week, husband Dion came on board.  If I would make 486 brownies, he would sell them at the second car show (this past weekend).  

So this past week was spent accumulating supplies, designing simple packaging, eating baking lots and lots of brownies, and designing a larger, more functional cart that I now love in the way we humans love ice cream, or when our favorite sci fi is renewed for a second or third season...because that rarely happens, or how little puppies wobble when they walk...or how over 9 million of us love watching this little puppy topple over this equally cute baby boy and make him cry...

If you'd like to read more about how the bigger cart and fundraiser ideas turned out (spoiler alert: amazing), hopefully I'll have the sequel, On the Road AGAIN to FUN-draising...Part 2 up in a few days.  Can they sell a mess of brownies?  Will they be baked in time?  Can they make it through this challenge without arguing (who? us?)? Plus, will there be enough containers? Will the weather cooperate? (kinda sorta)...How many brownies does husband Dion want her to make next time?  Will they become brownie makers and sellers for the rest of their middle-aged lives?...you know, the kind of questions you may not be able to stop thinking about until they're answered...

There will be photos of how a yellow-handled dolly estate sale find, combined with a few yards of yard sale fabric, and this yard sale find...

became this...

(ahhh!..I couldn't wait)

In the meantime, this is what I turned our house into last week...

How are you making your today world beautiful?

Summer Guy Sitting On Some Fountain Fish, Pink Hair, and A Pumpkin Pony...neigh neigh

I'm still on this  reorganizing, fixing kick.  Really I'm not sure what's gotten into me.  This has been our home for a year now, but if you would've walked through the house on any given day these past few weeks, you may have assumed we've just moved.

Part of my reorganizing has been going through digital photos and videos. Sorting through them, backing them up...filing them in the correct folders, transferring them from multiple places, etc.  I have put off this job for YEARS. Once we lost some pretty special photos.  At that time a vow was made with myself to stay on top of it from this point on.  But kick me out of the convent, because I haven't.

It's amazing what gets done when there's something on my list I don't WANT to do.  Like REALLY don't want to do. Suddenly things like watching youtube tutorials on how to carve a pumpkin into a pony become priority.  

But going through our family photos and videos has turned out to be a good thing.  They feel like they were taken yesterday, but the girls are so small!  We did the home school thing for Sara's first few years, but I imagine watching those videos is similar to the sorrow kind of joy parents feel on their child's first day of kindergarten.  Or I don't know, maybe it's what parents feel when they watch videos of their kids.  There's an idea.

Amidst all the filing and furniture moving, as well as the all-things-under-this-roof-move-around, I'd like to post a few photos of this summer's trip.  This way in two years, when my photos are once again stored in multiple computers, thumbnail drives, or whatever else is new to then, I can be sure to find these here on the world wide web...then eat dark chocolate while lamenting thinking back on how quickly our girls are growing.

As mentioned in this July post, Sara, Siri, and I had the chance to spend a few weeks at the beach this summer while Siri received osteopathic manipulative treatments in the area. If you are looking for an experienced and all-around amazing Osteopath, send me an email by clicking on the email icon at the top of the blog, or fb message me here for his info or for more info on OMT.  We travel quite a distance for Siri to be treated by him, as he came highly recommended to us.  Now we are the ones who highly recommend him.

One of Siri's favorite things is walking the boardwalk on our trips.  We can walk for hours, and she is so happy and content. She would rather walk than eat.   I like it too, and it's good for both of us.  But I also like to eat...like pretzels.  I like to eat pretzels.  This summer I reintroduced pretzels back into my diet.  "Hello again pretzels!" I said.  "Hello to you." they replied.

Here we are walking at night.  Towards the end of our trip, Sara started asking if I'd like her to push Siri every now and again, giving me a break.  She can be super sweet like that.  

I love what this picture represents.  She is such a great big sister to Siri and a HUGE help as she's getting older.  

We also had the chance to speak at an annual golf tournament benefiting the house where we stay while on these trips.  At the end of the banquet a very generous man walked over to us and gifted us the gift he had won that night...it was a 100 dollar gift certificate to the rather prestigious gift shop. What a kind gesture.  Because I'm the best  a loving wife, I decided to spend it on husband Dion. One shirt was ninety dollars, so I didn't want to get this wrong. We texted and sent pics back and forth, until he was sure it was what he wanted. It is soft. It is pink. Husband Dion is super hot in pretty much whatever he's wearing, and this soft and pink shirt is no exception.  

Here we are taking selfies in the fancy ladies restroom and checking out the fountain at the golf course.

Isn't it beautiful?  This sitting-on-two-spitting-water-fish guy is my favorite.

I've also been meaning to post our summer hair changes, because it's exciting and will compel you to quickly come back to read more blog posts.  not really.  But this is a blog about creative process, so this covers that right?...kinda sorta.

Before the trip the girls needed haircuts.  Sara wanted it short for the beach, and I promised to give her some pink hair once we got there.  Siri's before and after cut...

Sara's before and after cut...

To make a strip of Sara's hair pink, we used Splat.  This was a two day process for us.  On the first day, we bleached out her natural color.  We used plastic wrap to keep it where we wanted it.  It looked like this after bleaching.  

The following day we dyed the bleached area pink.  Here is also a bird on her head.

And here she has underwear on her head.  
Both perfectly normal.
Some day she will appreciate her mother posting photos of this type on the world wide web.

I discovered a fun new product to use on my hair this summer too. The air curler! While bestfriend Gretchen was visiting, we made a few trips to our local discount store, where she introduced me to this controversial hair product. Since our tv isn't hooked up with cable, I hadn't seen the As Seen On TV infomercials. After watching the reviews on youtube and seeing how awful they are on amazon, I began to second guess this five dollar purchase.  But then I followed the directions, along with my favorite hair oil, and this happened...

It swirls hair around in a vortex like, pink container that attaches to your hairdryer.  Like a cotton candy machine.  Considering all the bad reviews, I can't really recommend it, but it was much faster than curling, and curl doesn't stay in my hair all that long anyway, since naturally, in spite of best efforts, most of the time it's determined to do its own rebellious thing.  Why IS "beach hair" all the thing on pinterest? Isn't it just a nicer way to describe tangly, frizzy, messy, out of control hair?  yes. yes it is. because that's what beach hair is.  unruly frizz.

This pic is from an earlier trip.  When Siri and I got back from our walk, it was like this.  And there were bugs on it!!!  gross. Maybe they like my favorite oil too.  I guess if you're a girl and you try the air curler, and it doesn't work for you, you could return it.  It also worked on Gretchen's shorter hair, but not so great on Sara's long hair, so we're 2 for 3.  It may be worth a try.

We had to dye Sara's back when we got home, since school started pretty much immediately.   School policy is no unnatural colors and no mohawks.  Good thing we didn't go with the mohawk.  Apparently in school, a strip of pink hair is a distraction to the other children. Here's part of my fb rant status about it:

"I don't understand why kids can't have mohawks and colored hair in school. They say it's a distraction. I'd like to see a study done where one room has a boy with a mohawk and another one has only "non-distracting" children, and then they all take tests and prove there's a difference because of the distraction. Imagining a kid coming home and saying, "Well mom and dad, I would've done really well in that class, but I couldn't stop staring at this kids hair. I couldn't even eat lunch today. He was such a distraction. It was all I could think about." I'm all about the rules when they make sense, but this one is petty and dumb,and I'm grouchy about it."

That was pretty grumpy huh?

And now, as summer comes to an end, here are a few more memories of the warm beach air, evening campfires, amazing sunsets, ocean walks, and of Siri and I sitting on our bench, while keeping an eye on Sara taking on the waves and her almost daily work of digging the biggest hole ever...

Working on projects while eating pomegranate seeds. Stopping by Trader Joe's to buy pomegranate seeds makes me feel like I'm somewhat awesome.

 Sara's biggest hole ever.

A few years back, I asked husband Dion if he would someday buy this house for me, so we can grow old there.  Then he can retell me the story of how we met, like in The Notebook.  He said probably not.

I like to imagine up stories of the men and women eating at this fancy restaurant as well as another one that looks like what I imagine to be the insides of a giant, lit up pumpkin...what are they ordering, and what occasion brought them here.  Maybe one day Dion and I or Sara will eat here in the moonlight and these lights and listen to the the waves and take in the ocean breezes until we're kicked out or talked out, or Siri and I might eat in silence, which would be equally special.

Here is Sara's version of Hollywood Blvd.  She asked me to come put my prints by hers and declared us famous.

 Then she said we should run up and down this hill.  So we did...

 many many times.

And it was so much FUN!

Beautiful memories are vital in the building up of our relationships.  Photos help our family and friends remember together. These memories are precious indeed.  My heart is full of these gifts that have come our way...the direct result of the difficult choice to adopt Siri. Making these trips initially seemed like a sacrifice, but then quickly they transformed themselves into some of the most incredible bonding moments for our family.  It has become a family retreat of sorts, a second home. These trips gift us with a new environment...they get us out of our "stuck"...they gift us with loving friendships...heartfelt conversations, laughter to anticipate.  They give us the space to breath, think, process, heal. They help Siri to become her healthiest self.  And they give us time to dye our hair pink.  

How are you making your today world beautiful?

*correction from the Favorite Summer Things Facebook Giveaway, posted earlier this summer.  The liquid eyeliner that doesn't smear is NYC, not NYX.  my apologies ladies and eye liner wearing man friends...