Zoe's first oil painting

With her Nana talking to her about painting, pallets, laying out color thick, mixing color, Zoe used the paints given to her by Auntie Carrie and created the oil painting seen here. Nana said there are only 3 strikes on the entire painting that are not Zoe's.

Collaborative art

Zoe and Finn worked together on this.. Finn did all the snowballs and dots on Santa ..

her own room

For the first time ever Zoe has asked for a room of her own.. so she can paint it.  Really, I can't wait to be able to paint a room with her.. what fun that would be.. She is trying to decide between painting a forest and painting a candy shop (with lots of cups of hot chocolate)...

god is an artist

One night last week Zoe got all mystical on me.. laying in bed, Finn asleep, this is the time she talks to me.. this one night she asked:

What if we all live in a painting? What if God is a really, really good painter. What if she just paints us and the trees, and the flowers and the animals.  What if there is just a large gallery and Earth is just one of the paintings.

That is a universe I want to live in.

Recent art

Art part 2

Zoe drawing with story

Zombies!

Halloween 2013

Halloween 2013 was eventful.  For weeks, months, Zoe knew she wanted to be a Zombie, down to the outfit in detail.  She and her dad picked out a dress that was perfect at the thrift store.. purple tartan skirt, black vest, white shirt, added a long sleeve white turtleneck.. all with the purpose of destroying it and coloring it.. which they did, with vigor.  Come the day of the Halloween after school and Zoe and her Dad starting painting her face.  Zoe was traumatized.. I believe she had a hard time rectifying what her face looked like and what she thought it would look like.  There were lots of tears.. we as a team redid her makeup more than 3 times.  I did mine to give her an example, and it sort of helped.  Finally, she is happy, covered in some amount of blood.. her whole attire was great.. she showed up and her two best friends were witches.  By the time we ate, she was beside herself, and felt like an outsider.  She refused to go trick or treating.. whereas Finn, Asha and Claire couldn't wait to get out the door, and left without Zoe and I.  Zoe cried for more than an hour.  I tried everything.. I listened a lot.  Tried to drag her out of the house, trick her out.. the only thing that worked was heading home to get her witch costume...  On the way home I told her why I was so upset.  I told her that I was worried that she thought so much about what other people thought, about fitting in, that for her artistic soul that was the wrong way to be.  How I was worried some day, someone would say something bad about her art, or her technique and she would loose her passion.  That she needed to stand up for being herself and strive not to fit in, to be comfortable being her, to only define herself by being her.  I told her that it reminded me of this story we read about "what will I be when I grow up".. and how the last line is.. "It doesn't matter what I will be, as long as I will be... me".  Much to say, we got back to Kirsten/Asha's and she was fine.  She rallied.. we went door to door to about 4 houses (most had run out of candy), she joined her friends.. her brother and her friends shared with her.  All's well that ends well.

And she asked me to read her the story when we got home.  Maybe she did understand me.

Side note: Fireman Finn had such a good time.. was leading the pack.. running to the door, even when he legs would go no more, he asked his Daddy: "Just you walk to the door, you carry me.. I'll hold the bag and say 'Happy Halloween. Trick or Treat!'" They did a house or two that way before heading back.

He was besides himself with tiredness when he finally was in bed.. a quick leg, foot, and arm massage and he was out like a light.

Pictures up tomorrow/when-I-find-my-darn-camera-cable.

Fwd: Owl

 

It seems we have our own owl,

(see attachement)

who is not necessarily nocturnal.  We were out raking leaves off the porch and a big "Who.. who.." sounded.. really close.. directly above our head.. it was our owl, who the kids have named "Snowy".. Finneas and I saw it two days ago after dinner.. today  it was at noon.

It stayed in the tree, clearly checking us out, and the cat, and us, and watching us, for at least 20 minutes.. long enough for me to get this picture

Of course after the kids started hooting and howlering, we missed it taking off.

 

Stuck in the baby swing

Zoe's appliance

Zoe drawings

teeth, not eating.. oh, and not chewing

On Tuesday (geez, only two days ago), Zoe got an "appliance" glued to her 3 molars on the top.. one that will slowly spread her top jaw so that it is as wide as it is supposed to be (it is currently quite a bit smaller than the bottom and all her teeth are crowded.  She has a sort of loose front tooth, hopefully this device will make room, and they will fall out on their own. Additionally, only these molars are the ones that contact when she shuts her jaw.. her teeth also need to curve down more (slope of her top jaw relative to the bottom).

Every night for two weeks we get to turn this key like thing and move it .25mm out. Then another orthodontic visit to see how its going.  Then 6 months of wearing it.  Then probably a retainer.

Anyway, it has been okay for her, aside from her having to massively change her eating habits.. she mostly ate raw carrots, tomatoes, apples, crackers, granola bars, etc.. all things that are taking her some time to figure out with only these molars touching.  She has eaten a fair amount of smoothies, cheesecake, yogurt, canned fruit, mashed potatoes, etc.  I've given her soup for lunch each day, and she has begrudgingly ate it.  I, of course, feel these things personally and deeply, it reminds me of the time I gave her vitamin drops at just a few days old and I felt so terrible, like I had done something wrong to her.. I feel that way again.  Its probably harder on me than her.

Tonight she was so hungry (I think she misses the crunching), and while Bruce was taking the kids home, she grabbed a wintergreen life saver.. in the midst of leaving the store, she aspirated it.. and ended up throwing up a bunch.. Bruce took her to the emergency room where he called me and said, "We will be a little late." "Why?" "we are in the emergency room".. "why?" [time enough for me to freak out, panic]  "Zoe aspirated a winter green life saver".. as I'm quickly trying to figure out how to get down there, he tells me to stay home... there weren't in for long, the nurse figures she coughed it back up, probably swallowing it.

She seems fine, all is well.. I am exhausted.

go out with someone

Z: I can't wait for the halloween dance.  You know, we can go out with someone.

Daddy: What does go out with someone mean?

Z: [very long explanation... she had a hard time putting it to words...later...] It like there are these people..... and they walk to the gym together... there is a spotlight.. you have to dance the best you can with your partner in the spotlight

(very abbreviated version)

Wow! Zoe turned 7 today.  Hard to imagine that little girl in my arms 7 years ago is this lovely little girl who can almost put her arm easily around my waist.

I count today as a major success for many reasons!  Zoe has a wonderful teacher for this year, Mme Boucher, and I think a great group of classmates.  I now have to label pens, pencils, markers, etc.. yeah!  

Zoe spent almost every night on vacation whining/crying about taking tests.  I mentioned this to her new teacher and she said she'd do everything to make Zoe comfortable taking exams.. including reducing the size of her exam until she is comfortable studying, passing successfully, etc. I think it will be a big year for Zoe in terms of scholastic foundation.  She is now ready to work on things, cares about getting them right.

Zoe has also become very conscientious about the world around her, especially homelessness and the poor, wasting food, not running water, composting, etc.  Zoe is really pationate about helping out the poor.  I'm currently looking for ideas. I've told her we can adopt a family (ie donate food for Thanksgiving  and year around). We can adopt a family for Christmas, providing them gifts.. but Zoe wants something .. right.. now! ideas?

First day of school.. 2nd grade

Cousins

Nana and Grandpa

Zoo animals

Not camera shy at the Hogle Zoo

Cousins

Wrestling cousins

Bubbles at Nana's with Kodak puppy

Lawn relaxation

Zombie walk

I asked them to slowly walk towards me

Ride homeward