Patreon Giveaway

Today is the last day to join my Patreon and be entered to win this little doll. She is inspired by the Japanese Kokeshi doll.

Koekshi are wooden dolls, originating from northern Japan. They traditionally are very simple face and a floral pattern on their bodies. I was inspired by my daughter's pippis when making this doll.

All of my Patreon patrons are entered into monthly doll drawings, even $1 members. If you're interested in winning this or future dolls, please visit my Patreon page and consider being a member!

Thank you!

 

I am wild about Kokeshi dolls and have a tiny collection of my own. If you're interested in learning more about Kokeshi, please check out this wonderfully informative book, Kokeshi, from Tohoku with Love

Wow! It has been a long time.

Ah, my darlings!
I know, I know. It's been too long. We were cleaning for guests and hosting guests and having a birthday and hosting guests and finally, finally it looks like things will calm down enough for me to write blog posts again. I have a lot to tell you guys about, but I need to get the posts written and well, I'm still having trouble getting 10 minutes of quiet to get my thoughts in order.

I'm hopeful for a post later today, which isn't an apology. Fingers crossed!

San Diego Comic Con!

I'd love to say I were going to SDCC, but sadly it's not in the cards for me this year, or likely ever, because children and cross-country travel. But my little dolls will be making the trip! Yay!

Each year, Cindy Wang, of Geeky Hooker, drops her darling creations around the convention center, leaving hints on her twitter feed where they are located and the person who gets there first gets to keep the doll.

I emailed Cindy and asked if she would be willing to drop a few of my dolls and she graciously agreed! So the nine dolls in the photo above will hiding out in San Diego!

If you'd like to follow along with the fun, please be sure to follow Geeky Hooker on Twitter or Facebook. I will also be sharing all of her posts on my own Twitter account.

Now, let's be real. If you're unlucky enough to not be going to an amazing convention or just really unlucky with winning things like I am, you can always contact me about a custom doll. I love remaking designs. My shop is currently a little light in dolls due to preparations for a DC convention I will be attending in August. So please, don't be shy! I love to make dolls which will make others smile.

Back to School Sales, already!!!

Ahhh! I'm still trying to get into summer mode over here an noticed, while going through the Sunday paper, all the back to school sales. Crazy talk! Our homeschool is mostly a year-round school, because Bear and Bun start begging for school when we take too long of a break. (Let's cross our fingers they're still like that when they are teenagers.)

Usually I try to hold off on back to school shopping until our state offers a tax free weekend to buy school supplies, but last year the stores were nearly sold out by the time that date came around. (August 4-6 for Virginia residents btw.)

Personally, I'm weak for office supplies. It makes me so giddy buying things like pens and notebooks. The smell of fresh office supplies. Ahhh!! It's too good. To try to keep me from going overboard and within budget, I have to take inventory on what we still have and what we need or need to replace. Usually glue, oh my goodness, our family flies through glue sticks.

I really don't believe we need much this year (aside from glue sticks), but I hear that siren's call from the stationary section of every store I visit. Maybe one extra notebooks won't hurt.

Dinosaur Camp Prep

Sorry for being so crazy busy!
I'm putting together a curriculum for my children I call Dinosaur Camp. After homeschooling through the year,we take it easy with a two week long unit based on dinosaurs. Bear LOVES dinosaurs (poor Bun, not so much, but she's a good sport as long as the activities are fun.)

Today I'm laminating so many pages, but it will be worth it. Once we get things all together, I'll make a huge post of exactly what we did with links to curriculum. I also need to intensively clean our house over the next two weeks in preparation for family to visit. Oh, and make product to sell at an Anime Convention in Washington, DC. Ahhhh!!! Not enough time!

I hope you're having a good weekend!

The Great Chicken

Over the Fourth of July weekend, this amazing specimen appeared in a neighbor's yard and I can't stop laughing. I mean look at that monster sized chicken! It's huge and the most patriotic chicken I've ever seen. Happy Birthday, America! Cock-a-doodle-doo!

I wonder if the person who put this gigantic chicken in honor of our country is a fan of The Bloggess or if they just really, really love gigantic metal patriotic chickens.

If you haven't read The Bloggess' account of giant metallic chickens, please read on.

Fly-by posting

Posting a quick post today!
My husband, The Dude, has a new job! Hooray! He has this week off while and will be starting his new job on Monday. But that also means our school and home schedule has been dumped on its ear.

I was going to write a big post, but my children are determined to test every fiber of my patience today. I'll post tomorrow instead.

Love and hugs,
Marcy

Podcasts!

I'm not sure about you, but I love podcasts! Today, I wanted to take the time to share some of my favorites!

99% Invisible
99% Invisible is a delightful podcast presented by Roman Mars. It covers a variety all the unnoticed architecture and design in every day life. There are so many interesting things I've learned from this program. I tried to go back and choose my favorite episode, but there are so many, including McMansions (and what it is that makes us crazy about them), the Mojave Phone Booth, Chinese Food, and Milk Carton children. There are just too many good episodes! 

Gastropod
Gastopod is a podcast co-hosted by Cynthia Graber and Nicola Twilley. This is one of the longer podcasts I listen to, because let's face it, having children means I don't have a lot of time to dedicate to listening to anything but squabbling children, however this one is one I need to listen to. I always learn something new about the history of food. 

Lore
I found Lore early on in my podcast listening and it is definitely one of my favorite podcasts. I must download each episode as soon as possible and I hungrily look forward to my children's nap time so I can listen to it. Lore is like having Aaron Mahnke read a storybook to you about the strange side of the world. They are artfully crafted stories accompanied by beautifully haunting piano pieces. Some stories are a little graphic, so please mind listening around the little ones.

Myths and Legends
If you're like me, you love mythology and Myths and Legends is one of the best mythological podcasts.  I really enjoy Jason's retelling of myths and fairy tales with a modern eye and never fail to laugh. I've even learned of a few stories I've never heard before. I also enjoy The Creature of the Week, where a mythological creature is introduced. Most episodes are ok for children, though thoughtfully Jason will let you know before hand if there is any questionable content.

The Adventure Zone
Out of curiosity I've started listening to this series and have to admit I'm loving it! The Adventure Zone is a podcast of 3 brothers and their father playing Dungeons and Dragons. The family is hilarious to listen to and makes me dearly wish I had the opportunity to play a table top game. This is one that is definitely not for children.

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Ok, so I've already gushed a bit about Lore, but I really love this podcast. I even am a proud Patreon Patron of this series. Well, if you're not familiar with this series, there is so much going on. Firstly, there will be a television series released on Amazon Prime later this year!

Aaron Mahnke, who is a writer first, is publishing his first Lore book! It's called The World of Lore: Monstrous Creatures and you'd better believe I've already pre-ordered my copy.

(By the way, on accident I've learned that if you preorder items from Amazon you eceive the lowest price offered from the time you've purchased the item to the time the item is released. This includes movies, books, and video games! No heavy lifting on your part! Gosh, I love automatic savings!)

Book Review: "_____ to the Rescue!" by John Himmelman

(The links in this post are affiliate links. If you purchase an item, I may get a paid a small amount. I am not being paid for a favorable review, I really do like reading picture books and sharing gems with you.)

When Bear was just beginning to go to our Library's story time, we were introduced to a wonderful series. We recently revisited it along with the last two in the series we had never read before and oh my gosh! These books are too fun!

The first in the series is Chickens to the Rescue (Barnyard Rescue). In this delightfully illustrated book, the Greenstalk family and barnyard animals are all having problems. They are saved by a flock of very helpful chickens. Each page has lots of little tidbits inside, so reading again and again is encouraged.

The second book in the series is Pigs to the Rescue: A Picture Book. This one is my personal favorite. While the chickens were so helpful, the pigs are a bit ... over helpful. They always try to help, but they do a little too much each time. My children loved finding "baby pig" as they named the piglet. (You can see baby pig on the cover hanging off the ladder.)

After a bit of a disastrous rescue, it's now the cows' turn in Cows to the Rescue (Barnyard Rescue). In this book, the cows help everyone at the county fair. This one is also very cute, but it just wasn't my favorite.  Maybe I'm not a big cow fan, though my son declares this is his absolute favorite.

Lastly, it's Duck to the Rescue (Barnyard Rescue). Poor Ernie the Duck wants to be helpful too, but nothing goes right for him, until a helpful little sheep steps in to make Ernie the hero he longs to be.

I LOVE this series. Like really and truly love it. The story is absolutely silly and the illustrations are so fun to look at. I swear, every time I reread a book, I discover some new aspect of a page. So, 2 thumbs up from me, especially for Pigs to the Rescue. This is a winner of a series.

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As I'm sure you've noticed, I had to phone it in with the photographs and link to Amazon today. Sorry about that, but it kinda works, because I wasn't sure if you have heard about Amazon's Prime Day on July 11th. I usually miss out on these kinda sales, so I wanted to be sure you guys knew about it ahead of time. It's a 30 hour period of big sales and some are going on now. I've picked up a few things for my business already. If you'd like, I can try to highlight some of the deals I see.

Don't have prime? You can Try Amazon Prime 30-Day Free Trial! Just in time for Prime Day! Amazon is already offering a variety of cool giveaways. Sadly, I haven't been very lucky, but maybe you will be!