The Call: The Final Push — Jessica My oldest son is a senior this year. He will be taking the SAT for the second and last time next Saturday. A lot is riding on his score and although he feels comfortable with how much he has prepared, we continue to push him to study. Response: […]
The Call: Pumpkin House — Cheryl Four years ago, when the major renovation on our house was just about finished, we went down to New Hampshire for a weekend that included a family reunion and a day at Storyland. While driving through North Conway, we passed a colonial-style house painted pumpkin orange, with cream trim. […]
The Call: How Not to Conduct a 365 Project — Jessica Helpful Hint: Don’t wait until the end of the day to try and grab a picture — no matter how much business you had to conduct during the day (and evening), and no matter how bad the conduct of your youngest children. I’ve been […]
The Call: Long Distance — Cheryl I have one older brother and one older sister. Maureen and I have always been close, and I was very thankful that our sixth child was a girl. With four brothers, Bridget needed a sister. Mine has been one of my closest companions, and I hope that Bridget and […]
The Call: Lensbaby Mama — Jessica One of my favorite tools and the one that I feel really pushes me to reach my creative potential is my Lensbaby. It does more than just bend and create blurry photos, really. To create a successful shot, you really have to think about what you are doing and […]
The Call: Unabridged — Cheryl About three years ago, I read A Tale of Two Cities for the first time, having borrowed an old hardcover from Dennis’s parents. I enjoyed the book, but found much of it confusing. Reading the introduction after finishing the story (I sometimes do it that way) made me realize that […]
The Call: The Green Screen — Jessica My eight-year old son has been playing with stop-motion animation. Thanks to a great little app on his Nintendo DS, he has a made a few “shorts” of his lego Star Wars figures battling aliens and crashing their ships. He asked me if he used a green screen […]
The Call: Pouring Out the Pink — Cheryl Pink always attracts my attention: it’s been my favorite color forever. The only pink walls in the house are in Bridget’s room. I haven’t been able to sell Dennis on them anywhere else (but we have lots of blue and lots of purple). Therefore, I have to […]
The Call: Photography Crash Course — Jessica My husband has suddenly been bitten by the shutterbug. After looking through a bunch of websites over the week, he finally asked me last night if I had any books that I could recommend for a beginner trying to understand the essence of photography. Ha! Do I have […]
The Call: Precious Metal — Cheryl Mom had a yellow gold charm bracelet. I loved to open the drawer of her dresser and take the lid off of each square, white or cream-colored box to reveal necklaces, bracelets, earrings and pins. Most had been gifts from my father. I knew exactly which box contained the […]
The Call: Leading Lines — Jessica Thus, to see what shapes make up the everyday objects in our world, we must reach back into our child psyche. A dining room table becomes just a rectangle, a beach ball or an umbrella are now spheres and circles, power lines on the road are just converging lines, […]
The Call: Folded and Fierce — Cheryl The flat plane pleases my eye. The colors, the patterns — They inspire me to cut, Layer, tear, paste and paint. Not my dear Henry, though: All he wants to do is fold. The Response: Rain Down — Jessica I was feeling a bit like Stanley today. It […]
The Call: India — Jessica Our black lab is a familiar site on the couch in the study. Even though we shoo her off and tell her no, she always seems to jump right back up. And since she always looks so sweet and comfy-cozy, I just don’t have the heart to make her get […]
The Call: Magic Bracelet — Cheryl A year or two ago, I embarked on learning peyote stitch by creating a bracelet with black and blue-green seed beads. I was happy with the stitch and the results, but I wasn’t sure how I’d finish the base I had created, and I put it aside. Until recently, […]