Craft Idea: Painting Fans

I don’t do crafts. But sometimes, yeah, I do crafts. This was our activity for the 9 y.o.’s birthday party, but it would lend itself to a VBS project. So I share.

Who were the artists? 18 Girls at the party, ages 3-13. Two of the girls (ages 4 & 6) played on the back porch the whole time, the others painted. All 16 painters, including a few very energetic ones, seemed to enjoy the project and stay focused on their work.

What we did: We painted folding fans. We acquired a box each of these white fabric ones, and these wooden ones. You find them in the wedding section of the craft store, and these were 18-count boxes. We used bottles of washable tempera paint, and also offered markers and glitter-glue (already on hand). For the paint we purchased six-packs of small bottles in metallic and glittery colors, and I think this worked well because no matter how hapless the artist, your paint selection was guaranteed to coordinate.

VBS Themes? This would be a great project if you are studying a saint who lived in a time and place where folding fans were widely used. One of our guests ran back home and brought a list of Japanese words she had from school, and two painters used that for their design. –> For any VBS lesson, you could provide a selection of possible design elements that suits your theme for the day.

Paint Control: Each artist received a cheap saucer-sized paper plate for a pallette. I squirted nickel-sized samples of desired colors on each girls’ plate. The girls got the message, and when they re-filled their paint, they took just a little at a time. I issued new plates on request to a couple artists who needed larger or refreshed pallettes.

Brush Protection: Our array of brushes included old toothbrushes, cheapo kids’ water color brushes, good quality kids’ brushes, and really nice adult painting brushes. I handed out the better kids’ brushes to the girls (one thin, one thick for each to start), but they were free to help themselves to anything on the table. No brush damage! I think that fan-painting lends itself to good brush technique because of the small surfaces.

Rinse Water Management: I used short, heavy mugs and glasses for the rinse water, and filled them no more than half-way. Girls shared cups placed in the center of the table, and I renewed the water on request. Low center of gravity pays off: no water spilled.

Budget: Ours fans were on sale for well less than $1 a piece, but suggested retail was something like $18.99 for an 18-count box. So shop around if your budget is tight. I spent about $10 on paint, and used perhaps a third of it. You could no doubt do much better on paint prices. –> We will use our leftovers on other projects, but for VBS, half-used paint bottles can easily turn into waste. If you need to strictly control the budget, pick just a few colors, and don’t open a new bottle of a color until you’ve finished the old one.

I can’t remember what the paper plates cost, but they were the super cheap ones, and for 16 painters we went through maybe 20 plates. I passed out napkins or paper towels on request, used a handful of those. I already owned the other supplies — brushes, rinse water cups, markers and glitter glue. Most people just used paint. On the wooden fans, this project could be done exclusively with markers if desired.

The paint needs to dry! I used old shower curtains to cover the carpet initially, and then used them to cover the shelving where the girls put out their fans to dry while we had birthday cake.

Project Time: I estimate we spent about 30 minutes on this project? In a classroom setting, you would want to have a second activity on hand for students who finish quickly. It would also be nice to have a come-back-later option for students who chose a very detailed design and ran out of time.

Caution: Everyone wants an extra fan. Just say no.

Socialized.

18 Girls.

12 bottles of paint.

50+ paintbrushes.

None on the floor.

I have arrived.

Wake up! Hey, Wake up!

That’s what my then two-year-old used to shout at his baby sister in the next seat when we arrived at our destination. The parents were not amused.

These two articles might not amuse you, either. But if you need to be really grumpy, these’ll do it.

–> I’m continuing with the regular-life-requires-my-attention-theme, so outsourcing my invective to ‘things that showed up in my inbox’.

From Christian LeBlanc, interesting link to an essay on contraception and the fall of the west.

The West lasted from AD 732, when Charles Martel defeated the Muslims at Tours, until 1960, where it fell without a battle. In 1960, the birth control pill became widely available. Many think of it as heaven, sexual nirvana, the route to self-expression, wish fulfillment, and liberation for millions of women. I think of it as Auschwitz in a bottle. It was and is genocide, as, using it, the women of my generation happily traded off 1,200 years of unparalleled growth, wealth, security, stability, scientific and ethical progress for a second BMW in the garage.

I’m not persuaded of author’s provocative conclusion (“Islam is the only way”), but the irony is there. In the 19th century the French quit reproducing — yes, before effective contraception became widely available — and by the late 20th were wringing their hands over the cultural impact of all the muslims they’d imported to do the labor of the children they’d never had. Germany has followed suit, and the US isn’t far behind.

(Though, luckily for our culture, we are importing truckloads of macho catholics with their awesome mariachi masses. Maybe God does love us more? Kidding. Really. The French have Brie — if that isn’t love, I don’t know what is. But yes, I do like a rousing Spanish mass now and again. Perks up the excessively-somber soul. And as much as I am moved by the beauty and devotion of faithful muslims at worship, no, I can’t slip down to the corner mosque for a mini-revival.)

Anyhow, key point of link for me is this: You can’t refuse to bear children, then get all shocked and horrified at the presence of the people you imported to do the work of the offspring you never had. You want someone t0 mow your lawn and do your dishes? Either rear yourself a pair of middle-schoolers, or hire someone else’s.

[Teenagers everywhere are now saying aha! You really did raise me to be a slave! The mother points out that she does a thing or two for her own children that she doesn’t do for the random low-wage stranger. Indeed, here may lie a bit of the problem: rather than a steady flow of youngsters who do the grunt work for a decade and then move on to greater work, we attempt to create a society divided between perpetual overlords and perpetual economic-teenagers. And then are shocked, just shocked, when the daring, hard-working, self-sacrificing immigrants turn out to be just like our own children — ready to move up in the world after a spell.]

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Your other link is this article from the HSLDA, from Swedish parents who moved to Finland in order to homeschool. I will use this as my cue to get off the internet educate a few fresh faces of my own.

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PS, castle news: We got a new roof. Looks a lot like the old one, only much, much younger.

March 1 Last Day to Register for CWC Online

Catholic Writers’ Conference Online: It’s free, no-obligation, and exceedingly helpful even if all you do is drop in for one or two things the whole week. Anyone is welcome, and you don’t have to be published or smart or talented or anything. I haven’t seen this year’s schedule, but typically there are courses of interest for all abilities and types of writers.

Tomorrow is the participant registration deadline. So go sign-up ASAP if you haven’t already.

Opinions Solicited (How often does that happen?)

Hathaway’s looking for opinions on his Crash Course in Catholic Ethical Thinking . I’m having my turn at the busy week, so I promised him I’d comment by mid-week or he should pester me. But you, aren’t you looking for someone to argue with today?

Here’s his ending:

. . . The Church can have compassion for the person in the extreme without saying “this teaching no longer applies because there is this one extreme case, and the rest of you can go on and do whatever you want.”When someone’s holding a gun to your head, either literally or metaphorically, and you do something intrinsically evil, you’re not a sinner. If the Nazis are at your door, and you lie out of fear, that’s not heroic virtue, but it’s also not a sin.

Again, intrinsic evil just means that the act is always evil and can never be virtuous in and of itself. It does not mean that it’s as bad as something else or better than something else.

So:

1. Means, motive and end are all good? Act is virtuous.2. Means, motive and end are good, circumstances are extreme? Act is heroically virtuous.

3. Means are neutral or good. Intentions are good. There are multiple ends, at least one bad and one good? This is “double effect”.

4. Means are bad. Intentions are good. Ends are bad. Circumstances are extreme or person is ignorant? The act is wrong, but culpability is reduced, possibly to nothing.

5. Means are bad. Intentions are bad. Ends are bad. Person is ignorant or not acting in total freedom; and/or matter is not grave? Venial sin.

6. Means are bad. Intentions are bad. Ends are bad. Person acts in full knowledge and freedom. Matter is grave. Mortal sin.

It is really crucial to be clear on these distinctions. To say “X is intrinsically evil” is not the same thing as saying “Y is a sinner for doing X” or even to say that “X is always mortally sinful”. It’s just to say that the using X as a means puts the action under categories 4-6 above.

Read the lead-up. Tell him what you think. Friendly guy.

Lent-o-rama: Slubgrip; Sardines

1. Slubgrip.

You may have been wondering: What could cause a person who doesn’t post ads on her blog, to suddenly post an ad on her blog?

And you would not have been far off, if you thought, “She just wanted that cool-loookin’ gargoyle image.” Except that she hadn’t seen the gargoyle image until after she wrote to Fr. L saying she’d be happy to post his ad.

Very puzzling, isn’t it? The solution to the mystery is this: The Gargoyle Code is a really good book. And your hostess likes to promote really good books, because, well, the more good books people buy, the more good books publishers will print, and thus the more good books your hostess will find crowding the shelves of her favorite local Catholic bookstore.

Blatant self-interest. And now, in a fabulous wish come true, Father Longenecker has written yet more gargoyle-y fiction goodness. You can read this week’s episode here. And then you will know why you should buy his book. Which you can do by clicking the ad in the sidebar, or by visiting your favorite local catholic bookstore.

2. Sardines.

This is not usually a food blog, which is strange given how much I like the stuff. But as many of my readers eat, and a few of them cook, why shouldn’t we go off topic now and again?

Now is the time for my older sister and all other people who don’t like seafood to depart by clicking on one of the fine links in the sidebar. Many of them contain no horrid accounts of eating things that used to swim.

Anyway, here’s the story: SuperHusband points out to me, a person who eats tuna straight from the can, that anchovies and sardines are superior in every way. Insert list: health, environment, mercury . . . you begin to get the picture of the moral superiority that can be had by purchasing the flat rectangular tin instead slightly taller round tin.

How could I resist such an opportunity? I cannot be upstaged in the food-virtue department by my own spouse, can I?

So I go buy the stuff on the next grocery trip, and stick it in the cupboard where the tuna used to sit.

And then a couple weeks later, I get really really hungry, on a Friday when my normal non-lenten penance of staying off the internet has once again spectacularly failed and not eating meat seems much simpler, and we are all about light penances here, and in a fit of braveness I open the anchovies.

Here is the part where you laugh. Because, you who know anything about anchovies (as your hostess did not), knows that one does not eat them straight from the tin as one might do with tuna.

So now I have this open tin of anchovies, moral superiority on the line, and no, I can’t just give them to the cat. She is a small cat. And the dog will just get indigestion. And anyway, giving the pets expensive human food is no way to one-up the spouse.

But here’s what I discovered: You can cook with the stuff. And it’s good! Convenient! Useful! Tasty!

Now all the readers who already know how to cook with sardines and anchovies may quit laughing at me and click on a link in the sidebar.

Also, all readers who can boil pasta and have three Joy of Cooking recipes you can make, but you don’t really know how to cook yet, because let’s admit it, “winging it” in the kitchen is a skill one builds over time, you should just maybe consider the sidebar too. Because the potential for disaster and ridicule is quite high any time a can of tiny, strongly-flavored fish is involved.

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Now, to the empty internet, here’s what I figured out:

VERY IMPORTANT: Purchase the sardines or the anchovies “in oil”. Not the one in mustard sauce or something. Just oil. Fish in oil. That’s all you want. Two ingredients. (Plus salt or whatever. But no delightful surplus condiment flavors.)

Now you’ve got the proper tin in hand. You know the part of the recipe at the very beginning, where you put oil in the bottom of the pan and saute your garlic or onions or ginger or whatever it is that needs to be sauteed first of all?

Instead of the butter or oil, just dump the whole tin of fish right into the bottom of the pan. Use that as your cooking oil for that sauteing step. The fish will naturally get diced/shredded in the process of sauteeing your vegetables. Then proceed with the recipe as normal.

MORE VERY IMPORTANT: If you don’t like how fish tastes, don’t cook with fish. This is not one of those “how to sneak seafood into the recipe” tricks. This method gives the recipe a light seafood-taste, akin to say a crab recipe, or adding fish sauce to your curry. Depth, complexity, and all the moral superiority for which you had hoped, but in a seafood-y way.

What it’s good for:

Recipes that call for ‘fish sauce’. Think of certain thai recipes, curries, etc.
Soups that either already seafood-y, or that would like to be converted. With the caveat that say your spouse really loves oyster stew, that does not mean he loves anchovy-oyster stew. Don’t over-complicate recipes that want to be simple. Use bacon drippings for the oyster stew, your spouse will thank you.
Pasta sauce! Red sauce if you like, but this makes a great base for a vegetable-parmesan sauce, and maybe use up the last little bit of the cream leftover from the vichyssoise.

If you use anchovies, plan around the saltiness. You will not need to add the usual amount of salt or soy sauce to your recipe. Also, this is a good time to balance the intensity of the anchovies with something sweet and something sour (lime, vinegar, etc.) Sardines are milder, so you season more or less like you would have if you’d just made the recipe the normal way.

Happy Lent. Does it count as a penitential if you are looking forward to the new recipes?

Parents Caught Raising Well-Rounded Daughter

UPDATE: (Long as JDM has caught me goofing off again, I might as well do it right): Brad Warthen is on topic. Check out the video he links, hilarious. So true.

(Said by a fellow LLL grad who has not only CD’d, but hung them out to dry on the line. Then again, my 2nd-born’s first food was Tiramisu. My credentials are doubtful.)

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The Livesay’s on their daughter with the “weirdest life ever”.

I link because the whole parenting-police theme is central to that homeschooling book I’m reportedly writing. (Yes I am in fact writing it. Slowly.) We live in a bizarre society where one of the national pastimes is getting all huffy because someone else’s life isn’t one long giant defense of your own personal decisions.

The really funniest one is when some lady (yes, usually a lady), says something along the lines of, “Sure, nobody’s perfect, but how can that family possibly homeschool, when their children’s socks don’t even match!” [This is ironic, because of course if sock-matching were the measure of educational success, it would be so much easier to assess the schools.]

I kid not. People — registered voters with college degrees, even — truly do say this stuff. Lately I mostly hear it about those horrible horrible parents like the Livesays, who send their children to school, but the method can be used against any parenting decision anytime anywhere, so long as you pick your audience properly. The formula is this:

a) Insist that of course you aren’t setting up impossible standards

b) Choose someone or something you don’t like

c) Randomly choose some criteria that you have decided should be the central measure of human worth.

d) Make sure it is something that you excel at, and your target does not. Also, make sure the person to whom your are speaking manages well enough at the proposed criteria.

e) Use a tone that suggests the parents are feeding the children excrement or mating them with livestock, as you point out your target doesn’t meet your made-up requirement.

f) Chortle triumphantly at your brilliant proof that your target should give it up and just come to you for lessons in proper living.

You think I exaggerate. No I do not. People do this. And it makes life a nightmare for parents who are genuinely trying to figure out the best way to rear their children under difficult circumstances. So lay off the parents. That’s my Friday sermon: Lay off.

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BTW if you aren’t feeling chastised (or smug) enough, Ruth at Wheelie catholic has more cautionary tales of employee horror. Because the utter cluelessness of mankind knows no bounds. Go read. Be warned. Amend your ways. Find yourself rocketing to Employee of the Year. It’s all good.

Lent-o-rama and other quick notes

I made the Aggie Catholic Guide to Lent (thank you Mark Shea) it’s own special category in the sidebar. Am going to maybe build the category up a bit. Send suggestions. Thanks.

And yes, yes, I know I am behind on updating the sidebar with other great blogs I’ve recently started reading and recommending. Pester me if yours isn’t up on the list by Monday.

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Please pray for a special intention for some missionaries in difficulty. Thanks.

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Brad Warthen posts Clark Whelton’s What Happens in Vagueness Stays in Vagueness. Let it be a warning to us all.

Mr. Magundi on Beggars.

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And how to cut to the chase with your friendly but inexperienced evangelical door-to-door missionary:

Kind and earnest missionary asks, “If you died tomorrow, where would you go?”

Reflect. Give honest answer: “Purgatory.”

Silence. “Um, here, have one of these.” Hands over tract, quickly retreats to next door.

Perfectly nice kids, by the way, and nothing anti-catholic in the tract. Basic model plan-of-salvation, baptist version. Refreshing, really. Catholics could learn a thing or two.

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