Spring and Butterflies!

Very picture-intensive post!

I've been trying to do an art project of some sort with A each week for the past few months. In February, the month we started, we wound up doing things along a Valentine's theme - so hearts. In March, we wound up doing a rainbow and it kind of inspired the thought of doing a Spring theme for the next month or so. We have now completed several projects related to spring :) My next thought is to go with a garden type theme and do projects and trips related to that. So visiting different types of gardens in the SD area.

Here are some pictures of our spring themed art so far

The rainbow that started it - a background colored with crayons. And I cut up paper into little squares for the rainbow, then A helped us glue them on. She finally added her little frog sticker. When it didn't come off, she was a bit sad, so we will have to do sticker art another day :)

After the rainbow, we did a cloud and umbrella. Daddy did both of these with A. He drew an umbrella and they painted it with watercolors. The cloud was cotton balls, spread apart and glued down.

Next we made raindrops! I cut out raindrops and A painted some and colored some. I also painted some :)

Of course, A always helps me clean up after a project :)

The theme wall :)

After that, we started on flowers and butterflies. For the flowers, I cut out petals and we glued them together, A was more interested in carrying the gluestick :)

I had a conference in New Orleans in early April, and A came with me to visit our family in Mississippi. There, we went to an Insectarium and saw a butterfly garden. It was so amazing! A loved it, and I really wanted to visit another one with daddy. Turned out that there is one that goes on at the SD Safari Park (formerly the Wild Animal Park) but for only one month a year - April :) So we went to visit that last weekend, and it was just wonderful. It was much more crowded than New Orleans, but still so awesome to watch the butterflies.

In New Orleans,

At the Safari Park, they have a children's discovery area with puzzles, toys, plushies, books, and coloring pages. It is all themed and this month it was insects and butterflies, of course :) So A got to color a page there, and then we went to go visit the butterfly garden :)

Just beautiful! I hope to find some permanent ones around here that we might be able to see more than once a year, but I'm finding they're pretty rare!

Of course, to go along with our butterfly art and trips, we have also been reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar with A, who is a huge fan of Eric Carle :)

Intro

So after many hours of trying to figure out the "right" name, this one kind of stumbled upon me as I was texting my husband ideas for him to vote upon. My mind always blanks when I try to think of creative titles, names, etc. But I think this one fits for what I hope this blog to be.

I'm a graduate student who (attempts to) work at home while also taking care of my 18 month old daughter. My husband is also a student, though is about to graduate as an RN. We are both incredibly blessed to have the ability to spend significant time with our daughter, even if it does involve mass chaos as we try to balance everything. So we try to do a lot with her, whether it be dancing to music, playing outside, watching ants, watering our plants, crocheting a hat, or doing arts and crafts. We are also fortunate in where we live - San Diego, which has a plethora of things to do and see :)

So here's my attempt to share these journeys with others. At the very least, it will help capture moments when life seems to just fly by.

Why River Weaving? Because rivers are a great representation of life - flowing, finding unexpected things around each turn, full of life, being changed by and changing the world around them. Weaving because weaving helps eternalize memories, events, symbols. It captures the ephemeral moments and makes them material. And it too is a process, a story in its own making.

Of course, there is also the fact that you can't weave a river, just as you can't grasp water. You can only weave representations of it, only hold the idea of it.

And here we are :) Here I will have the happenings of our lives.