Stockholm Octavo

Picked up roses for today's art class at Albertson's. This one is an intriguing smoky salmon red. The children won't like it, but I couldn't resist. Three to nine year olds prefer the glaring colors I call Walmart Purple and Target Pink, preferably with sequins and leopard prints.

I've read several books since I finished Karen Engelmann's Stockholm Octavo, but that is the one staying in my mind.  The patterns of the octavo, a type of fortune telling with cards, are much like patterns in quilt blocks and even tie dye.  Tie dye being my other project of the moment.

This is the first time I've tried pulling basting threads on a dye project.



© 2013 Nancy L. Ruder

Red orbit

Struggling with my approach for art instruction with an incredibly young group of students this semester.  The smallest kiddies can just barely hold a pencil to scribble circles, and are inconsistent naming colors.

Stop worrying. Start with RED. That's what the voice said.

That voice is just the deep, stewy crockpot in my head, slowly simmering inspiration from seemingly random leftovers.

Can't tell my prefrontal cortex from my automatic ice cube maker, but I'm listening to the audiobook of Jonah Lehrer's How We Decide. The audiobook is fascinating, although reading the paperback kept putting me to sleep. How, oh how, am I going to teach art tomorrow?

Really red?  Just yesterday I posted about meaningless alliterative intensifiers, and "really" might be one in this situation.  What is the slow-cooker recipe for tomorrow's lesson? Stir it all together and see what happens!

A new Mars rover--Curiosity

My grandbaby reminds me of his dad's Red Rings toy from Johnson and Johnson back in 1982.

Outside my sliding door, Dad's colored rings hang from my birdfeeder hook. They used to hang in the dining area window. Pretty sure I bought the rings at the Dallas Arboretum and gave them to my folks.

Inside the condo, I unearthed a ziplock bag of red plastic peanut butter jar lids and other nesting lid sizes.

Paper-Pro Easy Punch 1-hole punch from Office Max chomping through ten sheets of paper. I'm impressed!

So, tomorrow night I hope to have photos of our art class red rings.

© 2012 Nancy L. Ruder

Hotter than a hub cap

Welcome to the red and blue world of sight-reading words. It's where I live, my den hut pup tent. Look, look, Dick, see Mom's cap.

My weekend was a pig mop pen sit.

Monday was a wet kid nap mat set.

I dream I can van map run hit road Jack.

Over a hundred degrees again today so it's a bug sun hot ant day.



hub and tab are 2 guys with hats and caps drinking from mugs, jugs, cups, kegs and taps.


Can Tab get a hit on his next at bat? Does Tab munch nuts? Does Tab chew gum in the dug-out?

Can Hub cook ham in a big pot?

The kids don't get hub, tab, or keg, but comprehend put hot dog in bun.

Tab is a diet soft drink.  Hub is a wheel cap, or an airline system or a communications center. A hub has spokes when you speak.

When red consonants and blue vowels work together, they make words.  You can't have one without the other.

Pop top pull tab cold can hot sun long day, oh my, what more to say?


© 2012 Nancy L. Ruder

Go Big Red

Please make this drought go away.  Bring on the rain! The map is red, but the plantings along the freeway on my commute are brown crispy critters.  It's a highly flammable world.

Please let Big Red keep helping Dad.  She is a gift for my spirit, and for Dad's connection to the here and now.  When Big Red, aka Penelope, offers her hand to shake Dad's, he still pulls his hand from under the blanket to shake.  She calls Dad, "Papa", and "My friend".  Her compassion, openness, and humor are the best medicine.  She can tell me in one breath that Dad tossed his lunch tray on the floor AGAIN, and in the next say she's about ready to start throwing things herself!  Oh, Lordy, don't we all have days like that at our jobs?  Then she has a bowl of tomato vegetable soup saved back for Dad when he gets hungry at the wrong time.

Grow big, red cannas.  Keep attracting those hilarious, healing hummingbirds.  I love their ruby-throated antics and territorial aerial battles.  The cannas are taller than the privacy fence.

  


© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

My red lettered days

Yesterday was an "in the red" sort of day.  The nice plumber came to solve three long-standing non-emergency aggravations:

• The cold water shutoff valve leading to the washing machine was calcified, ossified, petrified like a geologic cave formation.  This is a chicken/egg problem.  Did the shutoff become frozen when the washer cycle control went crackerdog and would only fill with hot water?  Or did the cycle control go flopbot because the shutoff valve was frozen?  Now mind you, the washing machine is about twenty years old, and the shutoff valve is probably forty.  If I bought a new washer, I would still have to replace the shutoff valves.  Plus, I had a walrus/washer problem.  Were all my clothes shrinking because the washer always filled with hot water?  Or was it that I was, ahem, outgrowing my clothes?So now I have very cute new matador shutoff valves.  They look just like the matador in The Story of Ferdinand.  I may rig my laundry room to play the overture to "Carmen" whenever I open the door, just like the restrooms at "La Madeleine" play French 101 lessons while you sit on the potty. [See visual aids A and B]

A.  Matador shutoff valves

• All my drinking glasses come out of the dishwasher all spotty. There's not enough water pressure for the kitchen sink or the dishwasher.  Sure, the dishwasher may have lingering issues from the Big Meltdown, but now everything under the sink is all pretty and the hoses don't look like macrame.

  

B.  Matador illustration, Lawson c1936

• Then there's the darn rusty bathtub/air conditioner problem Of Which We Do Not Speak, except that if the plumber is already at my condo he might as well deal with EVERYTHING! Let's just say the plumber has fixed the problem and the air conditioner should not drain rusty water into my bathtub.  I've cleaned the tub with Super Iron Out Rust Stain Remover.  We will see...

So Wednesday was a day of $$$$ condo ownership fun.  Friends took me to supper and a play last evening to cheer me up.  Now I get why geezers go out to dinner at 4:45.  If I am the youngest person at the table, none of us in the candlelit booth will have long enough arms to read the little print on the check to figure out the tip.  And the play?  A dripping blood-red very dark musical comedy written and performed by Matthew Posey in his home/theatre, Ochre House.  The Dallas Observer reviewer called it "Sweeney Todd sandwiched between elements of Greek tragedy and the Muppets".   [See  C].

C.  "The Butcher" playbill

As dark maroon as Wednesday was, Thursday was a cinnabar delight.  Meet us at 10:30 the email suggested.  Short notice.  Long day of fun.  Three old friends.  My opera buddy.  My blogging muse.  My amazing, funny, stressed, generous, thoughtful muse!  A tolerant La Madeleine restaurant staff wondering if/when we would ever leave.  Shaky after many American coffee refills.  [See strawberry rhubarb jam and Chinese chop, D-H visual aids].

D.  Chop  and strawberry rhubarb jam.

E.  Dad will love this jam!

F.  A sense of honor and validation.

G.  The gift of my chosen name.  

H.  It feels magical!

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Twisted demise of my new parka

But I just got this coat!

After my creek cleanup effort last Sunday, I tossed my black Pillsbury DoughGirl parka into the washer with all the other muddy clothes.  Moved it to the dryer.  Hung it on a hanger.  Got up Monday after a way too short weekend, and struggled into the parka to go to work.  And struggled.  What? Ho?  Something was askew.  Why couldn't I move my right arm?  Why did I look like Igor in "Young Frankenstein"?  Why was my coat AB-normal?

Somehow all the filling in my new parka had come loose from the quilting, except at the right shoulder.  So all the poof had agitated and tumbled around and around like a ballerina with one shoe nailed to the floor until it was the size of a baseball/bagel around the vortex and rock hard.

If you happen to need a chain untangled, a shoestring unknotted, your Christmas tree light strings salvaged, I am your girl.  But even I could not untwist the batting and move it back where it belonged.  I wasn't brought up to just surrender and discard something that might yet be fixed or repurposed.  Oh, the low self-esteem!  I slunk to the dumpster to toss in the coat and debated whether I should also discard its detachable hood.

The Montgomery Ward store where I bought my new parka went out of business in 2001.  I quit shopping there in 1995, having purchased the coat when I returned the final Valentine gift from my spouse.  I was pretty irritable, having found our Wards credit card bill.  My spouse purchased two tropical flower push-up bra/panty sets, and a gold ankle bracelet with a heart charm.  I received one bra/panty set for Valentines Day.  The salesclerk in the jewelry department translated the SKU codes from the bill, and showed me the garish ankle bracelet.  Geez, divorce was due to irreconcilable aesthetics, among so many other things! 

Today I purchased a new fleece winter jacket.  It is Valentine red.  Life is good.  Just ask Igor.

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Christmas of the birds

Our pencil holder is scrap wood, adding machine tape core, red felt, black bead, pipe cleaner, black acrylic paint, and a bit of pine greenery. 

The card is a Charlie Harper print. 
© 2010 Nancy L. Ruder

Red Hot Bad Napper Chili

My temper tantrum student brought a most appropriate gift of Firehouse Chili mix.  She has come a long way in our consistent environment since entering school, but she is still red hot more often than not. 

When she is bad she is horrid, just like the little girl with the curl.  She resists napping even though she is smart enough to know a good nap would make her feel better.


As a mom, I read the Mother Goose rhymes with certain personalizations.  Once you do that, you have to use the same personalizations every single time you read the rhyme.  Who knows how "smack dab" became part of the reading?  It must be pronounced like a hissing/chomping reptile with a backhand to the forehead:

There was a little girl
Who had a little curl
Smack DAB in the middle of her forehead.


And when she was good
She was very good
And when she was bad she was horrid.

Just what does "smack dab" mean? 

In essence, the phrase means "slapped precisely in the center." According to the Oxford English Dictionary, smack-dab showed up in print in 1892: "He hit him smack dab in the mouth" [Dialect Notes I, 232].

The "at" symbol, @, always looks to me like the curl smack dab in the middle of a forehead.  The chili is looking mighty fine simmering on the stove.  Not a bit like a tantrum...

© 2010 Nancy L. Ruder

Twinkly health care reform

When I am in charge of the world, there will be four national health care plans for all Americans.  We will have a choice, of course, because Americans are all about choosiness.  The options will be:

 Blue--For folks who want peace on earth and need a little piece of quiet for the holidays.

  Red--For people who turn on the rear burner but put the pan on the front burner.

  Green--For people who take reusable bags to the grocery store.

  Multi--For people who like people...the luckiest people in the world.

All the plans would be essentially the same.  All would guarantee that you see your doctor within 45 minutes of your scheduled appointment time or the visit is free.  All would fully cover mini Christmas lights as preventive Mental Health care for up to $15 in new strings per year.

© 2010 Nancy L. Ruder

Post Its falling down like hail

The leaves near the creek reminded me of, gasp, the pile of neon red Post It bookmark stickies on the shelf next to my dictionary and field guides.  Shouldn't it be the other way around?  No poet would compare autumnal foliage to office supplies.  How dare you say "The blizzard smelled just like White-Out"?  That would be like saying Mom's homemade macaroni and cheese was almost as good as the Kraft box stuff!

Still, the autumn breeze was sending golden leaves raining down, and making the red leaves shimmer.  Had to head back home to Google the lyrics to Nat King Cole's song "Tenderly".  The evening breeze caressed the trees tenderly...

Competing for my attention was a Robert Johnson lyric about leaves falling down like rain.  No, blues falling down like hail, even though the leaves and Post Its were red. 

So now I've got a hellhound on my trail of sticky notes.  Hansel and Gretel might want to stop by Staples.

That was easy.

© 2010 Nancy L. Ruder

Red

Prairie Bluestem suggested I find one color or theme in my possessions and build my interior design on that color.  What a wonderful organizing principle.  Oh, that I could discipline myself to make that choice.



I like red. 



A lot. 



Not really scarlet, crimson, or garnet.  More pimento and marinara and fire engines.



The red of the cannas that attract the hummingbirds.  Especially the red of my mother's collection of Dansk cookware, and the hot lava glaze on the Woolly Mammoth's pottery piece. 



Fresh tubes of cadmium red light oil and watercolor paints.  Cherry tomatoes and a well-worn dictionary.



Stuffed red peppers for a winter supper. A can of Mr. and Mrs. T Bloody Mary mix on the airplane between Denver and Lincoln.



Head 'em up.  Move 'em out.  The red pieces should probably be accents in my condo arrangement.


© 2010 Nancy L. Ruder

Who said red?

Thanks to suggestions from a NETLS earliest literacy workshop hand-out, I've started the After Nap Storytime.  The storytime routine helps the children have a quiet, special time in what was often a crabby part of their day.

What is NETLS?  The Northeast Texas Library System is a cooperative or consortium of libraries in thirty-three counties providing support and continuing education to member libraries.  My longtime friends shared what they learned at the workshop when I subbed at the library. 

One suggestion, the Color Box, from their workshop fit my immediate need to help our youngest students learn the names of colors.  I put together a box of red objects because I had a nice red box.  Each child pulls an object from the box with closed eyes. The child does a little show & tell about the object, naming the color, describing the object.  We joke about getting our hands stuck in the box by trying to pull out more than one object. From way back in my memory came the conversation, "Who said red?  Did you say red?  I said red."  That became part of our repetitive Color Box game.  I think it comes from Mary Serfozo's book, Who Said Red?



On another front I am addressing the division of Mom's collection of red Dansk pieces between myself and my siblings. So, who said red Dansk?


 

Last weekend I finally caught a red skimmer dragonfly with my little Canon camera.  Today I found a strange red lily growing between the condos and the creek.  It doesn't fit either patio or wilderness. 


I wonder if it ran away to become a carnival worker on the State Fair midway. The more I looked at it, the more the lily resembles the Tilt-a-Whirl ride at the fair.

© 2010 Nancy L. Ruder

Commuter's warning/Commuter's delight

Weeks are speeding by without any opportunities for reading Moby Dick on my Kindle.  I worry that I'll forget whatever I had learned about sperm whales by the time life settles down. 

Sailors are on my mind, though, as I head to work straight into the sunrise.  4 x 12 years ago, more or less, I learned a song from The American Singer elementary school songbook.  Our teacher must have blown her pitchpipe to start us singing:

Red sky in morning
Sailors take warning.
Red sky at night
Is sailors' delight.

Did anybody tell the sailors that sunset and sunrise colors are more saturated when the air is full of particulate matter like pollen and dust? 

Life is spinning along while I try to sell my father's house and manage finances.  At the same time, I am working on a continuing professional education packet about music, earliest literacy, and shared culture.

Did anybody tell the sailors that IRA redemptions are totally taxable?  After several attempts, I talked with one of my father's financial advisors about making funds available to pay Dad's bills.  Somehow I got hide'n'seek crossed with tax recommendations.  I just want to know why Ollie Ollie's oxen are tax income free.

And who is this Ollie Ollie fellow?  Does he drive to work when the sun is just rising?  Does Ollie lift a coffee mug from his cupholder to salute the morning?  Does Ollie ponder our shared culture, its musical connection, and the mangling thereof?

© 2010 Nancy L. Ruder

Beaded bag, Bohemia, and bedazzled

My sister brought me this beautiful shawl from her trip to Prague and Vienna. We found the beaded bag in a trunk of things from our great aunts. The two items go together perfectly. I can't wait to doll up for a Dallas Opera performance at the new Winspear Opera House with them.


We love our new and very red opera house. Opera-goers were dressed for the Sunday performance of Verdi's "Otello" in their scarlet and crimson finery. I hadn't seen so much red since my last Cornhusker football game in the Seventies.

Fritzi's Chihuly

I think this part of the Chihuly exhibit would have been my mother's favorite. It reminded me of her red Dansk cookware and serving pieces. Chihuly calls it the Orange Basket Forest, but the orange is very close to red.











© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

Lining up

In elementary school my teachers used to think up different arrangements for students to line up--alphabetical by first name, or last, or both; by birthday, by height... We did a lot of things by height back then, in a form of discriminatory shortism. We lined up for the class photo or the Christmas music program by height. When we chose up sides for recess games like Red Rover, the two tallest kids were usually the captains making the choices. These were scary times for skinny short kids. The outcomes were more influential than any NFL draft, at least for a generation of psychologists and licensed family therapists with kids to put through college.

I like to use categories that don't scar students for life:

If you have pink socks you may line up.
If you have white socks you may line up.
If you have no socks you may line up.
If you have two socks you may line up.

© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

Hyphenated married bird names

The preschoolers are learning to identify common birds. Red-headed woodpecker, ruby-throated hummingbird, red-winged blackbird. The older children are learning more exotic birds, like the scarlet macaw.

I'm thrilled that they are learning synonyms and subtleties for red. Crimson, scarlet, and ruby just make language more interesting!

To hyphenate, or not to hyphenate? That was my question. Some of our bird materials hyphenate "red-headed" and "red-winged". Others do not. My trusty Birds of North America prefers hyphenation across the board.

Visiting with one girl about the woodpecker, I remarked that it is a "very handsome" bird. "Yes," she said, "he looks ready to get married." She seemed to think the bird's markings resembled a rented wedding tuxedo! I can see her point. He just needs a bowtie. What will the bride be wearing? Are the owl and the pussycat invited?

© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder