Hair History: 1960's

My current collaborative work with photographer Jake and Jen Moreland of Two Birds Photography. Thanks to our beautiful and desirable models.

Moving

Hi everyone! I am moving all my blogging efforts to my professional blog maryellenleroy.blogspot.com. Please join me there!
Mary

Parenting with Star Wars: The Power of The Dark Side

In one of our bed time conversations about Star Wars James asked me,
"Mom, why did Anakin choose The Dark Side? Why would anyone choose The Dark Side?"
I was so pumped that he asked that question. I love an opportunity to talk to my kids about truth and our world.

I think it's a question that we all need to think about. To understand the question though you have to understand The Dark Side of The Force.

In Star Wars, The Force is an energy field that is made by living beings and surrounds all beings. Some beings are specifically sensitive to The Force and it's power. These beings are selected right after birth and taken to be trained as Jedi Knights. The light side of The Force is a good energy that is used to protect and teach virtues like patience, self control, wisdom, respect, quietness, etc. It takes years for a Jedi Knight to learn to use it to administer peace and justice in the galaxy.

There is another side to The Force called The Dark Side. It uses anger, hatred, violence and jealousy to give it's followers very powerful skills in a short period of time. The beings that have force sensitivity that turn to the dark powers of The Dark Side are called Sith Lords. The Sith are the Jedi's greatest enemies. The Sith crave power and control and will do anything to get what they want. Many other beings worship The Dark Side of The Force and don't have force sensitivity. They are just bad guys.

So why would anyone choose The Dark Side?

This is my answer to James,

"We have so many choices every day. Sometimes we know what is a good choice. Some times we make mistakes. Many people choose The Dark Side because they are angry or hurting. Some people choose The Dark Side because they want money or to be in charge. Some people choose The Dark Side because they believe that it will help them or because it sounds like fun. It is very sad when someone chooses The Dark Side. Does The Dark Side ever help anyone James?"

"No, it hurts people," James will reply.

Then I can say, "James, Anakin made a bad choice to join The Dark Side but isn't it awesome that he changes at the end of Star Wars? Even if we make bad choices we can still change and learn to make good choices."

Now because I am a dedicated follower of Jesus Christ and His teachings I usually also add that God loves us no matter what side of The Force we choose and that He keeps loving us and never gives up. I want James to always know that there is always redemption and hope.

This may seem over the top to some of you. I am so happy to be over the top though. I want to reach my kids with lessons about truth in any way I can. I am just speaking the language of James!

Mary

Parenting With Star Wars

Several people have asked me to blog about our journey with Star Wars. This is dedicated to them!

When James turned four he suddenly wanted to play bad guy/ good guy. I'm not really sure how it started. Being a pacifist I wasn't really sure how to steer him along. It was hard for me to watch him play guns and fight. I had to come to terms with his boyness. Almost all boys want to play guns and fight. They don't know what killing or death is they just know they want to run around and be as wild as possible. I knew I had to find a way to channel that.

I started out exposing him to a Christian super hero called Bibleman. It was really hard to watch but I figured it could teach him some spiritual truths. It totally back fired on me. I quickly realized that I was exposing him to behaviors he hadn't even discovered yet. The mix of fantasy and reality also really bothered me. I am all for teaching my kids to abstain from certain behaviors but I don't want to teach them just from a sin perspective. I want to teach them about making choices from both a spiritual angle and a practical angle. It was mostly just too old for him.

I can't do super heroes. I think they are a bit cheesy. I also am bothered by their portrayal of women. What kid needs to see boobs hanging all over a comic book page?

I finally decided to watch Star Wars with him. There are a few reasons why it worked out perfectly for our family.

1. It is classic American cinema.
2. It is story rich. Story is so important.
3. It is science fiction.
4. Princess Leia Organa is an awesome portrayal of a strong and compassionate woman.
5. I enjoy watching it anytime.
6. It doesn't focus on death but life.
7. It clearly represents the battle between evil and good and all the complexities in between.
8. It teaches respect for elders.
9. It teaches forgiveness and redemption.
10. It teaches radical racial acceptance.
11. It opens the door for many spiritual conversations.

I am sure there are a few more that I can't think of in this moment. (Justin is watching a Weezer interview and it is distracting me.)

We watch a Star Wars movie at least 4 times a week. We have costumes, books, bedding, toys, puzzles, stickers.....................................................

Next in my Parenting with Star Wars series I will focus on my wonderful conversations with James about "The Dark Side" (You don't know the power. There is no escape!)

Mary

I have been thinking about cosmetics. A lot. I need a break from blogging about my art classes so I am going to talk about cosmetics.

I work in a salon part time. I use a ton of chemicals when I do. Many days after I work I have a heaviness in my chest or I develop cold symptoms. I am unusually sensitive to chemicals in cosmetics and beauty products. It's one of the reasons I can't stay a blonde for very long even though I love it.

Recently I was approached by a direct sales company to sell their cosmetics. I had been to one of their "spa nights" and must have been targeted as someone who is good at sales. I am usually pretty vocal at those kind of events. And it is true that if I like something I let the world know. The sales consultant gave me a bunch of products to sample for a few weeks to see what I thought. Even though I am very skeptical about direct sales products I agreed to try her samples.

I feel like she kind of opened Pandora's box for me. The whole scenario caused me to really think about how I feel about the beauty industry as a whole and my part in it.

I will say that I hate direct sales cosmetic companies. Most of them rant and rave about empowering and helping women.I don't dispute that they do give many women a chance to run their own business from the home and that this is valuable but I would like to make a few thought provoking comments concerning their business practices.

I wonder if it is helping women or hurting women to teach them how to ruthlessly sell cosmetics to their friends and family in the name of self esteem. Is it about really helping a woman with her self esteem? Is it helping or hurting women to spend so much money on needless cosmetics? Is selling them a twenty dollar hand scrub helping their self esteem? What about the harmful chemicals in the products? Is that helping or hurting women. I wonder if anyone else thinks these thoughts.

The company that approached me is called Beauti Control. The first thing I did was look at their website to find their parent company. I discovered that it was Tupperware Brands. Tupperware Brands also has six other skin care lines that they sell around the world. I am not thrilled about using a cosmetic line that is backed by a plastics manufacturer, especially one that is being shady about taking the BPA out of their plastics. The next thing I did was look them up on Cosmeticdatabase.com. The cosmetic database is a safety guide to cosmetics and personal care products brought to you by researchers at the Environmental Working Group. Basically the group signs contracts with different cosmetic companies to test and research their products and gives them a rating based on their toxicity. I was disappointed to see that Beauti Control won't even sign a contract with the company. I guess they have something to hide.

So I decided to pass on Beauti Control. I wonder what company I should look in to next on my quest for good cosmetics? While I ponder that I will also be thinking about what make-up line to buy for the salon.

Mary

Experiencing Art Week 2

(This is a really old penny.)

What an awesome week! I am so pumped that most of the kids worked in their art journals. Almost everyone had filled at least two pages. That is wonderful. This is a wonderful first step to seeing things as an artist does.


This week the kids drew pictures of their bedrooms in their books. We talked about them at length. I loved hearing about their "studios". A child's bedroom is a great picture of the art going on in their mind. I also asked the children to bring in something special from their bedroom. It was a great show. Here are some of the things they said and did:

-Neil brought in a Lego scorpion. "I love to build things for my room." he said.

-Ellie showed us a picture she drew of her bedroom. It was so interesting that she made her bed huge and her twins bed tiny. Maggie thought it was really funny.

-Max told us that he really enjoyed cutting out pictures of cars and comics. He filled many pages.

-I think it was Eian who drew us a picture of his walls with no furniture so we could see the art on his walls. His dad had painted him a skateboard. He also drew us another picture of his room with the furniture in it so we could see the layout of his room.

-Justus had a picture that didn't have rich artistic detail but it did have detail to scale. He included every window, door, shelf and even the heating vent.

-When asked what he brought to share Sam held us both of his thumbs. He had drawn two faces on them and gave us a little concert. The best part was I remember hearing him ask for a marker before class started.

-Maggie filled her journal with really funny stories. The above picture made me laugh out loud all day. She had about ten drawings just like it. I think Threadless should buy her design for a t shirt.

Here are some of the pictures of the fantasy rooms the kids designed.

The top picture is Neil's room. Notice the craft stick entry way. The next picture is Eian's room. He really concentrated on his carpet. The third picture is Sam's room. He brought his own stickers from home to use. The last picture is the room that Davis still hadn't glued when class was over. He wanted everything laid out just perfect before gluing. I wonder if he ever got around to it.:)

The most fun was had pilfering through all my junk. I let every child take as much home as they wanted. I can't wait to see what they do with it.

For next week they are supposed to draw, glue or take pictures of a dream they have had. We are going to talk about artists who use optical illusion in their work. It has such a dream like quality. Then we are going to spend the rest of class painting.

Here are some ideas you can use to help your kids this week:

- Talk about colors. Look at a favorite picture and have your child pick out the different colors. Have her/him draws those colors in circles in his/her journal.
-Talk about a dream you have had with your child. Have them draw a picture for you of your dream. Have them pick out colors to use with you.
- Spend time building a fort with your child on their bed.
-Take all the pillows in the house and build a palace. Have your child take a "nap" in the palace and then ask about the dreams they had.

Looking forward to talking to your kids about their dreams.
Mary

Experiencing Art Week 1

"Art lessons need to be in touch with Children's lives and center around things that have meaning for us all. Instead of exercises, art lessons need to be inspiring, tapping in to universal experiences and memories. Art or art lessons are real because they are deeply motivated from the artist's heart." George Szekely

I like to start each class by talking to the kids. We sit on the floor and talk about art and what they want to do in the class. Today we talked about what kind of art they most liked. Most of the kids said drawing was their favorite. A few enjoy making crafts. I also asked about their bedrooms and their beds. I like to know how each child decorates or plays in their own safe space. Here are my favorite points during that discussion:

-Maggie and Ellie are twins. Maggie tells Ellie, "Tell her what you made yesterday." Ellie says, "O.K." She smiles and whispers to Maggie, "What did I make yesterday?"

-Maggie tells us that Ellie likes to make things out of garbage and Justus tells us, "If we are using garbage I am out of here!"

-Sam tells us that he has some beautiful fish on his wall that have many different colors. He says he likes to go to the state park and fish. He also tells us that he was just bitten by a shark. I think Sam is going to be a writer.


We finished our discussion by talking about Art Books. I showed my art books filled with things that inspire me. It is my hope that the kids will use their books everyday and fill them with interesting items that we can talk about. As artists, we have to learn to see and feel before we can learn to draw or paint.

The kids made their art books. Here are some pictures of their work.




Encourage your kids to put things in their book and bring them back next week. It would be great for them to feel free enough to put more than drawings in their books. My art books are filled with pictures I have cut out, candy wrappers, cards, trash and anything else that seems too cool to forget about.

Next week we will be making small models of their fantasy bedrooms. They are supposed to put some things in their art book to share about their reality bedroom. Anything that they want to bring to add to their fantasy model will be happily used.

Here are some activities you can do to help them feel freedom in their art books:

- Look at magazines together. Encourage your child to cut out pictures they like and paste them in their art books. Have them write down what they liked about the picture. Walk around the house and find objects that remind your child of the picture they cut out.

- Take a walk. Encourage your child to pick up little scraps of "garbage". If your home is anything like mine they will find lots of interesting surprises under the beds and behind the TV. Have your child organize all the toys/trash/junk that he/she has found and take a picture to put in their book. Or you can have them draw a picture of their sculpture. Or they can even glue some of the junk in to their books.

- Go through the junk mail with your child. Have them make a collage from the patterns on the insides of envelopes.

Have fun!
Mary