Lily's Eloise Birthday!

I realize it has been FOREVER since I've really posted here. And that is kind of a byproduct of Facebook--I tend to post things there a lot more often. And also, the fact that I just don't have as much extra time these days for blogging (check out the Lily Bella website to see what has been keeping me sooo busy these last couple months!). I am trying to stay up to date on my arts and crafts blog though. And I just posted about Lily's birthday over there. If you want to check out the full post and enjoy some photos, please go here. :-)

Visiting a Chihuly Sculpture in Person!

(This is just a copy and paste from a post on my art blog...I will have more to post from our Racine visit...someday). :-)

Two weeks ago, we visited my in-laws in Racine, Wisconsin. When I posted our Chihuly project, my sister-in-law let me know that there was a Chihuly sculpture in the Johnson Building (as in SC Johnson) downtown! I was sooo excited to show the girls one of Chihuly's sculptures in person. They loved his work and that project so much, I knew they would be really excited to see it. And better yet, the Johnson Building was just two blocks from my husband's grandparents.

So the girls and I walked over there one morning and also got a treat in seeing the annual art sculptures downtown. Every summer, local artists decorate "something" and the objects are auctioned off. In past years we've seen lighthouses, Adirondack chairs, and this year it was big flower pots. Here are a couple of the ones we saw on our way. (sidenote: I was so mad--I forgot my good camera that morning so I had to use Lily's point-and-shoot).

The girls really enjoyed seeing the Chihuly sculpture. I believe it's known as the "Johnson Chandelier", but I'm not sure that's the official name of it. They couldn't believe it was three floors tall.


I really need to start taking them to art museums. I know, probably shocking that we haven't done that yet. :-) But, with the arrival of Kellan (our 18-month old son), some things were put on the back burner. Visiting the Minneapolis Institute of Arts is on my to-do list with the girls though. I think they would really love it.

Kellan--18 Months

Kellan turned 18 months old on Friday. He's getting so big! Makes me kind of sad. He will want to get into your lap, climb up, stay for exactly one second and then get down again. He's a busy little man in the stage where you can't leave him for a second anywhere. He's extremely observant and inquisitive. Still not saying a ton of words, but vocalizing quite a bit. He's the sweetest little kid. There's no happy medium with him. He's hot and cold with his emotions. He's either very happy (which is most of time) or quite dramatic (when you tell him no, or take something away he shouldn't have). He pretty goofy most of the time. Future Class Clown in the making.

We just love him to bits!

I had a newborn session yesterday and left my studio set-up. He always gets excited for a couple minutes when he sees it. So I snapped a couple 18-month photos:

Latest Art Project!

The girls and I are very proud of our latest art project creation! You can check out full details over on the art blog by clicking HERE.

And here is a photo to entice you!
I also have some other Science Friday images to get up and our Fourth of July and camping trip. UGH. I'm not sure I'll ever get caught up. Well, enjoy my minimal posts as I do get them posted. :-)

Science Friday: Homemade "Lava" Lamps

The girls had so much fun with the art journal projects last summer, I thought it would be fun to add another "regular" day to our summer schedule so this year we're doing Science Fridays too! We did our first experiment last Friday and the girls LOVED it!

I followed the directions from this Science Bob experiment to create our own "lava" lamps. We started by pouring water into the bottom of the bottles. Then the girls added vegetable oil. Between each step, I asked the girls what they thought would happen. We talked about how the oil and water didn't mix.


Next, drops of food coloring. It was great to watch the food coloring sit in the oil and eventually go through into the water. Before adding the food coloring, I asked the girls what they thought would happen with the food coloring.

Then, we added a half tablet of Alka-Seltzer and watched what happened.



They thought it was soooo cool how the color blobbed up like a lava lamp. (Random sidenote: we had a garage sale last week so the last several weeks we have been going through old boxes in the basement. They found my old lava lamp from my dorm room at Knox and they loved watching it. So I hoped this experiment would be a hit.)

They were so interested so to keep things going, I asked the girls what they thought would happen if we shook the bottles up and the oil and water mixed. Then, we had to wait patiently to see what happened. I explained to them that sometimes when scientists conducted experiments, they had to wait a long time to see what happened. The scientists had to be very patient. :-)


So we watched as the oil and water separated again. We still have our lava lamp bottles and every new person that comes to the house gets treated to the bubble show. The girls even tried them in the dark with shining a flashlight through the bottom.

Art Journal Tuesday

New blog post up on the art blog:

http://hollysartcorner.blogspot.com/2011/06/2011-project-2-sunflowers.html

This week's project was inspired by Van Gogh's Sunflowers painting.

I'm doing "summer school" with the girls again this year. We Math Monday, Art Journal Tuesday, Reading on Wednesday and Thursday and Science Friday.

We did a really fun experiment last Friday that I'm hoping to blog about in the next day or so. :-)

A Day Out with B-Pa and Gramma

At the end of March, we spent an afternoon at the Minnesota Children's Museum with my dad and Clare. We realized that we rarely ever do anything with all seven of us together. Either we drop the girls off to stay overnight, or I go over there with the kids for dinner to hang out when Andrew is out of town. It is not very often that ALL of us do a fun outing together.

There was a fun "Step into Art" exhibit.



And water play!







You could do your own face painting. Ella made herself into a lion!


This last photo is Andrew's impression of Keanu Reeves in the movie Speed. :-) Lily is driving the bus though you can't really see her in this photo. The museum was super busy that day, but we had a lot fun anyway!

Andrew's Commencement Address

We traveled to Racine this past weekend for a quick trip. Our visit began with quite a bang before we even got to Tom and Pat's house. We flew for this trip because it was a short weekend trip and we felt like that would be the best for maximizing our time there. When Andrew stood up on the airplane with Kellan at the end of the flight, Kellan proceeded to throw up all over the passenger sitting in front of me. He was hit square in the back of the head. It was AWFUL! Like something out of a movie. Another passenger rushed off the plane and bought the young man a new t-shirt. We apologized profusely and offered to give him some money for new clothes. The worst part was that it was this guy's first airplane ride EVER. And he was on his way to a cruise with his family and they had several more flights to go to get to the cruise ship. UGH!

Kellan wasn't even sick! We think it was a combination of a very full belly and a bit of motion sickness. He seems to have a bit of a sensitive stomach. At least we never have to see that guy again!

THEN, as if Kellan throwing up on an airplane and Andrew giving a commencement address weren't excitement enough, we had to add buying a new car to the mix as well! Our lease is up on our Acadia and we we've been shopping around. Finally settled on a 2011 Honda Odyssey. I wasn't super excited about a mini-van, but when I test drove it, it was great compared to the Acadia. I hated driving that thing around. And the mini-van really fits our needs right now. So I really am the stereotypical stay-at-home soccer mom now. Oh well. It's fun to drive around. I could care less about my "image". :-) We got it while we were in Wisconsin because Minneapolis didn't really have inventory of the model we were looking for and it was cheaper in WI! So lucky for us, we wouldn't have a repeat of Kellan's puke experience on the plane because we were DRIVING home! :-)

Here are a couple photos of the kids checking the van out for the first time:








Then on to Sunday, we had the main event! The Prairie School graduation where Andrew was asked to give the commencement address. He was given an alumni achievement award and then they also asked him to be the commencement speaker. He did a GREAT GREAT job!
Here's a link of his speech:

Andrew's Commencement Speech from Holly Isaacson on Vimeo.

We all were so proud of him! I don't think I could get up there and speak so well! Amazing!

Random Kellan Fun

Just a couple cute photos of Kellan around 14 months.



This purple Knox blanket has become Kellan's lovey. I may have to have Andrew pick up a second one on his Knosher golf trip this year so we have two. I don't know how he came to love this particular blanket. But it's super soft so I can understand why he likes it so much! :-)

E-I-E-I-Oops

Ella's class put on a little play in March called E-I-E-I-Oops. Ella had one of the larger speaking roles playing Mrs. Farmer-in-the-Dell and had several lines to memorize. You could tell she was a little nervous, but she did a great job! Here's a few photos from the play: