…whether this recycling bin gives you a rash or whether it’s the place where you put your old rash so that someone else can use it later?
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We received an email the other day from a reader, a professional photographer named Nicole. She was writing to say hello and to let us know that she liked the blog. And that she had taken some creative liberties with a few of the photos we had recently posted. Here are my flying babies, as reinterpreted by Nicole.
In case you want assurance that I was there to catch them.
Here’s Nicole’s photography site and here’s her blog. Next up, Nicole is going to use her uncanny Photoshop acumen to make Robbi look not pregnant.
Good luck, Nicole. We’re pulling for you. Alden has always been a big fan of binkies.
(Kato follows suit just because he’s a little brother, and that’s what little brothers do. But ultimately, he’s a dedicated thumb-sucker. He could easily never see another binky again and be perfectly fine). After a long build-up of deciding that eventually the binky has to go, we decided a few days ago that the time had come. This was precipitated by Alden losing a magnet that we had told her she could play with as long as she was careful with it, and the resulting discussion about how things can get lost, etc etc. So the company line is that we lost all of the various binkies we had lying about the house, which she seemed to understand (at 2 in the afternoon, hours away from bedtime). So we braced ourselves for the inevitable fury that would be unleashed when bedtime rolled around and the binkies were still “lost”. Fury it was, but not in the way we expected. Matthew took her into her bedroom to tuck her in, said good night, and closed the door. She immediately hollered for him to come back in, and demanded that he take the white puppy with him. “The white puppy? What white puppy?” And so, white puppy was banished for the night.
He is a rather fearsome creature. And that was that. We sat down at the dinner table, wondering when the crying was going to begin, and it didn’t. Beautiful, golden silence. Then, five minutes later, we heard her bedroom door open. (Oh no.) The patter of feet running down the hall to the doorway to the main room. (Oh dear.) Then, the whup-whup-whup of the cat door. (??) And then the patter of feet returning to her bedroom. (?!?!?) And the slam of her bedroom door. And silence. We went over to the cat door and discovered this:
Apparently, “Lady” the cow also didn’t make the cut. Maybe all this time the binky was just protection against White Dog and Lady. Oddly enough, there is another cow identical to Lady (also called Lady) who was allowed to stay and spent the night nestled in bed with Monkey, Bunny Rabbit, Hippo, Frog, Baby Hippo, Buzz Lightyear, Bucket, Sand Toys, My Fishy, Kato’s Fishy, Duck, Duck, Pirate Duck, Mama Duck, Oh, The Places You’ll Go, Lassie Goes to the Arctic, Miga, and Creaky Monkey. The only crying all night came from the kitchen counter, where White Dog and Lady consoled each other in exile. It has been brought to our attention (thank you, Sam!) that some copies of our first real published book (one that wasn’t published by us) have officially hit the streets. Apparently, if you pre-ordered The Super Hero Squad Flips Out! from Amazon, you should have already gotten your copy. We did not pre-order, so we’re still waiting to see the real deal – but we did get our hands on a proof from the publisher. I pretty much flipped out: Matthew was able to contain himself, and perused the 216 different story combinations with a critical eye: We were basically asked to do the book because we have some experience working with these mix and match/exquisite corpse-style books (see Ten Thousand Stories, After EverAfter), not because we are particularly well-known in the Marvel Universe. Basically, there are 6 stories along with 6 matching illustrations which are divided into three horizontal strips. Each of the strips can be turned as if it were its own page, thus mixing different parts of each story.
The trick to this kind of book lies in making the writing and the illustrations cross over the page breaks naturally (for the writing, this means grammatically, for the illustrations, it means that lines and colors have to line up nicely) – which, it turns out, is so much of a trick that LB Kids actually sought out little old us to do it for them. This was almost a year ago now, which is why it had to be brought to our attention that the books were out (not that we’re already so jaded about publishing our first book that we weren’t keeping tabs). In all fairness, we were told they weren’t being released until September. Matthew’s father pointed out that he wasn’t even sure we had worked on the book, until he found our credit in miniscule type on the back:
Further evidence that our names really aren’t the big draw on this particular book. But we’re happy to ride the coattails (or are they called “capes”?) of the Super Hero Squad any day. So happy, in fact, that we decided to celebrate with another piece of Hurricane Pie. We’re now calling it Super Pie, since it seems to be invincible.
We’re really not sure we’re going to be able to defeat it. If you’d like to get your own copy of The Super Hero Squad Flips Out! CLICK HERE. Amazon will ship it directly to your house in a nice sturdy box in no time at all, unlike the shoddy manila envelope service you’d get if it were an Idiots’Book. Morning has come to the barn. We still have power and water. The rains have stopped for now. Looking up and down the street from our windows, everything seems intact, but, admittedly, we have not yet gone outside. Piewatch 2011 continues. I’m doing my best to stay hungry, but this sucker is a Category 3.
It’s possible that we should have gotten the smaller one. On one hand, the hurricane hasn’t gotten here yet. But on the other hand, it has.
Robbi did share a bite with me.
Kato, on the other hand, was deemed a bit too low on the totem pole.
In other news, it’s raining a lot. A friend just wrote to ask me whether or not the barn floats. I think we’re about to find out. As Irene makes her northward march along the eastern seaboard, we have been engaged in a flurry of last-minute commerce, making sure we have the essential supplies we’ll need if the lights go out.
Go ahead and take a closer look.
This sucker is 4.69 pounds, more than enough to carry one through a few days of hurricane sustenance.
Robbi says she might even share a few crumbs with me in the kids. The operative word being “might.” Last night in Chestertown:
This morning on the drive to Wilmington:
The world is a wonderful place. I’m heading north to New York and home again tonight, hoping to be back in the barn before the rains come. At 23 weeks, Robbi got tired of waiting to have her baby, so she decided to take someone else’s.
Here is little Vivian. See how well she sleeps? Robbi is so pleased at how easily the “labor” was and how well-trained the baby seems to be that I don’t have the heart to tell her that she’s still expanding daily. I really don’t think she wants to hear it. I was first inspired to go visit Iceland when I saw this promotional travel video. Doesn’t Iceland look fun???
Inspired by Iceland Video from Inspired By Iceland on Vimeo. Actually, that is a lie. I was first inspired to go visit Iceland when I learned that Iceland Air offers a free stopover in Reykjavik on your way to Europe at no extra cost. I still haven’t taken advantage of the offer, but the video was tipping the scales. But now, but NOW!!! I think I might just have to make Iceland my actual final destination. Our dear friend David just returned from an amazing visit there, and sent me this photo:
Have a closer look:
What the??!?!! I love this in SO MANY WAYS. First off: why bubblegum, in all caps, and a different color? Second: why a giraffe?? Third: why 3D glasses???? And fourth: why does he want to kick ass?!??!?!?!?!? And fifth: can a giraffe kick ass and chew bubblegum at the same time???!?!?!?!?!!??!?! AND THE ANSWER LIES IN ICELAND!!!! (Actually, I think I already know the answer to the fifth question, and it’s HELL YEAH.) |
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