PVC Soccer Goal Net

PVC Soccer Goal Net

Our eldest daughter had a birthday party this last weekend. Normally, I try to do something handmade for each of the girls' birthdays. But this year, October was swallowed up by my coursework (we're talking stay up until 2 AM working, get up at 8 the next morning every day, only taking breaks for church and Friday night painting). So this year, I delegated the making of the handmade gift to my amazing husband. I picked out this Soccer Goal from Six Sisters' Stuff and sent the man to the hardware store. While he was there, he picked up the materials for a few other projects and I'll be sharing those as they get wrapped up.

The tutorial was great and here's our result:

The tutorial called for a mesh material, but I decided I would make a net out of string. For my first attempt, I used some cotton kitchen string I had left over, but it wasn't very durable. It looked great on the first day, at least! Here's a pic:

So we needed to upgrade to something sturdier and a little more permanent.

Here's what you'll need:

• vinyl-wrapped utility cord (I had this left over from my attempts at putting up a clothesline in my yard. Turns out I'm allergic to grass and pollen and shouldn't be drying my clothes on a line, but I digress...) I had 100 feet and used less than half for one goal. 
• small zip ties (leftovers again), they don't have to be super duty, bargain bin zip ties work fine. 

You'll also need some scissors.

1. Corner Lines.

I ran a line from the upper corner to the back corner on each side. (Note: I tied this line, then switched to zip ties for everything else because the zip ties were easier and held the rope more tightly).

2. Install Verticals on Sides. 

A. To do this, stretch a length of rope parallel to the vertical support and about 4" away from it. At the top, wrap the rope around the diagonal rope you installed in step 1. Secure with a zip tie.

B. Then stretch the new vertical rope tightly and wrap around the bottom goal support twice. Secure the end with another zip tie.

C. Repeat with a second vertical rope 4" from the first, and a third 4" from the second.

D. Repeat steps A-C with the other side.

3. Install Horizontals. 

A. Wrap the end of a piece of rope twice around the vertical goal support about 4" from the bottom of the goal. Secure with a zip tie.

B. Stretch the rope across all three vertical ropes. Secure intersections with zip ties.
C. Zip tie the horizontal rope to the diagonal rope installed in step 1. Try to keep the horizontal rope as parallel to the ground as possible. Wrap the horizontal rope around the diagonal frame bar once fully. Repeat for the second diagonal frame bar.

D. Repeat step B with other side.

E. Wrap the end of the horizontal rope around the vertical support twice and secure with a zip tie.

F. Repeat steps A-E with a second, third, and fourth horizontal rope, each 4" above the last.

 4. Install Verticals. 

Using the same method, install three vertical ropes from the top bar to the back bar of the goal, running parallel to the diagonal supports and 4" apart (approximately). Then install a zip tie on every place where the lines cross. I suppose that's optional, but I'd recommend it or this might happen:

Yep, she totally loves the goals. I just realized I don't have any completed pictures, so I'll try to get them tomorrow. Er, today. Wow, is it that late already?

 You can trim the ends of your zip ties if you want, but I have not per the birthday girl's request. She says it looks like a porcupine house, so the zip ties stay for now.

 And here's the difference in durability between the string net (left) and the clothesline net (right). (The gap at the bottom is due to the contour of the backyard, not shoddy workmanship. ) This picture was taken after the goals were used at the birthday, then left out in the rain for a week. They are holding up really well! Now to put the clothesline on the other goal.

10 Tips for Finding Good Art Deals

Well, we've been busy the last couple weeks! First, I have been privileged to teach not one, but TWO Coffee and Palette events. These events were held at our local church and I was asked to be the guest artist. It was an amazing experience and I think I learned just as much, if not more than, my students. I've especially learned about finding good deals on supplies and I'll share my not-so-starving artist tricks now:

10 Tips for Finding Good Art Deals

1. Buy canvas in bulk. 

If you can find a discount store with a large craft section, chances are they will sell pre-stretched canvases in multi-packs of 7-10. Some craft stores will also have the multi-packs and will allow you to use their coupons on them. Keep in mind, the larger the canvas, the more expensive it is.

2. Use coupons and sales.

Keep an eye out for those craft store sales flyers! I've seen canvas sell for as much as 60% off or buy one, get one free. Most of the craft stores around here offer internet coupons you can print if you sign up for the email listing.

3. Find a discount art store or wholesaler. 

One of the art stores here has a large wholesale warehouse that is open to the public. That's my favorite place to get brushes. They once had a box-style field easel for $30. (I still regret not getting that.)

4. For paint, skip the art section. 

If you're just starting out on painting, the price tags on tubes of paint can seem very intimidating! I'd recommend getting a beginner's kit (just the small tubes of paint and a palette). Then, as you use the colors, you can replace them with ones from the woodworking and craft paints section. They are usually much cheaper. Bear in mind the craft paint has a different consistency sometimes and you might want to research viscosity, etc. when you're ready to "graduate" to the art paints.
 

5. Think outside the box. 

Sea sponges at craft store: $5 for 4. Natural sea sponge loofah at grocery store: $2. Buy loofah, cut into 8 wedges. It works. 

Also, old paintbrushes with paint caked on can be soaked in alcohol (read that somewhere, but haven't tried it yet). Or, they can be used as stipplers and rough edgers.

6. Network with other artists. 

I only found the wholesale warehouse through recommendation of a friend. You never know who is a budding artist, who has old supplies sitting around, or who might make a good painting buddy.

7. Don't skimp when it's important. 

Two words: fan brushes. My sister bought a brush set and was fairly happy with most of her brushes, except the fan brush. She tried my fan brushes, then went out and tried to find the perfect one. She finally did and it was a little pricey. However, that is still her favorite brush and she uses it on almost every painting for something.

8. Take advantage of your local library. 

I've found a fantastic DVD series on famous landscape artists by David Dunlop at mine! I'm learning so much by not only watching these videos, but also checking out art books.

9. Buy what you need. 

Most of the art paints I've found are cheaper in larger sizes. However, if you aren't going to be using neon orange very often, a giant container might start to get old and separate. For an accent color like that, I would probably head over to the craft section and buy a small inexpensive container.

10. Paint with friends. 

I know I've said it before, but it's worth repeating. If you can find someone to paint with, your paintings will turn out much better (I suppose it depends on who you paint with!). Also, you can share brushes, split costs for paint, etc.

Painting Classes Update

Well, I didn't set out to share my money-saving tricks, but there you have it. Back to my painting classes. We had fifteen students in each class. The first class painted the coffee cup painting, the second a landscape. I think everyone in the first class was pleased with their paintings. The second class, I'm not sure. Theirs was much more difficult and we ended fairly late at night because of the difficulty. Still, everyone ended up with a blue sky, green grass, brown trunks, and pink blossoms. They all seemed to have a great time and several ladies have since told me how much they enjoyed the evening.

So when is the next one? We're working on it. I would like to do another before Christmas to keep the excitement for the classes going, but that's just around the corner! In the meantime, check out these process pictures I took during the practice session with my very patient husband:

 In case you're wondering, his painting is on the right and mine is on the left. The tiny painting in the middle is a result of being suckered into buying miniature canvases for two little girls and having leftover paint.

Isn't it cute? I had also bought myself a mini brush set specifically for this purpose and was dying to try it out. Coming up next are some Pinterest projects we worked together on.

Tobacco Hornworms

Yep, you read that right. Tobacco Hornworms. This isn't a craft project per se, but a cool science experiment the Miniature Master Gardener (MMG) and I did just for fun (and counted as part of her homeschool science curriculum). It's a long story, so settle in with a cup of hot tea and enjoy!

The Mysterious Origin of our Tomato Plants

Let's go back to the very beginning. Two summers ago, we had the brilliant idea to start a compost bin. We set an old MDF dresser on its side (without the drawers) and chucked in all our compost ingredients. The bin went well until the MDF started to fall apart and we noticed mice were drawn to it. So we carefully moved the compost bin and contents to the opposite corner of the yard, away from the house. It remained there for a while, but we started seeing snake skins and bunny droppings around it. Finally, we gave up on the rotting dresser. However, my brilliant husband, an avid Pinterest user, has found several ideas and hopes to build me a new and improved compost bin sometime in the future.

The original site of the compost bin has yielded some very fun mystery plants. We had a cantaloupe vine grow out of there which yielded just one cantaloupe, but the best cantaloupe I've ever had. We had an avocado tree sprout, but the two-year-old pulled all the leaves off of it. We have a new tree that I think is a peach tree. And we had 4 tomato plants grow from there. Two we transplanted to our official "garden" area, and two we left growing in the five-foot-wide space between the fence and the house.

The Finding of the Caterpillars

The two tomato plants in the garden seemed to be doing much better than the ones we left by the house. Imagine my surprise when I found two of these big, intimidating caterpillars on the upper leaves!

We looked them up on the computer and found out many things. Most tomato farmers consider them pests and advise quickly dunking them into a cup full of soapy water (in case you have some or too many of these beauties you need to make disappear, that's what I recommend). Often these caterpillars play host to a parasitic wasp and some sites recommended keeping the caterpillars infected with the wasps alive long enough to allow the wasps to hatch and infect more. Other websites claimed to plant tomato plants in the hopes of attracting the hornworms.

From what I could tell, these are tobacco hornworms, which are very similar to tomato hornworms. Both feed on tomato and tobacco plants. The spike, while menacing, is a fake.

Caterpillar Adoption

Caterpillars in the Jar

So we rounded up the first two, plus a third one,  and put them in a large pickle jar. They need plenty of soil for burrowing, since these caterpillars make their cocoons underground. We also put in a sponge and lots of fresh green tomato stems and leaves. It was really neat to watch them munch away on the leaves. The girls were able to use magnifying glasses to see the caterpillars' eyes and mouth.

Big Fat Caterpillar

At first, they didn't seem to eat much. In just a few short days, they were eating a whole jar's worth of leaves within a few hours. I hoped my poor tomato plants would be able to keep up with them. The caterpillars grew fat, as large around as my thumb, and twice as long. I'm not exaggerating! Look them up for some pictures on how gigantic they get. The picture at right is not quite their full size.

Remnants of a Cocoon

Burrow

Then one by one, they lost  interest in the leaves and started doing "laps" on the dirt at the bottom of the jar. They slowly burrowed into the soil. One burrowed pretty close to the glass, so we could see when her cocoon formed. For a long time, nothing happened. I had to remove the remaining leaves because they started to rot. We set November 1st as their eviction day if nothing happened.

Sphinx Moths

(Or Hawk Moths) As I was passing by the jar a couple days ago, I noticed the surface of the dirt was not smooth like usual. There was something on it. I looked closer and found a large moth lying on its back with its legs in the air. We took the jar outside and gathered up some more foliage from the tomato plants (which were thriving again by this time). It was a little bit of a struggle for the moth to get on the plant, but once she did, she scurried quickly to a spot where she could hang. Her wings were shriveled, but a few hours later, she had long brown mottled wings that were straight.

"Liz" getting cozy on the leaves

Soon after, the second moth emerged. She moved up the leaves more quickly and got in to Liz's spot. There was some fluttering as the two moths sorted out who was going to hang where. That attracted the attention of my cat (since these moths are huge, look like bats, and are often confused for hummingbirds) and merited the jar being shut up in the bathroom for the night.

By the next morning, the third moth had emerged and the first two had straightened their wings. It was time to say goodbye.

 We planned some time at the end of our school day to walk to the wilderness area near our house and drop off the moths (same place we released a turtle that wandered into our yard). We picked the same spot as the turtle: just on the edge of the pond, under a tree. After a few solemn words, the gardener pulled the masking tape off the lid. Instead of a massive fluttering of wings, Liz flopped out onto the ground after getting her foot stuck in the tape and crawled really quickly toward me. I imagine she thought I was some sort of tree. We got a stick and convinced her to grab onto that while we moved her to the tree. As soon as we put her on the trunk, she crawled to the edge and clung to the side with her wings folded around her.

Notice the bright body spots.

Perfect Camoflauge

The second moth, "C" climbed onto her stick after we showed it to her. Mini Master Gardener (okay, I've got to come up with a better nickname for her), actually got to hold the stick. C pretty much stayed like the below picture once she got on the tree. 

 Since "E", the last moth, was snacking on a tomato flower and had the most fragile wings, we moved her and the foliage at the same time.

 Our caterpillars turned out to be really fun. Mini Master Gardener is already hoping for some new ones in the spring.

Shared on Friday's Nature Table at The Magic Onions: http://www.themagiconions.com/2012/11/fridays-nature-table-7.html

Coffee and Pumpkin Paintings

Tomorrow is the big day! I'm teaching my first painting class. To practice, I asked my husband to be my first guinea pig. Here he is finishing up his masterpiece:

I'm glad he was willing to practice with me. We learned a few things on this round. The first being that the underglaze DOES matter. The first painting I did (seen below on the left) was done over a hot pink and bright blue painting our 5-year-old abandoned halfway through. The second was not to skimp on yellow ochre. We got some craft paint and the yellow ochre was a dull tan rather than the vibrant yellow. Still, I'm quite pleased with the results. 

Hers and His.

And I've completed another painting this week, though probably not one that will earn me any sort of notoriety. My sister invited me to a pumpkin painting contest at her work. The limitations: 1/2 hour, no palette (paint out of a cup), not my brushes. The assets: various paints, cool glittery bat stickers, free pumpkin!, and glitter.

Let me tell you, pumpkin is an unforgiving medium- both to paint and to photograph. I'll let you know if we do well, but I doubt it!

My Pumpkin

Normally I do an elaborate carved pumpkin every year, but I am so busy with school right now I'm not sure I'll be able to. We'll see!

2 Paintings of England

Fall Break is Here!

And not a moment too soon! Of course, by Fall Break, I mean I'm doing just one class right now instead of 2. The class I just finished was the hardest, but the most rewarding class I have taken yet. Just 7 more to go! But enough about school and back to the art!

Framlingham Castle Moat

The painting at right is my favorite so far. It's based on one of my pictures. I prefer to work with my own pictures because I usually connect to them better and I can remember some of the details the camera didn't capture. This picture was an outing we took to Framlingham Castle in England. My husband is carrying our daughter on his shoulders as we stroll through the moat.

2 Tips for the Day:

1. Don't feel the need to accurately represent exactly what you see in your source. If that was the intention, it would be photography, not painting (unless you're doing someone's portrait, which is why I don't do portraits- yet). Painting is about artistic interpretation. As the artist, you get to choose the level of detail and what you want to include.

2. A mediocre picture can sometimes make an amazing painting. In the Castle Moat painting, I liked the picture okay, but I LOVE this painting, which is really saying something for me. My reactions to my own work usually range from loathing to indifference, it's rare that I really love something I've done.

So here's the painting once again. If seeing my source photo would absolutely ruin it for you, don't keep scrolling! (Or scroll really fast to the next painting!)

 

And here's the next one (I really need to think of names for these things!) Can you tell the difference between the top and bottom pictures? I tweaked it just a little and signed it.

 In case you were looking REALLY closely, you might notice my brand new easel (a birthday present from my sister!) in the top photo. That's probably the cleanest it will ever be. For what I changed on the painting: added light green in the top center leaves, added light green on the lower right leaves, added lighter colors to the gravel. And here it is next to the source photo, a picture I took from the window of a tea party in England.

Here are four of my other paintings grouped together:

In other news, I've been asked to teach a painting class for a women's group this month. They've had such an overwhelming response that we are offering the class on a second night! I'm quite excited to be teaching and encouraging others to branch out and try new things.

More paintings!

I'm supposed to be doing homework, but I thought I'd take a few minutes to share what we've been up to. Since I've been in school, I've really needed a way to relax one night a week. Doing landscape paintings has become my outlet (for now, I change artistic directions fairly often). I don't really have any great techniques to share, but I have a few tips:

1. Get a buddy and an honest critic. My sister is my painting buddy. We never paint the same picture (other than our first ones because we did a class together), but we usually pick something in the same genre and size. Having her here pushes me to do better and keeps me accountable to finish my work. My husband is the critic. He tells me what needs to be fixed and what looks good. He's nice about it, but he doesn't hold back.

2. Find a size that works for you. I bought a value pack of 12" x 12" canvas. The size is large enough for me to do a decent painting on, but not so large that it takes more than one sitting to finish. Perhaps one day I'll tackle something bigger. For now, it's nice to focus on technique.

3. Just past the "I hate it!" phase is the "Hey, that's not so bad" phase. If you hate, keep going until you're satisfied with it (same thing goes when writing a novel).

4. Check out sales and wholesalers. I was able to snag some canvas at a really good price from an art store I don't normally go to. And a friend of mine recently introduced me to a discount supply store that had amazing brushes for 25 and 50 cents apiece!

And that's it! Over time, you'll get better and better. In the meantime, you'll relax and have a great time. That's all for now, I really need to get back to writing my paper.

One Painting Class and Two Painting Parties

Right about now, if you've been following this blog, you might be thinking, "Oh yay! She's posting again! She must be really caught up on all her classes and have a spotless house." ...And you'd be wrong on both counts. I'm actually procrastinating on a paper, but the kiddos are still asleep and I thought I just might have enough time to post a few things before they wake up.

This semester I had intended to hit the books hard (3 classes!) and put everything artistic on hold. Well, I have certainly slowed down on my artistic endeavors, but I haven't stopped them entirely. I have some entries already photographed, but I haven't written them up yet. Just before school started, I finished repairing a couple of my quilts. I also compulsively doodle during Sunday Sermons- mostly henna designs and Celtic knots, which I would love to start posting every Sunday. Finally, I took a painting class with my sister, which led to the other paintings you see here.

Wine and Canvas Class

Ever since I heard about them, I've thought wine and painting nights sounded like a great idea. The only problem was the paintings weren't anything I was interested in (meaning they looked too easy) and the classes looked too large. Then I found out my favorite ceramics painting place was hosting them. My sister picked an awesome painting for us to try out and we went. We had a great time! In case you were wondering, mine is on the left and my sister's is on the right.

The colors fit perfectly with how I'm redoing my guest room and the painting looks great in there.

My Painting

Then my sister thought we might be able to do other landscapes, using some of the techniques we learned at the class. I was skeptical, but my competitive side won out. We bought some canvas and hosted our own painting party.

She chose a tree-filled picture with a ray of sunlight bursting through the trees. I picked out one of my own photos, a picture of a blossoming dogwood at my grandparents' house.

Painting Party 1- Dogwood

Unfortunately, my sister took off before I got a picture of her painting. Here's a picture of mine. I'll have to set it up for a better shot at some point (with my current record, look for that in about two months!). We had some friends over as well who did some really cute paintings for their kids' rooms.

My kids participated in the painting as well. Below you see "Happy Bird" and "The Eye with Makeup" by the five-year-old.


















The two-year-old did the following paintings: "Flamenco Dancers" and "Flowers in a Vase". Either she's extremely gifted or I have a really good imagination, probably a little of both.

Flamenco Dancers

Flowers in a Vase

 Since it was a holiday weekend, we were able to squeeze in another painting party on Monday. This time, we invited my friend's daughter. She painted her version of the painting we did with the class. My sister and I tackled some more landscape photos. Mine is on the left, hers is on the right.

I'm not entirely sure how I feel about my paintings. Usually, when I paint ceramics, I either love a project or hate it. (That reminds me! I have a ceramic project I finished, but haven't photographed yet!) These I don't feel strongly about either way. So if you see one you're interested in (out of mine or my daughters', but not the first painting), let me know and I'll list it on Etsy for you.

Canvas painting is not terribly expensive, can be finished in one sitting, and is relaxing. I'm definitely hooked. Until I can afford another class and they offer one I'm interested in, I'll probably check out Youtube videos. I'm also hoping to tap into my brother-in-law's genius when he's here for Thanksgiving. Believe it or not, he's the resident artist of the family and his skills surpass mine by far.

If you're considering painting, go for it! We bought our canvas from Ross and I had paints left over from other projects.  Also, talk with your friends, you never know who might have a stash of acrylic paint that needs to be used up.