quarantine – tiny kelsie

During early quarantine, it was trendy to have a family portrait taken on your front steps. A photographer would come, stand 6+ feet away, and send you an edited shot free of charge, with the request that you would make a donation to the food bank or another charity. It was popularized in our area by local photographers Jenna Stern and Michelle Gurner. But I saw friends getting their photos taken for “The Porch Project” all the way down in Texas.

Another thing that I saw a few families do was a FaceTime photo session. I wasn’t really sold on the idea until I saw Jordan Ashleigh‘s work. I loved how her vintage vibe worked with the quality of the FaceTime photos, rather than against it. I had to have some of her work!

We scheduled the shoot on Memorial Day, and that afternoon we had our first visit with another family since the quarantine began months before. It was the beginning of a new era–reintegrating with friends. These pictures are extra special to me, as they represent the end of the strictest of this (first wave?? hopefully only) quarantine and the ways that our little fam spent our individual quarantine time.

Continue reading “My QuaranTeam: A FaceTime Photo Session with Jordan Ashleigh” →

I wanted to get in on the covid quarantine rainbow hunt, like I described yesterday in my post about messages of hope during the pandemic, but my 20-month-old son isn’t quite old enough to draw a rainbow and my tween is a little too old to be interested.

I’ve seen a lot of Eric Carle inspired tutorials on Pinterest, but most people don’t get his steps all the way correct.

He did an interview with Mr. Rogers on Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood many years ago where he showed his exact process.

What people frequently get wrong when emulating Eric Carle is that he didn’t use traditional paper for his creations. He used tissue paper. You know, like the gift wrap kind.

This makes the medium harder to work with for toddlers, causing tears. But it also allows more dimension and light to filter through.

After the little guy painted sheets of different colors (we used finger paint, though Eric Carle uses acrylics) I cut the sheets into arched strips, then taped them together on our window.

Viola!

Spent week three of social distancing trying not to succumb to despair. Hope feels like a distant memory, but I have to remember that any moment in time is just as fleeting as spring-it comes, it blooms, it withers, and new things are on the horizon.

I don’t have a lot of hope for what’s happening, what will happen next or after that. Dark times are here and more are following. But in dark times there are still bright moments. You find something someone else planted, years before you, in your own backyard. For brief moments, your home feels just like home, not the fortress from fear of what surrounds us. There is still sunshine, flowers, food in the pantry, and love even in a world full of sickness, death, greed and corruption.

Positive thinking and self care won’t cure the hurt I feel for the outside world, but as I go through this fourth week of #quarantine, I’ll try to shift my focus to the moments right in front of me.

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Tag: quarantine

My QuaranTeam: A FaceTime Photo Session with Jordan Ashleigh

DIY Eric Carle Inspired Rainbow Craft for Toddler