Puppet of Annie the Brownie

I had an idea to make Girl Scout rod puppets so I started off making a Brownie and decided it should look sort of like Annie. I gave it glasses and cut its hair to look approximately like Annie's and made its vest match hers as well. I downloaded some images of official insignia and printed them out at a tiny size to glue onto the vest. I drew the try-it patches but I could have done those the same way... I'm nearly finished with the Junior Girl Scout but will probably hold off finishing her until my schedules eases up some.

Ralph's World Party and Puppet

We went to hear/see Ralph's World play their awesome kids' music and some of the Bad Examples' adult music also. It was awesome and a really fun party at the home of our good friends, the Butera's. Gwyneth and I had talked about the possibility of a Ralph puppet when she saw the rod puppets at LEAD last week so, not one to turn down a cool challenge lightly, I made a puppet of Ralph Covert for the party. It took me much of Saturday and was a super fun project. This puppet had some new features to make it interesting - glasses and a cardboard guitar with wire strings. Ralph autographed the puppet, gave it a tattoo under its shirt and decorated the guitar with eighth notes. It turns out a rod puppet that plays guitar is a great outlet for nervous energy so rather than pick my fingers all night I made the puppet strum its guitar along with the music.

Here is a photo Gwyneth took of the puppet in her backyard (before guitar decoration :) :

Rod Puppets

This is Harry Potter, the rod puppet. The instructions came from the Usborne Book of Puppets, although we used our own customizations, clearly. We bought the book at the Atlanta Center for Puppetry Arts the last time we were there. I have an a very elevated level of respect for Jim Henson now (and all puppetmakers). These puppets are not exactly easy to assemble! Someone much craftier than I could use this method to make really fine puppets, though. I don't have a lot of patience for the detail work that would be involved in making very well finished puppets. I used liberal amounts of craft glue and cut cloth with crooked lines and the eyeball method of measurement, though we did use an actual tape measure at the beginning of the project.


Harry is Annie's puppet. The kids were able to help with things such as wrapping the yarn around the cylindrical container to make hair - the greater the circumference of the container the longer the hair - this is not mentioned in the instruction book but a bit of reflection upon the principles of geometry leads one to the secrets of puppet hair making.



Snape is my puppet. I did not look up "sallow" in the dictionary until after I had bought the felt, but I figure the extra pale color makes for a more sickly looking puppet than the plain flesh color that Annie used for Harry. Using "sallow" as a guideline would have led me to hunt for pale grey or green felt but I like the color I ended up with. I might have gone overboard with nose sizes for Snape and Mushy, though Annie was adamant that Harry's nose not be too big so his turned out in a more normal range.


"Mushy" is Arthur's puppet. He chose the hair colors (two different types of yarn), face color, hair length and clothing fabric - which happens to be the same fabric we will be using to make Dumbledore's robes whenever we make him. It is probably evident that Arthur drew the eyes and mouth as well.


The puppets can only be moved via their rods so there is not much to do except swing them around in their stage which we haven't made yet, though it's fun to stick them around door frames or get under the table with them. We plan to make Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger and Albus Dumbledore next. If we get into it we might make more characters - Hagrid would certainly be fun since he'd be a bigger size... By the way, it's very hard to cut hands out of felt (for me, anyway). I think I'd also like making Rita Skeeter and Luna Lovegood but we'll take it one at a time!

Zoo Atlanta in January

Annie received "Zoo Tycoon: The Complete Collection" for Christmas and has loved playing it. It's a zoo simulator game in which you build exhibits, hire staff and give them assignments, build attractions, restrooms, dining facilities for guests, and so on. If the animals aren't in exhibits appropriate to them, messages are flashed at the top of the screen warning you that "Moose 1 doesn't like his exhibit" and so on... or "Grizzly Bear 2 is ill". Guests wander around the screen and you can click on a guest and see what the guest is thinking. You can even check and see how many guests need to use a restroom at any given point in time.

Once, when Annie's zoo wasn't doing very well (in her learning stages, obviously :), one of her guests stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and started vomiting repeatedly. We were mesmerized by the pixillated puking person and pondered exactly what conditions in her zoo might have prompted such a projectile performance.

Playing zoo on the computer led to playing zoo in the backyard ("African warthog 2 has escaped the exhibit and is stampeding the guests [screaming]"). Playing zoo in the backyard led to... of course.. a request to visit a REAL zoo. Even though today is January 6, and it's one of the coldest days so far this winter (if not THE coldest), we went to the zoo. I knew if we didn't go Annie would keep asking... and since we homeschool and everything's a learning opportunity, basically, I figured not much could be better for learning than going to the zoo in this kind of weather.

Lessons learned:
1) Primates are not exhibited in the winter (wonder why WE were there???)
2) Zebras, lions and giraffes are (and zebras stand with their backside towards you :)
3) The bird treehouse exhibit is REALLY warm
4) Pandas like it cold and will show off eating bamboo for you for as long as you want to watch, which for Annie and Arthur, where were hungry and cold (as I was repeatedly reminded) was not very long
5) Absolutely NO restaurants or snack bars are open in the zoo this time of year
6) You can buy a $3 bag of spicy buffalo peanuts in the Panda gift shop
7) Do not follow the signs to I-85 when leaving the west parking lot - they lead you to 85 South, and the next on-ramp to I-20 after that is to I-20 WEST.

Here are some photos from the trip. I've been to zoos lots and don't remember that much - but somehow, I think I will remember THIS excursion much more!

Annie and Arthur - hungry birds in nest

Ice Skating

Annie wanted to take ice skating lessons but really she just wanted to ice skate... and so did I... and so did Jenny... so we decided to all go ice skating at the Atlanta Ice Forum in Duluth. Arthur was getting over a cold so he opted out of learning to ice skate this time but thinks he will try the next time we go. Annie was a great beginner and quite fearless. We took turns helping Annie to skate. Only one person was really necessary to help her but with two helping we could get away from the wall for a while. Here is a photo of Annie going around with Jenny and Eric. By the way, my shoulders were sore the next day from all the times I kept Annie from falling on her rear end. (she did fall down some anyway!)

Christmas family photos

Amy, Conrad, Jenny, Bonnie

Conrad & Jenny

Archer Annie

Here is Annie with her Young Archer's Set. The ends are tipped with suction cups. She mailed this request to Santa Claus herself. She is a good shot at this, too. I think she is going to be a female version of Jason Fox, ala "Fox Trot". :)

Tuna Fish Cookies

It's true. This past Sunday, not only did Annie build a house for our cats (with Eric's help), she also had the brilliant brainwave to make tuna and cheese cookies for our furry feline friends, Spider and Cricket. They were a big hit.

You might not have realized this, but rolling out the "dough" is a necessary step in making tuna and cheddar cheese Christmas cookies for your cats.

Here are the Christmas tree and candy cane shaped tuna and cheese "cookies". :^)

Spider samples the scrumptious snacks.