The Ten Days of Carpmas

We are a little lacking in the contributions to CarpArt Day this year. This piece was stolen from another blog.

(GASP! – oh… wait… that’s from my other blog… that’s okay)

Celebrate Carpmas AND at the same time — demonstrate the theory of Persistence of Vision OR, more accurately, Phi Phenomenon or Beta Eye-Movement OR in Layman’s Terms (and I love the Layman) an optical illusion that prequels early animation toys of the nineteenth century.

Huh?

Observe:

Collect: glue stick, hole punch, two rubber bands, card-stock cut into a 100 mm x 80 mm rectangle, a paper picture-drawing of a carp (on 90 mm x 70 mm paper) and a paper picture-drawing of a platter (on 90 mm x 70 mm paper)

You can color-up you picture-drawings to make them pretty if you wish...

Glue-stick the paper to the card stock — try to centre the drawing as much as possible. IMPORTANT - the image/picture on the rear-side must be pasted upside down in relation to the frontside.

Punch holes through either side and loop in some rubber bands....

Pinch the rubber bands between your fore-fingers and thumbs and twirl. If you twirl at the right speed you should see the illusion of the fish and the platter as one image:

Some other Carpmas themed thaumatropes to try:

Fish… in a lake or pond

Fish… in a bath tub

Fish… in an oven

Potato… in a pot

Or conversely, if you would like to try a more traditional thaumatrope design:

Bird… in a cage

Fish… in a tank

Rider… on a horse

Hat… on a head

Etc… Etc… Etc…

Observe the joy on the faces of the Sugar Cookie School – they await the warmth found within the oven. They are not afraid of what lies ahead – they have each other. That’s why the rule must be maintained. You can’t eat just one…

Happy Carpmas – May you all be blessed with health and happiness. Keep it real. Remember the fish.

A warm-up for Carpmas 2011!

Just discovered that Carp Carol 2007 was not included in this collection (Carpmas pre-dates this blog):

Help with writing this upcoming year’s Carp Carol would be greatly appreciated!

Instead of carp I chose Tilapia accompanied by a basic creamy style potato salad. The hard boiled eggs were meant to add colour, but I cooked them too long – the yolks greyed – I brushed them with food dye. I’ll do pretty much anything for a good food photograph, especially at the end of a long hard blogging period…

Happy Carpmas to all – and to all a good night…

I typed half the question into Google. It knew. I was immediately frightened:

Tom finds this article on Boing Boing and Capri emails it to me moments later.

Link : Family Xmas traditions – Boing Boing

Ruth gives me this card –

Then…

Mary gives me this card –

And as a capper and fourth thing, Tom brings home hamburgers for dinner but chooses a fish-wich for himself.

Very odd indeed.

There will soon be photos of fish and potato salad in this spot… but later… after I sleep, work and cook.

In the meantime – may you all have a Happy Carpmas in your respective time zones.

Are you ready for the Carpmas Sing-along?

Authors Note: The Carp Carol exercise was a bit of a personal failure this year. I had it in my head that I was going to finally – after eight years – master my Vince Guaraldi arrangement of O Tannenbaum, film it and then upload it for you to sing along to.

I am, apparently… completely incapable of such mastery. After several mistake riddled video-taped performances  – I have finally given up.

Instead, you get a photo of me at the piano:

And lyrics to the Carpmas Carol entitled “Potato Plant“:

*

Potato Plant, Potato Plant

Starchy tubers growing

Potato Plant, Potato Plant

Carbohydrates hoeing

Mash, fry, brown, whip and julienne

Bake, grate, cube, crisp and au gratin*

Potato Plant, Potato Plant

Starchy tubers growing

*

*

And the Youtube video for the Vince Guaraldi arrangement:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kw6h4mZO1oU[/youtube]

*Note that for rhyming purposes one must use the anglo pronunciation of “au gratin”. Now, why the English choose to anglify a french word when they could just as easily say “with cheese” is beyond me… but HECK… it works with the lyrics in this song…