Grrrl Power!

I made this for my latest sketch at SSC.






There are many things that inspired this layout, and I feel compelled to share them here. See, first of all, I worked as a construction worker for a year and a half. It was a big change from teaching preschool, and there is a long story about how I got there, and how I got back to teaching. All of which, I would like to capture in scrapbooking form at some point. I think this layout, is my starting point. It only captures one small facet of that journey, but I think I have come to realize that that is how it is going to happen. There are too many pieces to the story to get it all at once. So, I will capture small pieces as they come to me.

When I first decided to leave teaching, and I got into the training program here,, I got this card from my mother in law:



But, more importantly, it came with this stamp:




And with these words: "I think you are a real Wonder Woman."

Fast forward a couple of years, my mother in law now lives in the building next door, and I did a lot of work to renovate her apartment. (I am shamelessly proud of myself for that.) One of the finishing touches on that apartment was to put up a bar in the shower. As I came out of the bathroom with my drill and my hammer, she said, "you really are what we worked for all those years." The "we" there, was all the women (and men) who fought, demonstrated, and demanded equal rights for women. Now, I had already thought about the fact that it was pretty amazing that I got to do what I did. Sure people doubted me. I even doubted myself, but I never thought I shouldn't be a carpenter.

So this layout says: "I am sure that many academic articles have been written about the modern day feminism. Whatever they might say, I know this: I have been a mom, a preschool teacher, and a construction worker, and I never felt like I had anything to prove. I just did what I wanted to do. So to all the women who worked to make that possible: Thank You."

And now I will shamelessly show off the work I did in my mother in law's apartment. I will show off both my painting and carpentry skills, as well as my fabulous design. A lot of people shuddered when they first saw this apartment, and I don't think my mother in law was that thrilled with moving in to this:





But I managed to turn it into this:









I even made the kid in the picture.