I will continue to let our children stay in the background as they wish for the time being. I will write more on this blog about the parts of our lives that the kids are comfortable sharing.
Our family has lately been on an amazing and complicated journey. I wrote about my husband Michael's puzzle/sculpture Superplexus on this blog back in June of this year. More than a year ago Mark Frauenfelder, the editor-in-chief of Make Magazine, had asked Mike to write the story about the history and evolution of his idea from a beginning concept to a 3D object. So the saga began....
Before the article was published it had to be revised several times because we discovered a whole new chapter to the story that had been hidden from us. Michael found an online post on BoingBoing that revealed there was an impostor of the original Superplexus toy being marketed here in the US. This was not legal, so Michael contacted KID in San Francisco(his design partners of the toy version of the puzzle) to have their lawyers investigate. After several months KID was able to negotiate a contract with a distributor in the US who had not known that their version was illegal and counterfeit. Thus the new, legal, non-electronic toy "Perplexus" was unveiled.
The article has just now been published and hit the newsstands on November 17th. If you'd like you can read it on page 40 in volume 20 under the title "Toy Story". If you are a subscriber to the digital version of Make Magazine you can read it online, or if you wish to read a 2 page excerpt from the 6 page article you can find it here. Just click the "x" on the black box that appears in front of the article to remove it from the page.
Before and after the article was released we received several calls and e-mails about the toy, the large Superplexus sculpture, and the subsequent wooden sculptures Michael is designing and will construct. One of the most uplifting things we've learned is that several Special Education teachers(and one school counselor) have evidently found the toy beneficial for some of their students in developing their hand-eye coordination, sharpening their abilities to mentally focus on a task, and in one case opening a line of communication that had not been previously available. We are hoping to hear many, many more of these positive stories. My uneducated guess is that somehow the toys are possibly helping to bridge and balance the two sides of a person's brain.
Mike has recently received a second commission for a new large scale "Circles" sculpture design. And more things are happening with the Superplexus Vortex, and Perplexus, but the details have not been ironed out yet so I can't write anything further at this point. Mike and I really wish the toy was made from recycled materials but that hasn't happened...yet. I am working on this with angel and prayer requests...! We are excited to see where the story leads from here, especially because the economy has already had an impact on Mike as an educator, as well as on many people and families in the toy industry.
Thanks for reading...and I'll keep you updated. :)
♥Becky
