My Art

A little over a year ago I discovered poured painting. I fell in love with it. I've been doing it a lot lately. I pour on canvases, glass, terracotta, wood, etc. I have opened a shop on Facebook to sell the items I make. These even include jewelry made with the dried paint skins.  https://www.facebook.com/Creations-by-Chrystal-265603773483541/

I am working on getting my nerve up to do flea markets, craft shows, farmer's markets. This includes trying to find a way to display my wares without breaking the bank. So, I am going to be on the look out for some unique and inexpensive way to display necklaces. This seems to be my most challenging thing to display. I have over 100 necklaces made already. 

The Last Three Days

My head is spinning.  I just spent three days at this year's METC Conference.  Half of that time I was in the beginnings of my ISTE certification training.  The other half I attended break out sessions, luncheons and explored the exhibit and play areas.

I learned so much in these past three days. I am excited and nervous about going back to work.  There is so much I want to do now. Last year I decided to focus on one thing I learned about and I am still working on developing my skills in that area.

This year I am.going to jump right in to something that is WAY WAY out of my comfort zone and will also be WAY out of my students' comfort zone, too. But, I am really hoping that it will end up creating some very meaningful learning for all of us.  It means completely throwing out what I had planned for us over the next several weeks and changing everything about the way we spend our class time. I am excited and terrified at the same time. I'm either buckling in for a great adventure or diving head first off a cliff. Either way we are going to learn something.

There is something else I am going to put time and effort into that I walked away from the conference with, but it has to do with adult learning. I  am hoping to be a catalyst for change in the way our district does professional development.  This is another thing that I am both excited and terrified about.

Finally, I am fully committed to completing my ISTE training.  I met some incredible teachers in my cohort for this and am looking forward to working more with them. It's going to be a lot of work and some pretty intense learning.  Part of me is really nervous about all of it but I am trying really hard to maintain my self confidence.

These past three days were the best conference I have ever been to and I am very grateful for the time I got to spend there. I really hope I do what I learned justice.

Work

Today I was at work for 12.5 hours. Yesterday I was at work for 12 hours.  I will probably be there just as long tomorrow.

Last night I was working on yearbook layouts and getting copies made for today. Tonight I was writing lesson plans for next week and getting copies made for the rest of the week and for the beginning of next week.  Tomorrow I will be getting substitute plans written for three days next week and trying to get as much grading done and in the grade book as possible.

Why do I need three days of lessons for a sub ready? I am going to METC conference Monday through Wednesday next week.  I am so very excited about it.  I will be starting my ISTE cohort during the conference, too, so I will be on my way to ISTE certification. 

So, while it's been a really good week of learning for my students, I am really exhausted and hope I can continue being there for my students the rest of the week the way I want.  It's really important to me that I have two really productive days with them and set them up to be able to be as self sufficient as possible while I am gone. 

At some point I also need to prepare for a new group to sixth and seventh graders.  Wednesday is the last day my current group will be in my classroom. I have to have new attendance cards a seating charts made for four classes before I get back to work on Thursday next week.

Took a Step Forward

I have a problem with believing in myself.  It is something that I allow to hold me back a lot.

I started creating jewelry from paint skins almost a year ago. I sold a bunch at work last year and had all these intentions of doing craft fairs, flea markets, etc. I didn't do any. My only reason is fear. This makes me very frustrated with myself.

This weekend I posted online some of my new necklaces I made. I had a few people say they were interested and actually sold one necklace.  I had people ask about an online shop and business cards of which I have neither.

Tonight I listed a bunch of my necklaces in the shop feature of my Facebook page I created a long time ago when it was just my photography and has morphed into a way to showcase all my artistic endeavors. It's called Creations by Chrystal. I invited a bunch of people to my page and will invite more later.

So, we will see if I can keep the insecurity and fear monsters from sucking my motivation and self confidence out of me. Maybe I will actually find the nerve to actually set up camp at a flea market or farmer's market this summer.

A Few White

One of the things I like to make from my paint skins is jewelry. I've used pendant and bracelet trays so far to create unique one of a kind necklaces and bracelets.  These are a few of those blank pendant trays.

Before we had an entertainment center in our living room, our television sat on a small xorner cabinet stand. We still use that stand as a sort of side table. I keep it covered by a folded up white lace table cloth  that was handed down to me. This is part of the lace

Short Post

Today is my son's 17th birthday. My baby is almost grown up.

Photo a day #1 for today was a landscape taken in September.

Photo a day #2 for today was Livvy feeling annoyed by her sister sitting on her.

A Throw Back and a Drink

This week I've had a little trouble keeping up with my challenges.  I have managed to do them but I've been scrambling to get them done. Tonight was no different.

I actually decided to go with an old picture for one of them. My son will be 17 tomorrow so, it has been a few years since I caught this picture of him and one of our Scottie girls asleep under the Christmas tree.  But, it illustrates friendship perfectly and it's one of my favorite pictures.

I have been using the squirtable flavorings in my water lately.  I found one I just love. It's peach bellini. It's actually good enough to deserve to be in a wine glass.

It's hard to find a place in our house where the background isn't cluttered.  A couple white tea towels helped. But, it still didn't really turn out the way I wanted.  It's not the worst, but far from great.

Trying to Grow

I am trying to grow as an artist. Honestly, I have th

is feeling of guilt calling myself that. I have no formal training and at this point it is a hobby for me.  So, a big part of me feels I have no right to call myself an artist.

In my attempt to grow, tonight I tried some different techniques.  I have these picture easels I bought at the dollar store and decided to use them to prop up one of my canvases as I poured paint on it. I first painted the canvas black. I poured my paint while the black paint was still wet.

I used a color shift green, a bright orange and a yellow. I poured the yellow and let it run. Next, I poured the green and then the orange.  I alternated those colors until the canvas was covered. I did tilt the canvas some to help the coverage.

I did two other green/yellow/orange pours tonight. One I flipped three cups of individual colors on a canvas I'd painted black first. The other I did a dirty pour.

 

The other color combination I worked with was pink/blue/sparkly gold. I did two canvases using this color combination.  The first one I did a straight clean pour and the other one I did a flipped cup dirty pour. 

I am really happy so far wit the results. I am thinking of adding semicolon butterflies to them.

Now, for my photo a day challenges. One of them was dark.  I chose to feature one of my favorite local shops that is located in our historical district as "I went here."

For dark, I edited a photo of my daughter sitting on the couch drinking wine. I used a filter that enhanced the shadows in the photo and darkened the colors. 

Something Red in St. Charles

I can be a bit compulsive when I find something that interests me. Like with the photo a day thing, it would not be out of character for me to try and do a dozen of them. But, I have been pretty good about sticking to two. But, I found another challenge I've decided to try to participate in as of this week.

This one is weekly, though. It is supposed to focus on your city. Since I love my hometown and the surrounding area I figured that was a good enough reason to add it.

This week's theme was "something red." At first I really was a bit worried I would not be able to actualy start this week because I had no idea what to do for this. Then, it hit me. So, here is something red in St. Charles.

Our historic district still has a red brick road.  While it is kind of a pain to drive down, I wouldn't have it any other way.

A space was the topic for one of my other lists for today. One of my favorite spaces is my painting space.

I really had trouble with the last one. It was "nice!" I actually went to see what other people had chosen to do with this.

I came up with the nice smell my wax burner has when it's turned on. I got it as a Christmas gift and I really like it. As a matter of fact I've been quite compulsive about buying wax for it. I have about twenty different packages of wax cubes already. At present cinnamon pecan is in it.

A Drip and Dinner

Today was not my favorite in the world of photo a day challenges. Both prompts were blah.

I'm not a fan of prompts that have to be taken at a certain time. I think I have already discussed that. But, I am also not that fond of taking pictures of food. But, I am committed to doing this. Dinner tonight was sloppy joes and steamed vegetables. The one nice thing was Caleb's girlfriend Emma was here with us for supper.

Photographing drips can be fun if you have the opportunity to be out in the rain or when ice cycles are melting. Otherwise it's hard not to get stuck with turning the faucet on to cause a drip.

We were at the swim meet again today.  I tried to get water dripping off my son after warm ups and just ended up with a spot on the heat sheet.

I thought about trying to get paint dripping by doing another pour today, but what I did yesterday is not completely dry yet and I really didn't want to add another set to the drying area yet. I ended up with my tea dripping from my straw after being at Mod Pizza. It's not a great picture, but it met the criteria.