Blog Update

Lots of new blog posts and updates are 'in the works' just not enough time to actually write...I have been painting! And sewing! And I made all of my Christmas cards!! Nothing to complain about!!

I've got lots of posts started for next week. Hope to get some hyperlinks added and finish up some writing so that I can set those to post. I have been feeling super inspired lately. I hope this keeps up. 

;-) Happy full moon and happy (almost) weekend!!

Are You Ready For Some Football?

I sure am!!

Heading up to Arrowhead Stadium tonight for the KC vs. Chargers Game. GO CHIEFS!!

I am super excited to wear my red wig and super fan cape ;-) More pictures coming soon!!

Be sure to check out the Birds of a Feather Blog today to see a really great owl pillow!!

Top 15 Memorable Albums...that will always stick with you....

Keeping with the theme of self-portraits this week, I thought it would be fun to post this recent FaceBook note that wrote with my top 15 most memorable albums.

The rules: Don't take too long to think about it -choose fifteen albums you've heard that will always stick with you. List the first fifteen you can recall in no more than fifteen minutes.

No Judging! These are not in order:

Salt-n-Peppa Black's Magic Album
Stroke 9 Nasty Little Thoughts
Matchbox 20 Yourself or Someone Like You
Garth Brooks No Fences
Christina Aguilera (Self-Titled First album)
Jack Johnson In Between Dreams
Sublime 40 Ounces to Freedom
The Chronic Dr. Dre
ZZ Top Tush
Kings of Leon Aha Shake- Heartbreak
TLC Crazy, Sexy, Cool
Modest Mouse Moon Over Antartica
Franz Ferdinan (Self-Titled)
Lilly Allen Allright, Still
Lady Gaga Fame

So, Nellie...how is your year going?

 How is school?

I get that question a lot....I'm sure most people get asked about their careers....So, how is lawyering? How is the lawn care business? How are things going at the office?

What am I supposed to say?

How do I achieve an interesting response without being too boring, mundane, depressing, or overly-enthusiastic?

I always say that things are going good....great...alright...fine....same-old-same-old...back into the routine....etc....

But if people really knew how tiring it is....
How depressing it is...
How lonely life is in a kids world....
I could probably make them cry with one story about the little girl whose personality completely changed in just a couple of weeks. She went from being a sweet, smart, normal girl...to something totally different...the changes were subtle...but when things are going on at home, I can usually tell...I only see them once a week, but their artwork always tells a story....even if they don't intend for it to...
How organized I have to be...
How much I have to clean...wash dishes, wash tables....
How many times I have to put 24 chairs up on the tables and take them all down...in two art rooms...
How much stuff I have to haul in my car....
How bad my back and feet hurt when I try to wear cute shoes...
To play a game and have a 5-year-old yell 'this is boring' at the back of the class is incredibly discouraging...
When a lesson totally bombs and I just want to cry because I have a room full of chaos....(doesn't happen very often, but when it does....YIKES)
The duties. Working in a school isn't just about 'art'....
The co-workers....nearly all women....(I worked for the Highway Patrol in college, mostly men....) it took me a while to make friends at school because there isn't much time for 'adult' communication.
To haul car loads of clay 10 minutes to another building, load and unload them into the kiln room to be fired and then hauled back, using my own gas and time....
To go to Wal-Mart and be spotted by my students...

But....

If people really knew how fun it is to be an art teacher...
To read those books with the crazy voices and make the kids laugh when I drop my marker 35 times during a demonstration and I have to keep bending over to pick it up...
My job really is all about coloring and cutting and painting and gluing....Sometimes I feel guilty when my 'prep' involves writing my name in bubble letters and coloring it in....its just too fun to be work, right?
To get told I am beautiful every day....
To get a dozen hugs, high fives, smiles, and love notes every day....
To be admired by hundreds of sweet souls...
To be so excited about the first day of school that you can't sleep the week before....and sometimes even after a long weekend...
To plan, strategize and think about a project over and over...until I finally get it right...and I figure it out, inside and out so that I can break it down for non-readers, English-as-a-second language, and special needs learners...
To see a project or a unit all the way through, so that every kid is successful and proud of what they created.
Telling a funny joke or a story, that only a kid would laugh at...
To spark a fire for art just with one student's art at the mall, art show, or even in the cafeteria.
To talk about art with kids....and know that they just 'get' it....
To go to Wal-Mart and be a celebrity....'That's my art teacher!" They will whisper and shout to their parents....

And yeah, school is going fine this year....But I am about to fingerpaint with 11 classes of kindergarten....its fundamental at age five and the kids love it...so I sort of have to do it....but I am looking forward to the day it is over.

I am also looking forward to an art conference in October to talk about art teacher things with other art teachers in Missouri and I am really looking forward to it! (If you are going to Knob this year, send me an email, we should totally hang out! I will be staying in the night owl cabin!!)

So if you ask me how school is going, I will probably say 'good' or 'fine' but if you really want to know the truth, it just depends on the day that I have had....and which side of the BUT is weighing more heavily on my heart at the moment.

(These pictures are from my photo booth....I wore a vintage blue polka dot dress for blue day last week....)
.

Orange you going to say knock-knock?

Do you ever look through your photos and notice themes?

Recently I was browsing back through my photo booth photos and noticed a few pictures from my orange dining room. I love the dining room because of the white chair railing and hand painted stripes along the bottom. I don't often take pictures in that room because in the evening the lighting is super orange (middle picture) but in the morning, (bottom picture) the lighting can be really quite nice.

I was having a little laugh at my changing hair and I thought you might enjoy a look at this great theme in my photo booth photos on my Mac.

Photo 6.
April or May 2008. Rocking the bob!! I am thinking about going back to a bob, with the bangs eventually.

Photo 131.
Not sure when this one was taken....I was sick of straightening the bob...I wanted layers. This haircut was pretty cute in person, easy to manage and very versatile.

Photo 662.
September 2010. My hair has really grown! I love having long hair. I have been trying out lots of styles. I never thought I would like bangs, but I DO love them! I took down the Venus Di Milo Botticelli reproduction so that I could make a hair tutorial (Featured on the Birds of a feather blog this week, be sure to check it out!!). I was worried the sexy redhead in the background would be too distracting. ;-)

Hope you are having a great week! Thanks for reading! ;-)

Life is good...

Last night it rained....and I loved it....today I have a roast cooking at home. Life is good! (**Edited: Rinda, yes this is a self-portrait!)

Blogs that inspire me....as an art teacher!

As an art teacher, I am constantly on the lookout for new projects to do with my students. Teaching ages 5-12, I have to have access to a variety of ideas for all ability and age groups. What works or 10-year-olds might just be disasterous with a class of 24 kinders!

In addition to the magazines that I read at school, I also follow lots of gifted and talented art teachers who supply tons of great resources that they use in their art room. Even if you aren't working with classes of kids in a traditional sense, you might be in need of ideas for a girl scout group, Sunday school class, VBS, or for your own children. 

BEWARE: each of these blogs have a side bar filled with additional art teacher blogs and it can be a little overwhelming...sometimes I get really distracted and overwhelmed myself when I have 17 windows open because I clicked every single one of their links (sometimes to find the source of one picture in my inspiration file....oy...) I just go off on a browsing 'tangent' and never really accomplish anything since I am just looking, looking, looking. It can be addicting!

Paintedpaper
A gorgeous source of inspiration for painting projects. Laura has been an art teacher for 14 years and paints with her students way more than I do!! She has so many great ideas and she always brings the projects together at the end in some sort of amazing bulletin board display that looks like an art installation.

MaryMaking 
Sometimes all it takes is one picture of a child's drawing to spark an idea for an entire unit of lessons. Mary is so creative and infuses childrens literature into her classroom. I often use books as sources of inspiration so I have many works of art from her blog in my inspiration file.  Recently she posted a link list to her favorite blogs and I have been clicking on each one, reading the previous entries, searching for interesting posts, and inspiring artwork!

Deep Space Sparkle
This site always has so many great ideas for young students. The majority of mine are in kindergarten so this is a great source of inspiration for my lessons. She also has some wonderful and cheap books available for download. I have purchased several of them!

The Crafty Crow
One of my favorite resources for crafts. This is the best site if you are looking for crafts with kids or groups of kids. It doesn't focus too heavily on fine arts, but it has so many links to great projects, it is an awesome site.

Art Projects for Kids
This is hands down the best spot for ideas. Kathy Barbaro is one of the best art teacher bloggers I have found. Her instructions are simple, the images she shares are useful, sometimes even with a step-by-step drawing guide. The blog is simple and easy to navigate and also has class printable murals, practice sheets and templates for sale at around $5 each. 

I sincerely appreciate all of the art teacher blogs out there that make my life easier.  

When I was in college, I thought that I knew so much about 'FINE' art that I would never, never, never do 'babyish' stuff with my kids. Macaroni...hahaha....glitter...bleh....yarn and popsicle sticks??? I thought I could seriously teach elementary art for 20 years and never drag that stuff into the ART of artmaking. I had a very snooty opinion about cheesy materials.

Then I did my student teaching.


My mentor used colored sand.



Colored macaroni.


Woven yarn bowls.


Popcicle stick puppets.


It was my job to implement her curriculum so I HAD to use that stuff.  I thought the kids might think it was babyish too. But they didn't. They LOVED it! I have been incorporating those 'familiar' kid craft items in my art lessons since day one. And I haven't looked back. Of course I still set up still lifes, self-portrait projects and other 'traditional fine art' subjects....but I ALWAYS have more fun when we get to throw some glitter on something!

This post is for Whitney!! ;-) Good luck with homeschooling!

I {Heart} Swedish Bloggers

Hello! Happy Labor Day!!

Lately I have been on the look out for some new blogs, new content in general. One afternoon I was searching for vintage hair styles and I came across a whole slew of fantastic blogs from some sweet little ladies in Sweden.

In college, I spent six weeks studying in Sweden where I developed an appreciation for Swedish design (Ikea especially) and the whole Swedish culture. I have started following several of these blogs (after browsing through the backlog at all of the amazing pictures!) Even though I can't understand most of the text, I love the style, grace and class portrayed in the photographs of these gorgeous Swedish bloggers. Admittedly, I don't know much about them from what I am able to 'read' but the pictures are just so fantastic, I don't need much more than that.

I hope you will find some inspiration in this post!!

Sandra @ http://rodeo.net/niotillfem/http://rodeo.net/niotillfem/ 
She has an English blog Google translator on the homepage of this blog to make it easier to navigate and read her content.

I adore Sandra's look. Prior to 6 months ago, she had a personal metro blog address here. And I found tons of great inspiration through the back logs. Tons of yummy food pictures, gorgeous masquerade costumes, fantastic fashion and one of the most gorgeous blogs I have seen in such a long time.

So refreshing to see such a renewed source for inspiration!!

Swedish Elle blogger Elsa Billgren @ Need Help Dressing? is absolutely gorgeous!!

 And she has a fantastic apartment!

Blogging for Veckorevyn in Stockholm, Linnea and Jennifer are absolutely gorgeous!

Thrifting!! YAY!

Originally, I found a link to their previous blog, Sweetnothing and browsed all of the old blog posts for tons of inspiration and yummy looking Swedish food!!

Warning: Ridiculously Cute Baby Pictured in this Post

My friend Trista invited me to a family outing at the park recently to take pictures of her family. Here are a few of my favorites.

Baby with Grandma-great.

Derrick and his hat, so cute!!

Look at that big smile!

Snuggles...

Those mirrored glasses are perfect!

Cutest brother and sister ever!

So precious, makes me want to cry!

I love these little tu-tu pictures!

Such a happy baby!

I'm hoping to schedule more family pictures like these this fall! I enjoy capturing the love and tender moments like these!