Showing posts with label art teachers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label art teachers. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 29, 2016

In the Art Room: Spring Breakin'/Conventionin'

Hey, friends! Now that the spring breakerin'/art teacher conventionin' dust has settled, I thought I'd share with y'all just what went down in sunny Cali and windy Chicago. I gotta be honest with you tho: I was terrible at documenting both! The lack of photo shooting (and sharing in social media town) was not intentional. I seriously just never seemed to have a moment to bust out my camera/phone! The fun of meeting so many folks, making so many friends and just chatting the night away was all encompassing. And I wouldn't trade that experience for the world!
So what I've got here in this post is a meager offering of images of what was a fabulously good time. I'm actually sharing these pics in reverse order of my adventurin' as we just wrapped up a brief trip to Southern California this past Sunday.
We shopped, hiked and, of course, Disneyland'ed our days away. I could totes live in SoCal if it weren't for the traffic. And the fact that I'd need a mountain of mulah to afford all the amazing restaurants and shops I'd be gettin' myself into. I always feel so happy after a visit to California. I mean, this amazing canyon hike starts in a Ralph's grocery store parking lot. THAT'S HOW MUCH AWESOME THEY HAVE. "Oh, yeah, man. See some canyons get some canned goods. It's how we roll." 
But let's rewind to the previous week when I found myself in the sunny (altho, true to it's name, windy) city of Chicago. The NAEA convention was all that and a bag o' nuts (and by "nuts" I mean Nuts on Clark, y'all. Holy cow! I love the carmel and cheddar mix!). This here photo was taken outside the Lego store during my one afternoon of shopping adventureness. I managed to do some serious damage in the MOMA section of Uniqlo. Y'all should check that out if you've not already. 
So the NAEA conference was held in this enormous and confusing maze of a mammoth called McCormick Place. Y'all. This joint could hold, like, 25 Chuck E. Cheese'es (I have no idea why that is my chosen reference of measurement but 'tis. Mostly cuz I've no idea what the size of a football field is but El Chucko, I do). Need some perspective? Not only could it hold about 5000 plus art teacherin' types but also a C2E2 convention (which is kinda like ComicCon but not. It was explained to me why it's not the same as ComicCon but I fell asleep after the first coupla minutes. I was all, wake me up after the story of Princess Peach, would ya?)
POKEMON! Just now noticed the handy place to hang a badge. #thickneck. #genius.
One of the highlights of my Chicagoland adventures was getting to see my fam. You see, I grew up right outside of Chicago in Joliet. My aunt Judy (who is actually my age...you decipher that fam tree) lives in Chicago and my mom lives in Indiana. We had a great time going out to dinner, staying at mom's seedy dive of a hotel and catching up. My mama even went with me to see the van Gogh exhibit! Along with my three thousand closest friends...
Holy moly, y'all. Who knew folks be so excited to see a bedroom. I wonder if anyone would even pay a dollar to see mine. I can promise you it's not nearly as neat as van Gogh's. 
At the convention, I presented three times which was a thrill. I was ALMOST as excited as my buddy Tracy there in the front row (heeeeey, Tracy!). I presented alongside blogging buddies Phyl and Laura all about, you guessed it, blogging! If you missed out, go here for the deets, y'all. 
I also had the honor and pleasure of presenting with Janine Campbell. We chatted about student legacy projects. Janine actually inspired me way back at the convention in San Diego when she showed one of her legacy projects. Since then, I've been a big fan of big collaborative pieces. She was such a great speaker that I felt like her crazy sidekick. I mean, just look! Does it look as though I am performing an exorcism or what?!


One of the highlights of the convention was getting to lead a hands-on needle felting workshop! Each participant had the opportunity to needle felt an apron (I chose green because the event was held on St. Patty's Day!). Many got a solid start and had a ton of fun. It was like hanging out with 20 of my newest best friends!
After a super brief needle felting intro, each dived right in. All participants had such creative and unique ideas. I loved each one!
 My favorite part was just getting to know each participant. 
 I mean look at that table of colorful awesomeness!
Most folks worked on their aprons but I love that others decided to work on sweaters and even one person even worked on a coat (it looks fab, Lisa. Can't wait to see it finished!).
 I mean. Really? Really. Awesomeness. 

It was such a wonderful experience. I'm so glad to have had the chance to meet so many amazing folk and share what I love the most in the world: ART! (and art teacherin'). 
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Sunday, September 7, 2014

What I Wore #113 and A COSTUME CONTEST!

Magnificent Monday: Not gonna lie, having an extra day added to my weekend was simply splendid. I clocked more pj's -n- crafting hours than usual which was at the top of my To Do list for the weekend. I did manage to look presentable on Monday but only because I needed to make a craft store run. dress: Anthropologie, old; sandals: Target, old
Whut is UP, party people? I dunno about you but, while I love me a nice long three-day weekend, it does leave me feeling a pinch frazzled and fried. When I got to school on Tuesday, it was like waking up with amnesia. I was all, "Who am I? Where am I? Why do these strange children keep coming to my art room and messing the place up?" I tried putting a CLOSED FOR BUSINESS sign on my art room door but neither the kids nor their teachers were buying it. 

Given my aforementioned frazzled -n- fried state, I only managed to snap three photos of what I wore this week! I started to pile just too many things on my plate as the days went on and, well, snapping pics of my outfits just kinda slipped off the plate, I guess. Howevers, this leaves me more room to share with you a couple of exciting things:

** The Winners of the Best Dressed Art Teacher Contest are recognized in the October issue of SchoolArts Magazine! ** 
I'm so excited for these awesome art teachers and their chance to be recognized in a publication that means so much to the art education world. Congrats, y'all!

** I'm hosting a Dress-Like-a-Famous-Artist/Artwork Costume Contest! ** 
That's right, ya'll! The Best Dressed Contest was so much fun that I thought an Artist Costume Contest would be fab. You know, Halloween is right around the corner. This would give you a chance to come up with something fun to wear in your art room AND share with the rest of the art teacherin' world on this here blog. Not only that, but Nancy Walkup, editor of SchoolArts Magazine has agreed to feature the winners! Here's the deets:

1. Dress like a famous artist or work of art! (duh. That's kinda the name of the contest.)

2. Snap a high resolution photo! SchoolArts can only produce such photos in their magazine. If you have no idea what "high resolution" means, I'm going to walk you though those steps in this post!

3. Submit your photo and a brief description of your inspiration to my email address! (cassieart75@gmail.com)

4. Submissions due by Sunday, November 2nd! 

5. Vote on this here blog! Winner will be announced mid-November (it's too far ahead for me to actually give you a date. My brain is small.)

6. Winner will be featured here AND in SchoolArts Magazine! And how cool is that, y'all?!

I hope you are just as excited about this idea as I am. And I can't wait to see what you come up with! How fun will this be, y'all?!
October issue of SchoolArts Magazine where you just might be featured!
Speaking of being featured, special contrats to the following awesomely dressed art educators (clockwise): Natalie Friedl, Michael Kantor, Lindsey Ostafy and Ashley Hammond. Special Thanks with Sugar on Top to Nancy Walkup for sharing these art teachers with the art ed community in SchoolArts Magazine! In case you can't read the copy, here's what it says: Art teacher and blogger Cassie Stephens is widely known in the art education community for her amazing homemade art-related outfits. This year she decided to hold a contest on her popular blog highlighting the very best of the artfully dressed. In the end, six art educators were named "Best Dressed Art Teacher." Here are a few of the winners. 
Putting a face with a name, here's the also-awesomely dressed Nancy Walkup! I need that zigzag dress in my life when I teach line, Nancy. Hook a girl up! It was so fun meeting Nancy at NAEA...I can't wait for the next conference to chat with her again.
Last Days of Summer Tuesday: Even though the temps here are still well into the 90's (with an extra dose of humidity, thanks to some pop-up storms), the leaves have started to fall and it seems the whole world has become a Pumpkin Spice Paradise. I figured this just might be the last time I could wear this week summer number. dress: Bernie Dexter, scored on ebay; sandals: Swedish Hasbeens, sale at Anthro last season; belt: Anthro sale, now
Now, let's chat photography, shall we? When Nancy and I met at NAEA and I took out this Scotch-Taped-Up ole Canon Power Shot of mine (that's at least 5 years of age), Nancy took a step back, sucked in her breath and said, "Is that the camera you use for all of your photos?!" Um, yep. I ain't fancy, y'all. I'm all about the cheap. Now hubs did upgrade me recently...but I still only travel with this guy. You see, you don't need a fancy camera to take great photos. You just gotta now what you're doing. So, lemme show you a couple things that will make snapping your costume pics a bunch easier. 
First of all, you'll wanna take photos that are high resolution. That means Nancy will be able to use them in SchoolArts without them being too pixelated. To make that happen, press the "function/setting" button on your camera. On my camera, when I do that, it looks like this. Do you see where it says M2 at the bottom left? Use the arrow button on your camera, scroll down to that so you can change it. M2 is the size of the photos I use on this blog but it is not big enough of a photo for a magazine.

Now, scroll across to the L setting. If you look closely, you'll see that L has some dimensions above it: 3264 X 2448. That's the printing size. Meaning that's how big you could print that image and have it look good. If you look at the dimensions on the M2, you'll see it's smaller. It cannot print as large of a photo without getting too pixelated. On my camera, to select this new setting, I press the "function/setting" button again.

You'll also need to adjust your "fine" settings. So on my camera, I just scroll up one and scroll across to the Superfine. Cuz that's how I like to consider myself: supah-fine. Once you've gotten "superfine" and "L" set, you're good to snap away! Now, this will bog down your memory card...so if you go back to just snapping normal pics, you might wanna readjust your settings.

If you are snapping photos on your iPhone, check your settings as well. I do not own such a phone (I like to live in a the early 2000's with my dim-witted phone) so you'll have to play around to figure out those correct settings. Personally, I always think a camera is better than a phone photo but that's just me.

Another tip: Use a tripod! AND use your camera timer! I take all of these photos of myself, by myself. A tripod is great because it can be adjusted to find your best angle (c'mon, ladies, you know it's all about the angle!) and it's STILL. How many photos do you have that folks have snapped that are just too darn shaky? None of that with a tripod. Also, set that timer. I use a 10-second timer on my camera and it works great. 

I hope those tips are helpful! I know if you take the time to make something magical, you'll want your photos to be perfect. 
 Tiptoe Through the Patterns Wednesday: I know what you're thinking, "What kind of art teacher steps on kids paintings?!" To answer your question: The kind who also posts countless photos of herself wearing something wacky every week. You know the kind. Ahem. Speaking of these paintings, my friends in first grade worked in groups of two to paint 'em. It's all apart of the big fat Dot Day mural they are creating. They'll be ready to be hung this week (I don't have a choice, our Open House is this Thursday and I've gotta get 'em on the walls!) so I'll share the finished result with you very soon. top: garage sale; beaded necklace: made by me, DIY here; skirt and belt: Pin Up Girl Clothing; shoes: thrifted

Can't wait to chat with you again! 
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