Lessons in teaching

Teaching has a new meaning when you find out in the middle of class that half of the students in the class room don’t speak English…now that puts a new little twist on teaching art to 4 year olds – oh wait that was not in the plan either – I was told K-2 but I made it happen and the joy of art is that it is not science and you can be flexible and you let things flow the best that they can. Oh there are going to be some challenges but this is also something that I want to try and see where it will take me. Plus it looks good on the resume that I can say I have had ESL experience and teaching too- in the public schools. We made a little mess with the cooking oil that made the pictures ‘shiny’ – so that they made their own stainglass window. Next week I will have the older kids and we will be making stainglass windows with tissue paper.

I was supposed to have another interview today but it was canceled, or at least moved to another day and time. I am running the studio tonight since Madeline is in NY playing with glass all week and I am teaching the stained glass class on Thursday night alone. And then next Saturday I am teaching the fused glass class – the one that enjoy the most. But I do have to say that I really enjoyed the PMC class, a few of the regulars from Tuesday nights attended Madeline’s pilot class. I could really get into that – however I am not so sure my wallet can. Why is it that I have to find the fun and $$$ classes and habits to love. The studio has been quite for the most part since the holidays, I think it is hard getting out of the house when it is cold outside. But I will take the quite and the space. The church is saying that there is a big chance that they could be closing down for the summer to start the construction and the big move for the studio to the basement to a room with a sink. The sad thing is, we will be without a formal studio for a few months but we will be returning to a better room- yeah a sink just makes an art room that much better.

I am still working on the dancing women candle sticks and I have found these great star bases, however I am having issues with getting them from gold to silver and locating more of them. I need to send a few to the GPS alum art show and some over to Hoopla too. I have the cutting down it is the wrapping that I am having issue with when they get to hot and I drop them…got to remember that metal conducts some good heat.

In other news…the roommate who started the flood is moving out on the 15 th- that is 2 more weeks from tomorrow (happy happy) we still have not locked in a new roommate but I know we will find one. I had one girl come and look at the house and after talking to her she asked “does your den always look like this?”…my comment was no most of the time the art is on the walls…she then told me that she would want to departmentalize the den and put my cocktail napkins which are in some martini glasses into the drawer… I don’t think we would mix well – and who puts there monogrammed cocktail napkins in a drawer for no one to see? (yes I am from the south and my little sister works in a store where almost everything is monogrammed)… There are still some who are calling and say they want to come and see the house but you never know if they will show up or not. I would love to wrap that up but for once I am not worried about it. Really I just want new carpet in my room -

Small world with glass

So I went and played with the new stainglass books that I picked up a few weeks ago from a great after x-mas mark down of 50% off - I found this one project that I had to try - but to try it I had to search the area to find 2 things that I needed to make the stain glass women candle holders. So I started at AC Moore and found the 2 things I needed but thought I have to be able to find these else where - well elsewhere has yet to be found. the votive candle holders are only 44 cents at AC Moore a great deal maybe they will let me by a case of them with their 40% off coupon. And the rings will they are the only place so far who has them - I have a few more places to check out to see if I can find silver plated rings. The first run of these turned out to be easier than I thought they might be, other than touching the hot metal that wrapped them a little bit before I should have - gloves are the trick and the metal curler to make it fit. I will see how long they take to make after this first pair and see if hoopla might want them... I need to go by there and pick some things up... I will post a picture of the candle holders when I finish the pair. So I might have a new little project to work on...That is till the PMC silver clay class happens and then I might really get into trouble.

Wednesday the painter was supposed to show and did not again, that is after I spent the morning taping down shower curtains and such all over my room before I headed out for substitute training... The training was fine, filled with paper work and small world connections. I had the one guy sitting on the row with me end up as the 2nd of 5 kids also... then we had to have ourselves introduced by the person next to us and say something - so I used the good old HGTV gig - so after lunch I had this guy come up to me and hand me a card and say , my wife does glass too you should contact her - I look at the name on the card and I know Patti - I know your wife - I work up at the studio with Madeline - so its just a small world. I get to go up there today to be finger printed and to check and see if the painter did show. Cause they said that I could be in the system and start working next week - now that could be a busy week since I also start teaching swim lessons then - and the list of the days for the lessons keeps getting longer. It went from none, to Mon & Wed and now add Th and Sat to the mix - I am going to be water logged by the end of the WSI class. Back into the work force I jump...dive and just hope that I will float to the top again.