First day at Art Unraveled

Finally, Shari and Sandy arrived at the hotel. We all got checked in and we went out for dinner at 3 pm Arizona time. Well, it was 5 m our time. We went to Lone Star. I have never seen such a huge-o sweet potato. It was way too much food. What is nice about this hotel is that you get free shuttle service within a 5 mile radius of the hotel.


There was a presentation and a thing to meet the artists from 7-9 pm. Not all the instructors were there. They must come later. There was some interesting art though. The presentation was done by Marney from Artella. It was way too introspective for me. I did not do the exercise. I am not a Collage for the Soul type of person either. I know myself well enough to not dwell on it further. I do not feel that I need a mission statement for my art self. As a business major and having an MBA, I have been taught to have goals and to have a mission statement. I no longer feel the need to do that as a teacher. I have many goals for the students but do not feel that I need to strive for something professionally like I used to. I just want to have fun with my art instead of having a mission statement for that as well. It would be a different story if it was a business instead of a passion - that does not financially support me. That is just me. I am sure that others got a lot out of it. I am just shallow - I admit it.

It was interesting to see the instructors' art. The pictures online do not do their art justice. I did not see anything else that I wanted to take though. I am meeting a lot of people and putting faces to their names. I keep being left behind by my friends because I stop to meet and chat with people. It is our standing joke now. I met Marissa Vidro. Can't tell you if I spelled her name correctly or not. We have been in some swaps together in the past. She does fab work. It was awesome to meet people that I never expected to meet. I guess it was a good thing to put my pict on my blog so people would know who I was and say "HI".


After the meet 'n greet thing, we took a little side trip to Trader Joe's for snackies. The other ladies went up to bed but I cannot. I don't feel the urge to do art but I am too restless to sleep.


Tomorrow's class is on metal covers and bookbinding. Will let you know how it went. It has been fun meeting all these people. Amazing, how many people read my blog. Thank you, all of you!


Being the MBA that I am, I can tell you that my mission as a teacher is to teach the curriculum as creatively and effectively as I can. That means that I must use different methods and change constantly to adjust to the needs of my students. I want my student to become lifelong learners. I believe it is my job to help them learn how to think for themselves. It is not my job to teach them from rote. They need to learn how to think things through themselves. It's not just about the right answers, it is about how they get there. It is easier to tell them how to do something to get from A to B. It is much harder but more rewarding to see how they get there themselves.

Night all.