diy art projects

I’ve been trying to be arts and craft-sy lately with a few diy projects. I’m attempting to paint some canvases to hang up on my living room wall, create a canvas portrait and paint some cards. Here are some of my attempts and projects in progress. Unfortunately, I had a pretty big failure with one of my canvas portraits. Stay tuned for hopefully some finished pieces of work, if they come out well!

singapore tunnel art

Yoo-Kyung and I had fun exploring Singapore during her visit. We walked from the Fullerton Hotel to Clarke Quay and found some fun tunnel art along the river. I love these unexpected finds!

Paris Through the Years

A few weeks ago, I wrote about how I decided to get my self-portrait drawn by the street artists in Montmartre after hearing from my dad that I got it done when I was younger. Well, it turns out that this was a true story (Korean parents are good at making up stories).  Here is the proof! I was in Paris when I was 2 years old. We were living in London then. Kristi suggested that I post a picture of the self portrait from back then and the current one, but I don’t think my parents kept it. So here is  a peek at Paris from the past to the present.

  

Sitting Still Silently

I received an e-mail response from my dad telling me how we went to Paris when I was 3 years old and got my portrait drawn by a street artist in Montmartre. After that, I knew I would get my portrait done again. I had a chance to go to Montmartre and after carefully trying to find the “best” artist to get my portrait from, the old guy in the beret was the winner. It cost 30 Euros and he spoke fluent English. He told me that if I didn’t like it, I wouldn’t have to buy it. How could I say no to that?

“The first five minutes are the most important, so try to stay really still.” He instructed.

“Ok.” I responded.  This shouldn’t too difficult I thought.

I thought I could sit comfortably, but I was wrong. I wasn’t able to lean against my chair as I sat up and had to turn my head towards the artist. I had to keep smiling and stare at him. He kept telling me I was doing a good job posing, keep smiling and look at him. His frequent reassurances were helpful and kept me still.

As people would come and stop to look at the drawing, some even took photos. How funny to think that my drawing is saved on small memory cards belonging to random tourists. I kept smiling and tried to stay still, hoping for the best. He continued to switch pencils, drawing and shading. His eyes would scan my face as he tried to make it as accurate as possible.

“You can move now,” he told me.

It was finally over. Little did I realize how hard it would be to sit still for a good 20 minutes. I was pleased at the end, but wondering, is that what I really look like?

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Brush With Celebrity

Slice of Life Challenge #27

Brush With Celebrity

Students on field trips, couples young and old and little kids all gather.

People lift their cameras above their heads towards her.

Everyone wants a glimpse of her.

Go, go, go

Her beauty, her mystery, and her popularity,

bring us closer to her.

Weaving through the crowds and inching towards the center

Go, go, go

We see her staring right back.

Does she like all the attention?

It’s not easy being a celebrity.

Go, go, go

She looks even more stunning in person.

Fighting against the crowds, we find a way out

Our captured photos provide enough proof for us.

Everyday Should be Teacher Appreciation Day!

My head was pounding when I woke up, I knew it wasn’t a good sign. I started getting ready for school and started feeling so nauseous, I was sitting on my cold bathroom floor, hoping that it would go away. I managed to make it to school, but as my kids started coming in, I had trouble keeping my head up. When my students were in chapel, my principal suggested I rest in the nurse’s office. As I laid down on the bed, it felt oddly weird, but comfortable lying down in school on a bed.

Afterwards, the nurse gave me some medicine, not sure what it was, but I ate it anyways and picked up my students. I couldn’t really go home, because we had our literary magazine school wide celebration that afternoon,which I wouldn’t miss no matter how sick I was. As we got back to the classroom from chapel, our room mother was there waiting for us. She brought me the most beautiful flowers and presents for teacher appreciation day! Why don’t they have this holiday in the states? (Or do they?) The actual day is Sunday, so we are celebrating today.

In addition to the flowers and present from the class, my students each made me cards! It actually wasn’t much of a surprise, because fifth graders are not good at being secretive. Yesterday, I overhead a number of students talking to one of my students, about giving him the cards and I saw a few students making cards in class. I didn’t say anything to them, because that would be kind of mean, so I pretended to not notice. I mean it was hard not to notice, they kept asking me if they could use the different construction paper.

Well, thankfully, I started feeling better after a few periods, and our literary magazine celebration went really well! We set up our gymnasium like an art museum and had all the students’ published writing pieces and artwork on display! We also had the author of the Korean book Cloud Bread come in and speak about being a writer.  I plan on writing another post about the book Cloud Bread soon!

Flowers & presents from my students!

The homemade cards! <3

Our art exhibition with student work.

Poems my students wrote.

Artwork from one of my students!

Cake cutting ceremony for the literary magazine.

The cutest cake ever!

Student Artwork on Display by City Hall!

"beautiful city, seoul"

"beautiful city, seoul"

One of my students winning an award for her artwork!

Student artwork on display in the streets of Seoul!

Our students entered an art contest and many of our students had their artwork chosen to be displayed outside city hall for the Seoul Friendship festival. Here are some of their amazing pieces of work!

Simple Valentine’s Day Paper & Cards

I learned how to make painted paper from my a great co-teacher last year! So I had the kids paint red & pink painted paper and this is what we can came up with.

First, get blank paper, paint & a thick brush

Next, paint horizontal streaks across the paper.

For fun, you can have students paint dots or designs on top!

Now with all this paper, we cut out hearts where students made heart maps and put their poems on. We will be hanging them up in our room. I will try to posts some photos on Monday! Then, we also used the painted paper to make Valentine’s day cards and crafts.