New Beginnings in Minnesota!!

After a four year absence from the world of art teachering!!!  Rejoining the world of the art classroom studio has been wonderful, overwhelming, joyful, exciting, panic inducing and more!  

Arriving and discovering what 30 years the previous art teacher gave to the art room and the community has been daunting to say the least. First week and half has been spend hitting the ground running to get the room sorted out by doing inventory of all art supplies that are consumables, checking what equipment is available and in working condition has been the goal while also sorting and relocating student work from recent year to 20 years ago.  It's quite a thing to see. 

Where the art teachers desk shall go!

Here's pictures if the art studio classroom as it takes shape.  It'll be a few more weeks before we are fully functional but for now 50% of the room is functioning.  

Boxes of yarn!  Never been so excited to come across yarn before.  Yay. 

Can't wait to share what I've learned in the past few years in weaving!

Prepping a bulletin board with my stash of SMARFab!  It's awesome. So glad a saved it for now.  NAEA 2014 thanks 

A loom that I've discovered on my Art Teacher group on Facebook!  Bless you whoever posted this. 

A view facing the art teacher mothership with flying dot mobiles in honor of International Dot Day last week.  So loving these dots!!  

Till next time. 

Changing of the adobe...

Howdy folks...

Just had a changing of the adobe so to speak today.  Went from Itaewon foodie capital to a more quiet residential area in the Map-gu district.  It was touch lugging my wheeled luggage around but managed to make it in one piece.  

Bye Itaewon,  it's been nice knowing you as a neighbor.   Thanks SP Questhouse for hosting my stay for two weeks.  

After a challenging trek across town via subway with heavy luggage it was past one in the afternoon.  

Arrived to a nice Korean BBQ lunch which was my first meal of the day.  Had a nice cup of cafe latte earlier after posting off a small package I. Order to lighten my load. No such luck... In the lighting of the load.  

Anyways here's some pics of my second temporary Adobe in Seoul for June.  

Garden House Guesthouse... Love the smaller location and its hidden behind a iron gate.   

 Setting the table for Korean BBQ as the rain started.  Delicious!  

Nighty night all.   See you bright and early.  

Friday Adventure in textiles!

Yay Happy Quilt warehouse store... 

Jije Station platform!  

Finally made the trip to "Happy Quilt" warehouse shop off the Jije station on line 1: dark blue line out of Seoul

Just a peek at some of the fabrics.  Was too excited to take pictures inside.  But wow.  

Lantern inspired print and...

The Kitty Chronical newsprint...  I was in heaven with this.  Love my kitty back home waiting for me to return from abroad. 

Well that's it for now.  The fabric choices were amazing.  

Thanks to http://farleysfaraway.blogspot.kr/2012/09/happy-quilt-my-favorite-store-in-korea.html?m=1 

and http://johnnieandangela.blogspot.kr/2011/08/new-happy-quilt.html?m=1.  

I had discovered johnnie and Angela's blog first back in April after visiting Dongdaemun Market the first time.  Wanted to get a list of fabric shops in Seoul but also in Korea so I could have a diversity of fabric selection.  

Cheers.  Happy fabric hunting.  

Lost in the world of Digital Media...

Digital Media City... The city of the future where technology is key!

Hey everyone!  It's been one of those days that don't quite go as planned.  

Started my day with the usual breaks fast but didn't follow my usual plan of writing things down.  So I started out with the plan to head south to "Happy Quilts" store where I've heard they have tremendous variety of fabrics.   Let when I got on the metro I ended up going the wrong direction.  So had to drop that plan as it would take two hours to arrive and since I know myself with fabric.  I need at least 3 hours or more to look around from what I've read about Happy Quilt.   

So happy quilts is off the table for the day.   Considering my options my eyes wandered and noticed digital media city. Of course for some reason my mind is saying digital media center.  Lol. Oh boy. 

Anyways. Here are some photographs that I took of the public art installations.  

Here's some of the art fences made from the construction materials as the Digital Media City buildings are being built..  But wow. I enjoyed seeing what they came up with.  

This is where I crossed the street to find my way around...

OMG...  Ants are here and they are HUGE... There's swarms of them all over and just marching along.  I thought this was genius. Scare people into keeping the area clean of trash.  

Seems to be a huge mural or something. There are balls of string or something.  Various sizes.  Here's some more shots. 

Some kind of design that uses line to create patterns. Just gave me an idea of what I could do for an art piece after drawing them.  String art for the fiber studio center.  There's a name for it but it's avoiding my grasping handle. M...Mandalas??  Hmm. It'll return when my mind is calm again.  

Here's one from my sketchbook

Some more quick shots of the public art that caught my eye.  The buildings are fabulous too but they make for another post in the archecture of Seoul.  

Ciao for now.  Catch you later. Got that Happy Quilt Place to get to early tomorrow morning.  Metro will take two hours to get there.   Will share my findings in a fabric post coming your way shortly this weekend. 

Saturday afternoon at the Museum

After enjoying a delish brunch of waffle with gelato with a latte, time was marching on so up and hopped on the metro subway to take a walk to Han River... 

Yes Han River in Seoul...  Lots of recreational parks for the public to enjoy with activities from hiking, biking and fishing if you prefer.  Anyways as I was leaving the station there was an exit leading to the National Museum of Korea.  So it didn't take me a mind blowing second to head that way as it's pretty darn hot outside and this gal here wasn't in the mood to turn into a sauna soaked human figure outside.  

Ohh blessed... The Museum is HUGE!!!

Wow... It's gorgeous.  

Okay... I went in to see the Polish art exhibition.  These works were amazing.  We were allowed to take some photos but no flash or tripod allowed.  Here are some of my favorites..

Ignore the glare if that's what it is.  

"The Breath"

The children's museum... I really enjoyed visiting this one as it's very hands on for the kids and adults can have some fun too.  Puzzles, hands on activities for the kids to learn about how things were done years ago. 

Some favorites... Okay I admit almost all are my favorite. 

Architecture of Korean buildings...  I admit to a fascination with their roofs. Sue me. Here's more... I didn't want to take pictures of kids in order respect their privacy and also their families.  

A working KILN... I wish.  It's a model of what ceramic kilns looked like in the old days and maybe still around today.  You can kinda seen inside to how they stacked up the pottery to be fired.  

How merchants or sales people weighted and measured things back in the day!  

Little displays of weaponry and more.  

Here's the construction center to build a house or building.  I loved this and just watching the kids work it out was awesome.  

Here's a peek into a room under construction that'll open soon. But the clouds are my favorite so just had to take a picture!!

The next installment of the National Museum of Korea will be posted shortly.  

These museums are free to the public with the exception of the Polish Art Exhibition!