Category: Homeschooling

Oct 13

Re-entry & an announcement

I’ve had some quiet time sequestered in my home. I have not been well this summer or early fall, but feel I am finally making progress towards “the way it was”. The few classes I have taught have taken my full energy leaving me voiceless on the interwebs.

How I spent much of my summer.

Strangely, being ill has been a blessing to me. All those daily chores that can become so mundane suddenly have new life when one is kept from them for too long. Now I get a little thrill from going to the grocery store and cooking meals. I’m hoping this appreciation of the little things of life will remain for a very long time.

During my  forced solitude, I have had much time to process ideas that have been rolling around in my head. This was facilitated by the Shine Bright E-Course which got me thinking about who I really am and why I am here on this earth. That and some nicely placed coincidences brought me to the conclusion that I’ve been veering off my God-made path. Not in a bad way, but rather in a way that wasn’t quite fitting for my purpose. So I have a big announcement, big for me anyway. I will be working towards a Masters in Art Therapy over the next few years. I have a few prerequisites to complete which will be done at the same time my last homeschool student graduates high school. Nice timing as I dive into the program.

So what does this mean for Hidden Art Studio? I will still be teaching classes, but my teaching schedule will be limited. I will still be sharing my art with the world, and I will most definitely be facilitating the Joy Journal Project. What changes the most is my internal focus and perhaps my voice here on my blog. My heart has always been for the underdog. I am most drawn to helping women and girls trapped in homelessness and all that entails. At this point I am turning my attention toward the new Kansas City Rescue Mission Women’s Center which will open in Jan 2013. How this journey will unfold is a great unknown, but I’ve always been one for adventure.

11 comments Posted in Art, Classes, God's leading, Hidden Art, Homeschooling, Myself
May 13

Happy Mother’s Day xo

For although there are generations not born yet, the seeds from which they’ll come are in the body of the child right here.

The wind blows and no child is just one child.

Every child carries generations of children inside.

Every child is like nestled dolls, all these generations nestled within — and mothering is a holy trust of whole entire eras.

Every day, every mother, she mothers thousands – all the children yet still to come. ~Ann Voskamp

Sea monster 3

These beautiful words were shared by my friend, Gayle Dowell, this morning on facebook. They ring to so true, but make me melancholy. Knowing that the way I have raised my children will have effects that ripple for generations magnifies my every action and reaction. As a mother of two mostly grown children, I read these words and wish I had been wiser, more gentle, better prepared. I wish…

I cannot change the past, those parts I’d rather have responded with grace, but I can choose to recall the joy that we have experienced as a family. And I can adore the moment.

New view 3

This past week has been quiet here. My daughter is finishing her first semester of college. My men are on location working side by side.

self critique 2

Without having the duties of teacher, wife and mother, I’ve had a great deal of time in the studio.

Partake 2

The week has been a taste of what life may be like when my youngest graduates from our home school.

lotus tree 2

I like the rhythm of my days, having time ruled only by the grumbling of my stomach, but have found I have had my fill of quiet.

Sea monster 2

 

3 comments Posted in Art, Encaustic, Homeschooling, Relationships
Dec 14

Soldering on the fly

We have a couple friends that are avid fly fishermen. They make their own flies! One is a musician, one a watercolor artist, both share the same profession as my husband, Scott. So Scott noticed all the funky things I was adding to my waxy soldered pendants and went directly to their studio. While they aren’t busy producing videos, they are making their flies. The trend of feathers in the hair has made it more difficult to find these perfect fly fishing feathers. Even so, these generous guys shared some of their feathers with Scott so I could experiment with something new.

feather

My first experiment is a feather dipped in encaustic medium (beeswax and damar resin). Next will be a dry feather and wax encased in glass.

November is such a challenge for me, blogging (almost) daily about my creative venture for Art Every Day Month. I always grow and love the push. Yet, when December rolls in, I deflate in blogland. My time and attention turn to:

  • Christmas parties!! I love them. So much fun to see everyone outside of a work environment.
  • This year, my daughter turned 18. The party has been going on all month.
  • Semester end for homeschooling. I get the whip out at this point because I want vacation.
  • Oh yeah, our Christmas card takes about all month to get done and out the door.
  • Finishing up commissions for the Christmas season.

Psalm 119:65

I may not have a moment to shout out before Christmas, so I wish you all a beautiful, meaningful holiday season. Relationships first and peace in the center of your soul.

4 comments Posted in Art, Balance, Encaustic, God's Word, Homeschooling, soldered
Nov 29

Portrait swap

AEDM Day 29

Today I had the delight of doing a portrait swap with an artist friend of mine. She generously provided the crayons. Here’s a quick snap of the portrait I drew of my friend.

And the one she did of me.

Giggle

2 comments Posted in Art, Art Every Day, Homeschooling, Relationships
Nov 21

Slowing, slower

AEDM Day 20

I swear I was listening, even taking notes, but during the sermon yesterday, I had an idea. I didn’t want it to escape.

Then I went home and melted onto the couch. I think that 13 weeks straight of home education has worn me out. I’m thankful for a break this  week.

AEDM Day 21

Scripture pendants

This evening, a few more pendants. Tomorrow is Etsy day for me. My very hunky photographer and I will be working together to get the pendants listed.

 

3 comments Posted in Art, Art Every Day, God's Word, Homeschooling, soldered
Sep 09

Grammie’s lace

Haven’t quite gotten the studio time worked in to the new school schedule yet. Well, really I just needed a good excuse to put down the teacher hat. Thank you, Etsy, for making that possible. This week I received a request to make several of these:
Crocheted Horizontal
I love that crocheted lace. Found in a basket of lace made by my husband’s great-grandmother, this lace I find most delicious. After making several pendants this week, only a short bit remains. I hope that Grammie would be pleased that her lace is being worn as jewelry.

Almost as much fun as the soldering, was the packaging. Were I to sell in large volumes, these absolutely fun touches would no longer be possible. And the little packages wouldn’t be complete without a MOO card. I love MOO. The package is ready to go, and that sweet teacher on the cover, that’s my husband’s grandmother.
Etsy package prep Etsy package

I’ve come to the realization that I may not get large quantities of time in the studio this month. That’s okay with me. I would never give up the opportunity to work so closely with my family.

While my enjoyable moments of soldering were treasured this week, my heart keeps turning back to wax. I’m really looking forward to October. Judy Wise’s Hot Wax Workshop begins Oct. 17! And I just can’t wait!

4 comments Posted in Art, Balance, Encaustic, Homeschooling, soldered
Aug 31

*sigh

Elsie’s Quilt, 12×12 encaustic collage
Elsie's Quilt
Elsie’s Quilt was completed about a month ago. I deconstructed a very old quilt block and embedded the pieces in encaustic medium. On top is a vintage embroidery transfer that I burnished onto the piece. The first layer after the board was primed is 70 year old handwritten notes on college rule notebook paper. If one looks very hard, a word or two is detectable between the quilt pieces. I was hoping the handwriting would make more of a show, but the quilt is embedded with at least 15 layers of wax.

While taking apart the quilt block, I was surprised to find that most of the stitching was by hand, but some machine as well. This quilt block had been attached to others to make a quilt top, but had never actually been quilted. My grandmother-in-law had begun taking it apart some years ago to make doll blankets for her great-granddaughters. With few intact pieces remaining, I felt no loss in tearing apart another artist’s work. The old fabric gave way with a sigh of relief.

I’ve been sighing lately as well, with longing. I miss my studio. We, a homeschooling family, started our routine again last week. Homeschooling can be quite challenging. I have both love and hate it at times, but am ever thankful for the out-of-the-box thinking skills it has afforded our whole family, along with the cohesiveness it nurtures. What is imperative to a successful year in schooling is my ability to retreat to the studio to reset my brain on a regular basis. I’m hoping by next week to have our schedule tweaked so that studio time is back to a daily routine.

My daughter is a senior this year. She is an artist and musician as well. We will be celebrating her final year of homeschooling by attending Artfest together next spring. We sent in our registration and will be waiting for our final results on workshops as Teesha spends the next month diligently going over hundreds of registration forms. Anticipation…

3 comments Posted in Art, Artfest, Encaustic, Homeschooling, Relationships
Jan 04

Public school encaustic series

I haven’t addressed it much lately, but we are a homeschool family. My kids are now high school age. Our choice to homeschool our children is multi-faceted, a couple reasons being to raise up adults that are able to analytically process decisions outside of peer influence, and that are able to think outside of the box.

In my stash of ephemera is a typed college outline from the late 1930s~early 1940s labeled TEACHING AND ADAPTION (planning programs for elementary grades and Junior and Senior High School). I’m finding much of the content disturbing as it deals with training a child for group mentality.

The outline has been great inspiration for my encaustic series though.

Public School #2
Public school #2

Public School #1
Public school #1

Both my husband and I are products of public school. I made it through school with good grades, and college as well, coming out with a Business Administration degree with a major in accounting. I even passed the CPA exam first try. But I did not learn how to problem solve or think past the task I was performing. With all my education, I entered the job force not knowing how to do more than I was told.

Why an accounting degree? My passions were really music, writing, and dance. Dance was an easy no. I am short and broad with meaty legs. Music, well I entered college with a piano scholarship. My college English professor encouraged me to change my degree because she saw potential in my writing style. With short-sighted vision, I could not see a career path in either area besides teaching, and did NOT want to be a teacher. (Oh, the irony as I have taught my own kids this last decade.)

Over the past 5 years, I’ve been able to slowly let go of the public school mentality and learn to be who God made me to be. I still cannot sit still in a group or lecture situation. My body wants to move. I am one of the “undesirable girls in club”, the one who can’t shut up or starts poking or annoying others out of sheer boredom. Finally, all those layers of what society told me I was supposed to be and how I was supposed to act are stripped away. I can relax and be who I really am.

amanda ∞

1 comment Posted in Art, Encaustic, God's leading, Homeschooling, Liberty
Jan 01

Word

Happy New Year, everyone! Ready for the 2011 word reveal?
Happy New Year!

My word for 2011:  Movere (/moˈweː.re/) Latin meaning to move| stir| agitate| affect| provoke| arouse; [movere se => dance]
Yes, I’m a nerd. I love Latin. I love knowing the meaning behind the words that we use regularly each day.

Having hiked to the top of a mountain, I look down the steep and across the peaks. I see where I want to be. The mountains are beautiful. Without focus and determination, I will be distracted from my destination. I have an urge to start running down, going quickly, but know that will cause me to fall. With pace I must travel, building strength and absorbing the beauty as I go. Too fast and I will miss the lesson of the budding flower on my path. Too slow and my destination will not be met. The path will at time cause my pace to change just by the nature of its obstacles, but I will continue to move. This is the adventure that is 2011.

After the here and there of the holidays, I am ready for a regular rhythm of daily. Our homeschooling schedule begins again on Monday, as does my fresh desire to create art daily. With many goals and renewed focus, I am motivated to keep distractions to a minimum. Goals have been set to keep my life in focus and motion.

Daily goals:

  • Begin with Bible reading and journaling
  • Schedule schooling and admin duties to stay on task
  • Carve out a regular time for creativity each day
  • Eat good & healthy food

Creative goals:

  • Reopen Etsy shop with fresh inventory
  • Complete online classes
  • Begin work on encaustic series

Relational goals:

  • Be intentional and present
  • Be honest, confronting rather than avoiding
  • Communicate clearly
  • Leave open time to nurture relationships

Long-term goals:

  • Continue building my business plan
  • Develop new classes
  • Continue learning and educating myself by workshops and classes

Time to move, folks. Time to dance.

amanda ∞

2 comments Posted in Art, Good Food, Hidden Art, Homeschooling, Relationships
Dec 30

Classes Posted!

Do you live in the KC Metro area? Sign up for Introduction to Soldering: Making Jewelry in either January or February! This class is so fun, and the class fee covers all supplies. My favorite part is seeing each person’s individual style reflected in her jewelry at the end of class.

Some beautiful creations from past classes:

Did you notice the new “Classes” tab at the top of the page? The journaling class will be posted very soon with a class date in late January or early February.

This past month has been a whirlwind, but December always is for our family. We travel to visit family for both Thanksgiving and Christmas, plus my daughter has a birthday right in between. This year she turned “sweet sixteen” and celebrated by hosting a Murder Mystery Dinner. Everyone stayed in character all evening! What a blast.

This week I hit the RESET button in hopes to get back to my ?regular? schedule, whatever that turns out to be. I’ve been busy restocking the pantry, planning and actually cooking meals (my son had pretty much taken over the kitchen), cleaning the house, and catching up on my accounting duties for THE HUNKY MAN‘s business.

But…I find myself having a hard time diving back into creativity. I think it is the desire to have my house in order that keeps me from allowing play time, and the house is not quite there, oh so close. Stopping and starting is so hard for me. I would prefer it just flow on continually. But the breaks I do have, forced or chosen, always return me to that place of inspiration with a flurry of activity.

Here’s what I would really love to do in January, but I will be content with the inspiration derived from my very fun Christmas gift, the Polaroid Pogo Instant Mobile Printer.

My husband, the professional videographer, had a difficult time buying this gift for me. Not quite the quality photographs he prefers, but oh, the fun!

And now, back to work. So close to play time! But first I must get school organized so we can start again on Monday.

amanda ∞

comment? Posted in Art, Art Journal, Balance, Homeschooling
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