Category Archives: Bandwagons

Bandwagons, Photos

A new picture for a new project in the new year

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Projects I Have Started
  • The Photo-a-Day Project.
  • The presidential biographies project.
  • The 52 Dates project.
  • The terribly tardy bakers challenge.
  • The 100 books project.
    Projects Still In Progress
  • The presidential-bio one.
    • Projects I Have Completed
  • …

    • I could let that 0% success rate get me down. Instead, I’m just going to start another new project!

    I haven’t been using my camera all that much recently, and I’ve been looking for something to push me to change that. I’d also like to shake the weird, shy feeling that I get sometimes when I use my “real” camera rather than my phone’s camera. I’m hopeful that 52Frames will help on both fronts.

    52Frames is a community of experienced and aspiring photographers, all working from a new theme each week. I think there’s constructive criticism and feedback involved, which is always a little scary.

    The first week’s assignment was to take a self-portrait. We had a fire pit in the back yard on New Year’s Eve, and I liked the light and the shadows that were coming off of it. I tried to take a picture of myself there, but I hadn’t set up a tripod and my arms weren’t quite long enough to capture what I wanted with the lens I was using. I could’ve switched to my other lens — I have an 18-55mm and a 55mm, and I was using the 55 — but I was sick and didn’t feel like moving a whole lot. So I took one of the pictures that didn’t work so well and smashed it up with a picture of some Christmas lights I’d taken the same evening. And here’s the result:

    52.1: Self-portrait
    52.1: Self-portrait

    One of my goals for the future is not to rely too heavily on Photoshop. I went with this composite, though, because I tend to try to hide or fade into the background and I thought this reflected that impulse pretty well.

    I’m planning to share each week’s photo with you here, so feel free to goad me about it if I stop. Are you embarking on any new projects for 2015?

    Bandwagons, Homeschool, National Blog Posting Month

    Astronomy (and “Star Wars”) activities for the homeschooled kid

    In the Fall session of co-op, you may recall, I taught an astronomy / “Star Wars” class. Here’s a bit of what we did!

    We started the “Astronomy and also some ‘Star Wars’ ” class at co-op by reading a Magic School Bus book called “Lost in the Solar System,” and we also read a little from “The Solar System” most weeks.

    We made our own story cubes featuring “Star Wars” characters, planets and vehicles. Ours were made from card stock, but there’s a nice tutorial for wooden story cubes at RedTedArt.com.

    astronomy3
    We made suns to go with our solar system models. There was a sun with the solar system that I printed, of course, but the swirly painted ones we made looked so much cooler.

    We made little Yoda puppets on sticks. They were painfully cute, and Pete’s been using his as a bookmark.

    astronomy2
    We discovered new planets, which we wrote about and illustrated. This was probably my favorite activity from the class. The kids were really creative in describing their planets, and the craft activity was simple and sweet.

    astronomy1
    We made constellation viewers. This one was also pretty successful. The kids very much enjoyed punching out the stars with the ginormous thumb tacks I bought.

    In retrospect, it would’ve been better not to make it a mashup. I’m not sure I would’ve had enough activities to cover 9 weeks of “Star Wars,” though, so I suppose it’s just as well.

    p.s. Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, it’s the end of NaBloPoMo!

    Bandwagons, Homeschool, National Blog Posting Month

    Astronomy (and “Star Wars”) activities for the homeschooled kid

    In the Fall session of co-op, you may recall, I taught an astronomy / “Star Wars” class. Here’s a bit of what we did!

    We started the “Astronomy and also some ‘Star Wars’ ” class at co-op by reading a Magic School Bus book called “Lost in the Solar System,” and we also read a little from “The Solar System” most weeks.

    We made our own story cubes featuring “Star Wars” characters, planets and vehicles. Ours were made from card stock, but there’s a nice tutorial for wooden story cubes at RedTedArt.com.

    astronomy3
    We made suns to go with our solar system models. There was a sun with the solar system that I printed, of course, but the swirly painted ones we made looked so much cooler.

    We made little Yoda puppets on sticks. They were painfully cute, and Pete’s been using his as a bookmark.

    astronomy2
    We discovered new planets, which we wrote about and illustrated. This was probably my favorite activity from the class. The kids were really creative in describing their planets, and the craft activity was simple and sweet.

    astronomy1
    We made constellation viewers. This one was also pretty successful. The kids very much enjoyed punching out the stars with the ginormous thumb tacks I bought.

    In retrospect, it would’ve been better not to make it a mashup. I’m not sure I would’ve had enough activities to cover 9 weeks of “Star Wars,” though, so I suppose it’s just as well.

    p.s. Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, it’s the end of NaBloPoMo!