August 31, 2009
by Bonnie Porter
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LEARNING BY PLAYING. Retired teachers and professional women are lifelong learners. In our Beginner Watercolor classes it’s stimulating to participate in such an enthusiastic learning environment. . . . Similar to the energy generated in an art classroom full of Kindergartners or First Graders!
August 23, 2009
by Bonnie Porter
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KINDERART Home School classes are underway. I had a Full House this week since there was “no child left behind”! Usually at least one family cannot attend or a few children are sick. With 100% attendance we were packed tight around the long table. All of the boys and girls were so well behaved that we accomplished several projects. We did not complete the Parthenon project, but we were able to draw the fundamental components of the ancient building. They also learned the distinctive differences among the three different capitals at the top of Greek columns: Doric, Ionic and Corinthian.
August 13, 2009
by Bonnie Porter
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INTERMEZZO LADIES WATERCOLOR CLASS. Our neighborhood group is brimming with creativity, beyond watercolor painting! Fabric arts, quilting, and cooking talents, combined with a passion for reading. Today was a summer reunion session, peppered with stories of travels, celebrations, serious illnesses, and family history. Lessons from life. Just as all art is rooted in real life.
One member’s current interest in wool felting, roving, etc. was truly inspirational. She introduced us to the unique techniques and labor intensive process. We marveled at her mastery of the medium—as evidenced in the painterly style of her lighthouse “landscape painting” executed on a secondhand wool sweater as her canvas.
August 1, 2009
by Bonnie Porter
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Speaking of Girls….it’s so much fun to have granddaughters who share my enthusiasm for Art. Their Mom is always abounding with creativity and hands-on projects, too, so it’s part of their heritage. These girls enjoy doing “sample” art projects for Grandma. And the oldest one, now 12, is my right-hand Assistant during summer art camps.
July 25, 2009
by Bonnie Porter
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This is a test post from 
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July 25, 2009
by Bonnie Porter
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FRENCH PAPERDOLLS. Because of my focus on Impressionism in American Girl art classes, there’s one book I highly recommend for gift-giving to the American Girls in our family circles: CHARLOTTE IN GIVERNY, by Joan MacPhail Knight. The illustrations, by Melissa Sweet, are charming and the book is illustrated with beautiful reproductions of art masterpieces. One take-away inspiration from this book are these French Paperdolls, ready to be dressed in paisley, chintz and toile! I used my patterns to cut out “original designs” from both scrapbook paper, wrapping paper and fabric scraps. Paper doilies, ribbon snippets and colored pencils or fine point markers were used for design details. Several of the girls even added matching shoes and mini-purses!