Tuesday, September 19, 2017

Sketch by Aidan

        Ethan and I (Aidan) have been interested in art for a long time. So we were excited when we heard we would have a chance to join an art class called Sketch. We had a little trouble arriving at the right destination, but we finally found the church sandwiched between two other companies. We entered into a large room where tables were set. They were handing out art supplies, and we picked up our supplies and took our seats. We had a little more trouble getting all of our supplies. We were instructed to look at a list inside of our bags and to see what was missing. But when we searched the bag we found, to our great disappointment, there was no list to be found! After a couple of questions and a few minutes of confusion, we finally found all our supplies and settled down in our seats. The leader began to teach us about the artist we were studying. We learned about a French Artist named, Jean-Honore Fragonard. He lived from 1732-1806. If you know your history you can see he spent some of his adult life in the French Revolution. He began his life as the son of a glove maker, which, though a seemingly simple trade, allowed his family to live comfortably. This was the time period where gloves were in great demand. Fragonard's father tried to make some investments, but they ended up being unsuccessful, and he lost much of his money. As Fragonard's father watched his children grow, he decided they were old enough to make their own profit and take care of their mother and father. Fragonard decided the life of an artist was the life for him. But when he went to an artist to learn the trade, he found his skill at it was not profound, so he was sent to art school to improve his skill. After he came back from school, he was taken as an apprentice, and he copied the art the artist created. Although this was not ideal, it was how he was apprenticed. After a while he became more independent. He started during an art period where the pictures were serious and rigid. As he painted the French Revolution began. It was unfortunate for him, for the king had noticed his skill and had asked him to make more. Now that he was painting for nobles, he found himself in a very bad position. As the nobles were being killed, no one bought his paintings. He had painted many paintings, and a great number of them were of his daughter. After a while, he found a noble who loved his paintings, and he began to paint enormous pictures. But as the noble studied them, she saw that many of them looked much like her. The paintings were made in a series. It began with a small boy who grew up to man hood. Through his whole life he loved a girl. This is the girl who looked disturbingly like Fragonard's client. At this period in history, paintings were more open and fun. Even though they were beautiful, she refused to buy Fragonard's paintings. Fragonard decided he had had enough of France and the revolution, so he sailed over to America, who had recently finished the American revolution. He visited a relative in America. Fragonard loved the huge paintings he had painted earlier, and he still had them, for he had carried them across the ocean to America! As Fragonard looked at his enormous paintings, he decided to fill a whole room with them! He followed this motive and filled an entire room with the paintings. All the paintings stayed at his relatives house, and Fragonard decided to return to his homeland, France. He said farewell to his relative and returned to France. The revolution had ended and Fragonard was safe again to paint. But he saw that he had made well over five-hundred paintings, and had no clients to sell them to! He decided it was time to stop his profession. It was a good choice, for Fragonard died happy with his family. After his death, it was found he had only signed five of his paintings! This was the story of the Artist we studied. 
        After we learned about this artist and studied his pictures, we started our own art. Sketch is set up to give gifts of art to charity organizations, and the organization this month was called Sole Hope. This organization was helping people in Uganda. People in Uganda usually don't where shoes when they walk, and they can get bugs called jiggers in their feet. These bugs are extremely painful, and it is almost impossible to walk with them. Sole Hope takes out these bugs and wash the peoples feet. They say that wearing shoes and washing their feet will completely prevent the bugs from going into the peoples feet. If someone asks why they are washing their feet, they tell the story of Jesus washing his disciples feet, and how we are told to serve others. The packet held many things, including Styrofoam and cloth. The parents cut out patterns in the cloth, while the students used the scraps to make patterns in the Styrofoam. We pushed the cloth into the Styrofoam and with a plastic knife and made patterns. After about an hour, when most of the people had cleared out, we were still working. After we finished, the leader took pictures to make cards along with the shoes. After cleaning up our area, we left. I can't wait until the next Sketch.    

Thursday, September 14, 2017

The Damsel in Distress by: Shaila (age 6)

Once upon a time there was a princess and she was a loving beautiful princess and I hope you like my story okay now that I am done with telling about that she loved her castle and know what was the most pretty place in the castle that she loved? okay okay I will tell you it is the flower room as in dancing room and she loved it and I will tell you about it:It was the most amazing most beautiful place in the hole castle and she loved it and just thinking about it she was amazed and she went in there every single day and she loved it and I feel like I would like that too cause it sounds so nice and her mother gave her the most amazing flower ever she had liked it since she was a baby and nothing could break the flower and whoever wanted to steal it could not it had to have just the right code or they could not get it and it chose the princess and only her finger prints could get it to work except somebody who had her finger print can get into it oh sorry I mean they still had to find out the code and I could not even do it cause I do not have the finger print and I hope you do not tell anybody the code do you promise you will not tell?Okay then it is 7962999 so there it is and I hope you do not tell anyone like you promised don"t TELL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!Okay good now that we have that done now let me tell you about her parents;They were so nice and they were loving and loyal like there little princess and I hope you like this story so far but there is so much more to say and I hope you will like the rest so sit down and listen then when all of the people were asleep even the King and the Queen and the princess then that night a kidnapper came and kidnapped the princess and she screamed when she found out that she was in a new town and all of the people woke up early cause the princess woke up at like 10:00.AM in the morning and all of the people were very tired and as soon as the children heard the scream they waked right up jumped out of bed and ran yelling to there mothers and fathers screaming there is somebody new in town then all of the mothers and fathers woke up right away when they heard this then they followed the scream and finally got to her home and said who are you why are you here where are you from then the leader and his helpers came in shouting what was that terrible scream we just heard is somebody heart the leader was very careful with everybody in town and then he saw everybody were crowded around her the princess and she was amazing and beautiful and charming a so loving to all of the folks in the town and he said may I please stay with this princess and I hope you like this story cause I have been doing it for a long time and then she stayed with them for a few years and then she missed her castle and the amazing room so she made them agree to let her free and so she sailed to the castle and she was old so now she could get married and the parents sent some nice soldiers and so she picked the last one who was just like her he had the same finger print and the same loving heart the parents agreed she should marry him too so they had a amazing wedding and lived happily ever after.
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Friday, September 8, 2017

Update by Shaila



Shailas blog entry.
We went to Georgia with my sister to bring her to the College there and I loved that place it was amazing it was really hot though and I thought that I would not miss her this much but we all really miss her and there are pictures of her and us and our family pictures with her too once we went to a place and somebody took a picture of our family and that was great and we are happy we are homeschooled and l like being homeschooled so much better and I hope the others do too cause we get to spend time together. I hope we never ever go to school cause being here is so much more fun and the other thing is we can stay with our little baby brothers and I hope I will never go to school except for college and I hope Siobhan will not be too sad when I go to College and I am hoping to go to the College that Siobhan is at and I am almost done with my Blog Entry Cause my hands are getting tired of typing and I do not know how Aidan sends such long emails that is amazing when I am at the end of this page then I will be done with my blog entry and I might print it and I think mom might put this in the blog but for now she is doing School with somebody and that somebody loves doing school with her I mean Mom and we are doing something together tonight and that will be like so much fun we are going to bring a snack and I am going to see my friends and we will do games and that will me like so much fun and I am even closer than I was before to the bottom of the page and my hands are even more tired than before and I hope you liked my blog entry bye see ya on another blog entry
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