Thought you would like to see this promotional add with my alien bead on it!  too cute! 

I'll post an image of my 2nd place watercolor painting soon too!

Wonderful Email I Received

I received this email today after I sent 5 beads to the Toledo Museum of Art for their bead curtain project.  It just made my day:)


Dear Katherine,


On behalf of the entire Toledo Museum of Art community, I would like to thank you for the beautifully done glass lentil beads that we will be adding to our bead curtain. We appreciate that you took the time to make this special artwork for our community art project and I know they will inspire those who see them!

Our bead curtain community art project called, The Bead Goes On, was first imagined by one of our glass artists, Robin Schultes. Her idea has really taken off and we've had beads from all over the world by artists such as yourself, and also community members, some who have physical and mental limitations or stressed life circumstances. The curtain is progressing well! Here is a link in case you are curious! http://www.toledomuseum.org/events/community

Once again, we appreciate the time it took you to handcraft your beads get them to us from Pennsylvania!

Best to you,
Jennifer Bandeen
Robin Schultes
Toledo Museum of Art

My Bead on the Space Shuttle!

Whoo Hoo! My alien bead is really going into outer space!! It will board the Space Shuttle on May 14, 2010 and upon return be given to a child in the Beads of Courage program who is battling a life threatening illnesses. I'm honored.  I'll post an image of the bead soon.

http://beadsofcourage.org/blog/?p=43

drawing class

Drawing class was cancelled last week because of the blizzard, but tonight we had class and I would be lying if I told you it's easy.  I'm actually feeling super frustrated and I don't know if it's me or the instructor who has never taught before.  All the other students are frustrated too, so I'm just guessing it's a combination of instructor and the fact that drawing is hard!  Our instructor did ask us to check out Gustave Courbet who is a french painter.  I was not familiar with his work and google images rocks!  Thought this one was particularly interesting titled The Shaded Stream at the Puits-Noir, ca. 1860-65.

Yep, we've been dumped on!

Yep, it's true - all the snow that was predicted to come did indeed arrive.  We were still digging out from the storm from last Saturday and then we got 17 inches more yesterday.  Whew!  They are saying we have another storm on the way next week too.  All I can say is that this is more snow than we ever experienced in all the years we lived in Cleveland where you get lake effect snow! 

I feel really badly because the Buyers Market of American Craft show started today and I took this year off from the show and found out that only one artist made it to philly to set up the entire ISGB booth - poor Beth!  If my leg wasn't broken I would be down there helping her.  I'm hoping the other artists can fly in tomorrow, but if not I may still try to hobble down on the weekend to help her out.  It's  a grueling long show and I only hope that the buyers are not scared off by the storm, but my guess is that they will be:(  so sad! 

Broken leg and drawing class

Two years ago I started playing ice hockey with a local women's team. It was simply the most fun I had had in a very long time! Unfortunately, during our third practice this season I was skating and fell and broke my left fibula. It was devastating. Not only because it meant I would miss the entire season but because it had major ramifications to the other roles I play in life, such as mom, wife, and employee. I was unable to go grocery shopping, make dinner, take the train to work, or hold Mia's hand. Thankfully, I'm healing well and have been fortunate to have help from family.

I had been thinking of taking a drawing class and took the opportunity to sign up for one now that I had the time and needed time to heal. The first class was earlier this week and it was interesting. The instructor is from Hong Kong and working on an MFA at Temple University. While it's evident that he doesn't have much teaching experience, I think I'll learn a lot from the class. The other students were a joy to meet and make the class much more interesting. My homework is to do 6 sketches by the next class - I need to get busy!