July 11, 2011

Mixing Personal and Professional (Goals and Projects)


Here I am surrounded by the wonderful teachers from across Idaho who were my students in the class I just had the privilege of teaching for Meredith Essex, at Idaho's Arts Powered Schools Teachers Institute in Caldwell recently. It was jointly sponsored by the Idaho Commission on the Arts and our State Department of Education. We all worked on collage/assemblage boxes using (in Meredith's words) "a compelling personal story of transformation." Each of my students completed a wonderful art piece (their fearless leader isn't quite done...) and I am so proud of them all.
Now I am making public #1 a personal challenge, #2 a professional/personal goal (we artists tend to wrap them all up together) and #3 a specific project goal that is a key to my future:
Challenge #1 is to post something in here each day for one week. I figure even 6 days' practice should help get a habit started, and I really want to get better at this.
The personal/professional goal is to get 30 people subscribing to my little blog here. I'm not sure how long that will take, but I'm sure it'll be more than a week. Why 30? Maybe it's because my hubby and I are celebrating our 30th anniversary. (See what I mean about the personal and professional getting all sloshed together?)
My #3 project is to complete the commission I am doing for my wonderful web designer Susan Weaver who has been waiting so patiently for it for TOO long! (The reason this project is so important is that I need her help big-time again. I have places to go and stuff I wanna do with this website... and I am too embarrassed to ask her for any more help till I get this done!)

So there you have it: Jeanne's Monday-in-a-Nutshell. Oh did I mention that life is about to change around here? My brother and his wife are building a house next door, and will be living upstairs in my studio for a few months in the meantime. As I write this they are on their way down the highway from Alaska after 35+ years in Fairbanks. The guy in the foreground with the shovel is our son Sol, who's on the construction crew!