Electric Grinders and Julia's Birthday

This past week, I borrowed an electric grinder to smooth out my iron sculpture for the 3D studio class. I tried to be old-school and use a file, but it was taking a ridiculously long amount of time. Even with the electric grinder, I spent over 5 hours smoothing it out. It looks pretty nice, but I'll need to work on it a little more before it is due. Halfway through the process, I thought it would be fun to hit my forehead with the electric grinder. Luckily I didn't lose too much blood or hair.

On Saturday evening, a small group of us got together to celebrate my roommate's 21st birthday with games and cupcake decorating.

I Love Fall!

Now that the FHP Retreat is over, I am still busy, but this past week and weekend were much more relaxed and fun. After another Friday Night Dinner, a group of us attended the Honors ice skating event. I quickly realized I'm terrible, completely terrible, at ice skating, but can I blame it on my parents for not buying me roller blades as a kid? Oh, well. I supported an Honors event like a good UA should.

Saturday night I hosted a pretzel-making shin-dig. I made the dough, they made the pretzels, and then we ate them! It wouldn't be very much fun without that last part. Most of the people I invited are fellow BPMI students, and since we have an art project due Wednesday, we all pulled out our illustration boards and worked on them during the movie. It's good to multi-task.

I finally did it. I walked through my first corn maze with the Collegiate Presbyterian Church college group this afternoon. It was pretty intense, and just before we were forced to build fires and shelters out of corn stalks, we emerged from the labyrinth of despair and picked out pumpkins for carving.

Beautiful fall foliage- check; apple cider and warm pretzels with friends- check; Survival through scary corn maze- check; an attempt at pumpkin carving- check; sweet potatoes in my fridge- check. I'd say this is shaping up to be a pretty good fall.

In case you are interested, the link for ISU's LAS website with student profiles is below. I was interviewed because I am weird- Ok, or at least my major with the Spanish minor are kind of unusual.

http://www.las.iastate.edu/discover/our_students/index.shtml

Have a fantastic Halloween! I've decided to be Ms. Peacock from Clue.

Samples of Recent Artwork

Plant Party and E-Ball

1. Professor Highlight of the Week
2. I never knew this was going to be part of my job as a UA
3. Plant Party for Lynn
4. Church Retreat

1. Professor Highlight of the Week
Sometimes I forget that professors are not only teachers but also creators- and usually pretty impressive ones at that! In my 3D studio class, we have begun working with clay to capture the poses of a human model. It is so refreshing to work with another medium after two years of graphite, ink, and colored pencil. Well, I guess last spring I could also include Illustrator and Photoshop as mediums, but it is nice to go from 2-dimensions to 3. Actually, according to my 3D studio professor, Paul Shao, there are 4 dimensions with modeling because we can include time- seeing something from the past, configuring the image in our mind, and creating a replica in the future.

Professor Shao is by no means boastful, but after asking about some landscape models in the back of the room, I found out he was the designer of the Asian garden park along the river in Des Moines. He also has artwork in the Smithsonian's American Art museum and was a photographer for Vogue in New York. The College of Design wanted to cut the 3D studio, but he felt very strongly that this course was important. Professor Shao turned an old room next to the boiler room of the Lab. of Mechanics into a studio space, and now among the plants, classical music, and pattering of rain against the basement windows, I get to play with clay, metal, and glass.

2. I never knew this was going to be part of my job as an UA
For the retreat in October, each FHP section will present their themes or something about their group with a 15-30 second chant. To give the leaders some idea of what we were looking for, Jake, Tessa, and I came up with one and persuaded some of the Honors Staff to join us. Please be kind. Remember, Glee is a TV show and normal people cannot create an amazing song and dance routine on cue.



3. Plant Party for Lynn
To continue Friday Night Dinners and celebrate my friend Lynn's birthday, Julia and I threw her a plant party. She is getting agronomy and genetics majors and loves plants- it's fitting, trust me. Anyway, we encouraged people to either dress up like plants or wear floral materials. Although some people apparently missed the memo in the invitation, we had a mixture of floral prints, a carrot, a gardener, and me- an ear of corn. It was fun to catch-up and enjoy pasta, sauteed veggies, salad, fruit, and of course, cake before a couple of games of Apples to Apples. It is pretty amazing to think how dependent we are on plants in every aspect of daily life. In the book Omnivore's Dilemma,Pollan writes, "There are some forty-five thousand items in the average American supermarket and more than a quarter of them now contain corn." This not only includes food (chicken nuggets, mayonnaise, vitamins, frosting, canned fruit, etc.) but also items such as plastic bags, matches, magazine gloss, the wax on vegetables and fruits. . . Oh, Plants and People class, how I miss you!

4. Church Retreat
I have joined the Collegiate Presbyterian Church college group, and this afternoon we leave for an overnight retreat at Camp Hantessa in Boone. I have to admit, I am super excited! I thought my days of squeaky bunk beds crammed into a spider-infested cabin with the smoke from a campfire clinging to my sweatshirt, still slightly sticky with runaway marshmallow were over. Ahh- perhaps some of you might think this does not sound appealing, but I sometimes wish life was like summer camp. I love being surrounded by woods. I love having a close-knit group to live with and a wider group on the outside to keep things interesting. I love going on nature walks and creating arts and crafts, eating and cleaning communally, and trying new things like rock climbing and archery. I love how rejuvenated you feel when you go home even though you barely slept the night before and are covered in sunburns and mosquito bites. I love being led in an environment created to grow and learn and love. Summer camp, summer camp, summer camp. . . hmm, maybe I should go pack.

1st Week Down!

Warning: This blog may contain information that you do not care about and deem as unimportant and self-absorbed. Please feel free to skim.

1. Classes
2. Write like a Woman
3. Staying Connected with Friends

1. Classes
I feel like the gun has gone off, and I am out of the blocks, sprinting down the track. After my first week of classes, I believe I can say it will be an interesting semester- busy, but a good one as long as I can stay on top of everything. My classes include creative fiction writing: write like a woman, anthropology of Native North Americans, archeology of North America, a BPMI illustration studio, and a 3D modeling studio (clay, wood, glass).

During my freshman year, my classes still had a lot of homework and tests every 2-3 weeks (similar to high school), but now they have transitioned into a more independent approach with more reading and only two to three tests and some papers for the whole semester. Besides classes, I am also staying busy with undergraduate assistant work with the First-year Honors Program and co-leading two leadership classes with faculty members. I am working with two different faculty members, and the first one and I lead the class equally whereas the second faculty member expects me to take the lead while he is more of a soundboard to bounce ideas off of.

2. Write like a Woman
The creative fiction class has been an eye-opening experience already, and although I feel naive sharing this, I never knew there was literature so revealing and liberating for women. Some of the short stories also use very creative styles I have never seen before. Our professor said one of the mistakes beginning writers make is sharing too many details about things that are not important while leaving out things that should be explained more. To work on this, one of our future assignments will be writing a two-page short story with only 3-word sentences or phrases about the past five years of a woman character's life.


3. Staying Connected with Friends
My roommate Julia and I hosted our first Friday Night Dinner with some delicious stir fry. Because most of my friends are scattered around Ames now, I am trying to keep a group of us connected through weekly Friday night dinners/potlucks. I also want to maintain friendships with the now-sophomore Andersians still living in the dorm, and yesterday I attended an Anders house reunion/picnic/crumpets game(similar to field hockey). Last fall I was the social chair which was fun, but it is pretty nice now to be able to attend and enjoy the events without trying to organize them.

I also attended a small birthday party for a fellow BPMI-er, and my friend Audrey and I created a beautiful (well, beautiful in our eyes) princess birthday cake. Our major is so small that we plan on throwing a small birthday bash for all of the juniors this year. Today I will be trying out the Collegiate Presbyterian Church college group for the first time. I still plan on attending Cornerstone Church for The Salt Company, college ministry program on Thursday nights, but I am hoping to be establish a church family in the smaller environment of CPC and its college group.

Have a fantastic rest of the weekend, and shoot me an e-mail about what is going on in your life if you get a chance.

~Rachel

A few more from the Kick-Off