Pastel Painting by Jessica

"Pastel Painting"

by Jessica
11/12/07
Pastel on Newsprint
9" X 12"
Age 7
West Chester, PA

The Colorful Words Contest

The “Colorful Words” Contest
Short Story and Drawing
by Kristina
10-17-2007

It was a sunny morning in Thompsonville and an exciting buzz was sweeping throughout classroom 101 in Thomson Elementary. Their teacher had just told them they were going to have a “colorful words contest”. “What’s that?” I blurted out. “Raise your hand next time, Grace.” Said Mrs. Wendy. “Anyway, a colorful words contest is when I give you a sentence with a “blank spot” in it. You fill in that blank spot with a colorful or descriptive word. Then when you go home you write an essay, or short report, on descriptive words. Does everybody understand?” “Yes, Mrs. Wendy,” said the class. “Then let’s begin!”

Now before I tell you what we did, I want to tell you about my teacher. Mrs. Wendy isn’t like any teacher you’ve ever known. She’s a very nice teacher, only strict when she needs to be (which is hardly ever). Mrs. Wendy is a tall lady with long wavy blond hair. She has almond shaped blue eyes, and a nice glossy pink smile. Her teeth are the whitest, brightest, straightest teeth I ever saw. She’s very pretty and she’s 30 years old. She always dresses in clean and tidy clothes, but not boring ones. Mrs. Wendy always wears earrings depending on the day and high top purple and silver sandals on her feet. Sometimes she even wears high heels. Well, enough about my teacher. Let’s get back to the story.

“Okay… the first person that knows the answer pop up, alright?” Mrs. Wendy said. “Yes Mrs. Wendy”, chorused the class. “Good, ready, set, go! I was blank in the bushes.” Michael, Katlyn, Maddie, Aaron, and I popped up. “Maddie!” called Mrs. Wendy. “Conspicuous”, said Maddie. “Correct!” It was like that for a while. I heard words like casual, deluxe frequent, gracious, hospitable, celestial, precise, and jealous. It went on and on. Finally the contest was over. Every kid out of 24 kids had at least one point. The first place winner was Rachel, second place Tommy, and third place, Maddie. “That was a fun contest.” Said Mrs. Wendy. “I have prizes for everyone.” She handed each of us a pen that could change four different colors. For the first, second, and third place winners, though, they got a really neat prize. A homework pass. As the school bell rang to go home she reminded everyone to write an essay.

As soon as I got home I got started writing. Of course, I used words like adaptable, colossal, identical, persistent, inquisitive, and ecstatic. I also wrote this story, and when I turned it in Mrs. Wendy was thrilled and I got an A+. I know one day I’ll grow old and ready this story, and remember Mrs. Wendy.


About the Artist
Kristina
age 11
Wilmington, De

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Pink Unicorn

Pink Unicorn
by Jessie

About the Work:
Created: 10/16/07
Computer Generated Drawing/Painting
Medium: Microsoft Paint
Format: bitmap

About the Artist:
Jessie
age 7
West Chester, PA

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Sea Monster of the Deep

Sea Monster of the Deep
drawing

About the Artist
Anna
age 9
Wilmington, De.

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A Little Boy's Dream

A little Boy's Dream
Photograph
by Jerald
2/2007

About the Artist
Jerald
Age 8,
7 when he took this photo.
Felton, De.

Back Story
Jerald snapped this picture of his six year old brother, Rocklin, as he gazed upon the Space shuttle enterprise for the first time. Rocklin has dreamed of being an astronaut since he was a toddler and was thrilled to finally be able to see the space shuttle up close. In this photograph Jerald captures not only the moment, but also the awe and wonder and excitement they shared.

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"Three Billies in Fall" by Teddy

Three Billies in Fall

October 8th, 2007
18" x 24"
oil pastel on paper

About the Artist
Teddy
12 years old

Wilmington, Delaware

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Watercolors by Jessica

Energy - Blended
August 2007
9x11.5 inch landscape
Watercolor on textured 140 lb paper

Energy - Cool
August 2007
9x11.5 inch landscape
Watercolor on textured 140 lb paper

Energy - Warm
August 2007
9x11.5 inch landscape
Watercolor on smooth 140 lb paper




Funky
August 2007
9x11.5 inch landscape
Watercolor on smooth 140 lb paper

About the Artist:
* Jessica
* age 10
* Newark, Delaware

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Pencil Drawings by Madison

Crying girl

Young Boy

Dark Haired Girl

Puppy

About the Artist:
Madison
12 years of age
Ardmore, Pennsylvania

About the Work:
Pencil drawings on paper
8" x 11"
Rendered between April, 07 and Sept, 07

Some of the drawing were done when she was 11, some while she was 12.

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Calling for Submissions: Autumnal Reflections!

Marker on White Pumpkin - Rotting
by Billie Rose
age 5
12/11/2004

Now that Autumn is officially here I thought perhaps we could get those creative juices flowing by calling for work appropriate to the season.

Lets see work that includes an autumnal theme!
Photographs should be especially abundant and beautiful this time of year with all the pumpkins, hay bales, falling leaves and other signs of this season of change. The change of weather, colors and waning daylight offers a myriad of opportunities for inspiration, reflection, and introspection. Perhaps a poem? A leaf rubbing? A painting? An Organic Sculpture? A ghost story?

Whatever your muse, consider submitting your work to be published in Wit, Wonder and Whimsy. Be sure to review the submissions guidelines and include the submission form when sending your work!

I am looking forward to a harvest of creativity!

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Working at their easels...

About the Artists:
Homeschoolers,
Billie Rose - 8
Teddy - 12
August, 2007
Wilmington, Delaware

Photo by Connie

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Home Schooling for Goofballs

Home Schooling for Goofballs

Tired of questions/comments about why you're distinctly NOT starting school this week?

Here are a few suggestions:

Count to ten in garbled Pig Latin.

Wax poetic.

Wax the floor and then slip around in your socks.

Dangle a participle or two.

See how many sentences you can end with a preposition.

Go on a quest for that ever-elusive socialization
(hints: wear clothes, don’t drool, if possible avoid barking and licking people, DON’T bring purple crayon.)

Sit in a row, stand in a line, pee with permission - just to see how the other side lives.

Drizzle glue on mustache-shaped anything; stick under nose or above lip, whichever is most convenient; do a wee dance.

Procrastinate with gusto.

When speaking insert the word “like” every third or forth word.

Speak very slowly and make every phrase you utter sound like a question?

Insist on coloring within the lines until you fall off your chair/fall off to sleep/go into a coma.

Fry eggs in a purple tutu. Eat them very very fast so you don't miss imaginary bus.

Bleat like a sheep (if you are a vegetarian bleat like a nice, conformist broccoli.)

Glance furtively at grandma until she casts you a withering look.

Call your Aunt Mildred.

Roll yourself into a ball and suck your toes with your baby brother/sister.

Twirl your nose ring to see if it improves your eyesight.

Make your own dress code; revise it daily; feel the magic.

Stitch things together then rip apart as a character building exercise (perhaps complete this task before attempting quest for socialization.)

Read a book you don’t like. Read another. And another.
Be happy about it.

Say ketchup over and over again until you feel dizzy.

Drool pretty-colored spittle down your chin after eating water ice at a non-designated time.

Rhyme things with sheep (or lamb if you’re squeamish.)

Suck cream out of donuts in local Wawa; put them back when someone’s looking. (perhaps avoid this pastime if you are contemplating above-suggested quest for socialization.)

Stare down your cat.

Start a yipping contest with your dog.

Worry about disgruntled giraffe but only on Tuesdays at 10am.

Avoid speaking to anyone outside your age group between 7am and 4pm unless it’s a designated adult.

Draw faces on the undersides of your toes.
Soak feet in jello. Try to make sense of it all.

When you feel the urge to say something,
wave your hand in the air and squeak and/our bounce until someone says your name.

Compare apples to oranges.

Squish your sandwich to get that organic lunch-traveled-to-school-via-book-filled-backpack experience. (PB&J works best.)

Practice cool-sounding karate noises.

Yodel in desperately mismatched socks.

Sweep marbles and hairballs around the kitchen floor.

Stifle feelings of utility without yawning, crossing your eyes or shaking your head.

Catch bugs on tongue and chew thoughtfully
(see bleating exercise above for vegetarian suggestion.)

Crinkle your nose at warp speed.

Cultivate a lifelong interest in wienerschnitzle.

Visualize Engelbert Humperdinck.

Read A Fiddler‘s Foot and Other Folktales.

Whistle Dixie with a kazoo.

Don't laugh, giggle, squirm, sing, gloat, simmer, bubble or boil unless someone insists.

Remember to set time limit for every activity.
When time is up STOP and leave task hanging in midair like dandelion fluff.

There, that should keep you busy for a while. Next week - homework.

Jenny

Reclaim September - go to the beach!

Artist Information:

Essay by Jennifer

* Homeschooling mom
* Brookhaven, Pa

* 9/4/07

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Wonders of Nature by Paul

The Wonder of Nature

wet, wobbling
like penguins on their bellies
out of eggs
yellow feathers
peeping voices
baby chicks


Artist Information:
Haiku - poem
Created 9/24/06
Paul
*Age 14
*Wilmington, DE

Congratulations and thank you to Paul for being the first Poet and Poem to be Published in Homeschool Happening!

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Photo Art by Joe

Warhol Jr

Created: 5/31/07
Medium: jpeg image produced with built in mac camera

George

Created: 8/8/07
Medium: produced on a scanner - 8.5 x 11

Sunboy

Created: 5/21/07
Medium: jpeg image produced with built in mac camera

About the Artist
Joe
8.5 years old
Collingdale, Pa

Congratulations and thank you to Joe for being the first homeschooled artist featured in Wit, Wonder and Whimsy!

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Blurring Time and Place in Venice by Roberta Smith

Artempo
This is a review in the art section of the New York Times of an exhibit at the Fortuny Museum in Venice Italy entitled "Artempo: Where Time Becomes Art." The exhibit is eclectic and unusual. This New York Times online review includes a really interesting slide show of selections from the exhibit.

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Room of Wonders!

Room of Wonders was developed for FRAMES, the French Regional and American Museum Exchange, a coalition of 23 museums that exchange works of art, technologies and resources. The game, Room of Wonders, is stocked with objects from these museums, antiques, are missing from the cabinet of curiosities belonging to Christophe-Paul, Marquis de Robieu. The player must search the globe for the mission object and learns all sorts of things relating to the artifacts, arts, antiques, history, geography and anthropology, along the way! The objects sought include a stone sculpture of a Chinese sea monster, a decorated shield from the Solomon Islands, and African mask and a Hopi kachina doll.

This wonderful game is part teaching tool, part Where in the World is Carmen Sandiago meets I Spy. The target audience is 6-12 year olds but I think it is a fun way to pick up some interesting information and is entertaining for all!

Room of Wonders
http://www.framemuseums.org/sites/room_of_wonders/intro_en.html

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Submission Guidelines

Welcome to Wit,Wonder and Whimsy! the online journal by and for homeschoolers in the arts.

GROUND RULES FOR SUBMISSIONS
Please remember this is a family oriented publication. I will not publish materials inappropriate for this journal. The works I reject may be very worthy of artistic comment and scrutiny and may actually be quite good but this is simply not the appropriate forum. Rejection of any work is not a value judgement or criticism of the work itself but merely a choice made regarding the appropriateness of a piece of work for this particular journal.

WHERE TO SEND
To submit your work, please send it via email to:
Connie@dhsa.org

FORMAT
I can upload images in jpeg or gif formats and read both Word and Appleworks documents. More in the future about submitting digital video clips. Any art form is accepted, so long as you can email it to me, including but not limited to visual art pieces such as drawing painting sculpture, pottery, weaving, clothing design, quilt design or other forms of design work, stories, poems, essays, photographs, digital video clips, soundbites, pod casts, reviews, etc., etc., etc. Visual and performing artist will need to get someone with a digital camera or a scanner to help them email a image of their work.

WHO CAN SUBMIT WORK
Any homeschooler of any age can submit work. I would like to encourage our adult homeschoolers, parents, grandparents, college students, cousins or friends to submit work as well. Although our focus is on the homeschooling community, art does not live in a vacuum. Viewing the work of others can inspire, spark and encourage our younger homeschooled authors and artists!

PRIVACY
I will only publish the author or artist's first name or an alias, as well as age, city and state of the artist or author's residence. However, I do need to have complete information in my personal files as well as a statement of permission to publish the work. This statement must be signed (see below) by both the author/artist and a parent or guardian. I will call or email you if I have any questions. I WILL NOT share personal information with anyone for any reason. If I am contacted about some one's work, I will forward the correspondence to the guardian of the author or artist and will leave solely to their discretion whether to reply. I will not forward or respond to any inappropriate comments but will simply throw them out and label the incoming email address as junk.

IMAGES OF OTHER PEOPLE
If your artwork includes images (photo or video) of any person, you must inform them that you have submitted the work for publication in this online journal and get their permission. You must inform me that you have obtained permission when you submit your work or I will not be able to publish the work. I will not publish the names of any individual portrayed in any photographic or video image. (Unless it is part of the title, is only a first name and you have permission.)

COLD FEET
Once something is published, I am still able to remove it from the archive. I will need a permission statement and certification to remove the work, similar to the permission to publish. the statement must come from the same email address and must include the same full name of artist and guardian and other identifying information that was included with the original submission. You can email me if you have any questions: Connie@dhsa.org

HAVE FUN!
Well, this is all much more weighty and officious than I would like it to be. This publication is meant to be about having fun and sharing. We just need to be sure that we are not harming anyone in the process. I sincerely believe in art as a form of communication and personal expression. In other words, once created it needs to go out into the world. It is my deepest desire for my young homeschooling artists, families and friends that Wit, Wonder and Whimsy! will create a vehicle for homeschoolers to do just that, to share their work with the world and to see the work of others. In this way art will fulfill its most noblest of purposes, to allow us to briefly see this world through the eyes of another and thereby to better understand each other and our world.

Please feel free to contact me if you have questions about any of this.
Connie@dhsa.org

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Submission Form

1. Information to be published.
*Title of Work
*Date created
*Medium or Media
*Format and Size of Original Work
*First name or Alias
*Age
*City and State
(If you do not want any of the above published, be sure to let me know)

2. Information for my files;
Confidential, private and not to be released, made public or otherwise disclosed.
Full Name of Author or Artist
Full Name of Adult and Legal Guardian
Email address
Phone Number
Address

3. Required Statements: cut, paste, fill in the blanks:

* I, (name), certify that:

* (name of work), is original and my own work and the work of (names of all collaborators).

* I have permission from all persons appearing in my work to use and publish their image.

* I grant permission for my work to be published in and to promote the Wit, Wonder and Whimsy! online journal and related activities. Connie, dhsa and Wit, Wonder and Whimsy! is not seeking any copyright interest in my work.

* I understand that, because my work is being submitted via email, my certification statement below is intended to be in lieu of my signature.

* Certified by: (name of artist) and (name of guardian).

* Date (the date you are certifying this statement)

EMAIL your submission to:
Connie@dhsa.org