My Murals

Besides putting time in on almost everyone's paintings I also did 7 of my own. I didn't intend to do that many, but in the end I wanted the whole fence completed and everyone else was less energetic about that goal than me.

My first one didn't win me any popularity contests with the kids, but I'm forever a teacher and firmly believe that walls and visuals should teach and remind. (The kids' complaints sounded something along the line of "Mom, how come all of your murals are 'churchy'? What they don't realize is that the reminder is just as much for me as it is for them!)

Sister Beck's talk in April 2010 conference spoke to me. She talked about navigating successfully through life with the help of the spirit. ("with personal revelation, [a woman] can prioritize correctly and navigate this life confidently.") I loved the image of navigating with a map.

A little piece of Americana. . .

After doing Tessa's ABC mural I decided I wanted something representative of my teaching years. I chose a few of the safety tips from the dust cover of Officer Buckle and Gloria. The book came out shortly after I began my teaching career and I used it every year for many different activities. It still is one of my favorites.

I wanted to do a throw-some-paint-on-the-fence mural. . .(something abstract that I didn't plan out that would be a color explosion). I had a large space on the back fence that was assigned to me, but I wasn't confident with my paint-throwing skills so I opted to do a planned-out scrapbooking look. Not super happy with this one, but it's too much work to change. . . In the curvy lines I stamped quotes: Being happy doesn't mean that everything is perfect. It means that you've decided to look beyond the imperfections. **Happiness is a habit. Cultivate it. ** Smile! ** Our greatest joy comes from developing love and compassion. The more we care for the happiness of others, the greater is our own sense of well-being. ** Love---no matter what.

This is the one I've gotten the most comments on. . . and it was one of the easiest to do. . . and one of my favorites. I love how it captures each of us.

(To create it, I took pictures--consecutive shot setting--of each of us, printed them and traced the outline of them onto a sheet protector and then projected them up.)

In the end I had a large area that still needed paint and since it was off in the corner I decided to throw some paint. . . .Amazingly, I'm fairly happy with how it turned out.

(Whew. . . now onto blogging the other things I'm WAAAAYYYY behind on. . .I'm sure you're happy to moving onto a new subject too!)