You know you're a costume geek when...

My sister-in-law, Hillary, asked a very valid question: why am I in London to begin with?  Which made me realize how sad it is that in two weeks of blogging not only have I covered only four days of my trip, but I also haven't even mentioned my purpose in coming to the UK at all.  And now we're home and we need to get this trip written up!

That being said, I spent three weeks in London for a class called "Costume and Character: 18th and 19th Century English Costume and Society" led by my costume design professor at IU.  We lived in Nido Spitalfields, the tallest student housing building in the world.  It's a horribly modern building that, strangely enough, I didn't take any pictures of.

Left: Our housing, photo courtesy of the Nido Spitalfields website. Right: Our class building.

Finals

Looking back on this week, I feel as though nothing of significance has happened, but that's prooobably because I leave for the U.K. tomorrow.

In reality, a ton happened, obviously.  I mean, which of the weeks this year didn't have lots of stuff going on?  But this week was a little different as it was finals week... of my first year of grad school!  I finished it!

Penultimate

Okay, dear readers, the end is upon us!  By that, of course, I mean the end of my first year of grad school!  Next week is finals and a week from today I will be frantically packing to go to London (I leave the following Monday)!  My mantra right now is: Just keep working. Just keep working. London! London! London!  Ben's is similar, but he has four weeks left in school.

With the end of the year comes exciting (and some not so exciting) annual events.  Last week (I knew I was forgetting something in last week's post...) the MFAs and BFA seniors had a portfolio review.  We first years weren't required to present a finished portfolio, just whatever portfolio we had coming into school and a stack of things we've done throughout the year.  We met individually with the tech/design professors during the day to present our work and talk about our progress.  At 5:30 there was a reception open to the public.

Left: You may recognize the booklets in the back from my URTA presentation last year.  This picture is kind of a tease because you can't actually see much of the renderrings... apologies!

Right: The dresses I made!

 Some close-ups of my 20-inch renderings.

Left: Edward Gorey inspired renderings

Right: Late 18th century costumes.

The MFAs!

This Friday was Drama Prom (not Drama Proma, much to Ben's chagrin).  It was... a lovely evening during which we got dressed up and had some good food.  To be honest, the event was mostly geared towards the BFAs and they were way more into it than any of the MFAs were.  Not to mention that Pepperdine University's Theatre Department had a KILLER banquet each year, so I'm a tough critic (it's also possible that I just need to get over myself...)  But it was fun to see so many people dressed up.

Prom pictures!!!  This is also the first appearance of Benolds in the blog... see what I mean?!  And when they both have beards... whatch out!

The best part of the evening was the dramatic romance novel reading done by our costume professor and mentor, Linda.  Let me explain... Linda 1. is awesome, 2. is really well read and spoken, 3. is an amazing designer, 4. reads romance novels almost non-stop providing us with some great out-loud readings, and 5. writes some of her own.  Each year the Theatre Department's Student Activity Board holds an auction to raise money and this year an item on the docket was a reading of a romance novel excerpt custom written by Linda for the winner.  It was also to be read at Drama Prom.  Yay for us!

Benolds audaciously asked if they could go bowling while the long awards ceremony commenced and we informed them that firstly, no way could they bowl while we had to sit through the long list of awards; and secondly, Linda was on the program to read so it would be worth their while.  The verdict:  completely worth staying!

Ben kept track of where we were in the program - note his marks of exclamation next to Linda's reading.

Finally, yesterday evening Katie and Jeff hosted an end of the year cook-out at Jeff's house.  We were unfortunately rained in so it became a ... cook-in?  Regardless, it was a great final gathering with wonderful company, delicious food, and less noise (BFAs are loud).

The Little 5.

Bloomington prepared for and celebrated the Little 5 this week.  The Little 5 is a 50 mile bicycle race held each year at the IU Bloomington campus.  People celebrate by spending the entire week intoxicated and disrupting traffic in various ways (driving drunk, walking in front of moving cars, and other general mayhem).  I only witnessed glimpses of the festivities as I was mostly locked away in the theatre building preparing for finals, which are ONE WEEK AWAY!!!

A Titanic Week

Looking back on this week it's hard to believe all that got accomplished.  Waiting for Lefty opened, I had three big assignments due, attended an amazing two-day master class for rendering in Photoshop, I broke my old phone and got a new one - finally joining Ben's phone plan, and managed to have an amazing girls' night with Julia and Erica (which involves a story about having an amazing husband).

Catch Up

I know.  We missed last week.  It's just that it was a relatively uneventful week when you compare it to the weeks preceding it and I just keep putting it off until this week had completely finished. Now it'll just get combined into this week's entry.

So here's what's going on:

An IU Addition!

This week was mid-term, and therefore, quite chaotic.  I didn't have any tests, but did have loads of projects.  Two rendering projects: a movement piece based on the Seven Deadly Sins and an upbeat musical called "The June Wedding." Each meant to give us practice using colored pencil on different colored paper, which is super cool!  A design project: 12 designs for the show of our choosing, in my case, "Blithe Spirit" by Noel Coward.  And I may or may not have finished my weekly draping project on time... it's okay, we get one free pass.  I apologize for not having anything to show for all my work... just know that at some point this summer I will have a very nicely updated online portfolio for you all to see.

Love-ly

As many of you may already know, our week started out with a bang!  You may remember me writing about some funny lights we noticed around downtown Chicago:

 

Another Fun-Filled Week!

As the title denotes, it has been another busy week with tons of fun included.  Thursday and Friday I spent packing up costume storage because we are moving to a bigger, nicer building.  It's going to be pretty great.  The old building is getting demolished, and rumor has it that it was condemned?  But that really is just a rumor from someone in Slavic studies (shared the building with us)... so don't take my word for it.  It took three days just to pack up all the shoes!

Friday we went bowling on campus (that's right folks, a bowling alley ON CAMPUS!) with the "Party of Two" (a.k.a. P.O.T.  maybe not the best acronym...) group from church.  This group is comprised of couples without children.  It was a blast getting to know some more people and I happened to kick everyone's butts in the second game... Ben did really well too :)

Saturday night was Arts and Culture night at church.  We thought this was just a fancy way to say "Talent Show" but it really was quite the classy affair.  In the Relief Society room paintings, pottery, and other visual arts were displayed.  I set up my four little portfolio books I displayed at U/RTAs last year. With the highly reputable Jacobs School of Music here, we have a very musically skilled congregation.  There were arias sung, classical piano, violins, Jazz, tap dancing and MAGIC!  That's right, folks, Ben was a HIT with a short magic show which I recorded!  So, without further ado, here is the video I've been promising :) (I apologize for making the one sideways... I didn't have the forethought when I was recording)  Enjoy and have a great week!

Super, Duper, Pooper Scooper Fast!

Three-year-old Daniel provided us with this quote-of-the-morning in primary at church this morning when challenged to sing "head, shoulders, knees, and toes" as fast as he could.

First order of business: I have discovered the snail mail version of twitter and it's FABULOUS! It's called Post Crossing.  I won't make you suffer through my terrible descriptions, but it's extremely exciting.  If you love checking the mail like I do, now you can actually know that something good is coming.  I hang the post cards I receive in my cubical at school which makes for an interesting and fun-looking work space.