Rachael Baker and Kim Devine's Project 52 is everything but the kitchen sink.
Project 52 involves trying 52 new things throughout our senior year as an independent project. Rather than focus on one topic, we decided to involve ourselves in small aspects of different activities. We aren't sure what we'll discover, but it certainly leaves room for adventure.
Saying I'm a sushi enthusiast would not be an understatement on any account, because in fact I have loved Sushi for as long as I can remember. But somehow, I have passed over the opportunity to craft the delicacy on many occasions so I decided to take the task into my own hands.
I have recently been following a health blog which posted a recipe for quinoa, avocado, spinach, salmon sushi. So my friend Margo and I attempted on a Friday afternoon with nothing else to do. It took a few rolls to get the hang of it but it was very yummy in the end! I hope you enjoy our progress pictures!
Stop motion: a cinematographic technique whereby the camera is repeatedly stopped and started, for example to give animated figures the impression of movement.
I attempted to film the stop motion video when I created Open When letters for my friend Molly. However, I never posted the video because although it was a learning experience, I didn't find the video to be any good or interesting to watch. Once again, I attempted a stop motion video with the melting crayon art project. Since I asked for a tripod and received it as an early Christmas present, I had the added benefit of the tripod. However, I once again was not impressed with the results.
I have decided to combine the videos and post them anyway to show my improvements. I have learned the importance of keeping a camera perfectly still; even with a tripod I struggled with this skill. In addition, stop motion is very time consuming. Each movement takes about twice as long with the added necessity of pressing the camera button. I think that when done correctly, stop motion can be a fascinating technique. I hope that next time I attempt a stop motion video, I will have learned from the mistakes you see here and succeed.
17. An art project: melted crayon art
Art has never really been my thing, but I have always wanted to try melted crayon art. I've seen it on websites like Pinterest. So, I tried it out. Even though it took a long time, I am absolutely in love with how it came out.
I hot glued crayons to a poster board. I used RoseArt crayons mixed with a few neon Crayola crayons. I believe the Crayola produced brighter colors when melted. Other than that, the only necessary materials are a hairdryer and newspaper to cover your work spaces (include the walls behind the poster. You may actually melt the top of the crayons without meaning to).
I also obtained a silhouette of a couple standing under an umbrella. I covered it with tape while melting crayons around it.
The whole process took several hours to get the final product I wanted. The best part was you couldn't really mess up - you could always simply move around whatever you had already melted by re-melting it with the hairdryer. The crayon also had a tendency to splatter into the areas of other colors, but it turned out looking cooler that way.
Something like this is the whole reason I love Project 52. I never would've made the time to do this, but it was great. Plus, I have something to hang up in my room that I can actually say I made. This will stand as a reminder of everything Project 52 stands for in my mind: to live without regrets and take advantage of opportunities like a couple taking advantage of a special moment despite the adverse weather conditions.
Ms. Morris is our Project Explore mentor, and she recently underwent surgery for her wrist. In addition, it is almost Christmas. So, we figured it was the perfect time to surprise a teacher with not only a thank you present but a Merry Christmas/Get Well Soon present. Rachael and I had one of our friends ask to take a picture of her for the yearbook. As our friend took the "picture" (which was actually the video you see here), we came in with a poinsettia, flowers, and a present. Inside the present was chocolates, a card, and a Snoopy mug and stuffed animal (Snoopy is her favorite).
15. Wear a costume to school
Since this blog was created in November, we have to play catch-up with some of the tasks we completed prior to the creation of the blog. One of them is "Wear a costume to school", which both of us did on Halloween.
Both of us used a play on our names for our costumes: Kim Possible and Rachael Baker was a baker. The Kim Possible costume did not look like much of a costume because it was partially normal clothes, so I borrowed a monster onesie to wear during school. Both of us definitely stuck out and got attention for our costumes, but it was a fun experience for the day.
Recently my friend Margo and I have been trying to create healthier eating habits so when I came across "healthy banana bread" I figured it was worth a shot. I am currently typing this while the bread is in the oven so there is no end product for me to comment on right now. However, I can tell you the recipe does not include white flour, butter or granulated sugar of any sort. Instead theses ingredients were replaced with applesauce, honey and almond milk for a dessert which is definitely healthy and hopefully delicious as well!
My dad recently purchased a gopro which first became popular for their ability to film underwater and Kim and I thought it would be a hoot to try it out. Since I don't like to get pruney and Kim is on the swim team we thought it best if she dealt with this task hands on. I got to watch from the nice, dry bleachers as Kim swam and dove.
It took a few days (weeks) for me to figure out the program and pick an appropriate song but I hope everyone enjoys the final product!
I created this task in the summer specifically for my best friend. Although we have never lived in the same town or gone to the same school, Molly and I have been friends since sixth grade. We swam on the same same swim team. Although neither of us swim on that team anymore, we have kept in contact. We talk nearly every day.
The right photo is us in middle school, while the left is us after swimming against one another in one of our last high school swim meets in October 2014.
Because I know I won't be there for every big event in her life, specifically because we both will be heading off to college this summer, I came up with the idea of writing "Open When" letters. I wrote ten letters that she can open at different events in her life, and I put each of the sealed envelopes with her Christmas present.
The Letters
1. Open When: You get these letters (and Merry Christmas!)
2. Open When: You're feeling blue
3. Open When: It's your senior prom!
4. Open When: Graduation
5. Open When: You're about to leave for college
6. Open When: You need a throwback Thursday (memories of us)
7. Open When: You want a laugh
8. Open When: You need inspiration/motivation
9. Open When: Anytime in your first year of college
I have performed many miscellaneous jobs over my 17 years, so how does this one in particular qualify as something I've never done? Well, the reasons it qualifies for this project in particular is due to the lack of qualifications I had for the job, aka I was hired as a face painter at a 3-year old's Orthodox Jewish birthday party.
Now I am the type of person who could think they were drawing a beautiful sunset and later have someone misinterpret it as a deformed Octopus. So I was pretty terrified by the fact that I would be drawing on human faces. Okay now that I have given the gist of the situation there are a few realizations that I would like to share.
It is very very, very, very, important to test the paint before you arrive otherwise you may end up with paint chunks on a child's face.
Surprisingly enough, a parent will not tell their kid if the drawing on their cheek looks as if the artist attempted with their eyes closed.
Klezmer music for 4 hours can be found very relaxing.
There is no room for mistakes when a child asks you to paint their hand (they'll eyeball you the entire time -no pressure)
The kids will eventually get bored and if you so choose to entertain them they will do all or any of these five things:
1) Ask you to take pictures of them doing flips
2) Force you to do the Macarena with them
3) Ask to paint on the right side of your face
4) Ask to paint on the left side of your face
5) Ask to draw on your forehead
To which you will only have one choice: let the madness ensue.
Time Lapse Definition: denoting the photographic technique of taking a sequence of frames at set intervals to record changes that take place slowly over time. When the frames are shown at normal speed, or in quick succession, the action seems much faster
Some of the tasks on our original list included filming different types of videos, including a stop motion, underwater, and time lapse video. So, I decided to combine the time lapse task with the making crepes because a time lapse video needed to be involved with something that took a very long time. And because each crepe had to be cooked separately and we had so many trial and error situations with the recipe, the crepes took a long time. The crepes task (#9) actually took several hours, but I filmed clips to create a time lapse video just about two minutes long. However, I encountered some technical problems with this task and will share them with you:
1. You need a tri-pod to film for this long a time period. I didn't have one, and I also didn't have a person to film for me for most of the clips. My brother was the other person making crepes with me, and he was too busy making the crepes. So, I alternating between making things with one hand and filming with the other, and putting the camera down in certain spots and hoping the shot worked out.
2. I do not recommend the time lapse feature of the iPhone. The new iPhone update has a time lapse feature, and some of the clips in my video were filmed using it. For my purposes, the speed was way too fast on the time lapse. Slowing it down on my computer created a bit of a blurry effect.
3. In addition, filming with the iPhone means you need to film landscape. However, I forgot a few times which is why some of the clips are so small. This means it is not easy to film one-handed, so that wasn't a realistic goal for me. I also was not used to trying to film in a store, so I didn't realize it needed to be landscape for the best quality video.
Here are the clips I was able to edit into a time lapse video:
It wasn't the simplest recipe to choose because it has three parts to it (the crepe, a filling, and a chocolate ganache sauce). It also had a few things we had never heard of before, like mascarpone cheese (which turned out to be a light, fluffy, and sweet cheese used to enhance the filling).
Because it was red velvet, our batter turned out bright pink. The crepes themselves were the correct red color.
Admittedly, our first attempts went poorly. My brother Kevin described as a trial and error task that was "more error than trial."
This was our first crepe. To say it went poorly may be an understatement.
Our second attempt didn't go much better.
After two failed attempts, we headed to Bed Bath and Beyond to get the supplies we realized we couldn't succeed without: a non-stick pan and a no-stick skillet.
The chocolate ganache sauce.
My dad decided to really over-chocolate the crepe.
But after we had the right materials and made a few mistakes, we were successful. My brother mastered the ability to flip the crepes while I made the ganache sauce, rolled and filled the crepes, and poured confectionary sugar over the cooled crepes.
8. What's known as a "DIY" project: Do something yourself that you typically buy.
My favorite drink from Dunkin' Donuts is a Dunkaccino, a mix of hot chocolate and coffee. It's just around $2, but that can add up quickly.
1/2 a packet of Nestle Cocoa Powder
4 oz. Folgers' coffee beans
1 dash of salt
1 tablespoon of vanilla
Filled up the rest of the mug with 1% lowfat milk
I warmed up for a minute and forty seconds in a microwave on high power.
Using half-and-half is probably better than milk to get a more similar Dunkaccino taste, but what I made still turned out pretty well.
7. Conduct interviews on a topic currently impacting society, and compare the responses of different age groups.
One of our inspirations for Project 52 was Humans of New York. Photographer Brandon Stanton became famous from photographing portraits on the streets of New York City. He interviews his subjects and posts a snippet from the interview as the picture's caption.
Since one of our original ideas was to conduct interviews similar to Humans of New York, we decided it should still be part of Project 52. So, we made it one of the 52 tasks.
The place to find people of different age groups for me is Thanksgiving. My grandma hosts Thanksgiving, and you can find friends and family of all ages in her house - from babies to my awesome 94-year-old grandma. I brought my camera along and conducted interviews. I edited the footage, splitting the clips by questions, and I came up with this.
As for the comparison of different age groups, older people tended to view the act of taking a selfie as selfish. The very young children saw selfies only as an act of fun and a way to remember special moments. I asked several teenagers, and most of us had taken selfies but still were willing to admit that it was a selfish act.
Even though this is my second patriotic task in a row, and it seems as if I may be creating a trend, I would like to state that this portion of our project was not planned. In fact, it came to be due to a lack of recognition of our veterans on Veteran's day.
A few years ago the School Board decided that due to excessive snow days we should have school on this particular holiday. On the first year this occurred every single one of my teachers made a point to do something to honor those who serve be it a moment of silence or having us write letters to veterans. However, I am shocked and disappointed to say that all but one of my teachers neglected to even mention this holiday this year. Later that day as Kim and I were talking we realized that we both had relatives that served and were awarded with the "Purple Heart." As we continued talking we came to the revelation that we should not fail to recognize those who fight for our country just because we were not asked to do so in school. Thus number 6 out of 52 was born.
As Kim and I created our list, task Number 5 had originally been dictated as "A Trip to New York City." However, we both soon realized that we had been to New York countless amounts of times so unfortunately, it could not be used as a part of our list.
Yet as I passed 180 Greenwich Street in Manhattan I came across a totally new aspect of the "City of Dreams" which in fact was a place that symbolized much that was lost, the 9/11 memorial.
The 9/11 memorial was built in honor of the victims of a terrorist attack in 2001. The sight of the memorial is breath taking and there were mass amounts of people gaping in awe at the beauty as well as checking for the names of their loved ones. It was very interesting to me that there were many security guards and furthermore they were not letting anyone smoke or speak on the phone while on the premises. I believe that shows a huge sign of respect to those who were lost in this tragic event. The memorial means so much to the families that lost members so it was very touching to experience to be able to see the amazing structure.
4. Attend and participate in another student's Project Explore.
Today, I traveled to a nearby assisted living facility and attended Olivia DiMarco's dance therapy class. I was not allowed to take pictures or videos of the residents, but I took pictures and videos of Olivia to show her accomplishments. I ended up talking in front of the residents, too. I told them about my Project Explore and why I was attending this session. In addition to dancing the Macarena with the residents and watching one of my closest friends perform, I got to listen to a few fascinating stories.
Olivia's class was not just about stretching and doing dance moves with the residents. She also provided them with great entertainment. Olivia brought Margo Libre as a guest dancer, and the two of them had the residents clapping and complimenting them endlessly for their grace and dedication. They both performed dances from The Nutcracker. Next month, Olivia will participate in The Nutcracker for the seventh time. Before saying goodbye, Olivia shared the classic story of the ballet she knows so well.
Watch this video to see excerpts from Olivia's dance therapy session! (Be sure to click the square button next to the word "YouTube" to make the video full screen)
The most fascinating story we heard from one resident was about Sally Hansen, who founded Sally Hansen Beauty Supplies. The resident brought her up because Sally Hansen was a ballerina before she had anything to do with cosmetics. She became involved with nail polish after she retired from ballet.
Olivia's project was a great experience. Having Olivia and Margo perform immediately lifted the mood in the room, and that was an amazing thing to witness.
3. Participate in the volunteer "Drive By Raking" project.
The youth of St. Philips took to the community streets today to show support and rake leaves. "Drive By Raking" is a service project; the youth group surprises members of the community by raking their yards. People are chosen to be Drive by Raking victims because they have recently suffered a loss or tragedy, and the youth pick up rakes to show them how much we care.
This sign was left at the yards we raked.
Everyone was surprised to look out and see a group of young people raking their lawns. But we were surprised, too: several times, hot chocolate and cookies were brought out as a thank you!
NHS students Sabrina Imbrogno (left) and Rachel Ranieri (right)
The activity was a great success. Six groups of youth raked twenty-four yards. And gained a whole new appreciation for leaf blowers.
