Segundo dia de Carnaval!: Second day of Carnaval!

I neglected to mention that yesterday was the first day of carnaval, which started out as a religious tradition before lent and has since become an all-out weeklong fiesta! The kids were all dressed up yesterday as if it were Halloween. My favorite costume was definitely a zebra. I'm pretty convinced that everyone should have to lighten up a bit and wear costumes to school/work/etc at times like these.

We had graphic design class today. I was sure that I had everything that was asked of us, but I forgot to bring my grid study with me to the cafe where we met, so I got an incomplete. I printed out my layouts and everything, which looked funny even though I put them in CMYK (because printers can only handle these while pictures are taken with the colors of light-RGB). I did them in photoshop, but we are going to start learning In-Design, which will be cool.

Studio was helpful-we got an intro to urban design analysis. I think Christi sensed that we were all a little burnt out. We used trace and maps and markers, and did a ton of analyses really quickly. It seemed so easy when we were all there watching. Hopefully it will be that easy when we continue to do new ones ourselves.

After studio we went to Gran Via for a bit. The night ended weird with the Aldana boys in strange states...the walk home was frustrating. I'm going straight to bed.

El dia de San Valentin: Valentine's Day

Today we had sketching class, whose ACTUAL title is not sketching class, by the way, and our photo assignments from last week were due. I made a sort of montage for each of mine. We were supposed to show the building through 4-6 pictures.

...and it's "that day" again!

Once again, Dad and Gramps are the perfect Valentines! They find me no matter where I am in the world. haha.

After our normal intro, we all walked over to L'Eixample and did a watercolor assignment. I was terrible at it, and I couldn't figure out what my problem was until Eugenia came over to remind me the watercolor techniques that we learned our first day...DUH! I want to re-do it because mine is horrible and lacks any sort of technique higher than the capacity of a 3 year old.

I did some drawings for studio in my sketchbook, tiny chipboard models just werent working out well. I did well on my sketchbook review from the field trip, so that made me happy. Then we did the firm visit, which was good but it went pretty late.

Our Valentine's Day ended fantastically...frozen pizzas in Aldana.

PS-happy bday to Nap and Pat

Sin camera: Without a camera

I neglected to mention that my camera still isn't working. I have to get new batteries and then I can try to figure out what is wrong with it, so if you are sensing a lack of pictures...you're not alone...

Listos para desenar?: Ready to design?

Catalan class rocks my socks. I love the process of learning a new language, and the different techniques and ways to learn and to memorize that only occur in language classes. It's really cool that it's just Gisela and me in the class. We have class from 12:30 to about 1:30, when we have a break and the two of us go to the cafe down the hall to get a snack or cafe con leche, then we head back to class for another hour, before heading down the street to the Urquinaona metro stop which we take to Espanya where we change to the green line and get off at Zona Universitaria for history class with the rest of the group. Tuesdays aren't so bad at all!

History was fine today. Felipe cut out the pieces of the buildings at the school woodshop and Victoria and I spent a good 2 or 3 hours setting them up and glueing them all down to the board, which seemed like a huge waste of time to me, but it looks good so no complaints, I suppose. I don't have much of a design for the block to show tomorrow. Just a basic height pattern. as a means of creating a slow increase/decrease in building heights in order to appease the existing buildings...that Jean Nouvell building is a huge pain.

Regresamos a Barca: We return to Barca

We got a crazy cab ride with no ventilation in the pitch black winding mountain roads at 5 am. Got on the bus at 6 and I passed out, apparently snored, "like a mountain lion" the whole ride home, got back and hit up studio.

We had a group desk crit today, and while our analysis wasn't uniform due to a changed template size over teh weekend and a simple difference in drawing technique/style, the overall idea of "integration" went over well. There are a lot of things that are currently separated across the huge hole in the urban fabric, better known as Placa de les Glories; it is divided in half, literally, into two districts (L'Eixample and Sant Marti), there is a urban design gap between the residential/commercial Eixample and the factory-getting-a-facelift section of Poble Nou. There is also the difference between the Mountain and the sea sides. We are going to look into the population as well, since we have heard that a younger crowd of many artsy people is in the developing area toward Poble Nou and Forum.

After studio today, I went to buy the plane tickets that I had seen last week before going skiing, and due to our hesitance we lost the good prices and everything jumped about 30 euro. I'm pretty pissed. We did decide, though, that we could take the bus to Girona in order to save money on a Ryan Air flight into Dusseldorf/Weeze airport in Germany. So we currently havea means of getting to our spring break destination! Go team.

La montana-dia 2: The mountain-day 2

The second day of the trip, we got up a little bit later and caught the bus down to Soldeu in front of the supermarket...then grabbed our stuff from the locker and headed up again!

Starting the day off right...food, warm clothes...snow

Ben and Meg at the top...I was getting better at not falling at the top of the lift, though I definitely too someone out yesterday! OOPS!

OF COURSE: we had to do those posed shots for our parents...because "who goes to another country to ski?" This is Tom's magazine ad photo!

I LOVE this pic of Bri! He is king of the mountain(s)!

I must note, that I am practically not IN snow...this is because we chose to go down a run basically meant for skiiers...correction-it WAS for skiiers. And just before we gathered to take this pic, i was making my way down a path that is about 10 feet wide-MAX. and the boys all stop, so I figure I'll just go off the the side. To do this I couldn't go down tho, that would mean i would tumble down the slope and it would probably have resulted in death-lol. SO I went up onto the little slope to my right...well--apparently I had a lot of speed from going straight through said path and ended up going over a few rocks, then managed to carve back toward the path and as i disappeared behind a big rock, i grabbed hold and managed to stop. So...basically we are standing in that barren area to the side of the narrow path so as to avoid being run over by skiiers. And I have a personal connection to the terrain! haha

Here is Ben-you know...just hanging out in Andorra, of all places!

The end of our ski-day was enjoyable. I watched Tom jump off the ramp a few times and the boys took one more run... then it was back to the market to grab some food for dinner.

On the way, we realized that the "non-hibernating bear-cows" that we had previously seen trudging around the mountain opposite the ski slopes, were actually sheep that lived in the town-go figure! They came down from the mountain just as we walked up the street to the market and they were lured to their barn with what looked like crumbs and vegetables.

Our day ended with Pasta Aldana and studio diagrams as well as getting a taxi to come pick us up at 5 am to get to the early bus home so we dont get back RIGHT before studio. I'd like to get together with my group and make sure that we have everything we need together and whatnot.

La montana-dia 1: The mountain-day 1

The mountain greeted us this AM after taking a bus into Soldeu, grabbing Tom's rentals, then getting ours -- which I did in all Spanish (score!). We put some stuff in a locker that we have for two days, bought lift tickets (which are electronic, so you keep them in your pocket instead of attached to your jacket), then jumped in an 8-person gondola up the mtn.

Ben and Tom...on a lift...going up...up...up...

The mountain was HUGE! There are tons of different sections. We would go up one side, down another, back up, then up again before coming back down! It was nuts. I didn't do much falling--Cait would be so proud. I wish she and Rachel could have been here.

It was a really tough mountain for snowboarders--they have a ton of flat spots. Tom helped me out a ton since he was on skis so I didn't have to keep unstrapping and whatnot. I held the boys up a bit, but hopefully not too much. I was working on my mad carving skills, and going straight down the mountain facing sideways is not exactly my style!

Bri was totally rockin out in his gray outfit...fist pumping whenever we passed by some music blasting on the slope.


Ben was being a surfer on snow...he could have been on waves and I wouldn't have known the difference!
That's Brian falling in front of me, and me...carving? or falling? You decide!

Bri, Ben, and I taking a break

After our day on the slopes we hit up a grocery store to make chili and grilled cheese, came back and showered, then did a family dinner! We even had dessert and home made hot-cocoa! True ski/boarders!

STUDIO IN ANDORRA: We can't seem to get away!

We did a bit of work, but it was a long day and another one is coming at us tomorrow! Yay for snow, boarding, good food, great friends, and tv shows in french!