My high school buddy and university roommate, Joanne asked me if I'd come along with her to help with a project for her niece's young daughter, Kara. Kara's school was doing a Flat Stella geography project and she was asking her Grand Auntie Joanne to take Flat Stella around Oahu and photograph some fun places. Joanne had done a similar thing a couple of years ago for Kara's older sister, Krista who is now in the fourth grade.
The year after I retired, the PTA at the school I taught asked for a photo of Art and me with suitcases in front of us. They used the photo of us to create a Flat Mr. and Mrs. for children to take wherever they were traveling over spring break. They invited me to come and see the bulletin board with all the photos the children had taken with us everywhere they went and the stories they'd written. That was the first time I'd heard of Flat Stanley.
This reminded me of the time we went to Florence (Firenze) and did a similar thing. We asked Jon what he wanted us to bring for him.
He said we should just bring a cheap little souvenir that we saw everybody buying that was representative of Florence.
Jon has always told us not to worry about bringing gifts for him because he'd rather we spend the time enjoying what we see rather than shopping.
Since Michelangelo's David was present everywhere we went in Florence, that's what we bought him.
Then we walked around Florence and took photos of David everywhere we went.
It was a fun project! When we gave Jon the David and showed him the photos, he laughed and said, "You had to bring me David? You couldn't give me Venus?"
With all these wonderful memories, I was more than ready to join Joanne in this fun project to help Kara. Did I mention that Joanne is a teacher also? Teachers love to do stuff like this.
Joanne had already spent a lot of time taking photos of Stella at various Oahu highlights, but wanted to be sure she did as much for Kara as she did for Krista.
We first went to Pearl Harbor where we took photos of Flat Stella next to the WWII submarine, U.S.S. Bowfin and the Arizona Memorial. Then it was on to the Aloha Stadium.
Here is Flat Stella next to the Sumida Watercress Farm.
It was beginning to rain and was so cloudy that there wasn't a lot more places we could go to.
Later in the evening I remembered something my brother, Dennis had just taught me. He'd shown me how to take part of a photo and copy it onto another.
Aha.... That was a light bulb moment.
I do have quite a few photos I've taken for my blog so I was able to copy Flat Stella from the watercress farm and paste her onto places around Oahu.
This sure was a LOT of fun. I hope my little granddaughter, KC has a project like this too because I am so ready for it!!!
The year after I retired, the PTA at the school I taught asked for a photo of Art and me with suitcases in front of us. They used the photo of us to create a Flat Mr. and Mrs. for children to take wherever they were traveling over spring break. They invited me to come and see the bulletin board with all the photos the children had taken with us everywhere they went and the stories they'd written. That was the first time I'd heard of Flat Stanley.
He said we should just bring a cheap little souvenir that we saw everybody buying that was representative of Florence.
Jon has always told us not to worry about bringing gifts for him because he'd rather we spend the time enjoying what we see rather than shopping.
Since Michelangelo's David was present everywhere we went in Florence, that's what we bought him.
With all these wonderful memories, I was more than ready to join Joanne in this fun project to help Kara. Did I mention that Joanne is a teacher also? Teachers love to do stuff like this.
Joanne had already spent a lot of time taking photos of Stella at various Oahu highlights, but wanted to be sure she did as much for Kara as she did for Krista.
It was beginning to rain and was so cloudy that there wasn't a lot more places we could go to.
Later in the evening I remembered something my brother, Dennis had just taught me. He'd shown me how to take part of a photo and copy it onto another.
Aha.... That was a light bulb moment.
I do have quite a few photos I've taken for my blog so I was able to copy Flat Stella from the watercress farm and paste her onto places around Oahu.
This sure was a LOT of fun. I hope my little granddaughter, KC has a project like this too because I am so ready for it!!!
Sheer genius! It is incredible how you used modern technology to do this assignment. Good job!
ReplyDeleteWhat a hoot! I'd heard of Flat Stanley, I guess in school. I think it's based on a true story of someone unable to be on a trip.
ReplyDeleteI had a patient's family want me to pose with their Flat Someone, and I put my stethoscope around it.
My son was the last of his '6 cousins' group to get married. All were in town but one, and we had a Flat Annie, and put her face in all the photos. They zapped the photos to her overseas as it was happening, and she felt it rather weird and spooky.
Mahalo for the Flat tour; I didn't know about the cannonball tree. DrumMajor
What a fun project! I enjoyed seeing all the places David and Flat Stella visited, Kay. :-)
ReplyDeleteWhat fun! I love Flat Stanley.
ReplyDeleteWe've done this a few times and it is always very fun. Our last flat person ended up with a full wardrobe and his own Facebook page.
ReplyDeleteWhat fun! When I was teaching infants we had a teddy bear named Gordon who travelled all over the world, and we had a wonderful time when he came back to school sharing in all his adventures. When he started to look a bit the worse for all his travelling we introduced a sister for him, who started travelling and sharing the load. The children loved it.
ReplyDeleteI just finished a similar project for my youngest granddaughter, and have had fun with "flat" adventures with her older sister and brother. It does make you look at your surroundings in a new way.
ReplyDeleteAwww...it was so touching of the PTA to ask for a pic of you and Art with suitcases and have the children take you with them on their adventures during spring break. That speaks volumes of what they thought of you, their teacher, and how much they'll miss you when you retire. That's such a nice retirement gift.
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..oops reread your post and anyway it shows how much they had already missed you!!
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blessings...
ReplyDeletedelightful I can see you had fun.
flat stella?
What a fun idea. Caleb & his mom & dad are going to Japan again in May. Wonder if I could come up with something for that trip?
ReplyDeleteHmm. I 'm wondering who I might like to do this with. I think I would choose a cute dog.
ReplyDeleteI love this, I remember my kids doing flat stanley, but what little girl wouldn't want a Stella instead.
ReplyDeletegreat job Kay! We also have a cheap David at home.
ReplyDeleteGreat job, Stella. I've done Stanleys, too, plus one for a friend who broke her leg and had to skip a trip to a show. We made a flat Carol, an excellent likeness of her, drawn by my sister. Except Carol is very well endowed, so we also had cut out costumes, like an evening dress and a bikini, where Carol could really show off.
ReplyDeleteThis is too wonderful!!! You've now given me an idea!
DeleteWhat a fun project, and a new one to me.
ReplyDeleteThere's a app for that! Check out Flat Stanley on your apps store. I have it on my iPhone and have used it a couple of times. Fun stuff.
ReplyDeleteI checked out the app, but I wanted something that could put a different face on Flat Stanley and Stella. It's really a great app though.
DeleteKay - If someone has to miss a reunion of friends or family, just get a full facial color photo of them, and enlarge it to the real-life size. Instead of the entire body, just glue the face-photo onto a ruler/stick. We put Flat Annie between folks, and have one of her being kissed from each side. We had to look twice to see that it wasn't really Annie! DrumMajor
ReplyDeleteI love this idea!!!
Delete"You had to bring me David, you couldn't give me Venus?", that made me chuckle!!
ReplyDelete:-)
Ah, Florence...I want to see it!!!
Well now, aren't you clever. What a cool idea and fun for the kids.
ReplyDeleteOh, what a great idea. My friend Poolie does this with a little toy clown, but flat Stella is new to me. I need to learn how to copy and paste like you have. How wonderful.
ReplyDeleteGosh! I wish I could explain it properly, but my brother still has to fine tune my understanding of how to do it. I can do very simple things, but with any complexity, I'm lost.
DeleteI seen projects like these, one local kid sent one to President Obama and he got a response.
ReplyDelete