Hello, there! 
Did you attend our Patterns in the Park with Beautiful Symmetry workshop on August 12th? We’d LOVE to see your nature-inspired creations here! 
Also, if you weren’t able to attend the workshop, you can see the slides we used here!
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Here’s my digital creation from today! The whirligig beetle in action! 
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I made a peanut pattern out of my lunch, then just spun it around in GIMP. Thank you all for a fun workshop!
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This came out beautiful! It looks like a cloth pattern.
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This is gorgeous, Zeb! Love the colors 
This was what we had set up for our symmetry in the park day and it went pretty well.
Lessons learned
- Try to print everything before you put them on the table. The pine cones were so underwhelming.
- Stamp pads are messy and color contamination is a thing… can you clean them?
- For the littles we just let them make prints we let them play and tried to explain symmetry as best we could. For the bigs I gave them challenges and tasks to create symmetry (of course I didn’t get a picture of that part of the display)
- HAVE WIPES HANDY!! Both for you, your patrons, and general ink messes (see the stamp pads are messy … 'cause I still have stamp ink on my fingers)
Overall we had about 200 (or more) people visit and I feel it was a successful program.
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Seeing this setup is so helpful! I have a ton of ink pads from a few years ago, and sketchpads. And I just had a conversation about bringing an [undefined] activity into an underused space in my building. This would be a really fun one where people could get a little messy and creative and then be on their way.
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@Chris_Dorman This part is not clear to me though, when you say “try to print everything” you just mean get a test print to see if it’s interesting enough?
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Yes. I thought the pine cones would look soo much cooler than they actually did after printing. So I would suggest test printing with your items BEFORE the event rather than at the event itself. It was a lot of fun and the students were using the materials in ways I NEVER would have thought of.
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Hello! I learned a few years ago during a printmaking class (for working with children), that an alternative to stamp pads is to take the lid of a container and insert a piece of felt cut to fit. Then add liquid watercolor or thinned paint to the felt just until it is coated. When the colors are contaminated, you just replace the piece of felt and add more paint. The one thing I learned when using this with a program is that you need to control the paint. Nannies and Grannies like to add too much paint onto the pads.
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LOL nannies and grannies
