BPL's Staff Arts and Crafts Reception, Oct. 12, 07

On this drizzly morning around 9 o'clock, a small group of BPL staffers gathered at Central for a Staff Art Show Reception-Potluck to enjoy coffee, tea and sweets, to talk and to look at the arts and crafts done by fellow co-workers in their spare time.





My small origami book and earrings are in the case on the right.



Adam B. (on the right) with Art S., his painting is on the wall. Adam works at the Tool Library at the South branch.



(Left to right) Joseph A., an Assistant at Central, Nga T. and Art S., we are standing next to one of Joseph's beautiful artwork.



Nick M. and his collages. Nick is an Assistant at Claremont branch.



Elizabeth's cover-quilt is behind Yvette and Gwen.



Colleen F. is a knitter.









Adam and Bob are both painters.



I am with one of my bosses, Tara R.. Tara is a Librarian-Manager of the North branch.



(Left to right) BPL's Director, Donna C. and Art & Music's Librarian, Andrea S.. Andrea is a quilter.



I am with and Barbara B., a Library Aide in Children's library at Central. Barbara is a local artist who does pottery. Please check out her work in my previous posting in June of this year, Live Oak Park...




Debbie C. (0n the right) is a Librarian at Central/Claremont and she is an expert in knitting.



I am with Erica G., a Librarian in Children's library at Central. Erica likes to do small paintings using acrylic.




















Richard B. is a Specialist at North branch. He is writing in the Guest Book that I added this year for staff and patrons to write their comments. I posted all the comments in my last post, BPL's Staff Arts and Crafts Show.

Origami Workshop at the BPL-North Branch, Nov. 10, 07

This is Berkeley Public Library North Branch. It's located on The Alameda at Hopkins Street in Berkeley. I started to work here in middle of June, 2007.



This is my first origami workshop at the North branch. It was a rainy evening and it gets dark early in the Fall. For a few minutes before it started, I thought nobody would show up, but about 18 people came. This workshop was for children, but some adults showed up to fold as well - the more the merrier.



We started with a hat using Sunday comic newspapers that I cut into a squares. We sat on the rug because it was easier to fold a big party hat.













The young and not so young seemed very deep in thought in their folding.











Afterward we tried on our party hats and that was fun.



Next was the balloon fold. I used a square sheet of recycled wrapping paper.







In the background is a table full of origami books for people to checkout.











This little girl played catch with the paper balloon that she just made, and she really enjoyed it.





The finished product that you could throw, kick, pass it to your friends or hang it up as an ornament.





Everybody seemed to enjoy blowing up the balloon. I also showed the group how to make a glider, a jumping frog (using a business card) and a bow (using a dollar). Origami is very creative and fun because from just a small square or rectangle piece of paper you can create a variety of fun three dimensional things to play or to give away. I enjoy teaching origami to everyone who would like to learn, and that gives me a great satisfying feeling at the end of every session.

These pictures were taken by my son. Thank you Anh-Vu! You did a great job.