3MindyP

Nicotine addiction is a huge social issue in the United States today. Teen nicotine addiction is just as bad. I am a 17 year-old girl from Michigan who faces nicotine addiction. When I was 11 I picked up smoking cigarettes. I thought it was the young hip thing to do. All I wanted to do was merely impress the boy I liked. He smoked, so why shouldn’t I? Cool, right? Wrong. Smoking was a terrible habit. A month later my mother caught me. Trust me, I quit smoking. Well, for a while at least. This past summer I fell into a different crowd. Everyone smoked there. I also acquired a new job, which was extremely stressful. Smoking then again became my best friend. 7 months later I am still smoking and in the process of quitting. I will only smoke one kind of cigarette. They are called Newport 100’s. I chose this subject because I am close to it and it hits home to me. Smoking is in my family. Both of my parents smoke, so naturally I knew I was going to. Yes, I plan on quitting, but I am here to say I am not against smoking. Smoking causes many harmful things to your body, but in Newports, there is a special drug they use to calm and relax you. Newports have helped me in my life and they are the only cigarette I enjoy. Working on this project was a pain. I had to completely redo the box itself because there was no box that was big that was in shape of a cigarette box. That itself took forever. Painting took way longer then what I thought as well. It took hours just for the first coat of primer. Then the Kilz paint kept eating the tempera paint. Painting the box took about a week. After that, I almost burnt down my entire project with a blowtorch. This project just caused me so many problems. In the end, I love my project. There’s a million things I would have changed. I would have taken more time to think things out and longer to paint the lettering but it’s okay because it’s burnt anyways!



For our environment project i chose two people in a graveyard. I was inspired by one of my old close friends. He loved cemeteries. I love cemeteries too so i thought i would choose this. I also chose it because i have been doing a dark noface theme this year. It was really hard to create the cemetery look. The sky was so hard. The grave stones were another problem. I wanted them to look realistic which didn't happen. If i could change anything, it would be the grave stones. Overall, i feel like it's a good piece. I was happy with it when i was done. I would have changed a few things about it, but i am over it.



This was the most frustrating project I have ever done. I don't mind technology but I don't like doing art with it. I swear I had to do this project literally like 16 times to get it done because either it wouldn't save or it would delete. Something always went wrong. With the process, I took the original picture and thought it look like something from Alice in Wonderland. I originally wanted and Alice in Wonderland background but it wasn't working so I thought of a new idea. I went on Fotoflexer and morphed the girl into little swirls. Then I went to aviary and put a swirl background behind it. I saw it as Alice being sucked into the a hole an being sent to Wonderland. I am pleased with it and I hope Lauren likes it.



We were assigned to make a recreation of a painting we were interested in. Personally, I didn't like any of the paintings i found so instead i did a picture. I learned pictures are extremely hard to do as well. I chose a girl standing in the dark with a blank face. I loved this picture. It's so expressive and dark. I just connected with it instantly. I ran into so so so many issues with this project. First, i had issues drawing out the body. I couldn't get all the details. It was too complex. FIlling it in was even worse! Chalk was my main medium. It was so difficult. It always went everywhere. The shading was beyond difficult. Everything kept going wrong. I couldn't figure out the hair. Finally, I got to the point where I was throwing chalk at my picture. I worked through all of my problems eventually. It took awhile. Honestly, I don't know if I like my art. I think it is successful but I'm just not satisfied with it. I could have done so many things much better but it was to the point where i just didn't care.



We were told to do a pinwheel for peace project, and my choice was horror/Halloween. I chose this because to me it is peaceful. I love horror. I think it’s fun, and in some weird way, peaceful. I originally chose music as my topic. That project wasn’t bad, but I don’t like having the same topic as others so I changed it. Next I did choose horror but I didn’t plan. I made a huge pinwheel with a flimsy base to hold it. It was not proportional whatsoever. On top of it, it did not spin. Worst of all it got ruined. My only choice was to make a third one. When I made my third one, I ran into a dilemma. I glued a candle in the middle, which prevented it from spinning. It was a tad bit flimsy but only because the base was a cornstalk. When making my third pinwheel I had a lot of decisions. First, I had to decide what I wanted on it. I also had to choose what to construct it of. I should have chose a stronger base. Next, I had to decide what tools would make it spin. Obviously, that was a fail. I made decisions in every part of the project. In the end I thought it was successful. I know it didn’t spin but I don’t care. It looks amazing and it blinks. Come on! That’s sweet. If I had to do it again though, I would have thought it out more.