Blogs Field Guide

March 3 Free First Saturday Sneak Peak

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by Emma Cohen Craving some artsy family fun? Here is a preview of upcoming programming. March 3 is a day of foreign flix, including seven shorts from Germany, South Africa, UK, France, Iran, and Canada, and an animated feature-length Japanese movie. Everyone feels lonely sometimes. So when we saw these films about loneliness and friendship, we knew [...]

by Emma Cohen

Craving some artsy family fun? Here is a preview of upcoming programming. March 3 is a day of foreign flix, including seven shorts from Germany, South Africa, UK, France, Iran, and Canada, and an animated feature-length Japanese movie.

Everyone feels lonely sometimes. So when we saw these films about loneliness and friendship, we knew we had to snatch them up and show them to you.  These works explore how characters overcome fear, boring rules, and even gravity to make friends and experience the beauty of the world–even if things don’t always turn out as planned!

In “Mobile,”  a 2010 German film by Verena Fels, a solitary cow literally flips her world upside down in order to make a friend.

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Warm, Fuzzy, and Brown: Free First Saturday February

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With this year’s field spotted with large brown patches instead of snow drifts there was little to do but make the best of the unseasonably warm Saturday.  Local artist Andy DuCett and our own Scott Stulen led Snow Solutions, an answer to those aching to roll sticky snow into satisfying spheres and cubes and fulfill [...]

Valentine for a Stranger

With this year’s field spotted with large brown patches instead of snow drifts there was little to do but make the best of the unseasonably warm Saturday.  Local artist Andy DuCett and our own Scott Stulen led Snow Solutions, an answer to those aching to roll sticky snow into satisfying spheres and cubes and fulfill their snow-sculpting needs.  Instead of snow the medium this year was cardboard.  Kids folded and shaped brown slabs into magnificent winter creations.  At the end of the day all that was missing was a cardboard snowball fight.

A Cardboard Igloo In Lieu of Snow

 

 Local artist Amanda Lovelee graced us with her presence again after an inspiring FFS event in September and returned with the idea for an Emotional Warming Hut.  Kids made valentines for residents of local nursing homes and enjoyed freshly baked cookies while they learned how bees cuddle to stay warm in the winter, a workshop taught by Terry McDaniel, president of the Minnesota Hobby Beekeepers Association.

Making Valentines in FlatPak

 

Terry Explains How Bees Keep Warm in Winter

 

In the Cowles Conservatory kids constructed their own imaginative gardens by using yarn to wrap branches and other shapes while the film Lost & Found played in the U.S. Bank Orientation Lounge.  Based on the book by Oliver Jeffers, the film illustrates a touching friendship between a tenacious penguin and a little boy.  Also Kare 11 stopped by to showcase our enthusiasm.  
 
Though the field was brown this month the spirit was celebratory and smelled of homemade chocolate chip cookies.  Join us for another community building event at the next Free First Saturday in March!