“It’s a great day for the amount of stuff they get exposed to, with the dancing and the singing and the artworks,” Dave Diedrich of the Horseshoe Carvers said.

Coordinated by Carolyn Sparks, Mary Kananen, Diane Robison and Gloria Banks, the Day of the Arts began in 1988 with the vision to give the arts as much attention as sports. It was then decided that the event would be held during the school day so every student could participate, Altoona Area School District Community Relations Director Paula Foreman wrote in a release.

This year’s event included presentations of martial arts, ballet, clogging, theater and jewelry making, as well as performances by the junior high Drama Club, the AAHS Jazz Band and String Ensemble and Ebner Dancing Drums. Several of the presenters are considered mainstays of the event, returning annually for at least 15 years. Diedrich and the Horseshoe Carvers are one of them.

The group got involved in the event because Diedrich said they used to meet at Mardorf United Methodist Church a few doors down from the school and the pastor’s wife asked them to attend. When asked what keeps the group coming back year after year, Diedrich said they “enjoy doing it to share our interest in carving with them.”

Third grader Evelyn Fetterman sits inside a bubble. Mirror photo by Rachel Foor

“They surprise us a bit with things that they do,” Diedrich said. “They do very well in 30 minutes.”

While the Carvers normally use wood, since they were working with fifth graders, they swapped the materials for soap.

“Not as many Band-Aids,” Diedrich said as he held up a popsicle stick. “We just sharpen these up.”

The tables in the classroom have a bar of soap at each seat with a stick as a carving tool. Diedrich said they also provide students with patterns for tracing on the soap. Students can then take their carved bars to another station for painting before leaving them on a counter to dry. Among those finished were a black cat, a snowman, a sled and a tiger.

“The bigger sizes work better than really small details,” Diedrich said. “But if things break, we use glue. Glue is our friend.”

Britton Keagy (left) and Landon Fredrick (right) receive "ice cream cones" of fog-filled bubbles. Mirror photo by Rachel Foor

One year, a student contacted the group following the event because he wanted to try more and ended up attending meetings with his grandfather, Diedrich said.

Another returning presenter was Lynn Dalby of Lynn Dalby Designs. A supervisor of science labs at Penn State Altoona, Dalby translated her love of science into what she described as her “side business” of taking bubbles to birthday parties, school assemblies, workshops and festivals.

“There’s so much science in a bubble,” Dalby said. “You don’t realize the angle, when bubbles touch, what they make. For the workshop, I lead them through making bubbles and how to use bubbles in a different way than anybody’s ever thought of.”

During the event, Dalby was set up in a classroom with a group of third graders sitting in a semicircle on the floor in front of her. Throughout the presentation, she would call up the students in groups of twos or threes to participate in different experiments.

“The solutions are made up of basically soap and water, but the water is trapped in the center of the bubble,” Dalby said.

Third graders Hailey Barry (left) and Penelope Middleton react to a bubble they had been holding popping and being filled with fog. Mirror photo by Rachel Foor

In one experiment, Dalby added a polymer to the bubble’s outside, “which is the soap area,” to make it act like a glue and enable students to touch them.

“When I make my own mix, I add a polymer to it, so the mix lasts a little longer and it allows me to make giant bubbles,” Dalby said, then mentioned filling bubbles with helium. “Then you’re teaching the kids that, typically, a bubble should drop to the floor. When it rises, they’re like ‘oh okay, so there’s something different — a different kind of gas inside that makes it go up.'”

Dalby said this event is always something she looks forward to because she loves interacting with the kids and doing science outreach.

“Kids just have great energy,” Dalby said. “The reaction you get from the kids is unbeatable. Just to see their faces and then you ask them ‘how did you like the rest of your day?’ And they’re all like, ‘oh, it’s great!'”

Mirror Staff Writer Rachel Foor is at 814-946-7458.

Gavin Feight (right) watches as Rylee Snyder finishes carving her first name into a bar of soap during the 26th annual Day of the Arts on Friday at Juniata Gap Elementary School. Mirror photo by Rachel Foor

Fifth grader Rylee Snyder works to carve her first name into a bar of soap during a workshop by the Horseshoe Carvers. Mirror photo by Rachel Foor

Fifth graders Aeris Mock (left) and Maeve Hoover paint old vinyl records that will be warped into bowls. Mirror photo by Rachel Foor