Friday 4/22- First full day of building

Today was a successful and busy day. After the group put together the goals for the day, our team set off to start building two of our three projects, the third had to wait because we couldn't cut wood due to the rain. We planned to have the metal pedals for the instrument I am working on cut out and painted, along with the pieces of the support metal cut. For the xylophone, we planned to have the frame cut out and mounted to the bottom piece. For the third instrument, the goal was to get everything marked ad planned out so constuction next class will run as smoothly as possible. 

All three tasks were completed, and our group ran a little ahead of schedule.

The xylophone group started drilling holes to mount the wood pieces, and my group started making plans to mount the pedals on the stem of the plant.

As always, my role was documenting and building the metal flower instrument. I enjoyed documenting today because it gave me an excuse to watch as the xylophone leaf was constructed. In terms of construction, I completed several tasks. First, I worked with Bryant to cut out the rest of the pedals from the sheet metal, while grant filed them down. 

Then at lunch I hot glued the circumference of each pedal in attempt to transform them from circular blades to child friendly flowers. Once I realized the glue wouldn't adhere, we decided to use painter's tape, and Bryant and I taped the edges. 

While we waited for the paint to dry after Grant sprayed them, I did some math to figure out how long each support piece would need to be. After Bryant cut them, we measured to see where they should be placed so that we could cut a notch into the stem of the flower. 

Overall I am very excited about our project thus far, and very proud of my team for working so diligently. It has been amazing watching as the pictures I sketched have come to life through each step of the construction process, along with how they have been revised in order to be practical for a prototype. Today was reassuring as we were able to finish our tasks with few barriers. Now the only challenge will be time, as one of our three instruments has not been constructed yet, and we still need to test the instruments to make sure they will actually make something we can call music.