art time

Here are some recent art projects we worked on in February when we needed something to tame our raging stir-craziness. You know, because record-breaking Nemo happened. And then two more winter storms the following two weekends. And Saturn coming tonight. Sheesh.

 This is the best photo to see how high the snow really got. It was very drifty inside our courtyard, so some places were bare, but most was very deep. That balcony that the snow reaches is at least 4 ft off the ground. The kids could just step from snow bank to snowbank over the fence into the playground. Once the wind died down we had lots of fun playing in the snow and one family even built a huge igloo that could fit 7 or 8 little kids inside it.

Now on to the art. I've been wanted to try this with Levi for a while considering his love of cars. He did the paint rolling for a while, but mostly ended up painting his cars and then giving them a long car wash in the sink. It all added up to fun in my book.

Here's Levi with some of his car collection lined up and ready to race on the Radiator Springs playmat I made him for Christmas.

I got a book for Anna at the library called Artist to Artist in which famous childrens book illustrators write to children about their art. Most of the artists have some piece of artwork from their childhood included, which I really enjoyed. Eric Carle's portion included a little step-by-step instruction for how he makes his collage illustrations. Anna looked at it and said, "I want to do that. Right now." So we did. (I actually looked online and found this which was more helpful than the tiny photos in the book).

We started by drawing the caterpillar. Anna made the head and attempted the bumps but couldn't figure out how to get them right, so I made the first two bumps and she finished it.

  

Then you paint the tissue paper. I showed her how to use a big brush and thick paint to make interesting brush strokes to show up in the picture. She liked making lots of designs.

To speed things up, I used a blow-drier to dry the paint, though it didn't need much. Then we traced the shapes we'd drawn onto the painted tissue paper, cut it out (with a little of my help), and glued it down (with quite a bit of help- she kept tearing the paper as she tried to glue)

Here's the finished product! Isn't he cute?

Anna drew his legs that evening and took markers to him the next morning. She gave him a hat, a tutu, and a smile. She also named him Ahcu Mone Cran (pronounced Ach-ah Moan-ee Crown)

And here's a little looser interpretation of art. Anna saw these groundhog day treats in Family Fun magazine and begged to make them. So we did.

 And I had this vision for Valentines Day decorations that worked out beautifully. I cut out all the hearts from construction paper. I let the kids decorate a few of them with smaller hearts, pom poms, and stickers. Then I strung them all together on pink yarn. The heat from the radiator mixing with the cold air from the window kept them constantly moving and we had lovely heart shadows all through February.

It's been a fun month, but I am OH SO READY for spring!