paint cut paste

you spin me right round, baby right round… what a flashback i had today to my own childhood artistic joys. i remember being at a carnival when i was probably around novi’s age and discovering the joys of spin art!

we received this alex fantastic spinner as a gift a while back, and i just pulled it out for the first time today. this is a great set – it comes with the hand-powered (kid-powered!) spinner machine, papers, cards, and red, yellow, green, and blue paint in squirty tubes.

i realize that this could totally be a great DIY activity, deeming the product absolutely unnecessary, and i say go for it if you’re a person who has a salad spinner to spare, some empty squirty bottles, and some tempra or acrylic paints (that you may want to water down a bit.) but i am not a person with a spare salad spinner (or even a salad spinner at all) unfortunately. therefore, this was a fun gift to receive for myself novi.

we both had a great time! mostly, i hand-powered the machine while she squirted the paint wherever she wanted…. though we took turns a couple of times where she powered the spinner and i squirted the colors.

talk about multitasking - i spun with one hand, photographed with the other

there were many little ooooohs and aaaaahs each time the spinner stopped and novi saw her creation.

each of them lovely bursting rainbows!

school’s out for summer! this was novi’s last week of preschool until it begins again in september. to celebrate, the parents hosted a little potluck party after the last class to honor the two preschool teachers who have been so amazing to our little ones all year long. and, of course, there were gifts…

we collaborated on a scrapbook for the school, where each child was responsible for creating a page for the book, complete with art and a photo of the child. here’s novi’s watercolored page (recognize the rubber cement watercolor resist?) it’s complete with her picture, a self-portrait drawing, and her drawings of both of her teachers. oh, and it’s signed by the artist!

a few weeks ago, we gave each teacher their own handprint tote bag for teacher appreciation week, but we still wanted to make them a little something to commemmorate the end of the year. so, apples for the teachers. naturally. i grabbed two wooden balls (flat on one end) from my wood stash, and i used the woodburning tool to put each teacher’s name on an apple, the school’s name, the year, and novi’s name on the bottom.

(school name blurred for privacy)

then novi went to town painting the apples with watercolors.

we waited for the paint to dry, and then we polished each apple with our homemade wood creme.

then we cut out stems and leaves from green felt and i hot-glued them to the apples.

voila, an apple for each teach! happy summer everyone!

i still remember the most fun day of my high school AP art history class – it was the day that each student brought in a big can of paint and a canvas, and got super messy outside making splatter paintings inspired by jackson pollock.

i knew my little lady would be down for this, as soon as it warmed up enough outside! (i’d be completely loony if i tried this indoors.) it seems like it’s finally sprummer here… hooray – so we brought our paints and canvas outside to play. you can do this on canvas, fabric, paper, greeting cards, etc.

novi was so excited when i showed her how to load her brush up with watery acrylic paint and flick it across the canvas and drizzle it above the canvas. she was so exhuberant that she wanted to slam it down onto the canvas, and called her technique the “splash-hit.” i went with it.

we both had tons of messy fun in the yard changing colors, mixing colors, and going crazy with different sort of techniques to get the paint onto the canvas without touching the canvas.

so simple, and so much fun! it is an awesome way to get your child into their body while painting, and to work with a large range of broad motions, using various actions to create art!

oh, and forget the smocks. just wear your messy art clothes! (if you don’t have outfits like this, designate some for carefree summer fun.)

admiring her masterpiece

this piece makes a welcome colorful addition to novi’s personal art gallery…

novi came home from preschool the other day with the cutest little fishy! all of the credit for this simple craft goes to her amazing preschool teacher for creating fun art projects around this month’s underwater theme. i just thought this easy fish was super-charming!

this is truly a painting, cutting, pasting exercise, so i had to feature it here on paint cut paste! i’m not big on purchasing or using paper plates in my home, but if you’ve got some lying around, this is a nice way to repurpose those last few into fun works of art. (and for that next birthday party, be kind to the earth and use washable plates!) all you need to do is cut a triangle out of one side of the plate (making the mouth) and then tape, glue, or staple it to the opposite side of the fish (to make the tail.)

then paint away… for these fish, novi’s classmates used a dollop of silver metallic (almost pearly) non-toxic, water-based activity paint mixed with liquid watercolors. then the kids glued large sequins onto the fish (for shiny scales) and a big googly eye. voila! a school of rainbow fish at school!

i could see these hanging at different lengths from the ceiling for a sea-themed birthday party decoration. novi enjoyed doing this so much at school that this little green guy won’t likely be the only fish in our sea.

when i saw this idea on playbased learning’s blog, i thought it would be a fun one for a warm afternoon outside at the easel.

novi and i mixed up some colored water in random spray bottles we found around the house. we just added about 8 drops of food coloring to the water.

we brought the easel out into the sun, and embarked on this charming little endeavor. as the blog (where i got the idea) said, it is a bit difficult for little fingers to work the pump squirters. the trigger squirter (our red paint was in) was a bit easier for novi to control.

novi wished the colors were brighter (next time, liquid watercolors might be in order.) we tried the paint on manilla paper, and it did show up brighter and made a rather cute little scene.

novi was still delighted with the paintings we made, saying “they look like lollipop trees!”

i think the large ones will make for good wrapping paper for all of those summer birthday parties coming up!

this is just the simplest spring thing you can do. paint a flower pot. plant some seeds. watch it grow. (couple this painted pot with a handmade bloom paper mother’s day card, and you’ve got a great gift to give those sweet mommas in your life!)

we went to a birthday party at a local art studio last weekend called celebrate art. one of the activities was to paint a small flower pot. novi got busy painting (with acrylics, i believe?) her pre-gessoed pot with a stylish color-block pattern.

once we were home and the pot was dry, we decided to plant some cosmo seeds in it.

we used my mom’s handy tip to put a flat stone in the bottom of the pot (to help the soil not run out of the hole when watered.)

then novi filled the pot with soil.

we sprinkled on the cosmo seeds.

watered…

and now we just apply more water, sunlight, (music – novi likes to sing to it,) and love and watch the flowers grow!