paint cut paste

you may recall that last summer novi and i had so much fun marbling paper with shaving cream, and we got beauoootiful results! after recently hearing from a friend that her daughter marbled paper in preschool with oil and water, i decided we should give this method a try.

science: oil and water don't mix

i looked online to figure out how to go about this project, and found this little ditty. so we tried it their way, by mixing one color of paint with water and the other color with oil. however, they used tempera paints and we used liquid watercolors (as i believe my friend’s teacher had.) we got unsuccessful results at first using the instructions because, well, oil and water(colors) don’t mix. see? one of the colors so wasn’t happening.

so then we tried another way. we laid the paper on cookie sheets (the kind with edges) and drizzled oil onto the paper haphazardly. then we poured on pink liquid watercolors (diluted in water) and rolled it around. then some more oil. then blue liquid watercolors (diluted) and rolled the tray around. sometimes we used the eyedropper to drop blotches of undiluted color onto the paper for a vibrant effect, too.

and then we got marbling…

it was fun to see the effects on different colors of papers. the swirls weren’t as defined as the shaving cream method, but random and lovely nonetheless. we hung the sheets to drip dry in the garage overnight.

the next morning, novi was pleased with her results…

as was i… the paper made for cute stationery for a little note to a friend.

it’s march and we have pink, white, and yellow blooms all over our neighborhood here – signs of spring!

tree in our front yard

one of my favorite spring blooms are cherry blossoms. i adore their soft pink petals. with spring in our hearts, we went to a friend’s house yesterday for a playdate. novi and i brought along some simple art materials: paper, sharpies, and a pink stamp pad. because the kids were going to make fingerprints, i got the water-based, washable, kid-safe stamp pad, as opposed to the dye-based kind. i have to say that it’s not very washable anyway, and i’m disappointed that the pink my store had was more hot pink than the beautiful pale color of a cherry blossom. oh well, next time.

regardless, the girls went to town making lots of fingerprints on small rectangles of white paper.

we noticed they preferred to use just one pointer finger, so we encouraged them to use several fingers at a time to cluster the pink dots, much like the tree would have clusters of flowers. (they didn’t really care about that though.)

the more random the pink splotches, the more full and fluffy the trees turn out to look. after we had several little sheets of fingerprints, the kids were ready to play and dance, so we mommas sat down with our sharpies. we made branches connecting the little pink poufs on the page to create the cherry blossom trees.

must clarify that my tshirt was a happy matching accident - must have really had cherry blossoms on the brain!

after the playdate (and lunchtime and naptime) we gathered up some materials to glue the little tree pictures to cards, and embellish them with rhinestones, sequins, and glitter glue.

the finished cards would make sweet “happy spring!” cards or even nice mother’s day cards.

an alternative to using fingerprints would be to use a paintbrush and some (pale) pink watercolors, but i figured that when making these into cards for family, they always cherish little paw prints.

last year, novi loved washington, d.c.’s cherry blossom festival. because we’re on the opposite coast this year, we won’t be able to go again, but we have these sweet images, memories, and art-making.

1 year ago at the cherry blossom festival, d.c.

happy almost spring!

this activity was sort of a blog fusion of several other projects we’ve done with watercolors, tape, and cards… it’s nothing new, but hopefully inspirational in its organic cuteness.

we’ve got a lot to celebrate as winter goes out like a lion and spring is welcomed in like a tiny sheep… many birthdays, pregnancies, new babies, and celebrations amongst our friends and family. when those times hit, we go into full-on card-creation mode in my house. on this particular rainy day, i was feeling watercolory, so i put out some watecolors and heavy watercolor paper. i always tear my watercolor paper with a metal-edged wooden ruler instead of cutting it, so that it has those lovely frayed edges.

i divided the paper up into lots of tiny pieces. i taped them down to novi’s art board, using artist’s tape around the borders to create white mats or frames later.

then novi got busy painting little scenes and fun colorful abstracts, too…

after the paintings were dry, we chose colorful blank cards (love the boxes of blank cards at michaels for cheap) and fun background papers. we glued them down to make some professional-looking kid-made greetings.

momma made a bunch, too!

happy merry celebration time!!! now we just need a book of stamps!