paint cut paste

just wanted to check in to wish all of you a happy valentine’s day!

yep, we made heARTful crayons again this year… per N’s request, we brought them back from this post two years ago. (last year N gave out homemade smoochie lipbalm to her friends - yum!)

this time around, when upcycling crayons, we incorporated a few valuable tips from my beloved blog readers and from our own trial and error.

here are a few ways to make your life easier when making molded upcycled crayons:

1. soak the crayons in water for about 10 minutes before attempting to peel the labels off. it’s CAKE compared to the last time we did it and i had rainbow wax under my fingernails for days! (my fingernails thank you, wendy!)
2. spray the mold with non-stick cooking spray (nut free, please!)
3. put the mold onto a cookie sheet that is lined with foil (to catch drips)
4. “bake” for 15 minutes at 250 degrees. (you may need to add on a couple more minutes to be sure they’re all melted.
5. note: stubs from your kid’s crayola twistables do not melt at this time and temperature like the regular ol’ crayola crayons do.
6. transfer crayons directly from the oven to the freezer
7. pop ‘em right outta the mold, package, and share the love!

hope it’s a lovely day! hug your loved ones close; reach out to loved ones far.

happy heART day!

we are delighted to take part in tinkerlab’s february creative challenge: make art out of paper bags!

acquiring the art materials for this challenge so brought me back to the first week i lived in boulder, colorado, in 2002. i went to whole foods without my own reusable grocery bags (the horror!) and got reception that was… well, not unlike jack mcbrayer’s recent guest appearance for the grocery bag sketch on portlandia (who else thinks this show is brilliant??! click text above to watch the sketch.) so, yeah… i related to jack’s character when we scored these paper bags from whole foods last week. i wanted to shout, “it’s for art’s sake, people! we’re upcycling!”

we set out on our paper bag art adventure without knowing the destination (er, product.) N wanted to “paint the bags like huge canvases.” so we started there.

she created large blocks of carefully selected colors on them with large sponge brushes and paint rollers.

it was like a rothko study in our play shed where they hung to dry.

after the paint was dry, N decided she wanted to make a weaving. before cutting up the paper bags, N wanted to color on some of them with her metallic creamy crayons.

we cut the bags into strips which were about an inch thick and 16 inches long. then N laid them out in the order she wanted, horizontally, and then vertically.

she chose some ribbons to use in the weaving, as well.

together, we wove. over, under, over, under. N practiced at lifting every other piece of paper and guiding the next one through it.

the finished weaving was so vibrant and lovely!

we decided to frame it in an ikea ribba shadowbox frame, size 20.5 x 20.5, without the mat. i put a few dots of glue between some key parts of the weaving to hold it together, and used double-sided tape to adhere the weaving to white cardstock/posterboard. this piece is such a fun addition to N’s colorful bedroom!

check out my other blogger friends’ paper bag creations around the web:

Imagination Soup, Hands On: As We Grow, Child Central Station, Putti Prapancha, Irresistible Ideas for Play-Based Learning, Teach Preschool, The Chocolate Muffin Tree, Nurture Store, Small Types,Make Do & Friend, The Imagination Tree, Toddler Approved, Red Ted Art, Kids in the Studio, Rainy Day Mum, Glittering Muffins, Sense of Wonder, Mom To 2 Posh Lil Divas, Come Together Kids, My Creative Family, Kitchen Counter Chronicles, A Mom With A Lesson Plan, Angelique Felix, The Golden Gleam, Clarion Wren, Living at the Whitehead’s Zoo, Let Kids Create, De tout et de rien, PlayDrMom, Creativity My Passion, paint cut paste, Kiwi Crate, Tinkerlab

if you’d like to share in the paper bag creative challenge fun, YOU are invited to join the linky below with you and your kiddos’ paper bag creation!

also, you can enter to win a $100 VISA gift card and three-month subscription to kiwi crate. to find out how by visiting this link over on tinkerlab or the kiwi crate blog. (pssst – the contest involves the beloved pinterest, so you know it’s gonna be fun!)

the other day, N and i set out to play with one of our favorite art media — liquid watercolors. recently there was a $1 per bottle sale on these at discount school supply (regularly $2.99, but they offer discounts all the time,) so we stocked up at a buck each! i just loooove how vibrant and translucent liquid watercolors can be!

i just put out four colors this time: magenta, turquoise, yellow, and purple. (the first three are a variation on primary colors that i just heart, and they mix to create beautiful combos! purple wasn’t even necessary, but it’s N’s favorite, soooo….)

free art play! these are the afternoons i live for. we did tons of experimenting with techniques — such as white crayon resist:

wet on wet watercoloring (saturate your paper first with water, then paint or drop colors onto it and watch them spread like magic):

sprinkling salt onto the painted page and watching the paint gather toward the crystals to create a stippled effect:

then we did N’s favorite method – squirted elmer’s glue onto the page, covered it with salt, and watched the paint get soaked up by the lines and blend into rainbowy goodness:

we played quite a bit. we even busted out the shaving cream at the end and did some paper marbling with the remaining paint in the jars. (because i hate to waste gorgeous paint and just have to use it up!) we did this over two years ago on the blog when N was just a wee thing, so check out that post for the technique. it’s amazingly beautiful and fun!

this day yielded so many lovely creations!

it was such a colorful afternoon with my sweet girlie and our favorite paints.

we felt like the color kittens! (do you know that old golden book? it’s classic!)

this is a little frog story, illustrated by my little artist. she calls it “play drawing” when she draws while telling the story (oh so dramatically!) as she creates the pictures. thought i’d share this little ditty N made up in her room on friday afternoon, in her own words, as explained to me when she came downstairs:

(click images to view them in a larger size.)

“once upon a time there were six frogs. they were hanging out on their lily pads until one day they decided they were bored. they wanted to paint cool designs on their lily pads. so they did. and when they did, they realized the lily pads looked like surf boards, so they went surfing!

one little frog (the one at the bottom who was about to paint purple in the first picture) surfed by a pole and held on tight!

and then when he let go and was surfing, he saw his reflection in the water, and he felt peaceful.”

i just love the expressive faces and postures captured in this little vignette… random froggy surfing fun!

this is a little post so that i can capture and share with my family (and you all!) a cute little book that N made for her great-grandmother (and my grandmother,) nana. my nana turns 91 today, and she got a beautiful book (and card) in the mail from my little one. here it is, page by page…

cover page

N decided on the first message of the book: “step outside and breathe” with a “rainbow-checkered earth picture.”

page 1

then an activity she and nana like to do together:

page 2

nana lives on a beach, which is one of N’s favorite locations, of course, so she drew this:

page 3

when i asked N what her favorite memories of thoughts of nana are, she said she likes how they’re always holding hands when they walk together, and she drew this next and thought of her own caption for it – “sharing family love.”

page 4

then she remembered one of nana’s favorite things on earth — candy! my nana is legendary for her “candy drawer!”

page 5

the last image in the book is a birthday cake for the birthday girl, nana:

page 6 (that's a 91 over there on the right, for her age)

on the back, N drew a picture of herself for an author page, along with her name at the top (which i’ve blocked out for privacy/safety.)

back cover

easy construction: we punched 3 holes in the folded papers and threaded it with yarn of N’s choice and finished with a bow.

i don’t know about you, but i’d be THRILLED to get a book like this for my birthday! handmade gifts are just so special – what types of gifts do your kids create for grandparents?

a few mornings ago, N ran into our bedroom the minute she woke and said, “i need to go outside on the sidewalk with a chair, paper, and crayons right now!” my husband and i rubbed our eyes and asked if she could wait a moment… eventually he threw on some clothes and took her across the street (in her pjs) while i spied on them through the window made breakfast.

she has a mission, and got straight to it (while my husband snapped photos of the process on his iphone. yeah, by now he knows a good blog unfolding when he sees it.)

eventually she shared with him what she was drawing — the tree in our yard.

here’s the beautiful tree in the flesh

when she was finished, she proudly ran into the house to show me the tree. she loved how the clipboard she used allowed for the little white space at the top, which is where she chose to write her name.

she remarked, “i’ve never drawn a tree like this before. i usually draw a brown rectangle and a puffy green top for a tree, but that’s not what trees look like! THIS is what trees look like! tree trunks have lots of colors in them, and sometimes branches are all scraggled.” later that day (once dressed) she asked to go out in the backyard to make another “realistic drawing.”

this time, the lavender.

and after daddy got home from work, they went down the block again so she could get to know another tree pretty well.

since these bush and tree observations occurred, she has also been sitting outside drawing houses and other plants, and really paying close attention to what her eye sees. another self-motivated art activity, and it’s just so wonderful to watch it all happen!

aside from the art projects we do around here, N spends anywhere from 1-3 hours per day drawing. this month, i’ve noticed a few new additions to her artistic development, and i wanted to share some of my favorite creations from july with you all. (but gosh, it’s hard to choose!) you can click on any image below to open the larger sized version of it to look more closely.

i am intrigued by how parts of the faces are covered in this image, and how the features are continued around the white parts:

"mascots"

while we’re on the topic of parts being covered, the image below shows foxes in different spots, and parts of their bodies are hidden by trees and clouds:

"how many foxes do you see here?"

N has enjoyed drawing tables and chairs for the past couple of years – i just love this one:

"the cafe"

whimsical animals are always a fav… she’s really into outlining everything now in pencil or black and then coloring it in:

"animal friends"

while we’re on the animal topic, the lucky girl in this image has a merry-go-round in her front yard:

"merry-go-round"

loving this dude so much that i want him on a t-shirt:

"weird guy"

inspired by the horses on the beach on our vacation:

"magical horses"

not only do i love how much is going on in the picture below, but N’s use of shadows under the figures is a new thing. (she says the gray marks under the ground line are shadows of the figures above them.) the zig-zag-like squiggles near the figures’ mouths mean that they’re talking. hee hee.

"playtime"

the image below is about finding the silly things happening on the playground… yes, the girl in the upper right is naked and peeing on the bounce house.

"how many silly things do you see in this picture?"

another nude “with a cool arrow design on her” – tee hee:

"naked girl"

"surfers"

"squirrel with his dinner"

"outer space"

and one last one i just love…

"home"

most of our days consist of this: N chilling at her art desk with her crayons and pencils just cranking out the pictures, telling stories about them while she draws. i LOVE these parts of the day. i know she is fully in the flow and engaged in what she calls “play drawing.” i enjoy seeing the world through her perspective in her art, as all of her images are completely authentic to her eye since i’ve never taught her how to draw anything. thank you for letting me share these with you, dear readers. in all honesty, sometimes i wonder how i get any other art activities up on this blog.

aaand happy half-birthday to N, who turned 4.5 this week! thanks for all who chimed in on my facebook page about celebrating half-birthdays in your home – glad we’re not alone!