We’ve been pouring over Geninne Zlatkis’s brand new, beautiful and imaginative book Making an Impression: Designing & Creating Artful Stamps
First we headed to the local art supply store to pick up a Linoleum Cutter Kit
Such a fun first attempt! We’re excited to make more beautiful hand-carved stamps.
We may be at the beginning of October, still months away from the winter holidays, but I am taking advantage of this second trimester burst of energy and trying to cross as many holiday preparation items off my to-do list as I can. We’ve been busy gathering and crafting holiday presents, and now we’re turning our attention to making more handmade Christmas ornaments for our tree.
Pressing plants gathered from our neighborhood into (gluten-free!) Sculpey Clay
Simple and sparkly, they’ll look beautiful on our Christmas tree. I love the feeling of a handmade holidays.
Thanks to the awesome staff and volunteers at the Charles Schulz Museum Museum Monday program for this project idea!
I’m a sucker for fun art projects that serve as a learning opportunity. This particular art activity allows kids to play with color making, as well as demonstrate how salt absorbs water. (Pretty freaking cool!)
First draw a picture with glue on a piece of heavy cardstock or watercolor paper:
Then use a spoon or fingers to sprinkle salt on top of the glue, completely covering all the wet areas. Then shake off any excess salt that’s not adhered to the paper.
Using an eye dropper place colored water on the salt trails and watch as the watercolors travel along the salt path.
Be sure to watch what happens when two colors meet!
I love this project because it’s fun for kids of all ages and the final product is so very pretty! I want to make one.
Here’s an art appreciation activity that introduces children to famous paintings; sparks conversations about composition, colors, and art imagery; and allows children to create art masterpieces of their own in the form of collage postcards.
I printed out pictures of some of my favorite paintings by Vincent van Gogh, Claude Monet, and Paul Cezanne for us to cut out and incorporate into our own postcard collages:
Our four year old daughter’s collage featured her own table adorned with flowers and fruit. (The woman in the collage is helping herself to a snack.)
I even made a collage of an outdoor scene:
I find it interested that we started with the same set of paintings and created two radically different collages. I love that there are infinite ways to do any activity. Imagination and creativity are such powerful tools.
I know that buried under all that craft mess there’s a kitchen table somewhere. We haven’t seen it in a few days, but it’s there waiting for us to finish our Easter crafting. I don’t actually miss it all that much. We’re having too much fun sewing, cutting, dying, filling… and we’re in the homestretch!
May you all have a wonderful weekend!
