Art Club ~ Bleeding Tissue Pumpkins

Friday we joined some members of our homeschool group for a monthly Art Club class. This month the gal hosting had a great project using bleeding tissue paper. The kids created pumpkin Halloween scenes in black markers (Sharpie) and then used the colored tissue to cover their drawings. One they were covered then they painted them with water, letting the tissue bleed through onto their paper and color the design. Each project was so different, colorful and fun!  Even Hudson and I participated - it was that fun!

This was Holly's first time using bleeding tissue paper - we've had this on hand, just never got around to using it before. Now that she has used this we'll be breaking it out for more artwork... such a fun element to use: colorful, easy, simple and fairly clean with beautiful results! This is fun to do on rainy days and place your project outdoors to let nature paint for you!

Art Club getting ready for instruction on the lesson.

Working hard on their designs.

Holly.

Hudson doing one too. His was simple with a single sheet of tissue.

Mom's design. Tissue still sitting wet.

Holly really took her time, I was proud of her!

Hudson's project completed.

Mom's finished picture.

Holly's beautiful project.

Our Week In Books

I always enjoy when I visit other blogs and they share about the books they are reading... I have found so many wonderful books that way! Book are HUGE in our family, one area we really don't hold back on - meaning we'll buy a good book we really want to read. We buy books for our kids, we check out books weekly from the library - we are book people. So, it only feels natural to share the books we are enjoying this week. I think I might do this a bit more often - if you have good recommendations for me, please share them!

Here is our week in books! These are books Holly has read to us and we have read to hear - most of the time both. They are pretty much all Halloween or seasonally themed. Some we have done artwork with or a story map and some we will still be doing that over the next few weeks to enjoy a bit more of the fall season. You will find a few of these are simply non-sense silly character books... ones Holly has enjoyed reading. But some, are beautifully done - Chipmunk Song or Every Autumn Comes The Bear or Pumpkin Soup are all wonderful books. How Many Seeds In A Pumpkin or  Seed, Sprout, Pumpkin Pie are great educational books. Then we have some fun movement and sound books, a poetry book and some silly stuff too! A well rounded mix to read, inspire, discuss, laugh with, think on and more! Our week in books:

Sponge Painted Pumpkins

We had fun doing some sponge painting - something we probably do not do enough of, which is crazy since it really requires very little... paint, sponge and paper! I drew a pumpkin in black marker and then set up both (yes, BOTH) kids with a plate of orange and brown paint with a sponge. Holly took her time with the actual sponge technique whereas Hudson soon found he could smear it. When they dried we cut them out. They both turned out great and I have to say it was wonderful to do an art project with both kids and no restrictions!!!

Alcohol Painting Technique

Yesterday we tried our hand at painting with water color paints and using alcohol with them - the results are beautiful!

Holly painted a couple of colors on nice water color paper - making sure to keep it wet and but not too wet. Once she was finished painting she used rubbing alcohol to drip or splash on her paper. The alcohol spreads or resists the paint out in little drop fashions, leaving behind lighter colors of the paint. Simple - yet pretty!

This was a very easy art lesson - just be sure to have the right materials. I think we are going to try this again soon with our liquid water colors on either fall pumpkins or leaf designs... coming soon!

Miss Fiona's Stupendous Pumpkin Pies

This year we came across two little wonderful 'witch' items... a book that is adorable and an art project that was equally adorable! These two items collided for us and from it we made a cute little combination.

Miss Fiona's Stupendous Pumpkin Pies by Mark Kimball Moulton is a book we heard a couple of years back for the first time. I have kept my eye out for it a few times with little luck. Well, a few weeks ago I came across this book while at the book store and we could not leave with out it. First we read it at the book store to make sure it was loved by all then we brought it home. This book is lovely, whimsical, poetic and illustrated with charm.

Today Holly read this book to me. She had a few words that proved a bit challenging (which is good) but she made it through. Since she is not quiet at the rhyming part of reading yet, I reread the book to the kids. We talked about her favorite part, looked at the illustrations and discussed if she would enjoy Miss Fiona's pumpkin pies or not.

Then she created an adorable witch art project. Starting with a quick look at Miss Fiona she picked her papers, cut out shoes, designed her socks, and made the witches dress. This is a super easy, quick project - but one that tied in so perfect with this book. We don't typically do much with witches as the idea is a bit scary for Holly... but this one is sweet and the project is cute!

Fish Hatchery

We joined out Nature Club for a tour of a local fish hatchery on Friday. This particular fish hatchery is a trout hatchery, although they do assist another local hatchery with salmon eggs because the have great local, spring fed water. An interesting and wonderful relationship between the two facilities.

The tour began with the learning a Native American lore or two about salmon. They saw some Native American art on salmon as well. This was great because we have briefly touched this at home this month, to hear more was a wonderful addition for Holly. Once finished with the stories the kids met their tour guide for the hatchery.

He talked to them about salmon and trout, discussing differences between the two - then took them inside the hatchery. Here he went over the whole process of hatching eggs, holding and feeding and then how they release them. Answered questions kids and adults had as well. After this we headed out to the holding tanks and he let the kids dip their hands in to touch trout and then the fun part... feed trout! They were able to feed little trout and then really large trout. They really enjoyed this part, a lot!

Once the kids were finished up with feeding our guide then walked with us out to the stream to see how the salmon run was going. It was great to compare two weeks after out last visit and see such amazing changes. First Holly noticed there were no salmon running at this location any longer (while we were there). She also talked with me about how much the salmon had decayed in the stream since our last visit - and boy oh boy, are they decayed! Such an amazing journey a salmon's life is. Later that day we reviewed once more the salmon life cycle and read one more book. This has been such a great year to learn and witness so much of the ending portion of a salmon's life.

Listening to stories.



What little brothers do while waiting!



Discussing the differences between trout and salmon.

Inside the hatchery.

Tanks that hold trout eggs.

Holly, age 6.

Feeding the small trout.

Feeding.

She invited Hudson over to show him how to feed. It was so sweet!

Bring a great big sister!

Small trout.

Sibling puddle fun!

Heading out to the creek.

Salmon is washed up in that tree, rotting.

It is so pretty back here - all the fall colors are moving in.

Checking out some dead salmon.