Watercolor Patterns

This morning Holly did a really fun art lesson from our Usborne book of Art Ideas. The project was a very simple yet very rewarding one.

Using a quality watercolor paper Holly painted the whole thing with water and painted wet on wet with liquid watercolors, she loved how the colors spread on her canvas. Keeping her painting rather wet was the key here or the project will not work as well. After she filled her whole paper withe watercolor arrangement she wanted she placed a sheet of plastic wrap over her art. Smooshing the plastic around gently she bunched the watercolor paint into the cracks of the wrap, making some really neat designs. Then she let it sit to dry. Once dried Holly removed the plastic wrap to reveal a beautiful pattern that she created. It was so cool!!!  She used such bright colors that her project almost look tie dyed.... pretty neat stuff!

Art Club ~ Pointillism

On Friday we hosted Art Club and did a small session on Pointillism. I introduced the artist to make pointillism popular, Georges Seurat, and we learned about what Pointillism is. How 'ism' is a movement... meaning his art style became a movement others followed. We looked a small slide show on his life and art style, looked at some photos of his work and then set to work on our own art work.

The kids were to design a fish or sea scene and complete the work in pointillism, or very small dots of paint. Considering our class was a large mixed age group we have all skill levels - older kiddos did free hand art without drawing their work, younger children drew their scene first and filled it in. Some kiddos were completed very quickly while others spent nearly the entire session completing their work. Seeing the diversity among our artists was really neat, some beautiful work was done!

Holly chose to do a sea scene, in which she did a fantastic job on! While her painting was very simple in appearance the steady work she did by painting it JUST in small dots (with an ear swab and toothpick mind you) is amazing! She spent the whole session working on her project, very determined to complete it. I am very proud of her thoughtfulness in her work and commitment to doing it as she invisioned.

Holly's sea scene -- done in all dots, from a q-tip and a toothpick.

All of the kiddo's finished art work! Great Stuff!

Sewing Class

This past week Holly had her first ever little sewing class with some friends. She will be attending once a month, learning a new skill and practicing throughout the month to bring her project back to share. She is very excited to do this!

This month they learned some basic sewing patience. Working with canvas and a blunt needle she is creating a wonderful little pink rug for her doll house. Really she is learning to have some patience, take her time, following a pattern for stitching and follow through.

Next month they are going to learn how to sew buttons on while creating a cute wall hanging for her room. Holly cannot wait for this class!

Dinosaur Unit

Holly is chugging away on her Dinosaur Unit. She is almost finished with the Triassic Period, most likely next week. We have really spent some time reading on the conditions of the Triassic Period, learning about the mass extinction that started and ended that time frame and what life was like. After doing a lot of reading and discussing our readings, Holly & I did a brainstorm of information that would describe the Triassic Period - animals, plant life, extinction, dinosaurs, mammals, insects, the world (Pangea) and the water (Panthalassa). It was a GREAT discussion and brainstorming session!

Holly is recording her findings in a dinosaur book. It is a blank journal with dinosaurs on the cover - as we move along she is making notes and keeping all of her information in there. She loves it!! As well, she is adding some dinosaurs to her time line. Her personal goal is to add four dinosaurs for each period along with plant life. 

As well, we are enjoying several books we own - this is not all of them, but some of them. As well as some fun stuff like a seek and find, sticker book, cards, kids story books and doodle book... all of this adds up to one happy girl!

Working Hard

Sorry for so much silence here lately - we will return with more postings soon!

Holly is busy working hard! She has been busy finishing up her first books of the year for first grade and moving on to her second books here soon. We are doing a lot of review work, both online and off. Many hands on projects are consuming our time - fun stuff like dinosaurs, bodies and art!!! Learning is happening all day here lately, that along with some outings, field trips, play dates, park time, little music class, Camp Fire, candy sales for Camp Fire, library time and swimming. Life is good!

Hudson is also busy learning and playing! He can now tell you all of his ABC's through song but better yet, he can identify them all too. I have began introducing lowercase this week and he is quickly grasping them. He knows all of his basic shapes: circles, oval, rectangle, triangle, rhombus/diamond, semi circle and square. Hudson is enjoying puzzles like crazy now and getting really good at them, does many shape sorters and stackers with ease, is pretty good at matching colors to shapes or items and is counting up to ten. He is mastering his colors now too. Words have just taken off - full thoughts are coming out on what he wants to do while we are doing school now, he will bring me projects or ask to write or do art. He knows what he wants!

So, we are here and learning and doing great!!! More to come very soon...