Painting the Alamo for Texas Independence Day

Tomorrow is Texas Independence day so tonight we painted a picture of the Alamo. I found a good line art and had the kids add stonework to it then paint it from top to bottom. Some got creative on the sky color but every painting looks great

 

Making furry groundhogs @ WBCL

Not your usual groundhog project! 

Using 1/4 page of construction paper we drew a fat little groundhog and then glued the 2 sides together with a stick in the middle. 
The kids were told they could cut him out or not--the real project was in making him furry. I had thin doll hair that most cut up then glued down to the groundhog. I also had some fur coat lining that others used. We added google eyes and a bead nose to finish them off. Pretty cute!!

Penguins and owls @ the library in January

We have had a lot of owl projects lately as they are easy to draw and lend themselves to a lot of techniques. We did screech owls tonight and painted them with palette knives using Basis paints with cornstarch added to give it a bit more texture. This group does so well, even the littlest ones. Gets a lot of moms drawing too.

Last night we did a drawing and painting project with penguins. At first I had planned a straight nature theme of a penguin family but that held no excitement even for me yesterday. Then I thought, why not have them being playful in the winter dressed up in caps and scarves? The kids spent almost 20 minutes drawing the 2 penguins. we talked about wing position to throw snowballs or ski or other activities and adjusted. Then we painted them. Lesson learned--washable black tempera is not black, it is green..grrr. Some of the kids got into spreading their paints around--"they are in an ice storm" some got excited about the colors (think pumpkin head instead of just a beak) Lots of talk about what was going on in their pictures. One of the penguins is even speed skating--you can tell who wants to be at practice.

Painting wolves with watercolor @WBCL

Last night we painted wolves in the Arts & crafts session. I found a nice picture of a pack of wolves that were not all snarling and printed it on watercolor paper. We did something a bit different by enhancing the lines with scribbles of black or brown color pencil then doing the watercolor using internet photos as a color reference. I would love to try this with watercolor pencils sometime but it really got everyone thinking of where to put their darker and lighter colors. Of course there are a few wolves of a different color and several of the older kids decided that a colored sky was essential.

Mariachis for Diez y Seis @WBCL

We talked a bit about the holiday and celebrations including music from the bands of mariachis.  I precut the paper and used tubes that were thinner (nearer 1") than TP ones from my foodsaver rolls. The kids were really into this with 2 tables making members of the mariachi band complete with a dancer and a microphone to sing into. Even though each person was given the same basic pieces each one got a bit of a personalization as they added touches here and there.  

The mariachis turned out SO good!!

Labor Day illustrated @WBCL

Sometimes art is all about the story! We had a really fun drawing and coloring project Wed on Labor day. We talked about the day then used the copied page to accent the words and draw pictures of people working or activities for enjoying on labor day. We had fun drawing a pizza guy with a chef's hat and multiple swimming pools with tubes to ride in. Lots of sparkly starts to glue on too. — at Wells Branch Community Library.