….same process as the grade 1s but we learned how to mix primary colours to make secondary colours
Thanks to Carla Sonheim’s free kids on-line classes for this terrific lesson.
Click on each image to get the entire picture.
…thanks to Carla’s recent on-line mini class in finger painting
Using only your hands to paint is very liberating. I loved the simplicity of it and the feel of the paint on my fingers. I’m hoping to do more and I haven’t even tackled the third assignment that let’s you get really messy.
The first assignment was to create a palette of colours using your fingers to mix the paint and apply them to the paper. The second part was to paint a vase of flowers but I decided to use two of my photographs that I recently posted and try to recreate them with this finger painting technique. Jill Kuhn actually gave me the idea after she commented on the first photo, suggesting that I paint it with watercolours. Instead, I used acrylics and my fingers. What do you think?
….at the baby shower guests were invited to decorate white onesies with personal messages and art
Our daughter, A, has never been too excited about party games but for her sister’s baby shower she acquiesced and found a fun activity for people to participate in. Actually she found three activities but I’d like to share the onesie project with you.
We weren’t sure if people would gravitate toward this task because it did require some thought and creativity. Surprise, surprise….people loved it. First of all A went out and purchased about a dozen plain white onesies in a variety of sizes. She was able to get them for about $3.00 a piece. You also need fabric markers and cardboard for this project.
A and J cut up cardboard to fit inside each onesie so that the marker would not bleed through to the back. In the backyard a work table was set up and people went outside throughout the afternoon and created their masterpieces. When they were all done, G, the mother to be, judged them all and picked her favourite. The winner went home with a bottle of wine. It wasn’t an easy task (the judging that is) and some of us who organized the shower quietly took ourselves out of the mix and made sure that our designs didn’t win. I had already won the matching game, my sister had won the guessing game and A and J felt it wouldn’t look good if someone else in the family won another prize.
All the finished onesies were put on a clothesline to dry. I forgot to take a photograph of the finished pieces but my daughter kindly photographed each individual onesie from her home and sent them to me. By the way she photographed them after she washed them so it’s good to know that the marker didn’t fade in the wash.
Which one is your favourite?
….another great art lesson for kids
Thanks to Carla Sonheim and Diane Culhane from Kids Art Week for this great lesson called Crayon Resist Night Sky.
This would be a great introduction to Vincent Van Gogh and his famous painting Starry Night. I used oil pastels but wax crayons would also work for this project. Students should be encouraged to use lighter colours from the crayon box, especially white. They make the most impact after the water colour is washed over them.
This could also be a lesson on texture so colouring in various directions and pressing quite hard are essential. Swirls and stars will add visual interest and are details seen in Van Gogh’s painting. Be brave and experiment with lots of different colours. Don’t limit yourself to colours that you think are sky colours. Reds, pinks and yellows and even greens make for very interesting night skies. Think of the Northern Lights and have fun.
Once the paper is filled with crayon or oil pastels move on to the water colours. Make them quite watery and start with the darker colours at the top of the page. Again use a variety of colours but avoid black. While the paint is wet you can also add salt to give your painting even more texture.
Using black or a very dark paper cut out silhouette shapes to add to the bottom of your painting. This can be anything you like; forests, hills, mountains, houses, fences and city skylines. When the paint is dry glue the shapes to the bottom of the paper. There you have it, your very own Starry Night painting.
…..thanks to Carla Sonheim and her free Kid’s Art Week
I’m always looking for new and fun ways to teach art to my students. Next year I’ll be teaching grades 1,2, and 3. I like to combine a little art history with the elements of design when I introduce a lesson. Carla’s Picasso Dogs is perfect. The kids will learn a little bit about Picasso, cubism and primary and secondary colours.
Students will be given a small piece of watercolour paper and a pencil or black oil pastel. They will be instructed to draw individual items that pertain to a dog or any animal that they choose. After drawing the first body part they will turn their papers 90 degrees and then draw the second part. They will do this six or seven times and then they will connect all the parts to create their Picasso animal or alien.
Once the parts are all connected the students will be given further instructions to draw lines across the animal to divide it into smaller sections (this is the cubism part). The first animal will use only primary colours. Once that piece is finished they may create a second animal and I will teach them how to mix the primary colours to create secondary colours. This animal will only be painted with secondary colours. The final step is to go over all the pencil lines with a black marker.
For students who work quickly they may draw a third animal and use a combination of primary and secondary colours. Here are my samples:
….Monday, July 6, 2015
People often wonder what I do at the cottage all day, especially when I’m up here alone. Well there’s lots to do but no pressure as to when I do it. I like that.
Instead of spending two days of solid cleaning when I first open the cottage I like to spread it out and do a little bit every day. I take care of the absolute essentials when I first arrive, like fill up the water barrel, start the fridge, make the bed, uncover the furniture and wipe down all the surfaces that I’ll be using right away.
On subsequent days, I’ve washed all the dishes, even though they were clean when I left in October, wiped out the cupboards and restocked them and organized my clothes and put them back into the dresser. All of this is necessary because at some point in the months when we’re away a few rodents manage to find their way into the cottage, looking for warmth, food and shelter. Unfortunately for some of them they don’t survive and I usually find a few carcasses lying about and of course evidence that they’ve been around. Luckily this year the evidence has been minimal and a few of them had drowned in a bucket of water that was inside the cottage.
One of my goals this summer is to finish reading the books that I started this year and then didn’t finish before I picked up another to read. I’m happy to report that I’ve finished two of them and am concurrently reading two more. I also started a new book and I finished that as well. I think I will report on those books in a future post.
Another goal is to do a little bit of art everyday or at least a couple of times a week. I completed one art assignment this week and I started sketching in my art journal. Another goal well on it’s way!
I didn’t bring up a lot of food on this visit but enough to get me through the week. When I was cleaning out the cupboards I noticed that I had left a container of dried beans here over the winter. I decided to make soup from scratch. I turned on the side burner on the BBQ and cooked onions, celery and carrots in a large soup pot. I added a chopped clove of garlic and then 4 cups of broth, 2 cups of water, a tin of diced tomatoes and 1 cup of dried beans. I added salt and pepper to taste and then I let it cook for 2 hours. After the two hours I looked in the fridge to see what else I could add and I found some chick peas, cooked hamburger and fresh mushrooms. I chopped up the burgers and the mushrooms and added everything to the pot. I let it cook for a few more minutes and dinner was ready. I grated in some fresh parmesan cheese. Delicious!
Of course I had way more soup than I could eat so I put the rest into container and froze it for future meals and I kept some in the fridge for another dinner this week.
While I was cooking I got a phone call from a friend who has a cottage four roads over from mine. She invited me to come to her place for a chat, a glass of wine and to see the finished renovations on her cottage. The soup had pretty much finished cooking, so I turned it off and walked over (1500 steps). The cottage looked fantastic and since we hadn’t seen each other since January we had a nice long gab and got caught up on each other’s lives.
When I finally left it was going on 8:00 and I ended up having a late dinner. The nice part was that it was already cooked, I just had to reheat it. Even though it was getting dark I ventured down to the beach for one last walk and just managed to get in my 10,000 steps for the day. I did decide though that leaving my walk for that late wasn’t the best decision because the mosquitoes also come out at that time. Note to self, walk before the sun sets.
So that’s my day in a nutshell. Everyday I read a little, do art a little, cook, clean and visit friends, either in person or on the phone. I hope all of you enjoy your days as much as I do. Cheers!
…..Sunday, July 5, 2015
A few days ago I wrote about stopping in Midland to purchase some tracing paper. On Sunday I took the six sheets that were gifted to me and tore them in half. I now had 12 sheets of paper to experiment with and attempt Lesson 13 from the Year of the Spark. As some of you know I’m taking an on-line course with Carla Sonheim and Lynn Whipple.
This week’s assignment comes from Carla. We’ve been instructed to paint a picture with black acrylic paint onto a piece of plexiglass and then, before it dries lay a piece of tracing paper on top to create a print. After creating several prints we are suppose to lay interesting papers underneath that will show through the tracing paper and add bits of collage to the surface to create a new piece of art. The final step is to photograph the finished piece and then the actual artwork is the photograph.
Being at the cottage I was somewhat limited with what I could use. My black paint dried pretty quickly and I didn’t have the extender that would have solved that problem. I quickly threw some papers into a bin before I came up here but I was wishing I had added more, especially more of my gelli prints. Having said that I’m pretty pleased with the pieces that I’ve created. I’m thinking that some of these might make interesting cards. What do you think?
……Thursday, July 2, 2015
I finally got here.
Thursday morning I finally got the car packed and shortly before 1:00 I set out, by myself for the cottage. It was the day after the holiday so traffic was minimal and I made good time but I knew that I would never make the 3:00 ferry. As I got closer to Cedar Point I made a decision to head into Midland and see if I could find a special paper I needed for my next art assignment.
There’s a new art gallery/school in the downtown and I was hoping that I could get what I needed from there or from a small framing business that also sold art supplies. Well the framing store has gone out of business and the new gallery only had a small supply of papers. They recommended that I try the printing shop across the street. I had nothing to lose and I still had time so I made my way up the street.
The owners were very friendly and very accommodating. They found a few sheets of tracing paper on an upper shelf that had obviously been there awhile. They gave me what was left and didn’t charge me. How nice was that!.
I passed through Penatang and tried to find the art store there but didn’t have time to park and walk up the street. I’ll leave that for another day. I’ll make do with the paper that was so graciously gifted to me. When I got to Lafontaine (the last town before Cedar Point) I made another quick stop and picked up a couple of bottles of wine.
I still had ten minutes to spare when I got to Cedar Point. The ferry was just coming into the dock. I’ve done this trip for over 25 years but I still don’t like backing onto the ferry. It’s about a twenty minute trip across the bay to the island and then another seven minutes by car to get to the far end of the island where our cottage is situated.
I arrived around 5:00. Luckily my neighbour’s adult daughter had arrived that day as well and she came over to help me unload the car. She also helped me move the fridge, set up the BBQ and started the pump so I would have water. Everything went well until the pump stopped. No biggie. The gas motor needed more gas. After filling it up we pulled the cord. Nothing! We tried again and again. Nothing! I wasn’t too worried. I always bring two large bottles of water with me for this very reason. We decided to leave it for awhile and give it another go in the morning. Little did we know what an adventure we were about to encounter. More about that tomorrow.
….. thanks Cee for four more thought provoking questions
What did you or did not like about the first apartment you ever rented?
Our first apartment was a basement apartment in uptown Toronto. We were close to the subway and great shopping and restaurants. I didn’t like being in the basement. Our windows faced the parking lot and driveway so we had to contend with cars rolling past our windows.
What kind of art is your favorite? Why?
My favourite art includes abstract paintings, watercolour or acrylic and collage and mixed media art. I don’t like things that are hyper realistic. I’d rather take a beautiful photograph.
A Ray Cattell painting.
How many siblings do you have? What’s your birth order?
I’m the oldest of three girls. When my son was born he was the first male born on my father’s side of the family in 50 years.
The three Winkler sisters.
Complete this sentence: I’m dreaming of a white …. (and no you can’t use Christmas as your answer)
This one stumped me for a few minutes. In fact, I went for a walk and really thought about this question. I’ve already owned a white car and my husband has one now. It wasn’t by choice for either of us but at the time they were our only options. I’ve really learned to appreciate white flowers and one of my favourite bouquets this year was all white. 
I’m not very fussy about white weddings or white clothes. I don’t like white food, unless it’s vanilla ice-cream or whipped cream and white walls leave me cold. I do, however, like bright white trim. Therefore, I’m dreaming of painting all the trim in the house white. I also love crisp white sheets and big soft white towels.
Bonus question: What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?
I’m grateful for a wonderful weekend with the family. We did a double Father’s Day celebration. On Saturday my husband and I hosted a BBQ at our place and our girls and their significant others and two of our best friends joined us. My husband did most of the cooking because it’s what he loves to do. I did all the running around and picked up things that we needed. We also went across the street for a bit to congratulate our neighbour on her retirement.
Our daughter and son-in-law couldn’t keep the gender of their baby secret any longer and they shared the news with us. Unfortunately I promised to keep it a secret for a little bit longer and not share it with the world right now.
On Sunday, we drove to my Dad’s place in Oshawa and celebrated Father’s Day with him. My sister took the train in from Chatham and we all shared a meal at their new apartment. I brought a salad made from the lettuce in our garden and Dad picked up his special treat, KFC.
One other thing that I’m grateful for was a very enjoyable Tea that my friend L and I hosted for four students from school. It really was fun and the kids learned a lot about ‘tea etiquette’ and a little bit more about their teachers.
This week I’m looking forward to the staff party and to the last day of school and the start of our summer break.
Cee’s Odd Ball Photo Challenge 2015 – Week 23
……an impromptu visit to the museum earlier this week furnished me with some very odd ball photos for Cee’s Odd Ball Photo Challenge
The nice thing about having a membership to the museum or the art gallery is that you can walk in at anytime and spend as much or as little time as you want and not worry about getting your money’s worth. Last Monday after my husband’s procedure at a downtown hospital we met our oldest daughter and enjoyed a nice lunch with her and then proceeded to walk to the museum to see if there were any new exhibits. We checked out an exhibit of Mexican textiles and then discovered a floor with African and South American masks, tools, sculptures, paintings and other artefacts. The blue woman sculpture and the specialty designed coffins from Ghana, I thought, made excellent photo subjects for this week’s odd ball challenge.
A south Asian sculpture using teak and indigo to represent the region.
Coffins in Ghana are specifically designed to honour the deceased’s past while alive.
The owner of this coffin may have been a car dealer or used a car to earn his living.
This coffin was designed for a fisherman. My husband said that his coffin would be a guitar case.
