Steamy Hot Cocoa!

We sneaked in one last "wintery" art project for the year - these steamy hot mugs of cocoa! 

Of course, the lovely painted patterns were the plan, but adding the fun foam marshmallows and the tracing paper steam was a great finishing touch!

 

 

More Squirrels!

Our Thursday afternoon Paint Your ART Out class created their own squirrel portraits. So CUTE! 

These feature autumn, winter, and spring seasons, too.

 

 

 

Little Squirrel Portraits

Aren't these the cutest squirrels EVER? 

Our Friday afternoon Art Kids created these fluffy tailed little creatures while learning to see from another perspective - that of a small squirrel. The trees were drawn and textured with oil pastels. They are large at the bottom and tiny at the top to show size and distance compared to the little squirrel. 


The background colors were then added with liquid watercolors painted right over the oil pastel for a resist affect, and the leaves in the upper trees were lightly added with sponges and tempera paint.



Each student was then given two pieces of brown construction paper (two different shades). The squirrels' tails were drawn on one piece and filled in with oil pastel, using lots of "squirrel tail" colors and lines. 

On the other piece of brown paper, the children drew basic sketches of their squirrels in pencil by following along with me. Then they added their own outlines, details, colors, and squirrel "personalities" with oil pastels. 





The squirrels and the tails were then cut out, glued together as desired, and then glued to the bottom of the painted background.


We had a variety of squirrel photos displayed as references to help our artists select colors and observe details and textures in the fur.

 

                                 

More Polar Bears!

Our Paint Your ART Out class wanted to celebrate International Polar Bear Day, so we created these fuzzy little polar bears! 

This art was created with white chalk and soft pastel on black construction paper, which was smeared and smudged to create shadows. 

The eyes and facial features were then added with oil pastel, and the bears were cut out and glued to paper that had been previously water colored and splattered with white tempera for a snowy effect.  Aren't they adorable?

 

All About Lines!

Our Little Artists have been learning about LINES: 

straight lines, curvy lines, angled lines, squiggly lines, dashed lines, swirly lines. 

Lots and lots of lines. 





This week we painted lines, then we filled up the spaces with color. Isn't that what artists do?

We had some abstract art going on too. No lines, just color filling up spaces. We call this "free painting," and preschoolers are really good at it!

I just love these... they're like little celebrations of life!