Creative Family Fun

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Art Activities

Cityscape Printmaking

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Project Around the World has taken us to Alaska, through Canada, and now we are spending time in The Big Apple, New York City.

We’ll be exploring the Statue of Liberty, the subway system, Broadway, and The Museum of Modern Art, but first we wanted to pay homage to the streets of New York with a fun printmaking project.

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Supplies Needed
Craft foam
Scissors
Glue
Heavy cardboard
Gray & lilac paint
Foam brushes
Black construction paper

The first part of our project was making the stamps.

We cut simple rectangles out of craft foam. A thicker craft foam works better, but just use what you have.

A grown-up will want to tackle the windows; I used a sharp paper cutter to slice ours.

The shapes don’t have to be perfect or intricate. In fact, our imperfections are what made the project turn out so well.

Once we had our buildings cut out, we glued them onto heavy cardboard. We recycled a shipping box for our stamps; it was the perfect weight.

After the glue dried, we started stamping.

We used gray and lilac paint to try and mimic the look of a city at night.

The girls brushed an even coat of paint on a stamp, then gently pressed it down on their paper.

They were amazed at how great their buildings looked. They then got to work making a city.

Once they were done printing, the girls added a few details such as a street, doorways, and clouds.

Lizzie even added the weather star on the top of one of her tallest buildings after we read about it in a book.

I love how our cityscapes turned out and I know we’re going to have great fun exploring New York.

One of these days, I hope to actually get to visit New York, but until then, we’re enjoying our virtual trip. Hope you come along with us!

Have you ever been to New York City? What it your favorite place to visit there?

Color Wheel Painting

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A simple and effective way to learn the basics of a color wheel is to make your own.

The girls and I recently did an easy art project while learning about primary and secondary colors.

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Supplies Needed:

Water color paper
Black permanent marker
Liquid water color (or acrylic paint) in red, yellow, and blue

Before painting, draw a large circle on your paper. We just traced around the edge of a small plate.

Next draw the lines to divide your circle in six equal sections.

Trace all your lines with a black permanent marker.

Now it’s time to paint.

We started with our primary colors (red, yellow, and blue), talking about each as we painted. You will be painting each wedge a different color. Each primary color will need a blank wedge next to it.

After painting our primary colors we moved on to our secondary colors.

I used an empty ice cube tray to hold our paint so we would have plenty of sections for mixing colors.

We looked at our blank wedges and decided what color they needed to be. The wedge in between red and yellow needed to be orange. The girls mixed up some orange paint for that wedge.

They did the same with purple and with green.

Soon, they had completed color wheels that we plan on hanging in our art room for inspiration and reference.

We’ve now spent several days talking about color.

We went on a COLORful scavenger hunt, read books about color, played in a color mixing lab, and now created beautiful color wheel artwork.

What is your favorite way to play with color?

Moose Silhouette Paintings

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One thing we spent some time learning about on our journey to Alaska was the moose.

My girls are very fascinated by animals (as are many children) and I plan on including as many as I can while we are learning about different cultures.

We chose the moose for Alaska. It’s a animal that is native to North America and is very prevalent in Alaska. It was also the perfect subject for an art project.

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After reading a few books about moose, both fiction and nonfiction choices, we found a picture to use as inspiration.

After looking at the picture awhile, the girls chose a variety of paint colors they wanted to use and got to work on their interpretation of the picture.

They painted mountains, grass, clouds, and lakes.

While they were working on their painting, I made a couple of moose silhouettes. I found a simple coloring page to use as a template. I reduced the page to about 25% on my computer, printed it out, and used it as a stencil on black paper. Once I cut them out, they were ready.

After the painting were finished we let them dry for awhile before gluing our silhouettes on.

The pictures turned out wonderful and the girls were very proud of their finished projects!

We had such a fun time learning about moose and creating beautiful pictures. If you’re curious as to the books we read, I’ve included a selection in the carousel below.

Are you going to join us on our trip around the world? I’d love to hear about your experiences.

Try one of these books for inspiration:

It’s a Baby Moose! (Baby Mammals) by Kelly Doudna
Amazing Animals: Moose by Kate Riggs 
Elusive Moose by Joan Gannij
This Moose Belongs to Me by Oliver Jeffers
Thidwick the Big-Hearted Moose by Dr. Seuss
Looking for a Moose by Phyllis Root
If You Give a Moose a Muffin by Laura Joffe Numeroff

Art Lessons: Watercolor Resist Hand Prints

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For our first afterschooling art lesson, I wanted to do a project that we could use to decorate the walls of our new art/craft room.

I first saw the idea of doing watercolor resist hand prints on Fairy Dust Teaching and had been waiting for the perfect opportunity to make these ourselves.

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We started with a couple of sheets of watercolor paper. The type of paper really does make a difference when using watercolors. If you don’t have watercolor paper, use the thickest paper you have.

Our first step was to trace our hand prints. The girls decided where they wanted their hand prints and how many they wanted on their paper. I helped them out by tracing their hands with a black oil pastel.

Once we had our hand prints traced, the girls got to work with our watercolors.

We made our own watercolors using this recipe from Happy Hooligans. They work so much better than the watercolors you can find in the school supply section of your store!

When we were done we had some wonderful artwork to hand on our wall. I can’t wait to fill the wall up with more art!

Kid’s Co-op: Let’s Paint!

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It’s time for the Kids Co-op! I posting the Kid’s Co-op a little early this week so you can get a head start linking up your favorite kid-related posts. Make sure and check out all the fun that has been linked up from other bloggers.

There was so much information shared last week! There was also sensory play ideas, baby play ideas, book recommendations, kid-friendly recipes and more. Today, I’d like to share three posts with some fun painting ideas.
Love, Play, Learn shared a super, simple pudding paint… that’s also edible!

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Learn With Play at Home shared an awesome idea for comb painting.
 
 
Now it’s time for you to share all the fun you’ve been having! Please join up and share your favorite post. (And, we’d love you forever if you’d link back to us!) Your link will show up on all of the hosts blogs. It’s time to link up, visit some new blogs, and have a lot of fun!