Easy Peasy Weavy Paper

It's fair to say that Boo's enthusiasm for my art projects is not always erm, well, overwhelming - usually she's deep in her imaginative play and doesn't want to stop when this happens.  Actually I'm taking her slightly less clinging demeanour of late as a good sign that we are perhaps moving through the 'difficult' post-baby-birth period and I'm hoping it means she feels more secure in her attachment to me.  Anyhow, she said no to this activity, so I just went ahead and started it myself.  Sometimes I wonder if I devise these things for myself anyway.. (actually I know I do, at least in part!). 

I had been thinking about activities using scissors as Boo struggles with them and I'd like to encourage her to get comfortable using them.  I know she can manage to cut a straight line if I put her fingers in the scissors in the right way, so I thought we could do a bit of paper weaving, the first stage of which would be cutting out the strips of paper.

So, the strips of paper turned out rather neater than those I was expecting to be produced at the hands of my preschooler!  I simply used a ruler to mark out widths and cut equal strips from different brightly coloured paper (IKEA).  Then, to make it a bit more interesting, I used Boo's Stockmar block crayons to create some colour/texture variation on the surface. 

Then the weaving began, and who should I find taking an interest.. Boo of course.  Create, and they will come.  In the end it was the weaving aspect that hooked in the little artist, and she sat on my knee and helped me weave the paper under and over, under and over.

 
 
Looking forward to some more weavy activities with the small one, building up to a small weaving loom at some point.

Clothkits n Cut Outs

It's been a while.  I've had a lovely little Clothkits parcel stashed away for a while now. First the season was wrong, then my belly swelled.  Finally it's time had come, and the scrunchy tissue was removed, the sewing machine unhusked and zim zum, voila, a skirt.  I was especially looking forward to this one as the design is by the tremendous Rob Ryan, whose quirky and poetic paper cuts are just what you would wish for on a skirt.   It wasn't yet open when I was living in East London, but when I finally get to go back (can't face it with a babe and preschooler in tow right now!) I'll definitely be making a visit to his shop Ryantown in Spitalfields.

Enough preamble, here's the item in question...

 
With Dadda Boo in the UK on a business trip, it was a one-woman (at least for now...) photo shoot in the mirror.  Hmmm, see the issue there?  The text.  Yes, the text... ho hum. The cut out lettering on the bell says 'This bell will ring when you take me in your arms and hold me'.  What more can one ask for than a romantic skirt?!

 
Ah yes, as you can see, I wasn't alone for very long. 

 
On the back the text reads 'Every bird is my brother and sister'.  Boo loves this.

And soon I was relegated to the background.

 
I have great respect for someone who can wield a scalpel with such impressive results, precision never having been my forte. 

Staying with cut-outs, today we picked up this book from the library:

 
Nicky McClure is a self taught cut-out artist who uses black paper to create images, usually with a family/home life theme. Her book Mama, is it summer yet? was just right for us today, when we are hanging on for the pacific northwest summer to finally emerge.  The young boy asks if it is summer way too early and his mother plants seeds with him and draws his attention to things changing in the natural world around them, until the strawberries are in fruit and summer is finally here.

 
 
 
Finally, if paper cutting rings your bell, you must check out the work of Peter Callesen, who can do things with a scalpel and a piece of A4 white paper than I can only marvel at.

Now where did I put those cack-handed scissors?

Scratch it out with Sgraffito

Sgraffito is the 'oh so arty Italian' terminology for a fun and simple technique with wax crayons which you probably enjoyed when you were young, I know I did.  I've been meaning to try it out with the Boo for a while, though I did choose to prepare the panels for scratching in advance myself as I thought she would tire of the laborious process of applying the thick layers.

I can strongly recommend Stockmar beeswax crayons for this techique, they really are superior to any other crayons I have used.

First you lay down an underlayer of luminous colour:

 
Then apply a thick layer of black crayon over the top:

 
I wasn't entirely sure what tool to use to scratch out the image.

First we tried bamboo skewers; too soft.

 
Then we tried an etching needle; too scratchy (and Boo pricked herself).

Finally, it dawned on me I had a scraperboard tool - I found it pretty easy to use this, and you can get different marks by using either the point or the side.  However, Boo found it a bit hard to handle and cut through the paper a number of times.  She managed to make some marks but only with my hand guiding her.

 
 
Here's mine:

 

 
 
After we had done these little panels, I was having a look around the web to see what tools other people used for sgraffito, and found some lovely dinky little images on the blog Made by Joel.  I read that he also used Stockmar crayons, and that the crayon set included a tool for creating sgraffito.  The lightbulb went on!  Ah, that's what those little plastic doo-dahs were in the two tins of Stockmar crayons we have (I bought one, one was a gift).... now where on earth have I put them?! 

Will report on their efficacy when I track them down...

Wonderful Wet-on-wet Waldorf Watercolour

I had a go at the Waldorf approach to watercolour painting a good while back here with mixed results (too early for Boo I think).  Now that she's constantly trying out colour-mixing with her other art media, and with my having had a little instruction on the method at a recent parents evening at Boo's Waldorf preschool (rather psychedelic results below....), I thought the time was nigh to have another go.

 
Preparation is important; you need to lay out the materials so that the child understands that they must clean their brush in the water and dry on the rag between applications of different colours.  We used Stockmar watercolours in the 3 primaries; an ultramarine, crimson and golden yellow.  You can experiment with cobalt blue, scarlet red and a more lemon yellow as well to see which create the best results.  You need a good quality watercolour paper.  Ours was not really up to scratch and the results were rather more muddy than need be.  The paper needs to be soaked in water in the sink prior to painting, and the excess water sponged off with a natural sponge, leaving the paper wet but without puddles or bubbles. It's also really worthwhile investing in a good quality watercolour (sable hair) wide short-handled brush.

I laid the paints out.

 

Boo seemed to take readily to the procedure of using the water and rag between colours.

 
And she was off...

 
 
 
After this painting, Boo decided that the crayons were coming out.

 
 
 
As we had the watercolours out, I suggested that Boo apply some paint over the top to create a wax resist.  She was fascinated by the method.

 
 
I'm not posting pics of the dried watercolour paintings because I found them a little disappointing due to the muddiness, pointing to the need for a heavier grade, rougher watercolour paper.  I've bought some quality stuff now, so when I get a chance we'll give it another whirl and hopefully our results will be more durable.

Playdough prints (or 'look, we can still make art')

In her playdough play recently, Boo has taken to pressing objects into the dough to create impressions, and it occurred to me that here was some printmaking potential, so we grabbed our chance today, whilst the wee one slept.

You simply roll out the dough to create a flattish surface (not too thin).

 
Then you go about pressing objects into the surface to create indentations.

 
 
 
Roll the printing ink over the surface using a printmaking roller, lay the paper over the top, press gently, and voila!

 
 
 
 
Here's some I did...

 
 
 
... and here's all our prints together...

 
I make my own playdough, so I'm not too bothered about it getting covered in printing ink.   Have fun printing!

Wax resist dyed Easter Eggs

 
 

 
We made some wax resist dyed easter eggs for our Easter table.  They work smashingly if you apply the wax crayon whilst the egg is still hot, but Boo was not keen on handling the heat, so most of our were drawn on when the eggs had cooled a little.  Then we simply dyed them with food colouring.

Boo then created her own little art workshop.  Having noticed the way the excess dye was spreading on the kitchen paper, she applied a whole lot more.  Curious as ever.

 
Happy Easter!

Let the Play begin!

 
A certain wee little man has just begun to hold toys and try to mouth them... though at this stage, his fists are far more reliable for him.  We await the exciting developments ahead in the next few months.

Meanwhile, Bear has been on his travels

 
Plane hand crafted by Dadda Boo.