An Artist in Training =)

Logan is having so much fun with his new art journal, he doesn't want to put it down! He wanted to learn how to draw faces, so I have started with teaching him the proportions of the face. How to draw the lines through the face to lay out the eyes, nose and mouth. And then I just let him go with it, to make his faces look how he sees them. This is about him being able to express himself. I am very impressed!!! For a boy who went from drawing basic smiley faces last week, to this in just one try......

Not too shabby!!!
He used to want to be a teacher, now he wants to be an artist..... and a paleontologist of course =).
Off to draw with my little budding artist!!

Learning Through Art

I am so excited to share this with you! This summer my husband and I decided that we wanted to pull our 8yo son out of public school and homeschool both him and our 5 yo. It has taken much prayer and research for us to come to this decision, but it has been wonderful so far.

I am taking a fairly relaxed approach to their schooling, making sure that the important things get accomplished daily, but giving them plenty of room for natural learning through play and creating with their hands.

I have wanted to incorporate art into their learning as much as possible. Our 8yo has been asking recently to learn how to paint and draw "like Mommy".... so yesterday we devoted our whole day to researching journal making and making him his very own handmade art journal.

We found this excellent video tutorial by an amazing mixed media artist (who I very much admire) named Tascha Parkinson.




After watching this video we were ready to get to work on our own art journals.... we just had to adjust things a bit to get a larger scale with our own books. We got our bristol paper and cardboard ready, and picked out our cool scrapbook papers.





Next we set to work gluing, and gluing, and gluing some more =).
Have to get the boys used to getting their fingers dirty if they are going to make art.



Then came the tricky part...... securing all of the pages of bristol paper inside the book. This was Logan's first time with a sewing needle.... and I think he did great!



After much work.... and thankfully no blood, sweat (well maybe a little), or tears.... we were finished!!! YAY!



Now to get drawing and painting in them!!
I specifically used the bristol paper because I knew that it would hold up well to pretty much anything we might want to play with.

We both learned so much in just this one project together. Not just art, but history, math, teamwork, following directions, and even more real life skills that will be useful for so many things in the future. And it made us closer as Mom and Son.

He loves me... He loves me not...... Art Journal Entry #1

I have finished my first art journal entry.
I did not intend for this to be a "Valentine's" theme... but i find it to be very appropriate.

I am posting photos in stages, i love to see how a painting develops from sketch to finished product.

In this first stage i have sketched, in graphite, a general idea of what i wanted the finished product to look like. I don't particularly like drawing hands, and my hands aren't very good for modeling. However my 7yo son has very nice hands... so i made him be my hand model for this sketch =)

Next i painted in her face with a mix of watercolor pencils and acrylics. Her hair is painted in acrylic, and the background is different shades of purple acrylic wash.


I just love how the finished product came out! I finished off her hair with highlights of plum, and her dress in turquoise acrylic. Her corset is silver, and i have used a piece of old lace as a kind of stamp to give it a black lace effect, which i also used down the left edge of the page. The daisy in her hair is from a gardening magazine. I finished it off with wisps of wind in silver, aswell as black and silver heart lacy stamps.

Fairies and Geishas and Art Journals... oh my!

COLOR!! Oh how I love it! All colors, even the "ugly" ones =). I spend much of my time working in Primitive colors, which is fine, I love what I do…. but sometimes BAM the color explodes!! That is what I love about altered art…. layers and layers of…. you guessed it…. COLOR!

I also have a thing for fairies. They are so whimsical and magical…. anything with wings fascinate me actually.

This piece may be my favorite so far. I used layers of paint, paper, watercolor pencil, ink, magazine clippings, buttons and beeswax. I love the colors in this, they are some of my favorites!

What can I say? I have been on an Asian kick lately, whether it is with my cooking or painting.

I love my Geisha Girl! Her kimono and fans are made from layers of printed papers, and everything else is painted with acrylics. I have shaded everything with a metallic bronze acrylic to add a glow, and I love how it gives the jade background a patina that looks much like tarnished copper.

ART JOURNAL!!

I love the idea! Something to carry around to jot down ideas, work with new techniques, and just play in every day! WOOHOO!

My brother-in-law bought me this beautiful journal for Christmas several years ago. It is made completely from recycled handcrafted paper. I love it!! However, I had no idea what to do with it….. until now. The pages are very heavy, much like watercolor paper. It was completely free of any sort of decoration, a perfect canvas for the imagination! And, of course I had to start by prettying up the cover a bit =)

(I had to get my messy table in there too, hubby just doesn't get the organized chaos of art…. I actually cleaned it up a bit for the photo)

I cannot wait to get started!! I will probably be journaling this online too, it's always good to have a sounding board, and what better than the world-wide-web for that??

Off to paint I go!