Playing with Colors

Things for kids to do here include driving to the beach, going to the park, going to the Lady's Club which has an inside swing set and toys, going to the mall, going to a friend's house, mostly things that involve a car or walking a ways. We usually walk everywhere with no problem, but the further into the third trimester that I get, the more contractions this causes, so after homeschooling, at-home activities have included a lot of reading, making cards and letters to mail family, spraying the gardens, building with blocks, puzzles and a lot of art. Talia and Elias especially like playing with colors. So far we've been....

Finger painting:

Drawing: (Here, a girl running away from an apple tree because they apples were falling on her head.)

"Writing":

Making Papi and "I love you" card that's supposed to be a fox made out of hearts:

Dancing Elephants

Talia drew these elephants wearing high heels (she didn't get that idea from me) and dancing in the water.

"They are scaring the crocodile away" she said, "but the duck can stay to play and splash around."

Doodles

Talia's art always makes me smile... Especially as it has been getting more detailed. Seeing the world from her perspective is always an adventure. Take this car, for example:

And these colorful bubbles with faces that we traced different round things from around the house and then filled in. Her faces made me laugh!

This picture is supposed to be a restaurant for people who have a tummy ache. The menu included oatmeal, fruit smoothies and mint tea.

We colored and cut out shapes and she turned them into this robot with a ball:

This picture is supposed to be a 3 seater bicycle with places for people to climb up. To me it resembles a disproportionate grocery cart.

A Sea of Wax

Talia really likes playing with colors and making things, as I'm sure every kid does, so when we saw an idea to use old crayons and melt them through a glue gun to create a unique work of art, she was very interested. Every time we went to the store she would remind us that we needed to get a glue gun! Ben finally went to a cheap store by the apartment and bought us one so that we could get to work.

A friend of ours came over to make a piece for her daughter's room as well. We explained how to be careful with a glue gun and showed Talia how to hold it properly and she got started. The old crayons we were using took a little while to melt, but when they did, they poured out rather quickly... which created some interesting textures.

I thought the "A" used for our little friend's room turned out nicely. It's almost like wax splatter/drip art!

Earlier this month, we went to the beach and had gotten some shells that Talia was anticipating using. She used browns to make the beach (but it seriously looks like chocolate) and lots of blues and a green to make the water and then glued the shells in the middle.

She was very excited with the finished result. Now the only problem is figuring out which way to stand it up since every way seems to work.

(Disclaimer: Yes, I know I use the word "art" rather loosely!)

A 4-year-old's Artwork: The Phase of the Parrot

Much of my daughter's inspiration for her artwork comes from what we have studied in science or seen in the natural world around us. Octopus, for example, came from a science investigation on these creatures. She then drew octopi frequently in following artwork, including the one below, which came from the end of what I'll call the octopus phase. (You can't see all of his tentacles, she said, because some of them are behind him. The baby octopi supposedly haven't developed all of theirs... yes, this is the imaginative part of "science" but isn't all art to some extent?)

She then asked me to draw the parrot on top, and thus began a whole new phase of artwork: the phase of the parrot.

Since then she has drawn many parrots. This rainbow-colored parrot has what's supposed to be a wing on the front.

This is a family of parrots, with a mommy parrot, Papi parrot and baby parrot.

Annnnd... this is what happens when Elias gets Talia's artwork. Apparently, parrots are tasty, too.

I wonder what she's going to draw next...

Childhood Artwork

My daughter, like most kids, has always loved drawing. She is constantly creating pictures on her magnetic drawing board, in the dirt with a stick, with colors on her paper or any other way she can figure out. I love it when she draws because it shows me a little bit more what the world looks like through her eyes... and most of the time, her depictions make me laugh in appreciation!

One of her favorite things to draw are bugs, spiders, butterflies and bumblebees. Once, a little, smiling bug appeared on the lid of her laundry pail (below.) He was so jovial and full of character, it was hard to explain how it wasn't appropriate to draw on the furniture with a straight face.

I think it's interesting that her pictures always involve characters from nature at this point in time. I like that she has enough contact with nature to feel that it is the natural thing for her to draw. However, it always has her own twist, like the spider (below) who looks quite startled!

At first, she would only use one color, when she used colors, to draw the entire picture. But as she has matured, she has begun to use multiple colors together to create a picture, like this picture of ducks in a pond:

Also, instead of drawing just outlines of things, she has recently begun coloring in some of her picture. Here, she was making a picture of a painted bunting for our neighbor as a thank you card for a book about birds for her birthday. I thought her bird turned out cute and had all of the right colors. He made me smile! :)

Do I think my child is a genius artist in the making? Not really... but I love seeing her art develop and appreciate all of the laughs and smiles she brings me with her whimsical pictures.