Wheels

Sometimes these mosaics turn out so lovely. Sometimes it crops the photos to crap. This one isn't so hot, but I wanted to condense many photos into one.

Kenzie has finally overcome her irrational fear of the wheeled toys. She's driving herself about the cul-de-sac. Finally. Guess she got tired of being the only kid hoofing it!

Blooming

Kenzie likes to pick me flowers from our yard, which we put in a little bud vase inside the house. This random act of kindness, was the inspiration for these. I don't think this was my unique idea - but I can't remember a source, so I can't site it. :)




We created the blooms while recycling toilet paper tubes, glammed up in glitter paints. Tissue paper is stuffed inside the round center, and a bamboo skewer makes a nice stem. And these, won't wilt.


Directions, per request:
This was one hour worth of solid entertainment for my daughter. I cheerleaded & surfed the web while she drowned her flowers in paint. :)

I used one toilet paper tube per flower.
Draw a ring 2" in from the edge of each tube. Repeat on other side.
Draw cut lines every 1/2 inch (so the kid knows where to cut, but reinforce that they have to stop at the center rings! This required a lot of impatient reminding on my part.)
Fold petals back, and you should have a flower with two layers of petals.
I tried to make each flower different by varying the cuts. :)



More parent/child collaborated art HERE .

Nana

A last minute visit from Nana posed lot's of fun. We packed a lot into the weekend: The Rainforest Cafe, shopping, carousel-riding, singing of special Kenzie songs (composed by Nana), another trip to Deanna Rose Farmstead, and even some extra long naps.



Thanks for coming Nana! We're still talking about it the next day!

Another week

Summer is flying by, and our blog is getting lost in the process. This is the only explanation I have for why.

skateboarding::swimming::sliding::surfing and other silliness.

Kenzie-saurus

We visited the Powell Garden dinosaur exhibit this past weekend. Kenzie is a dinosaur fan, and that just barely made the heat bearable.



Wading through the gorgeous gardens was inspiring for me and my mother-in-law as it is such a lovely example of how to make landscape work. I got many flower ideas and have already acted on a few of them in my own yard.

Amidst all the plantings, dinosaurs are scattered throughout. I think we missed a good number of them - they were so cleverly hidden, but it was a nice day had by all.

Sparkle painting

I found some really great & cheap fingerpaints with built in sparkles the other day. We tend to make a huge mess fingerpainting, so we took our antics outside.

The colors were lovely, and SPARKLY. We commenced with making sheet after sheet of painty goodness. Both of us dug in, albeit I was a bit more restrained than the child, given that I didn't want a sparkly camera after the ordeal. :)

While painting we started drawing lines in the thick paint. And then we begun to see accidental subjects, calling them out to one another. Another injection of creativity into a simple exercise.

We saw:
A race track (me)
A giraffe in a rainstorm (kenzie)
peppermint candies (me)
a snake slithering through grass (kenzie)
a kangaroo tail (kenzie)
leggos (me)
rainbow hands (kenzie)
fairy dust (kenzie)
a checkerboard (me)
crazy lady hair (kenzie)
...and this was only a few.

Amazing, how my mind went to the tangible - and Kenzie saw more visionary imaginative findings. It was a most excellent mess.

Photogenic Princess

Every have those days where you can't take a bad picture. Nope, not me. But she does.



It all started with a change of clothes - instant ballerina. Then following her outdoors (desperately wanting to fix her hair, but knowing I'd blow her "mood" if I did...)






She bughunted...snacked...waited for rain...lounged on the hammock...ogled her father who was mowing the lawn...picked me a few too many flowers from the beds...

Cute stuff. But, then again. I. AM. Biased.

Crafting with Kenzie

Onward into summer, it appears that we need at least a craft project per day now that it's blazing hot outside. We've got an arsenal of craft supplies, on the ready.

For The place where little and big art meet we had much begging to do another collage. Each week, I keep wondering when we might waver from the animal theme. Not this week. A "rhinoceros" she said. "Oh, and some flowers."



Painting and each flower handstuck by Kenzie. Wonky Rhino, missing a horn...by Mama. Oops. I didn't realize my mistake until everything was glued and the rest of our painted supplies had been hauled off by the garbage service.



And some handmade critters of the foam variety. This time, we (I) managed to get all the body parts in the right place.

Sprinkles.

She still can't get the name right, but this year she really enjoyed them.



She also sat with hands cupped around her ears for the entire fireworks display. The ENTIRE fireworks display. We got to see it all this year! And with happy well-behaved dispositions to boot!



Growing up is so much fun.

kenzie's doodle #5: Some giraffeses

Today, Kenzie was very specific about what to make for our project. How about these "giraffeses?"



I decided to make this more of a collage piece rather than again copying Holli's Junk-a-doodle style, so I gave Kenzie bare cardboard and asked her to announce the colors we'd need based on viewing our subjects. She painted these tones, which I then cut into the forms to make the giraffe's.



Kenzie however insisted on a few found objects mid-way through and collected the junk herself. So, that's how we got to the outcome:



More collaborative parent & child art can be found HERE .