Starting Our Garden Journals

This past weekend there was actual spring-like weather going on and we were able to get outside to check out the yard situation in depth. We planned the location for garden space, bought a few flower bulbs for one of the beds, and Ender started on a great plan for what needs pulled out. A few things were dead from the previous owners so that is first on the list to take care of in the next week or so as we prepare beds.

{Ezra's entry}

{Ender's entry}

One of the things I really want to be sure to do this first season with the new garden is to keep a journal of our work in the yard. I'm keeping the primary garden journal myself, which will be more list making and written journal entries than drawings. The boys are keeping smaller versions of my journal. Ezra's notebook will probably just be nature related drawings, but Ender is working to keep an accurate record of our time spent outside similar to my journal. We talked this weekend about making a point of noting the date and the weather, being sure to record what part of the garden we work in that day and what was done. He's still deciding how he'd like to organize his journal, but for now he's making a page each time we work outside.

We handed Ellie a pencil about a month ago and now she wants to draw all the time. In fact, she will most definitely squawk at you if she sees you with a pen or pencil and will not let it go until she has her own pencil. I read the book Young at Art when Ezra was a bitty baby and put a pencil in his hand right around a year old as well- that book has dramatically shaped the way art happens around here.


My garden journal is a bit less impressive- it consists so far of a list of items to plant, and a sketch of the layout. I'm excited to bring our plans into reality over the coming weeks.

Little Bits

:: Brian and I were talking the other night about what it is that makes a person creative. He would say that he isn't creative in a traditional sense and he's not- he doesn't have a creative hobby or anything, but he's a very creative problem solver for pretty much anything we might come up against.

I, on the other hand, really start to feel it if I don't have some sort of creative outlet for a period of time. Knitting, sewing, music, writing.... I need *something* creative most every day to feel "together" or "complete".

Brian has been home with the kids a lot more lately and he has really noticed how the mood of the house changes if they haven't had a bit of "project time" for more than a day or two. They need their time outside too just like any kid, but there is a very noticeable drop in positive demeanor without time to make things.


:: I've been obsessively searching for just the right beads for the yarn I ordered for the Shipwrecked Shawl... and realized last night that there is NO WAY I will be knitting that shawl in the next several months. How is it that I keep forgetting that I'm going to have a newborn any time now? And how is it that I forget what newborns (and the lack of sleep) are like?


No... no lace knitting for a bit since I don't particularly like ripping out anything knit during times of sleep deprivation.


I might still make sure to hunt down just the right beads though...



:: Ezra is obsessed with drawing and cutting out little people. There are super heroes, pirates and I'm pretty sure he told me he made George Washington the other day. He even made a paper house to stash them in. For awhile everything was going into a paper bag and after I almost threw it away thinking it was trash he made them a home.


:: I truly dislike markers. We try to provide the boys with a very wide variety of art supplies but I am always *very* slow to replace markers. The boys do a great job of taking care of all of our different kinds of paints and colors and clay and doughs, but when it comes to markers they can *never* remember to replace lids or keep them off the couch and carpet...


:: We've been surprised each day as we go out into the yard to find new things popping out of the earth, especially in places we thought had very little if anything planted. It reminds me of how much I love this season. There is something new each day- and at this new house, something a little mysterious as we figure out what all is planted here!


:: I am still deciding what exactly to cast on next since I finished the Hemlock Ring Blanket last night. One last little baby knit? The cardi I've loved since before I really even knew how to knit**? More socks?


**I've literally had the February Lady Sweater in my queue since August of 2008. At that point I'd knit about 4 cotton washcloths. I've actually knit the sweater to about 90% once 2 years or so ago, but I messed it up so badly that I tore it all out. I think I can handle another shot at it now...

A Little Artwork

Ezra is the resident artist of the drawing persuasion. He will turn 4 this summer and he spends about 90% of his time drawing. I'm pretty sure another 8% is spent cutting out some of his drawings, with the last 2% spent on snacking.

Ezra is also a ginormous Toy Story fan, and so he spends roughly half of his drawing time drawing toy story characters. He is an equal fan of the characters and spends time on all of them including the Little Green Men:

No character has too small of a part to be included in Ezra's artwork.

Most recently Jessie has been his fascination and he turned out this little drawing:

It's interesting to me how much Ezra has picked up from just listening in on the directed line drawings I've done with Ender this year. We haven't drawn anything amazing, but we have talked about drawing in pencil first, then going over that work with another medium like marker and then filling in with crayon or paint or something... and you can see all those steps. Ezra is included in those lessons as in "he's there" but he's not usually an active part of the lessons.

We just keep providing the paper and the markers, pencils, and crayons. There's no telling what he might make next.

Spring Birds, Part II

We tried a second version of the Spring Birds this week, this time with oil pastels and watercolors. Above is Ender's orange bird, and below is Ezra's red one:

Ender recently started to keep his colors a little bit more separate to avoid the "preschool brown" that happens when all your paints mix together.

Ezra? Not so much yet, but his most frequently chosen colors are red and black, just like he picked here.

Spring Birds

Ender has been fascinated with birds over the last few months, so when I saw this project on Deep Space Sparkle I knew it was perfect for us.

We're planning to try this project with various materials, so for our first version we used crayons and marker before cutting out our birds.

Then came the difficult decision of what kind of background to draw...

Ezra's bird

Ender's bird

Next up, trying the bird project with pastels and watercolors!

Bringing Winter In

We've been working our way through the winter craft list. My boys are kings of scissors and glue during this season! Basically I printed a bunch of things for them and they have free time in the morning to make whatever project they'd like. Ezra cuts very well for his age so he's able to do most of these projects on his own, but some 3 and 4 year olds would not quite be ready for this with their own skills, but you could still cut for them!

Here are some of the crafts currently on the school table in some state of progress:


Snowman Dress-Up

Make a Penguin

City at Night

Snowman Card

Handprint Wreath


And of course there is the entire winter section at The Crafty Crow that I haven't yet dived into...



We also have a few more wintery foods in the works this week:

Peppermint Cocoa

Snow ice cream

Pioneer Woman's Mac and Cheese

Saturday = Art Day

Saturdays are the only day of the week where the adults don't work and the whole day is truly our own.

I usually spend Saturday mornings catching up on housework while Brian and the boys run errands, but in the afternoons we have fallen into a routine of making art of all kinds.

The boys were gifted some paint by number boards and Ender spent a long time hunting numbers down.

We also experimented with mixing yellow, blue and red tempras to give us secondary colors for finger painting. Ezra had never done that lesson with us, and it was fun to watch Ender get so excited to share his experience with Ezra. Ezra guessed that all the mixes would result in more red since red is his favorite color. Ender would put his hands on hips, shake his head and say, "you can't get red from that!" in his fake exasperated voice.

We also experimented with painting with cotton balls. Ezra figured out that you can rub the paint on like a paint brush and even mix colors on the page instead of in the tray...

And Ender was quick to use the cotton balls to make dots on the page as well as toothpicks for lines and "coloring", which he decided didn't work very well.

What have you been making lately?

Curious Art

Ezra has been interested in shapes for several weeks now, so I've been drawing various shapes for him to cut out or color lately. About 2 weeks ago his shape obsession evolved into something else- he started drawing his own shapes!

It's the next part that is so curious to me though: He draws a circle-ish shape and then very carefully colors over the line he made:

And after about a week of that, he has spent several days drawing shapes and then filling them in with patches of color:

I've never seen a three-year-old do this before! We have never had any kind of conversation about "staying in the lines" or anything even close to that conversation, but he has arrived to his own "fill in the shape completely" conclusion.

He takes this project very seriously and when he starts to work on one of these pieces of art he is completely focused for about 20 minutes. I think I can safely say it's the longest he sits still for any one activity!

If You Give a 3-year-old Scissors...

If you give a 3-year-old boy scissors he will ask for something to cut.

If you draw something simple (like a square) he will say, "I think I want some leaves. You can draw leaves, right?"

If you draw 2 pages of free-hand leaves he will surely say, "Can you make me some more?"

And if you draw him more and more and more leaves he will cut and cut and cut until you have a nice little basketful.

But when you have a basketful he will look at you with those sparkling baby blues and sweetly say, "Can you pass me the glue???"

And he will most certainly enlist his brother for help, because a project is brewing...

And another wall poster is born! And for the first time a project was brought to life by the little guy.

Our tree books:

A Tree Is A Plant

Why Do Leaves Change Colors?

The Autumn Leaf

Red Leaf, Yellow Leaf

Making Cardinals

Cardinals have been hanging around our house lately, so when Ender caught sight of this craft idea at My Montessori Journey, he went in search of all the right tools to make his own cardinal! He was a bit on  the lucky side to have found paper plates since we have been purposely not using paper plates/towels/napkins for awhile now, but he found a few lurking in the  pantry.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We learned two things- our paper plates were too waxy for much of the color to stick no matter what medium we tried, and we also learned that Ezra was able to follow the lines to cut but just wasn't strong enough to cut the whole project.

A Little Painting