Craft Project: Gifts for Summer Sitter

I had a WONDERFUL high school senior who helped me out over the summer. She nannied for us once or twice a week and it made my summer so much easier! We all LOVED her! Even though we have one more year to have her sit for us before she heads off to college, I wanted the girls to make her something to say thank you for all the hard work she did over the summer.

Ella wanted to make her a foil embossed canvas like the ones we made for our kitchen wall. We kept it smaller and bought 5 x 7 canvas boards. Lily wanted to make her a button mosaic but I asked her if she'd like to use pony beads instead (we have TONS of pony beads and not so many buttons left). ;-) She said beads worked for her!

I started off by having the girls draw their designs with pencil. Then, Lily glued her beads on the paper and painted her canvas board. When they were both dry, we glued them together and here's her super cute ladybug bead mosaic:

While using glue and yarn for the foil-embossed canvas worked all right, I recently saw a blog post that suggested using glue for the embossed design. I had my 9 year old draw her picture and then I used Discount School Supply tacky glue to go over her pencil design. I thought this would raise up better than using Elmer's school glue or Glue-all. I went over my lines twice. We let it dry and then instead of using spray adhesive to adhere the foil, I used a simple glue stick. It worked FABULOUS!!! And much less messy than spray adhesive. I then used a q-tip to push the foil down around the dried glue. WORKED AMAZING! We will be doing all our foil-embossed projects with this technique from now on!

Here's the foil before she colored it:

And after being colored with Sharpie markers:

LOVE how both of these turned out and our sitter was overjoyed to receive them!

Foil Embossed Canvas

We were inspired by "We Heart Art" this week, it's a great blog with several ideas I filed away (okay I "pinned" them away). As soon as I saw this idea I knew we had to give it a try. I had three 8 x 10 canvases sitting around waiting for a project, which meant I could make one too! :-) All you need is yarn, Glue-All, spray adheasive, foil and permanent markers. Anytime my girls get to use permanent markers they are thrilled so I figured this would be a winner.

For the first step, I asked the girls to create a design with the glue and yarn. I asked them to not make any actual objects (like ladybugs, or people or anything). I just wanted them to create an abstract design.

(edited to add on 10/2/2012)--I have done this project since and discovered that TACKY glue works great to create the lines and it leaves a smooth line to cover. The glue covered yarn was so rough that sometimes it ripped the foil when I covered these. For the new project, I had Ella draw her image on canvas board first with pencil. We went over the pencil likes with the glue. I even went over the glue an extra time to make it a bit "puffier". Let it dry 24 hours and then use a GLUE STICK to attach the foil to the canvas board. This worked FANTASTIC! And I think an easier and quicker process than I describe before. Though, using the yarn and glue is a much more tactile experience. Both processes work, you can just use whatever works best for you. Here is the link to our second project. 
 

It's so funny how when I give the girls a little leeway, their personalities really come out. My older daughter is very ordered and likes a lot of structure. She is a major rule-follower and likes things to be just so. Can you tell all that in the design she made? :-)

And my other daughter is much more go with the flow and indecisive. She isn't as particular about as many things as my older daughter. Can you see that in her design?

And I think I'm a little bit of both when it comes to my personality. My design ended up being a little free flowing, yet symmetrical. :-)

The next day, I used spray adhesive and covered the canvases with heavy duty aluminum foil. I was a bit nervous about this step because I didn't want to mess them up. There was a bit of a learning curve. I found that it seemed to adhere a bit better if I let the adhesive sit for a few minutes before I covered it with foil. You also have to be careful when you are pushing the foil down in the negative spaces because it can rip fairly easily, even with the heavy duty foil. I actually used a Q-tip instead of my finger to push the foil down. I was afraid my nail might cut into the foil. The Q-tip actually worked quite well.

I also cautioned the kids about pushing too hard with the markers when they were coloring. We ended up letting the first coat of color dry and then they colored a second coat the next day which made the color even brighter. They did a great job! And I'm so excited about how they turned out. I've had this space on our kitchen wall that has needed something ever since we moved in over 5 years ago. And this is how it looks now! Yippee!!