Sensory Light Table: Paul Klee Shape Activity

We've been having a lot of fun with our new light panel. Not all of the activities we've been doing with it are art or craft related so I'm torn with sharing them here because I don't want to lose the focus of this blog. I may just throw the random activities into one post just so you can see what else we've been up to with the light panel. I've been trying to figure out ways to use it related to art so here's an original idea I came up with. Funny, part of this activity I did find on Pinterest, but I do think what I did with it is unique. I haven't seen this one anywhere else. I got the idea for making shapes out of plastic binder dividers here. The wonderful wooden blocks with translucent colored centers are soooo expensive. This is a great, cheap alternative!

I tried to think about how we could use shapes to make art. I could have just asked my girls to create a picture with the shapes. But I have learned from past experience that it is good to give them a bit more direction. When I leave things completely open-ended they tend to get overwhelmed. So I decided to transform our Paul Klee project from last summer. I showed the girls their Klee pages from their art journals and asked them to create a cityscape with the shapes. My younger daughter wasn't much into this, but it was the time of day when she is usually tired so she was more interested in watching a movie than doing the activity.

However, once again, my 8 year old was completely into this activity! She is so intrigued by the light panel. Almost anything I set up with it (even if it's more for my 2 year old) she jumps right in and is very engaged.

 

The image above is her finished cityscape. She explained to me that the two yellow squares on the posts on the left and right are lamp posts. And that's her origami hamster she made earlier in the morning. She says it was taking a taxi back to its house. :-) I thought that was so great! I asked her if she could make one more building where the hamster was so it would look even more like Klee's art. And I showed her how we could layer the smaller shapes to make even more shapes. And she came up with this:

In my completely biased opinion, I think that is a pretty darn good light panel rendition of Paul Klee's Castle and Sun! 

She asked if she could just play with the shapes for a bit when she was done with her Klee image. I told her to go for it. And she came up with this:

 

LOL! It's a home for her hamster! In the picture the hamster is in its "ball". The left part with the yellow circle is the hamster's wheel. And the rest of it is its maze/home.

She called her sister in to show her how the hamster could "go through" the maze.

 

So creative, cute and fun! I am so over the top thrilled that we have a light panel. It is so great to see how creative the kids get with it. And it's fun and challenging for me to see what I can come up with for them to do with the panel in an artistic way.

DIY: Photo Valentines

I pinned this idea months ago! And when I took the kids' Christmas photos last year I made them take a few that we could use for Valentines this year. I think they turned out pretty darn cute! And I'm hoping they are fairly unique in their class. Also, I got them as 6 cent 3x5's from Ritz so all of them together cost me $3.80 with tax. Well, plus the suckers, but I'm pretty sure I would have spent that or more on store-bought Valentines.

 

I just used an Exacto knife to cut along the top and bottom of their hands to make the hole for the sucker. Easy peasy!

The photos of the photos aren't that great because I had to take them at night. My older daughter has to bring hers in tomorrow morning, so I had to quick grab them while I could. But you can get the idea. :-)

Getting Organized!

I've been inspired to get things organized and cleaned out around here. Whenever I get in these moods, my effort only lasts so long before chaos takes over again. But it's always a good feeling once I do go through everything. I now have a cupboard cleaned out for our light table materials. I moved all the girls' board games out of the cupboard to a bookshelf where they can actually see them and remember we have them. I took half the toys out of my son's room so he only has half as much to dump out on the floor when he's playing instead of taking his nap. And I organized our art corner! I had one big bin before that had a bunch of stuff in it that we hardly ever played with: Fuzzoodles, perler beads, Pixos, random crayons, water colors, and more. I put the Fuzzoodles, perler beads and Pixos in the basement (just in case the girls ask for them at some point). And I purchased four of these bins from Ikea:
I store our art supplies in our kitchen and I loved that these had casters for easy pull-out access. I don't have a "before" photo, but here is our new art corner:
I used paint chip pieces for the tags. I'm not sure how well you can read them. But they are organized into "Craft Kits", "Art Journal Supplies (Mom Only)"--these are for our summer projects and I like to keep them just for that. Then they aren't all over the house--, "Painting Supplies"--all our various paints for messier projects, and "Everyday Art Supplies". Here is the Everyday bin:
I have two sets of Crayola washable paints, so I included some in here. All the foam pieces I cut up for the disastrous mosaic project last summer and the larger sheets I didn't cut up, and a variety of stampers, crayons and dot markers. The items in the white caddy I put together specifically for my two-year old son to have access to art supplies. I wanted something I could get out easily. I've always sort of been the Keeper of the Art Supplies because there are just times when I don't want to clean up the mess or we are about to leave or whatever. The girls both have a ton of stuff in their rooms for creative use (crayons, markers, etc). But the fun thing is that since I've made the "Everyday" supplies available for use anytime, they have been REALLY creative! Check out the laptop my younger daughter made out of the foam pieces!
She finished the main part and then decided that her laptop needed a mouse too. :-)
Isn't that great! So clever! Not anything I would ever tell her to make. She came up with the idea and ran with it. I LOVE it!

My older daughter got in on the fun as well. She got out our iPad and visited the Family Fun Craft app loaded on there. She found this cute little guy:

Image from the Family Fun website

Here's my daughter's version:
And I just have to throw this in because I don't have a good post to include it with. The same daughter who made the little heart guy has an easel in her bedroom and she created this self-portrait this week:
It's amazing isn't it?! She is in second grade. The lips crack me up. She is totally missing her top teeth. I LOVE it!