The girls are just finishing up their first year of art classes at Seahorse Studio. We feel like we hit the jackpot this year with these amazing classes. I mean, how often do you get an incredible teacher whose passion for art and interest in children is unmatched, small classes and tons of individual attention, beautiful location, and convenience? The studio is just around the corner from our home.
One word... heaven. (I think I may have mentioned before how being in the car too much sucks the life right out of me!)
The kids all love art. Not a single day goes by in our home where the pencils, paints, markers, etc aren't pulled from the shelves. And I love it. It's so much fun to watch the kids go through phases where they focus heavily on one particular medium or subject and then all of the sudden, one day they move on to something totally different. It's another great way to observe what is important to them at any point in time, as well as a peek into their changing interests.
At the moment, surprise surprise, Rollin is into dinosaurs so he works on those all the time. He has his artwork (and those he commissions from Rachel,our babysitter) taped all over his wall with blue tape, masking tape, and who knows, maybe even glue. Basically, if it's sticky, he'll use it. He is so proud of his efforts, so I try not to focus on how uneven or messy his wall his. I sit on his bed a lot when I nurse Evan and when I look past the disorder, I see a perfect snapshot of an energetic, passionate little 4 year old boy and all the things that matter in his world. And what an exciting world that is!
He also loves having us draw him dot-to-dots, dozens and dozens of them, and don't make them easy, okay?! This child wants a challenge. He makes all kinds of creatures and loves to create with tape. Oh boy, this Christmas he is getting a Costco pack of tape and I think he will be the happiest kid around. Last week, he transformed one of his dinosaurs into a super dino by taping to its main tail, lots of additional tails with little rocks dangling from them. He spent hours and it was a masterpiece. And a rather formidable looking creature, I might add.
Nina is writing books and illustrating them right now. I love her determination. She just completed her first book, Silly Makes a New Friend, last week. It took her several weeks and she worked on it a little bit every day. The last day, she secluded herself in my room to get away from the distractions and finished the last five pages. She is so tickled now when I read her her OWN book for a bedtime story. She also likes to draw pictures of happy people and puppies.
Nina's "Alouse Owl" won 3rd place in a local art contest.
Sela is also writing a book right now called "Prickles" about hedgehogs. I peeked inside and saw that she wrote an official looking dedication to Nina and I inside the front cover that said, "To my dearest Mom and sister who love hedgehogs." She draws mostly animals, and sometimes people. She focused a lot on owls this year, and then moved onto bunnies. Her bunnies on silk are one of my favorite pieces she completed this year.
Sela's seaweed pressing.
Sometimes I feel out of the loop without tv, but when I think of how the kids fill their downtime, I am so glad we've opted out for now. I doubt they would head for the art supplies as often if the tv were an option. I so enjoy watching their creativity blossom and watching them grow in their artistic expression. Television will always be there, but these early childhood years go by so fast and I'd much prefer them to spend it with a paintbrush in hand rather than a remote control.
The art classes have given them exposure to many other mediums, techniques, and artists. They have done lots of silk painting, architectural drawings, block printing, aboriginal dot drawings on rocks, sculpture, and one of the coolest recent projects was seaweed pressings. One day I arrived to pick up Nina from class and the studio smelled like the sea. There were buckets of seaweed of all shapes and sizes all over the tables. The kids were making compositions with seaweed Suzy had gathered from the Puget Sound that morning. And the pressings turned out gorgeous.
I've made an effort to display their art amidst the other art we have in our home. I recently moved a piece we recently acquired from a very visible spot in our house to my little office and replaced it with Nina's hippo on silk. When she came home from school one day and saw the change, she was so excited.
Her hippo makes me happy every time I look at it, and that is exactly what art is supposed to do.
Here are a few shots from one of Nina's classes. The project was plant/ flower pressings. The children gathered their own flowers from Suzy's yard (endless choices), arranged them on the paper, applied paint, and pressed them through this big press thing...I'm sure it has a name. But anyway, how fun is that?!
Right this way....
Horses and chickens...what's not to love
Nina, Suzy, and another work of art.
Last, but certainly not least, is Matisse. A gentle giant and occasional guest in the studio.
