Halloween Crazy Cats

Here is a easy Halloween cat project you can put up in your window to show off those glowing eyes.

It also looks nice up on the bulletin board.
























MATERIALS REQUIRED:

- heavy white sketch paper
- black and white tempera disk paint
- black paper
- coloured tissue, streamers, and/or coffee filters
- glue
- scissors
- white pencil crayon
- orange paper
- big button.
- black felt marker

PROCEDURE:

Paint your heavy sketch paper grey, Just swirl a little black onto your white tempera disk.  Use short sideways strokes with a large paintbrush.  I buy a class set of those cheapo ($1.00-$2.00)  brushes at the hardware store.  They are meant for one time only use (applying sealer),  but I keep them for years.

Let paper dry for a few minutes.  I get the kids to flap them or use the hair dryer.  (An art teacher can never have too many hair dryers!)  Then dry brush on a little extra black, you are going for that fur texture.

Take the black paper and draw out your cat face using the white pencil crayon.


Cut out the eyes, nose and mouth.  Save your scraps for later.

We are going to fill in those eyes, nose, and mouth with either tissue, vellum, painted coffee filters, or even streamers.

Something translucent.

Cut a piece large enough to cover the opening and glue into place.

To help the kids measure have them place the tissue over the opening and then using a pencil mark  the shape required.  Then cut.

Turn the face back to the front.  Using those scraps cut the little pieces you need.  Glue into place. 

Your face will now glow with a light source behind it.






Add details with the white pencil crayon, whiskers too.

Take your painted paper....should be dry now, turn to the back.

Draw a cat body shape.


Cut out.


You can use the scraps to make the tail.

Glue into place.  Be careful not to glue the head to far down the body or it will show thru the mouth.

Cut out a bow tie from the orange paper.  Glue into place and add the button.

That's it.  You can tape it to the window looking in or out.

Halloween Cat Art Project

Here is another Halloween art project.   It's 3D with the cat sitting out from the pumpkin background.

Very easy to make and makes a nice display for those Halloween themed bulletin boards or at home.  Make a small one with the ground equal in size to the pumpkin and you have a pop up card.










MATERIALS REQUIRED:

- black cardstock
- wc paper (14x12 or so)
- pencil
- tempera disk paints
- glue
- scissors
- white pencil crayon
- templates, Cat BODY and Cat HEAD
- colored paper (optional)



PROCEDURE:

On your wc paper or heavy sketch paper fold up the bottom 2 inches.

Flatten out again and sketch out a pumpkin shape using the fold line as the bottom of the pumpkin.  You want the pumpkin to be as big as you can make it on that paper.

In the bottom 2 inches draw a few leaves keeping most of the bottom paper.

Using your tempera disk paint, liquid tempera or wc paint add color to your sketch.

Using the templates trace out the cat body and head onto black paper.  Use a white pencil crayon so you can see it.

Cut out.

Now you could use colored paper to make your eyes, nose, and inner ears or you can paint them on scrap wc paper.

Cut out and glue into place on your cat head.  Using that white pencil crayon again draw in the whiskers and mouth.

Following guidelines on the template fold body and head.

Turn cat head to the back and apply some glue on the lower part of the tab after the last fold line.

Stick it onto the back of your cat body so that the fold lines match up.

When your pumpkin background is dry cut it out.


Fold up that bottom 2 inches on the fold line you've already made.

Apply glue to the back of the cat and the bottom inch that is folded up.

Do not put any glue on the tail above the fold line or on the head.

Stick onto background matching the fold lines of the bottom 2 inches of the background and the bottom of the cat.

That's it!

Now that wasn't so hard was it.  If you find your cat sagging a bit from the background you can add an extra strip of posterboard along the bottom fold line in the back for extra support.











See you soon,

Cat Portraits

So the inspiration for this project came from a pillow in the Marie Claire Idees magazine (Sept 2009).

At first I was going to get the kids to cut their own versions from fabric and then mount them on posterboard but I thought it would be more interesting to get the kids to create their own print.

The original was made from lace.

MATERIALS REQUIRED:
- white paper
- tempera paints
- assorted odds and ends for printing, i.e. cardboard, bottle tops
- plasticine or modelling clay (optional)
- scraps of ribbon or printed fabric
- embellishments for collar
- black paper
- black markers or pencil crayons
- glue

PROCEDURE:

Before starting you can talk to the kids about textile patterns, bring in some samples to give them some ideas about print designs.

Take a large piece of white paper and paint your background color.

After the background has dried take your odds and ends and using a different color start creating a print design.

Here I'm using bits of corrugated cardboard, bottle tops, ends of pencils........whatever you have around that would make an interesting design.

If you have some plasticine you can make your own stamps.  Etch in some lines with a toothpick.

I keep some scrap paper nearby as it's usually the 2nd or 3rd print you want.  Use the scrap paper as a blot for your first print.


Let dry.

Turn your printed paper over and draw out your cat design.

Cut it out.

Glue on some eyes made from paper.

Add a nose and whiskers with paint, pencil crayon or marker.

Take some scraps of ribbon and make a collar.  Glue down with tacky glue.

Turn over and glue the ends of the ribbon down.

Add an embellishment to the collar.  Here I am using part of a doily.

Glue onto an oval background.

Then glue this to a black piece of paper as a mount.

You can add a little border with extra ribbon or using markers.

Here is a blue version.

The book print cat was made by creating a page decoupaged with pieces from an old book and using Mod Podge.


See you next week.