Mixed Media Turtle

I have been spending some time painting turtles this long weekend.

As I tried to capture that texture it wasn't long before I was making a textured canvas.

It's like a mosaic as you design each section.






















MATERIALS REQUIRED:

- cereal or cracker box cardboard, corrugated cardboard
- primed canvas or you can use a nice rectangle of cardboard as a substrate (base)
- acrylic paint, blue, brown, tan or linen, green, yellow, black
- gesso
- drywall compound
- found items or tools to add texture, (bubble wrap, foam, lego)
- wax paper
- tacky glue
- metal washers
- cheesecloth, crackle medium, optional
- wc or heavy paper (poster board, manila tag), white tissue paper
- mod podge, optional


PROCEDURE:

Take a piece of corrugated cardboard and cut out a turtle shell shape.

Gather some tools to texture the drywall compound.

I use bubble wrap, lego pieces work well, combs, I also recently found this textured craft foam.




Take some drywall compound and place on a recycled plate.

Spread on the shell.  You can use a plastic spatula (hardware store) or just your finger.

Because I will be adding individual pieces to the shell I don't texture it.

On some thin cardboard (cereal or cracker box) spread on some drywall compound and then use tools to apply texture.

You can do a big piece that you will later cut into smaller pieces.

or cut out the small pieces

and texture each one separately.  Here I am using plastic wrap to add wrinkles and a wooden skewer to add lines.




Set aside to dry.  It takes about 6 hrs.

While you drywall compound is drying paint your canvas or cardboard substrate (base).  If you are using cardboard prime with a coat of gesso.

I wanted some different textures for the flippers and feet.

On some light cardboard I did 2 different techniques.
On the first I painted it a light linen colour and then added crackle medium.  Set aside to dry.

On the other piece I painted it the same light linen colour and then laid a piece of cheesecloth on top.  I added more paint on top to 'stick' it in place.

Let dry.

I also wanted some textured paper for the kelp.

Using gesso I 'glued' tissue, streamer and old book pages to a piece of heavy paper.

You could also use white glue to do this.




Set aside to dry.

While my gesso was out I added some to my metal washers.  This will allow me to paint them with acrylic later on.

When my drywall compound dried I added colour to my shell pieces.

If you did one large piece cut out the individual shell pieces before you paint.  If you wait you'll find your paint gets scratched off as you cut.


Paint the large shell shape as well.  Make it a contrasting colour to your shell pieces, like grout on a tile floor.

I also painted my cheesecloth piece with watery brown paint.

I did the same with my crackle medium piece.  Be sure to follow the directions on the bottle regarding the timing for this.

I painted my metal washers black.

Paint the heavy paper as well.  I used green, blue and a touch of yellow.

I've been playing around with spray inks so I added a little as well.

From the heavy paper cut some kelp and glue onto the background with tacky glue.

From the cheesecloth and crackle cardboard I cut the flippers, feet and head.  I used the large shell as a guide to glue them in place.  I then glued the large shell piece on top.

Start to glue on your small shell pieces.  If you lay it all out first it is easier.  Start with your largest piece in the centre and then work around it.

With my sharpie pen I added some details to the face.

The background needed a touch of something so using a straw, end of a skewer and a cap I added bubbles in different sizes with white and silver paint.


Add a coat of Mod podge to seal and give you that nice shiny look.

That's it.  You could always add a poem or text to take it further.




See you next time.

Mother's Day Portraits

So I'm stuck at home with a sick kid today but that has given me time to prep for tomorrow's lesson with Grade 4.





As a Mom I love handmade Mother's Day gifts.  This year Grade 4 will do portraits.

Last year Kindergarten did one for Father's day.















MATERIALS REQUIRED:

- canvas board, you can get this at the Dollar store, 2 for a $1.00, we are using 6x8
- acrylic paint
- decorative tape
- plain paper
- coloured pencils, crayons (twistables)
- fine sharpie
- scissors
- bright buttons
- coloured paper, scrapbooking paper
- bright buttons
- 'M' letters, I used the Cricut 
- Mod podge
- ribbon and glue gun for hanger

PROCEDURE:

Paint canvas board with acrylic paint.  Set aside to dry.

Using  a piece of paper cut slightly smaller than the canvas board sketch out Mom's portrait.

Add some colour using coloured pencils and crayon.  Because we are going to podge this portrait we do not want to use anything water soluble or it will just smear.

Using a fine sharpie do some outlining.  With Grade 4 we will do the sketch technique.  We don't want to do every line and we want some gaps in our outlines so it looks more like a sketch.

Cut out.  You can get tight to the portrait like with the Dad portrait or leave some background.

Set portrait aside.  Wrap the edges of the canvas with decorative tape which I also found at the Dollar store.

Now we add the word MOM.  I cut out a bunch of M's with the Cricut but you could also hand letter or print letters out from the computer and trim.

For the O we are making a little flower.  Mine is quite circular but you could also cut in petal shapes.  Out of scrapbooking paper or coloured paper cut 2 circle shapes. Glue into place and add button.

Give your portrait a nice coat of podge to secure everything and to add a nice gloss.

Add a ribbon loop to the back for hanging.




That's it.

Pastel Resist Bugs

Bugs are a popular curriculum topic right now.

This is a project I did a couple of weeks ago with Grade 2.
We went big, colourful and shiny!









MATERIALS REQUIRED:

- brown kraft paper, or paper bags
- pencil and eraser
- bug reference books/pictures if needed
- black sharpie
- oil pastels
- tempera disk paint
- metallic acrylic paints
- shimmer mist, optional
- scissors

PROCEDURE:

On a large piece of kraft paper draw a big bug.

Use as much of the paper as you can and when drawing legs and antennae don't just draw a single line use shapes, (squares, rectangles, triangles, circles) to form them.

On this bug you can see triangles used for the legs.

Outline everything with black sharpie but no colouring in with the sharpie.

Using oil pastels colour in your bug.  Use bright colours and allow some of the paper to show thru the pastel.

After you have coloured it all in choose 1 colour of tempera disk paint.  We used red and blue.  Apply a wash over the entire bug.  For the kids I put the disk into a separate container and add some water.

We use big brushes and I ask them to dip into the water and then go in on the disk to get nice bright colour.

Using metallic acrylic paints and the ends of paintbrushes add dots of metallic paint to your bug.

You can add some shimmer mist if you want to get that iridescent look.    The ones I used were inks which can be expensive to buy but you can also make your own.  Buy a travel mist bottle (dollar store) add a marble, pour in some metallic ink (look where the calligraphy supplies are in the art store) and you are good to go. Because this is ink it was applied by an adult.

Shake bottle well and then spray mist on.  Click on the next 2 photos for a closer look.

We used gold and pearl.

When the paper is dry cut out with scissors.

Mount on paper or just display as is.

That's it.

We also have been making lots of Mother's Day pieces.  I have made hundreds of these stepping stones in the last few days, buying concrete like crazy at the hardware store!

See you soon.