more class fun!


Our mono printing class on Thursday afternoon was full and fun!
Children concentrated very hard to grasp the new skill, and after a few practice prints, ensuring the wet consistency of the paint and understanding how to build up the printed layers, the children's confidence grew! We took our inspiration + colour palette from the many textures and colours of the Australian snow gum trees.
The following are a few snaps of their finished work [the one above is sensational don't you think?], printed on natural clipboards - a wonderfully personalised take-home-tool for future sketching and creating!


:: trial prints on paper, grasping the background, mid and foreground layers!


:: experimenting with textures and printing techniques - love the beaming smile!


:: This one made me smile - he'd just been to a science class and was inspired by a 'new invention' he was planning - love!


:: Beautiful and diverse linework


:: wonderful natural winter scenes!

Winter class sneek peek


Snowy winter magic sets the scene for our winter creating these holidays and both days of creating have been full and focused! Children are concentrating so hard there is often silence - very unsual! The fine motor skill required for penguin painting yesterday and the slow art of weaving today, both required a bit of extra attention - and the results were stunning - the children should be very proud of their new-found skills and beautiful artworks!


:: preparing the beautiful natural branch looms for today's class


:: oil pastels have been used to great effect on grey-winter backgrounds


:: and so the weaving begins...


:: over and under...using the great snow gum trees as colour palette inspiration!


:: age determined the degree of help each required with the younger ones finishing quickly with slightly less accuracy yet still texturally beautiful!


:: the older took to the weaving with beautiful precision and great results!


:: those finishing earlier were asked to draw their tree's, concentrating on the beautiful patterns and colours they had chosen!


:: What a tallented bunch of weavers and beautiful work!







artful



We are about to launch into our holiday classes tomorrow, starting with the particularly popular 'penguin painting'! I thought this wire sculpture by Theo Kaccoufa was fitting inspiration to kickstart our week of winter creating!
I will post here as often as I can, sneek peeks into our busy creating space!

weekday weave



Oh yes, it is the last week of school here before the holiday's and the last week for mad material dashes before the delightful onslaught of classes!
Lesson plans are done, material's list's being checked off, images of inspiring artwork are being gathered and then the labor intensive process of packing class upon class of kits begins! It is now a somewhat familiar frenzy as children wind down to holiday's, mama winds up to an intense period of art class work!



:: I'll never tire of finding these sweet little creatures around our house!
Children can paint and plan their own winter imaginings with these perfect penguins..





:: Tangles of delicious wool and beautiful natural branches are coming together.
The woven branches are a beautiful slow + textural work that look striking in a vase on display...



:: Who would have believed I would need to buy a store out of wooden clipboards!
What a useful way to combine children's artwork and ongoing creativity - use your unique monoprinted clipboard for holiday nature or gallery wanderings - an opportunity to sketch is always at hand...



:: ahh the clay! This is the one medium my children constantly wish to raid in the studio - can there ever be any shortage of ideas with a ball of wet clay in your hands!...



:: We are so inspired by the amazing images of the antarctic found in national geographic and such magazines - these will add wonderful surrealist contrast to our painted acrylic backgrounds!....



:: One of my children's favourite winter activites is fingerknitting! They are rarely seen without a ball of wool running in that familiar manner through fingers! We are looking forward to sharing some creative ideas to use those loooong lengths of knitting and some beautiful winter garlands too....

artful

'Colour is my day long obsession, joy and torment.' Claude Monet



Love the tones + geometry of this architectural watercolour by Amy Park.

a little book review



A little book review and a story today! Nothing like deviating from the planned posts of the week when the week gets a little unexpected - there is beauty in the unexpected!



I picked up this book on a ridiculous sale recently 'One block of WOOD' by Nina Tolstrup I am having a bit of a love affair with wood of late and this book spoke to the simple art of beginning to work with a medium you have no experience with! It contains a dozen or so projects designed to get you working with wood, learning techniques and making something practical - I love it!







At the same time around here, there has been a lot of log cutting for WEAVE+WONDER classes and parties - one of our very popular classes uses a beautiful cut log as a base for 3D creating! A sweet bi-product is that our children have caught the woodworking bug and after a quick workshop set-up, have come up with some wonderful cut/nailed/glued/screwed creations - this one below is my favourite! A small theatre for little charicters!









:: this final one is a creative way to use beautiful wood off-cuts! Drill a hole through the centre of piece of wood and a hole through to meet it on the back for a nail/hook and you have a small vase! Perfect for displaying dried branches or blooms!

artful

'In nature, light creates the colour. In the picture, colour creates the light.' — Hans Hofmann



Thread installations by Gabriel Dawe take fiber art to a whole new level! via Design Milk.

weekend wonder




We have wandered from lush green countryside to cozy home comfort, from re-arranging accomodations for visiting friends to a sweet 7yr old woodland fairy party [seen below]. Lego creations hide in every corner and new/old books rest on every surface after a date afternoon at the Lifeline Bookfest...Just the ways to amble through a cold and rainy long weekend!












a little story of creativity...



Its been a frantically busy week around here for all sorts of reasons and so my regular posts have been waylayed - the upside being that the class release is the last post that is lingering, excitedly...!
Bookings have been racing in and I have just caught up with the issue of invoices - so wonderful to be back in the buzz of class preparation again!
I thought I'd tell you a little story of creativity today. I would love this space to continue to become more about the sharing of inspiration and ideas on how to live a creative life in your home!


:: 'the 10m bowl'...experimenting with crochet + rope became a small bowl for littlest one's treasures - all 10 metres of rope!

We were at our little playgroup this morning - I am continually inspired by these women! Today the conversation wove itself around the subject of creativity. 'I am not creative, I mean, I can't draw or paint' one mother shared. A wonderful artist-friend and I disagreed, especially as she went on to share other passions - singing, stitching, sharing her love of puzzles with her children....
Drawing or artistic talent is one form of creativity. We also challenged that like any other skill, we may not be gifted but we can always learn!
I loved listening to the banter, the sharing of ways that each mother engages their children in their creative passions or ways their own parents or grandparents passed on creative gifts to them.... a watercolour class with a grandmother at age 10 was my artist-friend's first spark in her wonderful creative career. Another precious friend shared quality time spent with her mother learning to knit...my own story began with tinkering in my father's woodworking workshop....even shopping with your girls and teaching them to put together an outfit is a creative persuit!
Creativity really begins with discovering your passions and living them out - your own self-expression, your mark on the world! And living a creative family life involves sharing that 'spark' with your children - spend time doing puzzles, knitting, drawing or painting. Make time to tinker in the workshop or go on nature walks and collect treasures! You might be surprised what you can offer of yourself to your children, just by taking them along on your own creative wanderings!
I was certainly inspired by the richness and diversity and great intensionality I learned of in my playgroup circle today!
Happy long weekend xx


:: sliced logs are stacked in abundance around here in preparation for a weekend woodland fairy birthday party and upcoming holiday classes!


:: athletic's consumed much of this week and I was such a proud mama - even if it mean't working till midnight to make up for quality time spent!


:: loving the last of Autumn's colours in my garden [here and above]