Coastalgirl

the making of a hallowe'en branch and tree....

Yesterday involved a nature walk around our property and Leah collected dead branches to decorate for Hallowe'en. She insisted on decorating her own branch and wanted me to hang it on the wall. It just so happens that we moved into a house with an orange bathroom (egad), so very fitting for Hallowe'en. This is her branch....

And these are dead spruce branches collected from the yard, stuck in a pail with beach rocks and decorated with things we had on hand.

Yesterday also marked another Hallowe'en party; this one at preschool and she wanted to go as a kitty cat:

A very easy costume to put together with things on hand. Add a touch of face painting and voila there is a black kitty cat.

A few favourite Hallowe'en books we are reading this week:

On the first stroke of midnight, ten children, two dogs and a cat enter a haunted funhouse. On their journey through the rooms, they encounter bats and witches and goblins. As the clock strikes, the children bravely sing, “Oh, nothing frightens me!” — and one by one they disappear. By the twelfth stroke of midnight, only one brave child is left — and he’s about to get a big surprise! This Halloween story is spooky and fun, and just right for young readers (Amazon.ca). We sing it to the tune of "The twelve days of Christmas." It's a hoot!

Preparing a costume for Emily is an event for her entire family. Grandma brings her a purple cape and Grandpa brings a skirt to match. In a pattern akin to "This Is the House That Jack Built," striped socks, a red purse, and, of course, a big black hat are added. Then, "This is a snake that's long and slim-/To go with the hat with a big, black rim-/To go with the purse with the strings untied-/To go with the socks with stripes on the side-." Mom decorates and Dad looks on. Each alternating page is black with a colorful trim and the words for each accessory pop out from the otherwise white print in bold colors along with skeletons, bats, or ghosts. A boldly colored, full-page illustration of the child and the cumulative action appears on the opposite page. This is a great read-aloud for the younger set and a good choice for newly independent readers. It has all of the fun and none of the fright of Halloween (Amazon.ca)

so you want to make a cat?

 So we wanted to make cats for Hallowe'en......we folded a piece of 8.5x11'' construction paper in half, cut out an arch shape, so we had two arch pieces. One piece was made into the head and the other was cut into a tail. Both were glued onto the main body of the cat and then decorated with additional scrap pieces of construction paper. The cat is actually free-standing, but Leah preferred to adorn the fridge and then proceeded to make an additional 3 cats to give to family.

This idea comes from cut paper play by Sandi Henry in the section of 3-D projects for little hands. We've gotten ideas from several of these Williamson Press books. I like that we can start with an idea and never know how it will finish and the result is always a surprise. Projects like these are honing Leah's skills with scissors and glue.

Another lovely figure drawing complete with signature:

This is a happy man with a bubble on his head. I really like how the nose is between the eyes and the smile takes up more than half of the face. This one is going in a frame...it just has to. This one is going out to The Artful Parent who is also enjoying these drawing filled days with her little one.

a few things making our day special

It is this time of year that the creative juices flow, there is excitement in the air, and we enjoy the cool crisp autumn days as they pass into winter. a few special things that are making our day extra special:

1.  I just had a look at the photos from Leah's first costume party. She dressed as a wood fairy and we ventured outside to snap a few photos in the fall leaves.

Here is another while we were getting ideas for fairy houses:

2, We are in love with this book that arrived yesterday via Amazon.ca. We soon will be making thumbprints (aka Ed Emberley), collages, pattern painting, watercolouring...it's a bounty of ideas.

Here's a look at a few pages inside:

3, One of Leah's favourite stories right now is purple green and yellow by Robert Munsch about Brigid, who claims to need 100s of markers to make her creations on paper and elsewhere.

4. One of the most amazing things of the last few months has been the explosion of creativity and imagination I see in Leah. After months and months of scribbles, we finally evolved into figures and animals....I think it's a moment that many Moms of preschoolers secretly wait for with perhaps (I hate to admit it) a touch of impatience. We encourage and praise daily those incessant scribbles, but when a drawing comes along with recognizable features....it's a proud moment!

5. I came across the book the OK book and a video by Amy Krouse Rosenthal that I think is interesting and now it's on our wish list at the local library. "The book's hero is a little stick figure whose head is the O of OK, and whose arms and legs are the K. (Imagine the word OK tipped up on its side.) The scenery is similarly minimal: a black horizon line, a squiggly tree, some grass. I like to try a lot of different things, the OK figure says. I'm not great at all of them, but I enjoy them all the same. On each succeeding page, the stick figure turns in a series of OK performances, roasting a marshmallow, cutting a sandwich not really in half (I'm an OK sharer), and looking at the result of his fishing—a tangle of seaweed and a boot. One day, I'll grow up to be really excellent at something, OK says, while lying in bed. I don't know what it is yet... but I sure am having fun figuring it out." (Reed)

pet week

I have been feeling like death for a couple of weeks now and who would have thought sickness could last so long? Today I am out of bed and with a bottle of water in one hand I'm going to try to post to this blog, but also peek into my favourite blogs and the rest of blogworld. I'm hoping my strength returns with the warm weather and soon I will be able to eat normal food. I guess I am feeling a little sorry for myself, but I know I will feel better eventually...the trick is not to let it get you down for very long. sooooo...

This week is pet week for Leah and she is learning everything about domestic pets. I quickly scanned through our pet photos and came up with these that I printed off and mounted to cardstock for Leah to make into a little book. We have two white kitties, Helen and Clare. They are 14 and 13 years old.

hand painting

water lily , originally uploaded by coastalgirlimage.

I was reminded of kayaking Lake Superior today and decided to go through my photos of the trip. I picked this one to process a little differently and decided to do a little hand painting in photoshop. That is my version of a little daily craftiness in addition to another thank you card using a few of my photos and coloured cardstock.

card making and fingerpainting 101

Today we were inspired by a little craftiness.....first came the card making since I get so tired of lamely searching for storebought cards and sentiments. I have a love for paper like some love fabric, so I search out interesting patterns or make them myself. I have collected stamps for years and I'm always thinking of ways to incorporate them into cards for birthdays, thank yous, etc etc. Here are two recent ones. One is made from lemon slice printing with white acrylic paint (great idea for food printing for Leah too).

   
Our other bits of craftiness took the form of fingerpainting 101. Leah fingerpainted on the easel and mushed the colours together and then painted arms and backs of hands. I don't know if this is an activity we will ever outgrow. I think she loves the feeling of paint mushed between the fingers. Doesn't it look like great fun?

toothpicks and popsicle sticks

This week we joined the Moms over at unplug your kids for the weekly art/craft theme of WOOD. I dug out the toothpicks, popsicle sticks, and homemade play clay and wanted to see what we could come up with. It seemed the most likely candidate was a porcupine with its spikes for toothpicks and popsicle sticks for legs. As you can see, the activity was enjoyed and progressed into many questionable animals.

at the beach

at the beach, originally uploaded by coastalgirlimage.

After a rough start (I was sick with stomach flu for 2 days), we finally made it to the beach on the Florida panhandle. My parents were staying there for a few weeks to relax, shop, and walk miles on the beaches. Leah had a blast collecting buckets of shells, making sand castles and promptly knocking them all down. She learned the differences between the gulls, sandpipers, and pelicans and Grammy hopes to make a birder out of her yet!
I still feel weak and not 100%, but hope to be feeling better soon. I wonder now if there is another colour theme in photography going on this week? Must go cruise blogworld and see..........

off to the beach

We are off to the beach on Monday morning and will be back on Thursday. A trip to a different sort of beach than we are used to, but at least Leah will get to dig in the sand and who can resist that wonderful feeling of sand between the bare toes? More photos when I return............

experiment in B&W 30:12

I took this photo last month with the trusty 100-400mm lens (I know I've mentioned before how much I LOVE that lens...can't help it) and I know I've posted the colour rendition of this photo before. I can't help going back to it again and again. For one thing, I still have visions of a very bored white tiger looking at me with disinterest, but when Leah starting talking to him and asking him questions like, "are you hungry?", I couldn't help but snap his photo when he showed such interest in a little girl. Perhaps he was hungry or perhaps he liked the sound of her little voice. It must be so boring living in a zoo instead of the habitat he should be living in.....BUT it's nice that there may be a few more tigers in the world because of conservational efforts. Isn't he just beautiful? The black and white quality of his fur made the transition to B&W tones quite easy in photoshop.