The Bremen Town Musicians iPad Style

My students enjoyed hearing the story of

The Bremen Town Musicians,

and then we created our own stacked animals 

on the iPad.

They turned out pretty cute,

full of personality,

using different brushes for different effects,

cute critters singing under the full moon,

peaking through the curtains,

and even a nice ending.

So happy that these five wanted to take their time and do a fantastic job!

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Yep that one...

there you go.

Well bust my Buttons!

This painting is a large one.

So it is filled with flowers and buttons

in honor of spring!

the 52 buttons are from my mom and mother-in-law 

and I love to think of them while I stitch them on.

It has layers of texture from joint compound and crinkled tissue. 

Tissue paper is such a great base.

Here are some closeups...

of details and lines rolled onto the painting...

and painted tissue and stencils...

and those buttons...

with 52 drilled holes...

all stitched in place.

"Well Bust my Buttons" will be going to artEAST Gallery in April
and hopefully will find a home ready to embrace buttons.

Jack and the Beanstalk, Tunnel Books and serious Cuteness!

 Time for Tunnel Books!

 We made fairy tale books in one class,

and gnomes and mushrooms in another.

The students were learning how to draw with layers in the Brushes XP app.

So we made a background and several inner layers as well as a front cover.

 Then each page was sandwiched accordion-style in between.

Here are some of their cute imaginary gnome, mushroom and village books.

I think I want to live in this house!

The trimester finished this week

so I figured it was time for me to show you 

some of the other goodies we created this fall and winter.

The kids love seeing their work on mugs

and here are some other pieces that were created

that make me smile!

I love drawing on the iPad with them.  

It is a great 'learning to draw' tool.

Hope we made you smile.

Questions--

just let me know.

Cute as a Button!

Just finished this canvas mixed media piece!

 And I do think it is

Cute as a Button.

Don't you agree?

It makes me smile on the inside...

well maybe on the outside too.

It started out as a painting by a friend who was moving and decided to toss it.

I grabbed it and gave it a new life.  Some of the original texture 

and peekaboo bits of brown still shine through.

How cool is that?

It also morphed through many ungainly stages

as paintings tend to do.

I hated it until I was about 75% through;

Well that is not really true--

I just couldn't figure how to combine the spontaneous undercoatings

with the look it needed to be finished and look like one of my paintings.

It has layers of texture...

and paper I painted years ago...

and stamps and stencils and rubbings...

and stitchings...

and my mom's vintage buttons that make me smile.

It will live at artEAST in April until it is purchased,

and if not,

then I know the perfect place for it in my home.

Little Red Riding Hood iPad style

In my Fairy Tales class

we drew Little Red Riding Hood in two layers.

This was a hard concept for some

(who am I kidding - me included).

 They turned out fabulously! 

 First we drew the background on layer #1.

 Then layer #2 was Red and the wolf and some trees.

 I printed them out on good photo paper...

and we cut everything out and added pop up tabs,

then added some colored pencil and pen

and voila -instant cuteness!

Next I wil post our tunnel books with many more layers and cuteness.