Art Class

Solveig starting painting the chalkboard easel with water some time back, and now it’s one of her favorite things to do.  Well, it started with her just licking her finger and “painting” with her spit as the paint and her finger as the brush.  She did it so often that I finally got her a cup of water and a paintbrush and she has preferred that greatly.  Ingrid is now into painting with water too, and it cleans up the chalk off the chalkboard as well, so that’s a bonus.

Ingrid is getting so big, it’s crazy.  New words come popping out of her mouth daily.  She says whole sentences, and it stops me in my tracks when she does it.  Some time after I took these pictures I decided to trim her mullet a little again.  Now that I see these pictures I realized it probably wasn’t as bad as it was in my head.  I just wanted it to be more even.  At any rate, her hair is a tad shorter now.

Silje has been wanting to do more art, and at the beginning of school last year, I got her this little art class on DVD.  The supplies were kind of expensive, though, so I saved up for those and just got her some for this semester.  She did the whole DVD at once, though she was supposed to stop it several times she just wanted to keep going so I let her.  The medium here is soft pastels (I had some cheap pastels but a specific kind was requested and I was silly and wanted the exact stuff that the instructor said she should have.  I wish I had just let her at least tried before with the stuff I had first, but at any rate she has nice pastels now.)

She loved it so much, and asked if she can do the video a few times, and make a few of the same piece just to see if she can improve each one, and then compare the different drafts.  I thought that was a great idea.  What I loved about her doing this video is we got to pause and talk throughout about different blending techniques, and things like balance and depth.  I loved how she got so many colors done so subtly in the lake section.  Honestly, I sort of wanted to do it along with her but I was doing some chores in that room and listening in.  I think I might the next time she runs through it.  It just looks fun.  She wants to work on the bluebird picture next, as she has that DVD too, but I think we’ll wear this “Peaceful Lake” one out several times before we break into that one.  I’m determined for us to get as much out of it as we can.