Pepper Paints

Hand Dyed Tiles

I have been ooohing and aaahhing over Artsyvilles  drunken tiles for a while now. We finally bought some alcohol based inks (adirondack inks) and some 10 cent tiles from Lowe’s and went to town!

We started with  the alocohol blending solution squirted onto the tiles and spread it  around with a toothbrush.

Then we gently dripped small amounts of the colored dyes on to the tiles. As long as the alcohol is wet the dye spreads and runs.

We used straws to blow around some of the colors and q-tips to draw into the colors. If  you add alcohol on top of the dyes it takes the color away.

This was so fun. No two tiles turned out alike. We also learned that you can’t really control the outcome. You think you have it just the way you want it to look and then the dyes just keep spreading and combining into something else. But they all looked really great!

This is the same tile from the first photo–look how it changed.

These dyes are permanent and will stain so prepare accordingly!

Our Holton Rower Tall Paintings aka Pour Paintings

It’s been a long time since I last posted! To say I have been busy is an understatement! Less than two months ago, several members of our local unschooling group met at a local coffee shop to talk about starting an unschoolers co-op and today we held our first day of classes with about 25 families and 60 kids! We have 4 sessions in which we offer several different classes. Some classes are taught by outside teachers and many led by parents. Several of us have really worked hard to get this up and running so quickly…it is sort of  unbelievable that we made it happen…and happen so well I might add!

I am teaching 2 sessions of art. My head is so full of possible ideas it might just pop off and my kids are so glad I have a new audience to share all these ideas with! (Although both of them chose to take my class!)

Today we talked about artist, Holton Rower. You may have seen his YouTube video of his TALL PAINTINGS that has been all over the internet lately. I loved it so much and thought it was a perfect project for a first class discussion about process vs product. My husband I built a smaller version of Rower’s pedestals using a piece of 4 inch 2×2 on its end screwed on to a 4inch  2×4 on it’s side and finally screwing those to a 12 x 12 piece of plywood.

Rower uses acrylic paint and there was no way I could afford to buy that much acrylic paint. Then I realized that latex house paint is acrylic paint! Perfect!! We visited a few Habitat for Humanity re-stores and Home Depot’s for some cheap paint before remembering we have a friend with a painting business and TONS of extra paint. Perfect again!!

We looked at a few prints of Rower’s Pour Paintings and I let the kids try to guess how he put the paint down.

Then we watched the video and talked about product vs process.

Luckily I had tons of helpers today! This project was A LOT of set up! First I covered everything with tarps and cardboard. We poured small amounts of paint into dixie cups and let the kids pick their colors.

And the pouring began!

Each of my students made 2 pour paintings and luckily we were able to leave them undisturbed until next week. Hopefully they will dry by then!

I am so happy with the way this project turned out! The kids loved making them too! I would love to try this on a larger scale someday. I certainly have enough left over paint!!

DIY Lunch Bags And Gift Bags

I bought white lunch bags from one of my favorite local gems, Cake Craft. Cake Craft is a bakers oasis. Every type of candy mold, cake decor, boxes etc you can imagine.And all the sprinkles oooh!!

We used liquid water colors to paint our gift bags. I barely diluted the water colors keeping them as bright as possible. Open the bags up to keep the paint from bleeding through.

We let the colors run together on some and painted designs on others.

Take care not to tear them when they are wet. Once they dry they are ready to be filled with a gift or a lunch!

Look at the pretty bags at Artsyville! Actually look at all the pretty things there!!

Salt And Watercolors

I first saw this idea at Irresistible Ideas For Play Based Learning.  I LOVE this blog and get so many great ideas from them!!

First we drew a picture or design with a glue stick on some paper. Then we covered it with salt and shook off any excess.

Next we used eye droppers or pipettes to drip some color over the salt. We used liquid watercolors but I am sure food coloring would work too.

It was so exciting to see the salt absorb the colors.

We loved making these. A project I am sure we will be doing again really soon.

Candy Experiments

Last year I pulled a page out of Family Fun all about Halloween candy experiments. And this year I book marked a page from Mothering Magazine and another link a friend posted on facebook. Low and behold—they are all from the same website …. Candy Experiments.

My kids trick or treated twice this year, so to say we have lots of candy is an understatement!! They went through their stash and donated all sorts of goodies in the name of science.

We tried several experiments from the website. The most exciting being floating M’s and S’s.

Put some M & M’s in a glass jar and some skittles in another.

Add water and watch……..

Floating M’s and S’s!!

We made some sculptures with the sticky candy

We also tried color separation (chromatography) by adding m&m’s to a few drops of water and then dipping a coffee filter in. We waited until some of the color was absorbed and you could see the colors separate.

Did you know that laffy taffy floats?

We did a lot of mixing, soaking and poking.

And we still have lots of donated candy to play with tomorrow!