Hobbit Doors out of Fimo or Sculpey: polymer clay fairy house

Make them yourself with this tutorial!

Children's Apron Designs

Today was so much fun!  A friend of mine and I painted kitchen aprons for he little niece and nephews.  I've always wanted to let my students paint their own art aprons.  I find that squeezing out the fabric paint and then painting it on with a brush works a lot better than squeezing it on.  I've yet to have an experience in which the children did not get frustrated when they try to use those squeeze bottles for detailed work.

If you know these kids, you know how perfectly these fit each of their personalities!

Polymer Clay Fimo/Sculpey Rocking Horse

Check out my polymer clay project tutorials and unbaked clay ribbon in my etsy shop!

Polymer clay Penguin Figurine Free Tutorial

This was made using my granny square afghan tutorial.

This littles guy's cap and tie were made with this argyle technique!

                                                          
A friend of mine wanted penguin center pieces at her reception.  We spent an evening making penguins, and this is what we came up with!  I was happy because several of the girls didn't think they were artistic at all.  This is always one of my first clay projects with my students.  They love it!!!

Fimo Creche/Nativity Scene

One of my students made this little nativity scene.  It's simple, but I think it's beautiful!  Even little ones can do this project.  For another stunning Christmas project take a look at these stained glass manger scenes.

Snowflake Coloring Page

Also check out my post about how to draw intricate snowflakes.  It's great for all ages!

Design Your Own Snowflake: Printable Template

For a simpler printout, go to my post about intricate snowflakes.

I've spent the day designing snowflakes for a papercraft project that I have in mind.  These circles were a great starting point.  I printed off the template at a very low density, and then drew my snowflake designs with darker lines over the top.  Eventually I will trace these lines with a thin sharpie, and erase the lines I don't want.  If you don't want to deal with the extra lines, just place this print out under the paper on a light box or window.  I'm sure there's a much easier way to do this on the computer.  I'm certainly open to ideas, but for now, this has worked really well for me.  I could spend hours making up new intricate patterns!  For inspiration, I've been looking at photographs of real snowflakes!  For a simpler print out and ideas, see my earlier post about drawing intricate snowflakes.

This lesson goes very well with one of my favorite seasonal crafts. Snowflake ornaments!

Classical Drawing Lesson - Still Life

I was so proud of the students this time!  Their drawings looked beautiful.  I picked up these glasses at the goodwill, and bought some straws and lemons.  Each student had this arrangement to look at.  I started them of with this basic lesson on 3-D objects, and then we made lots and lots of observations about details and light.  Trust me, the students will be so proud!

Sunflower Still Life Drawing Lesson

Pick up a sunflower at the local market and you have an instant art lesson!   Sunflowers are great a subject mater for art projects!  Grab any medium, even just pencil and paper, and the students will soon realize how well they can draw from life!

  I explained to students that most people draw flowers from the front, but that it is important to see them from all angles.  I had the students sketch the sunflower from the front, the side, and the back.  After the student's are done sketching, we share what we observed and I compliment students who catch extra details.  It doesn't matter if the drawings look realistic.  The drawing accomplishes the goal if the students have demonstrated that they have made specific observations.