Tuesday, June 25, 2013

Egg Art by Jenna

A short post today - here's an example of an unsupervised art-and-craft project done by the kids. This doesn't happen all the time, just so you know. But sometimes, a particular art form so engages them that they will spend days working on a project without me having to lift a finger. Those are good days.

This is a crayon-resist-and-water-color project that Jenna (she's six) discovered on the Crayola website. She found it, called Kate over, they watched the instructional video together and then gathered supplies, plonked themselves at the kitchen table and worked. 

It involved drawing egg shapes on paper, cutting them out, drawing a pattern with a crayon and then painting over it to get fun effects.

When I noticed that Jenna was struggling with drawing and cutting out about 60 paper eggs individually (which was not the point of the craft at all), I interfered and suggested she use one half of a vertically-splitting plastic easter egg to trace around. She was much relieved.

The point of these colorful paper eggs, she explained, was for them to be pencil toppers for a table centerpiece for Easter. There was an accompanying family activity involving those pencils but it doesn't feature in this story much. She commandeered almost all the pencils in the house to make her centerpiece and when it had lost its novelty (and when we wanted our pencils back), I untaped all the paper eggs, chose 30 of the colorful-est, stuck them in rainbow order on poster board and glued a border of scrapbooking paper strips around it for a frame. It has since become the newest kid art hanging on Kate's and Jenna's bedroom wall. 

Jenna clarified in her solemn, matter-of-fact way, "Yes, it's nice. But actually I made almost all those eggs. Kate didn't do much." 
I'm making sure to pass that vital bit of information on to you guys, okay?

Unrelated: I'm already starting to plan the next birthday party, believe it or not. The downside of scheduling all our parties in the (miserably short) summer season here in MN is that they are back-to-back. Good thing I only have three children. And I tell myself that in the winter, I get to be an absolute slug and, armed with tea and a good book, adhere myself to the sofa and not make a single handmade thing if I choose (I'd probably last all of 5 seconds).


  1. What great art! And what a lot of hours of busy-ness!

    I laughed when thinking of you as a "slug". Yup, 5 seconds. ;)

  2. I love this! I feel so blessed when one or more of my kids finds something and 'runs with it.'

  3. Beautiful!
    Your daughter is an artist!

