Fall Art projects

We've been busy with a few little art projects this fall and thought I would share some of them with you.

1) Painting Pine Cones

This by far was the most surprisingly entertaining one of the bit.  We used actual pine cones that the girls found outside and then I gave them some paints to decorate however they wanted.  I had no idea Big K would get so into it and end up sitting there for over a half hour working on hers!

Little K started out strong but eventually ended up painting her entire arm instead which is what often happens.  Fine with me!

Big K's turned out beautiful (well Little K's did too but I didn't have much to work with) and it is one of my fall decorations out in my kitchen now! 

2) Apple Stamping

Cut an apple in half. Stuck a stick into it for holding and used red, yellow and green paints to make fun designs.  Her stick didn't work the best and ended up breaking off inside the apple so we just went with holding the apple which worked just fine too.  This girl LOVES her crafts!

3)  Apple Trees

Get yourself a paper plate and some green paint and get to town on painting that thing.  Then they can use their tiny fingers to make little apples on their apple tree! =)

4) Leaf Spin Art

This one I don't truly consider an art project, since the machine is actually doing all the work but you could be creative in the way you make yours if you don't have a spin art (place the leaf cut outs in a box and roll a marble around in paint on them. Same effect).  When we were done, we made a garland out of them for our back door.  

5)  "Knuckle" Pumpkins

Saw this idea on Pinterest.  You paint your kiddos knuckles orange, then press them down and they will look like tiny little pumpkins!  I then let Big K draw what she thought vines and leaves look like.  I'm all about letting the child create the art however they want rather than telling them what to do or even drawing it in for them.  This can be done on occasion but try to make your children's art "free art" as often as possible!  Helps build their imaginations! Note: I did add a few of the leaves at the end of the project once she was all done with what she wanted because she asked me too =)  She also decided to finish her art off with how she believed you spell pumpkin.  Apparently it's  "plysiehg." =)  

"Apple Pie Making"

Apples, apples, apples!  Our main topic of choice these past couple weeks.  I believe I got this idea from "Growing a jeweled rose" and then tweaked it a little myself.  I made regular old cloud dough that we've done before following the recipe: 7 cups of flour to 1 cup vegetable (or baby) oil.  But this time I added in some crushed up chalk (that I smashed with a hammer) to give the red color and put in some cinnamon for a yummy smell (I didn't have any sort of apple spice).  

They used their muffin tins to make yummy apple pies!  This turned out to be an activity that they stuck with for a LONG time over the course of a couple days AND it was a handy activity that they were able to do right outside the door on the back porch while Mommy made lunch.  Score!  The apple letters I had originally made for a different activity but never got around to it so we threw them in there too.  Big K liked putting them in alphabetical order and spelling out her name with them.  I tried to stretch the activity with spelling other words too but that interest didn't last too long.  Not yet at least! =)  

And this of course is what eventually ended up happening with it...making a lovely icky mess on my back porch! What toddler/preschooler can continue to play with something messy in a contained space? But it was enjoyable during the process so well worth it! 

Apple Tree Bath

Big K has been talking about apples a lot at school lately so she's really into anything that involves them.  The girls both simply LOVED the fall leaves tree we made on our back door so I thought "why not bring in an apple tree for a special bath time treat?"  They love bringing new ideas into the tub since those same ole bath toys just get played with day after day...

So I pulled that brown washable paint out again during rest time the other day and painted them a tree in the tub!!! Made some red and green apple cut outs from foam and they now have themselves an apple tree for a couple days until it all washes off!  

You could incorporate letters or something using these too but since Big K has already mastered her letters I didn't really see the need.  I just let her have fun and free reign to do whatever she wanted!  She of course did something creative on her own and created a pattern.

Little K's apparently all fell from the tree into a pile.

                                     

Don't you just love all these easy ways of entertainment?