Valentines Hearts & Random Acts of Kindness Week

Its Random Acts of Kindness Week from the 14th Feb - 20th Feb. 

There is more information and even a kindness pledge you can take on the following site:

https://www.randomactsofkindness.org/

There is also an Australian organization promoting anonymous acts of kindness:
http://www.wakeupproject.com.au/

You can order free kindness cards from them to give out.

To celebrate Valentines Day we made Valentines Hearts out of homemade air dry clay (for the recipe click here -  I love this clay we use it for Christmas ornaments and we used it for clay doughnuts in class last year).  I had already planned on making hearts of this air dry clay as I had some left over in the fridge from Christmas and then Happy Hooligans posted about some glittery ones and I thought why not?  I LOVE glitter (obviously not as much as the kids in my class WOW they used a lot of glitter!).

The idea of making hearts came from this post by Meri Cherry who made them out of polymer clay (too expensive for the amount I needed, would be perfect for small groups) and then gave them out as Random Acts of Kindness - perfect I thought I will combine the two!  So we now have glittery Valentine Hearts that we are giving out as Random Acts of Kindness....

I loved this version of some random acts of kindness kids can do so I printed it out and attached it to their hearts so when all the hearts are gone they an keep on giving by reading more ideas....

May much kindness come your way this week....and see if you can also ensure you carry out some random acts of kindness too....

Cheers
Fiona

Summer Holiday Challenge 2016 - Winners

The entries for this challenge was other lovely display of my students creativity.  The theme was SAND and I love what they came up with.

The winners were:

1st Prize - Mia K - what an awesome minion!



2nd Prize - Chloe W - loved this I even had to dig for my treasure!  I can't believe the effort Chloe went to with this.


 

3rd Prize - Titouan

 4th Prize - Pippa 
 

 Highly Commended: Clemmie, Matilda, Ruby, Harriet

Ruby

Harriet

Clemmie

Matilda

and even more wonderful entries (equally worthy of prizes yet I only had 8):

Poppy

Poppy

Lizzie

Caitlyn

Well done to everyone who entered!

Cheers
Fiona

Holiday Workshop Wrap up - January 2016

Another lot of Summer Workshops completed and its now time to move into the new year of Art Lessons.  Yet before I do its always such a pleasure to look back at the workshops and what fun we had!

As always I'm often having way too much fun to remember to take photographs yet here are a few:

Street Art - this was so much fun.  The children were so enthusiastic and I have to say spray painting is one of my favs when it comes to techniques.  Both my children participated in this one so I'm a proud mamma as well when it comes to the final product.

Cupcakes.  There is nothing better than doing some art and then getting to eat it too! Check these out and they managed to learn all about colour mixing and the secondary colours at the same time.

I forgot to take photos of the amazing little charms they did, yet I can tell you they were just the best.  Each child make 2-3 mini cupcakes out of polymer clay and I'm so pleased with what they achieved.  We also painted cupcake moneyboxes (sorry only one photographed) and check out all these cool cupcake drawings:

Action Art was also messy and fun.  It was a bit unfortunate about the rain this day yet we still managed most of our activites.  This workshop is always a favourite for me. There is no way you can't have fun throwing paint around, painting with a drill and blowing bubbles.....

Science Art was messy and so much fun - I hope they learnt something along the way.  Sorry very few photos - I was far too busy watching the amazing science happening before my eyes.

Watercolour Russian Buildings:  Loving these.  Some children really took their time and you really can tell.

A few also produced some Watercolour Underwater Hippos:

Mandalas.  What fun we had creating our Mandalas on stones, old records, CD's and on contact paper with natural materials.  The highlight of this lesson was painting a mandala on the pottery wheel - I'm so glad I've found another use for it.  This is so much fun everyone should give it a go!  I'm also proud of our group Tibetan Sand Mandala - hoping the sand each child took home is reminding of the fun they had and the positive messages our mandala was about.

Pottery is always such a hit.  Again the wheel is often the highlight - nothing beats the feeling of slippery clay spinning beneath your hands.  I'm really impressed with what the children created using paperclay which they painted and added glitter etc too.  Lucky me - I had my mum come and help which always makes this workshop so much easier to run.  Thanks Mum!  Sorry no photos at all, what was I thinking????

Mosaics - the photos speak for themselves.  These always come out so beautifully.  Well done children and thanks to the Mums that stayed and helped - I think a few would like to do one of their own now - told you its addictive!

Well that's the wrap up for January 2016 workshops - looking forward to seeing many of you again in the Easter ones.  Check out the Holiday Workshops Page for updates on what's on and email me at sunnysidearthouse@gmail.com if you wish to go on the email distribution list.

Cheers
Fiona