Five Cross Stitch Bookmarks

I made these five bookmarks for various teachers at the end of the school year. 

They were a big hit with the recipients.  Now all I have to do is figure out what to make for an end of the year gift next year as Blockette will have some of the same teachers she had last year.  Luckily I have LOTS of time to solve that dilemma.

More Artwork from Blockette

Earlier this month my family and I participated in Relay for Life.  Our team had some kid's games at the event as a fundraiser.  One of the games was a fishing game.  Blockette designed the screen for the kids to fish over. 

She was a bit overwhelmed with the huge scale she needed to draw in, so I told her that she should just draw it on regular sized paper and I would enlarge it.  If there's any art that I'm good at, it's putting something on a grid and enlarging it...original ideas...not so much.  That's Blockette's department!

I wound up having to paint the cardboard because the paint was quite uncooperative.  No matter how hard I tried, the paint only wanted to stick on in a single coat.  Every time I attempted a second layer, I only managed to remove the paint in the first layer.  I am not ashamed to say that I yelled at that cardboard on more than one occasion.

It all turned out in the end.

I think it's adorable...especially the expression on the mermaid who sees the fishing pole with bait!  Not in a million years would I have thought to do that.  That's why we pay the big bucks for Blockette to do these sort of creative endeavors.

Art Supply Organization

Blockette LOVES to draw.  Consequently, she has a nice stash of art supplies.  Previously we were containing them in these stackable bins.

They worked well for a while.  Then she had so many pencils and markers that every time you tried to find a particular marker, twelve would fall out.  The bins were over full, so they never ever got stacked.  So much for a space saving storage unit.

Then I saw this post from Curbly where they took an old shoe box and filled it with empty toilet paper tubes.  I mentioned this idea to Blockette and she thought it was awesome.

It took us a long time to collect up enough tubes.  Luckily, I discovered that for the shoe box I was using, I could get three sections out of one paper towel card board tube.  Every Wed when I helped out in the kitchen at church, I'd snag the empty paper towel rolls.

Finally, this weekend we had enough rolls to fill the box.

Here's what our new storage unit looks like:

 Blockette and I decided that the box would work best if the supplies were arranged in color groupings.  I love how you can find what you are looking for right away.

This box now holds all her pens, mechanical pencils, smencils, regular pencils, the gem topped fancy pencils she got from my uncle, colored pencils, twisty crayons, markers, paint brushes, popsicle sticks and scissors.

 And look:

Empty spaces!  That means she has room to grow and we won't be scrambling to find a new storage solution in 6 months.  Hooray!

She still has her crayons and art supplies of similar height in one bin.  They were too short for the cardboard rolls.  Blockette uses her crayons much less than she does her colored pencils.  Besides, as you can see by the first picture, even with all the random coloring utensils, the bin isn't too full to rummage through.

I did find this link for a different kind of art caddy using rolls of varying heights over at Instructables.  It reminds me a lot of the Advent Calendar I made for Blockette over the winter. I may make a version like that for her if she gets too many short supplies; for now the cardboard box is working great for us.

The funny thing is that I can't tell if Blockette likes the organization better than the shoe box itself.  She has taken it upon herself to decorate the outside of the box.  Even our organization has to be fancy I guess.  Such is the life of a superstar artist.

Chalkboard Journal Fail

This Christmas I decided to make something crafty for Blockette.  She loves journals and notebooks to write and draw in.  I thought that this Chalkboard journal from No.2 Pencil would be perfect.

Except that it wasn't.

I don't know what happened.

This time I followed the directions exactly.  Not even taking a single short cut.

I even used 6 coats of Martha Stewart chalkboard paint compared to the 4 in the tutorial.  Just in case.

I rubbed the surface with chalk and then wiped it off with a damp cloth.   Just like the directions say.

Then I wrote on the journal cover.  Seemed fine.  I erased it with a dry cloth.

So I wrapped it and it sat around for a week.

Blockette was so excited when she opened it along with a brand new box of colored crayola brand chalk.

So of course she grabbed a piece of chalk and went to town on the cover to see if it worked.

This is what happened:

If you look in the upper right hand corner you can see 2 games of tic tac toe she played with her father.

How sweet!

Only...

They will NOT come off.

I tried wiping it off with a dry cloth and paper towel.

Then I made it damp.

Neither thing got the chalk off.

I even tried rubbing more chalk on the cover with the side of the piece of chalk.  All that did was scratch the cover and change the hue to a slightly different shade of blue.

I don't know why it scratched the cover.  I wasn't using my super Hulk like strength super powers or anything.  Just a light gentle hand.  Maybe I AM the Hulk?

Any tips or suggestions about what I might have done wrong?  Or what I can do to fix this craft disaster?

'11 Happy Dance #35 and #36: Art Projects with Blockette

I saw this weaving art project on Pink and Green Mama.  Blockette and I made these over Thanksgiving Break. I made a turkey and Blockette made a Christmas Tree.  I traced my picture to get the same type of image.  Blockette drew her two pictures free hand.  I think she did an awesome job getting both pictures to be really similar.

The second art project was also from Pink and Green Mama.  This time it was a watercolor resist project.  The black lines are "drawn" on with a mixture of black acrylic paint and glue.  I don't think I had the right combination of the two, as it was a bit too runny.  Next time I'll have a higher ratio of glue to paint.

Blockette did the mermaid aquarium and I did the space scene.  I like Blockette's picture better!