Organization: Brushes

Why did I not think of this years ago?!?!

Do you have this issue?  Paint brushes stored in mugs/cups? 

Disorganized? Taking up precious cupboard space!

WELCOME TO SWEET ORGANIZATION & MORE SPACE!

I found a shoe holder/organizer made out of the non-woven material they use for reusable grocery bags.  I had to cut it down to fit the size of my cupboard door.  Be careful not to cut too much away or you could cause the actual pouches to come off!  I used hot glue to attach it to the inside of the doors.  Be careful with high temp hot glue...the non-woven fabric will melt like plastic if you are not careful.  I hot glued it on the seams where the fabric was doubled up.  This will hopefully give enough strength to it so the weight of the brushes do not cause it to come loose!  Make sure that the door will still close as you are attaching it!!  The pouches will sag some with the weight...which will cause them to possibly hit the area where the doors close.  Also..depending on how much you pack them...it could cause the doors not to shut all the way.  This is easy to figure out though.  I still need to weed through my brushes a bit more...but it is much more organized!!!

Genius...or Wacky?

So I've had this "wacky" idea for a couple years now....but never followed through with it.  Last fall I found Wacky Noodles for .30 cents a piece at Dollar General...bought them, but did nothing with them.  UNTIL NOW!  Today I cut the Wacky Noodles in half, temporarily secured the brushes in place with painters tape, and then hot glued them in permanently(the noodle does "melt" a little from the hot glue).  I used the cheap brushes that come with Crayola's watercolor sets....in case you were wondering. 

WHAT IN THE WORLD ARE THEY FOR?!?!?!

My thought is to have the kids do paintings where they are not able to "control" their brush like they would a regular brush(I also think this would be a great exercise to do with our teachers on a PD day!!!!).  I would ask them to paint something that would seem to require a steady hand, but because they were using the Wacky Noodle...they'd have to adapt how they rendered the image.   Most likely, the paper and paint would be on the ground...and they'd have to work straight armed.  

In my mind...this is going to be fun...different...and a wonderful learning experience!  I'm not sure when I'm going to test them out, but stay tuned...I'll share it with you when I do!! 

BRUSHES & BEVERAGES: TGE TEACHER ART NIGHT

There were 20 teachers/staff in the art room by 3:30 today...ready for our first ever Brushes & Beverages!   My principal had asked me if I'd be willing to organize this event for our faculty.  I was not realizing it was going to be in the midst of a very crazy week for me, but I AM SO GLAD WE DID IT!!!  What a wonderful thing to come together & create....leaving the worries of our job/life behind (if only for a couple hours).  At the area painting places...the instructor usually has a very scripted teaching style & the art work tends to look exactly the same.  I am not that type of teacher.  THANK GOODNESS!!  Take a look at the paintings & check out how different & wonderful they are.  Amazing how the personalities came out on many of them.  My instruction was to create a sunflower(ish). Stencils were provided for the fearful. Before every arrived, I plated basic flower colors for everyone, but had other colors.  I presented options but left it open for people to create their own original work  My role was to help, encourage, and answer questions.

Alien School Pictures

All my classes are in full Alien/Space/Futuristic mode at this time!  4th grade looked at Mona Lisa, and discussed all the ins & outs of portrait art.  They then created an alien class photograph/school picture.  We used watercolor pencils to color them.  This was a 2 day project.  I'm really thrilled with how some of them turned out!!!  Interesting though...spelling & cleavage must not be important in alien schools?!?!  Take a look and you'll see what I mean!??! :) ha ha To be fair...we were looking at the Mona Lisa for inspiration & she does have some cleavage showing.