September Art

Drew brings home a new art project everyday from preschool. And by the end of the school year, that's gonna be a lot of art! Drew is always very excited to show me what he has made (typically he has to show me right away, before we even get out of the parking lot!), and with some prompting, he'll tell me how he made it. When we get home, I take a picture of his art piece, and then hang it up for display in the kitchen.

Because I know that his art is going to mulitply, and eventually take over the entire house, I need to decide now how I'm going to preserve it. As a scrapbooker, I've read many hints and tips on what other mom's do to "keep" the art, but not the clutter, so I have a few ideas mulling around in my head about how I'll do this for Drew's art. One idea is to document it here with pictures, and therefore have it included in our book when I publish our blog. Another is to use these same pictures (or scanned copies of his art, reduced in size) in Drew's scrapbook, creating layouts that showcase his masterpieces. There will be a few sentimental pieces I'm sure to keep (I'm especially a sucker for those handprint pieces!) and will probably include a few in our Project Life family album as well as in Drew's keepsake box. I will admit, however, that it will be difficult to toss out any of this art - I'm just as excited to see it as Drew is to show me!

First Day of Preschool - 9/9/10

Made with "paint dotters"

9/14/10

An apple, made from a napkin, tissue paper, and pipe cleaner.

Apparently, it's stuffed with tissue. At least that's what I was told. :)

9/16/10

An apple made from a paper plate and scraps of construction paper

9/16/10

An apple tree that Drew colored (very impressive, yes?), and the apples are Drew's fingerprints.

9/21/10

Paw prints

9/21/10

This was an extra project Drew did at the art center. I'm not totally sure, but I think he was supposed to copy the picture of the flower...I'm pretty sure his is on the right. :)

9/23/10

Handprints, which doubled as a counting lesson

9/28/10

Fingerpainted pumpkin

9/30/10

A painted squirrel. I didn't get the full explanation on how he made this one, and he apparently doesn't know who glued on the eye or the acorn. :)

We get home from picking Drew up just before lunch, so as I'm making our food, I'm grilling Drew with 20 questions about his day. I usually don't get much. I know what he had for snack (a lot of cookies, I guess!) and who brought what for show and tell. But other than that, he doesn't expand much. I'll ask if they read a book or listened to music or did other projects or played with Percy, their class guinea pig, and I usually get a "no" to all of that. On Tuesday of this week, we were about done with lunch when Drew said, "Mama, aren't we going to talk about school?!?" Apparently I forgot to ask about his day, and I guess he really wants to tell me what he doesn't do! Needless to say, I'm anxious for conferences in November so that I can hear all about what he really is doing!

Until then, I'll rely on these. Mrs. Bland distributes these at the beginning of each month so that we know what Drew will be learning and working on. I keep it posted to the refrigerator but I guess I should reference it more closely when we talk about his day; maybe it will jar his memory!