Guest Posting: 3 Fun Fall Busy Bags

Yesterday I had a contributor post featured over at Beauty Through Imperfection!

3 Fun, Fall Busy Bags

What toddler/ Pre-school mom doesn't love busy bags?! My girls can't get enough of them and are crazy about these fall inspired ones.

Go check them out and say hello while your there!

Do you use busy bags at your home? What are your favorites?

Little Artist: Georges Seurat

This is going to be the third part of our on going "Little Artist" series. As part of our home school curriculum this year we are studying several famous artist and replicating the technique they used and/or one of their famous works of art. So far we have studied Mondrian and Matisse if you would like to check out our previous projects. 
This week will will be studying Georges Seurat and adding a fun, fall twist to our art project.

Seurat was famous for discovering a technique of art called pointillism. Instead of using brush strokes Seurat used a method of circular dots. He believed that by doing this it made the colors more brilliant and powerful.

If you would like to read more about Georges Seurat. Making Art Fun has great artist biographies. You can learn more about Seurat here. 

Supplies needed for this project: White Paper Acrylic paint in fall colors Q-tips Paint brush

First you need to paint a tree trunk.

 

Then allow it to dry completely.

Next up pick a color and start dotting your leaves on. I tried to encourage the girls to not use the q-tips as a brush. We were going for circular like shape to imitate Seurat's work.

If it helps you can draw a circular shape lightly with pencil and try to encourage them to stay in the line... or just let them go!

I love that this project is perfect for a 2 year old a 6 year old or even a 10 year old. 

After we filled in our trees we added a few, dozen falling leaves to complete the painting.

Beautiful!

Now we have some lovely fall art work to display on the wall and can cross "making a fall craft" off of our Fall Bucket List.

Linking up with Desiree, Elizabeth and Stephanie today!

Passport to the world: Italy

We are currently wrapping up our home school year, wahoo! I have LOVED this year but I am beyond excited and ready for Summer. Everyday I feel that I sound a little more and more like Olaf. "Oh, I don't know why but I've always loved the idea of summer and sun..."
In Social Studies we have been taking one country every week and learning about it. This week our country was Italy. Oh Italy, you are beautiful and captivating. I would love to go visit you but for now I will just wish and dream myself into Google image pictures. 
Here are some activities from this week:
Coloring the Italian Flag

 I made some easy Roman numeral worksheets and a little test for her to do.

We also talked about The Leaning Tower of Pisa and watched this video

After the video we decided to be crafty and make our own Leaning Tower of Pisa. I searched the internet for ideas and didn't find anything I could just print, so we got crafty and came up with this. 

Supplies needed:

Toilet paper roll

White and green paint

Sharpie

4x4 /6x6 piece of cardboard

Hot glue gun

Markers

toothpick

small piece of paper

First, I took the piece of cardboard traced the toilet paper circle around it and cut out a hole so I could easily fit the toilet paper roll into the piece of cardboard. Then we painted our pieces to let them dry.

Painting a cylinder was a bit tricky so I helped her.

After the paint was completely dry we took a sharpie and made LOTS of arches all the way around it.

 Then we inserted the toilet paper roll into the base. You want the tower to lean (obviously) so we trimmed about 1/4" off one side of the toilet paper roll before we glued it in. 

 Next, we made this cute little flag with a tiny piece of paper and a toothpick and glue it to the top. 

Finished product. I thought this turned out really cute.

That just about wraps up Italy except for a tasty Italian treat. What Study unit is complete without some kind of food, right?! 

Stick around and see what we made later this week. 

Happy Monday!