Vendor Spotlight: Little Blank Canvas

Little E has just started art lessons at Little Blank Canvas and I'm loving how awesome they are!! She had her first lesson last week and I'm really impressed with how much they fit into the lesson, how age appropriate the material was, and how much Little E loved it.

 

We arrived a little early so Little E was able to enjoy some time on their giant chalkboard. It's painted directly on the wall and Little E was fascinated by this!

 

Once the lesson began I was really impressed with how well Ms. Brittney led the lesson. She was great with the kids and broke it down so well for them. This week's lesson was drawing and painting a self-portrait. They discussed each feature they would have to draw, it's location, and she would give them tips for how to draw it.

 

 

After their lesson was complete and their paintings were drying, Ms. Brittney treated them to a story. Little E is a huge fan of story time so she loved this!!

 

 

They finished the class off with some chalk drawing on black paper. They practiced writing and drawing with the chalk between their toes and drawing silly made up animals.

 

 

Now for the big reveal...Little E's self-portrait. (Please remember that she's almost 5 and super proud of this one.) We'll just say it's abstract...

 

 

 

 

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Craft: Love Painting

I am a huge fan of Pinterest!! A couple weeks ago I found this photo on there and just had to recreate it. Now, I'm crafty but I'm not artsy at all! I can't draw and I do not freehand well at all, but I decided to give it a try.

{Etsy}

I know, Valentine's has just passed but Little E and I had so much fun painting this and I'm loving having it hung up in the house. Now I did change it up a little so that it would match my bedroom, but it was super easy and what an awesome keepsake.

 

I bought the canvas (a 2-pack of very large canvas' was $7.99 - not on sale) and I bought two small bottles of acrylic paint. ($0.82 since they were 40% off), all at Hobby Lobby. Don't forget if you subscribe to their emails (or check the newspaper) they always have a 40% off coupon for anything not already on sale.

 

I know acrylic paint is scary with kids, but it washed right off and washable paint just won't show up well on canvas. I stripped Little E down to her panties so we didn't ruin her clothes and it worked just fine.

 

First, you'll paint the canvas. I think it works better to have the darker color for this coat, but it's up to you. It will take you several coats but I had paint leftover so one bottle of each should be more than enough.

 

Once you're happy with the base coat, free hand your "L" and "e". This is the hard part. If the painting intimidates you, you can always purchase vinyl sticker letters instead. Be sure when you're painting to leave room for one handprint and two footprints.

 

Lastly, add the handprint and footprints. I found it was easiest to start with the feet. They're going to take up more room and you can control how big the handprint is by opening up or closing the fingers. You'll probably have to touch up the handprint and footprints with a little bit of paint to make sure that they're dark enough.

 

Here's our finished product: