Dirt Cake

Ok, so my little boy is turning 13 today, and I know that is a little old for the themed cake, but I just love being creative in the cake department, so I wanted to make a dirt cake.  I have seen a few on pinterest and  so I got this tractor at the 99cents store, made a bundt cake and added a plastic bottle insert in the midde, covered it with chocolate frosting and oreo crumbs.  I even took a piece out so it looks like there is a hole being dug.  Happy Birthday Henry!

liquid watercolors

I started using the liquid water colors this year and really love them.  I tell the kids to try and not add any water to them, so they stay really vibrant.  I use to get frustrated with the tray watercolors because we always seemed to run out of blue and the yellow always got dirty.  The watercolors seem to be much more bright and last a lot longer.  I will never buy trays again.

Inspiration

 Vocab words: concentric, and colaborative, radiate.  My elementary students have been learning about Wassily Kandinsky and concentric circles.  We got the inspiration for tis project from his "squares with concentric rings."  The students started with a 9" square of white paper.  folded it into fourths to find the center.  Then in multi-colored  crayon they drew concentric circles radiating out from the center, then added patterns inbetween.  Next we watercolored the rest with liquid watercolors.  When they had dried, I cut them into fourth and they traded 3 of the fourths and kept one of their own.  Next we taped them back together for a colaborative piece of art.  I am working on a larger one in which the elementary classes are creating as one big colaborative piece.  Hope you're inspired.......

We have also been inspired by Andy Warhol lately.  Working on these pop art pieces.  We haven't done the handprinting part yet, but the kids are tracing their hand 4 times and coloring them in solid bright colors, with coordinating background colors.  We will handprint next time with black tempera.