The Giving Tree- Leaf Crowns

I can hardly resist a good book! And it’s even better when it elicits some good discussion! The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein fulfills both of those needs. It’s a sad, yet sweet, book about the relationship between a tree and a boy over the course of their lifetimes. There’s an unexpected depth to this book, so you might want to preread it, especially if you’re unfamiliar with Shel Silverstein.

In his youth, the main character of our book uses leaves from the giving tree to make play crowns. That was the idea we ran with for this project! The materials we used were cheap and easy to find: paper grocery bag, tape, glue, scissors, and of course leaves. (I was easily able to make 4 crowns from one paper bag.)

The instructions are equally simple:

Cut strips from the grocery bag long enough to fit around your head(s).

Glue the tape onto the grocery bag strips sticky-side out. Leave a border of grocery bag on either side of the tape. This will help prevent hair from getting stuck in the tape.

(Double-sided tape probably would have been ideal here, but I didn’t have any so I just used masking tape. I used my fingernail to lightly press the tape into the glue and it was actually really easy. No tapey-gluey mess! No trip to the store needed!)

Leaf hunt time!

The tape worked double duty in allowing me to easily secure the crowns to the boys' heads. We decided to do this as a collaborative project, so all of the boys hunted leaves and put them onto each other's crowns. There was quite a bit of discussion necessary to get each crown made to the wearer's satisfaction. I do so love giving these brothers the opportunity to work together :)

Because this was a group project my youngest was also able to be involved, when we could catch him….

Insert play (& cuteness) here!

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It Looked Like Spilt Milk (Story + Art)

 

As part of our water unit study I decided to do a little art project inspired by the book, It Looked Like Spilt Milk by Charles G. Shaw.  This is a cute book, in which each page shows a white image on a blue background that looks like one thing….but isn’t. I really liked the way this book got Dude thinking!

This project was super simple yet lots of fun! Basically Dude squirted some white paint on blue paper…

Folded it in half…

Opened it up….

And we tried to imagine what the picture might be!

He actually made some pretty neat pictures! We decided these were: rabbits talking, a butterfly, and a plane flying through the clouds. Can you see them?

I found the idea for this fun little art project over at A Mommy's Adventure. She’s got lots more story related art ideas on her blog as well. It’s definitely worth checking out!

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