sewing

Just been to a secondhand warehouse and bagged this for €39.

The clutter on the top is just some of the goodies that were still in the drawers! It worked too - until I snapped the belt putting it in the car! I'm hoping they're easy to repair/replace.

cityscapes

In y6 this week we completed our reflected cityscape collages. The children suggested we could try and make them 3D and add shipping! So we did. Arranged in a line, panoramically, they are going to look very effective.

pottery

Today I had all of our y4's for the whole morning. We made 'Roman funerary urns'! We used the coil method to construct basic cylindrical pots before adding rims and facial details. Hopefully most of them will survive the kiln - if not then we can pretend they are authentic artefacts that have just been found, unfortunately broken, by a team of archaeologists.

xmas

I know we're still in November but our school xmas fair is next week! We've been busy making things to sell - here are some of the hanging decorations we hope folk will buy. MDF wheels, wooden shapes for the wings, dowel for the beaks and a scrap of red felt. They also have wooden tail feathers!

mugs (2)

And they're out of the kiln - not cracked! But yet to test if they leak!!

mugs

In ceramics club we have been making mugs/beakers. We used rolled slabs formed around tubes. After bisque firing, yesterday we glazed them and today they are being fired for a final time. Fingers crossed that they don't split (or leak when used!).

fs1

In FS1 (our 3/4 yr olds) today we made gingerbread man 'sculptures' out of craft sticks. Googly eyes, a button and some black felt tip dots completed the look.

Meanwhile I've been playing around with a slightly different style/method of creating my 'doodles'.

drawing

The y2's are studying 'Florence Nightingale'. After making pop-up lanterns we had time to draw pics of her. Top left are the before pics.
I think they managed to create recognisable images.

                        

more elephants

Y3's have been sewing. They've cut and stitched two sides to what is going to be a stuffed hanging decoration.  

mosaics

Today y4 began making their mosaics. They are using a mix of tiles - small ones that can be shaped with scissors and larger, glazed ones that can't! 

Next week we'll grout them.

BIG NEWS!

My book is almost just about as near as damn it to be published! The publisher is in the throes of sending it to the printers so hopefully it'll be out in time for Xmas. Can't wait to get my hands on a real proper copy. Yay!

Not sure why blogger crops the pics!?! But you get the gist.

City blocks

Our james Rizzi inspired, slab-clay built containers are finished. The children added details, using sharpies, around the windows, eyes etc. Now deciding whether to seal with a coat of neat PVA or not. They are going to be used as pencil pots and such like so won't need to be waterproof or anything.

tigers & dishes

Yesterday the y1's created some pieces based on Rousseau's painting 'Tiger in a Storm'. They've also been reading 'The Tiger Who Came To Tea' by Judith kerr. We used techniques from the last couple of weeks in that we wove, using paper strips, the tiger's stripes and then stitched the grass, using coloured wool.

Meanwhile in ceramic club we took home our completed and fired dishes.

remember, remember..

Today the little ones (our 3 yr olds) created firework pictures. 'Scraper board' explosions and a simple collaged rocket with a lollipop stick.

trees

Yesterday the y2's enhanced their Autumnal pics by adding stitched 'grass' and 'bark'. These mixed media pieces have involved printing, collage and now ' textiles'.   

elephants

The y3's today had a go at drawing elephants. They did a before sketch and were then shown different ways of creating recognisable images. Can you spot the before pic?

                        

Noah's ark

In FS2 today we made representations of Noah's Ark. We made them double-sided so that they both rocked AND could show the 40 days/nights of rain and the brightening skies. This is the quick one I mocked up to show the children - the treasury tag stops it from splaying out too much!