During the winter break I had a chance to work with the cutest kids and experiment with some new crafts at the Garrison Art Center!
We made water bottle stamp “snow flakes” by putting the bottom of a water bottle into white paint and stamping it onto blue paper. While that dried the kiddos practiced tracing different sized circles on white paper and cut each out for a snow man. They had fun using markers for adding details to their snowmen and then glued it all together for an adorable winter scene!
We also read the book “Over and Under the Snow” about animals that live underground in the winter. The kids LOVED guessing what animals we would find under the snow and then trying to draw their favorite.
We started by folding a piece of paper in half, and then used tape to make trees (these would be white after painting over) on the top. We kept the paper folded while they painted a sky and made sure that none of the paint would get onto their “snow” & underground animals. The kids were great about leaving the paper folded- I couldn’t believe we had no paint spills in the snow! Once dry, we unfolded the paper to reveal the bottom half and the kids drew their favorite animal hibernating.
Their favorite part of the day was our “inside snow” play time. Since it was too cold to go outside, I made fake snow out of 2 cups baking soda & 1 cup hair conditioner. I gave each of them a big handful in a large container and they played around with making snowmen, adding toy animals to their game and making footprints, but the best was painting on the snow (also the messiest!) This was definitely easier than getting everyone all dressed up to go outside and was even more fun. Next time around I’m definitely going to skip the snow pants, hats, gloves, scarves, jackets, drippy noses, wet socks, and stay inside with some fake snow and maybe a hot chocolate!
Jess Nash Art 
