Paper Plate Face

 

Zoë was invited to an art jammin’ party last week and here she is with her friend, K, making paper plate faces.   The party was held at an art studio downtown and they had two small crafts table out for the younger kids.  They had googly eyes, pipe cleaners, glitter glue, popsicle sticks, foam stickers, etc. –dream supplies for the little ones.  Zoë didn’t want to leave the crafts table to join any of the games!

 

She needed help with getting the pipe cleaner in place, but did everything else herself.  Ta da!

Zoë’s First Canvas Art

 

Zoë’s Art

 

Zoë must have been watching closely whenever Josh would draw, because lately she just started to draw and draw and draw.  She’s been asking for pieces of paper and she turns around and comes back with these. With no help from anybody.

I particularly love this one above.  She played around with the “o” in her name and made lollipops and flowers and a smiley face and she colored each one!  How cute is that?  I love that she “framed her work, too!  Please excuse my mommy pride, my friends! 

She would usually draw quietly and then she would come up to me with her hands behind her back and tell me, “Mommy, I have a surprise for you.  Close your eyes.”  I would close my eyes.  I would peek through my fingers –because it takes her quite some time before she would tell me to open my eyes.  It turns out that she had folded up her drawing to a small square and then she would stand there slowly unfolding it before presenting the drawing to me.  She would do this each and every time.

This one here is supposed to be a field of flowers.  The people are tiny “because they are babies.”  The colorful squares are windows.  The black boxes are “clouds” and the blue lines are supposed to be “rain.”

We Have Another Budding Artist!

 

She woke up one day and decided to draw… and just like that, Zoë presented us with these…

She got Josh to help her tape those two drawings together and then explained to us that that’s her “big family.”  She included her friends in this drawing of her “family.”  I’m the fifth one from the right on the top drawing.  According to her, I was “eating noodles.”  That’s why there are quite a few “lines” where my mouth is supposed to be.  Chris is the one with the biggest head in the second drawing.

I love that her “people” have hair and hands.  I love that she added the sun and the sky.  Mostly I love that every one of her “people” is wearing a big smile.

She also did this --

That’s supposed to be her and Josh.  That negative space in the middle of the drawing is where she had written down our surname.  I’d taken it out… but apart from that, every single part of this drawing is totally Zoë’s, with no help from us whatsoever.  She spelled hers and Josh’s name herself and more importantly, she wrote the letters herself!   I don’t think I could write, let alone spell at that age.

Zoë’s Art

 

When Josh was doing those two paintings that I’d posted yesterday, Zoë –never to be outdone, –did two “paintings” of her own, too:

When I was praising Josh for how good his paintings were, Zoë asked, “How come you not tell me mine are good, too?”

I actually love the colors she has in hers and I thought hers are very modern-art-ish.  I’d told her just that and she was happy.

Like KungKung’s Paintings

 

When Josh showed me this painting, it literally took my breath away.  I don’t think I could’ve done a watercolor painting as nice as this one even if I’d tried.  And this was made by a 5-year old.  Josh has certainly picked up some watercolor  techniques from KungKung during KungKung’s last visit.

I love how the birds really look like they’re flying, how the mountains had ‘depth’.  I love his tree.  I love how his colors do not run messily into one another, but are  ‘clean’.    I just love this painting.  SO. MUCH.

Shortly after he did the one above, he followed it up with this one below.   Here, Josh decided to add a boatman, similar to what KungKung does in many of his paintings.

KungKung would be so proud.

School Journal (Winter 2009/2010) : #5

 

School Journal (Winter 2009/2010) : #4

 

School Art : Butterfly

 

School Art : Rainbow

 

Josh (and now, also Zoë) is fascinated by rainbows.  When asked what his favorite color is, he would always say “Rainbow.” 

School Art (Zoë) : Skirt

 

School Art : Paper Cup Flower

 

School Journal (Winter 2009/2010) : #3

 

School Journal (Winter 2009-2010) : #2

 

On a day at the beach, there was a fish in the water and a d bird.

School Journal (Winter 2009-2010) : #1

 

 

The sun was hot. In fact, it was so hot.  Fish were swimming to the cold water.  Hotter than ever and ever and ever. Oh man, hotter than ever.  No, no, no. I don’t like hot!

School Art : House on the Water

Under the Sea

I love that Josh decided to use his stickers to make this… 

He was holding to his sheet of stickers when he asked for a piece of blank paper.  He proceeded to color the entire paper blue.  The black blobs are “rocks.”  And the tiny bit of green/yellow are “seaweeds.”  I love this!

School Art : Cellophane Fish

School Art : Cityscape (Night)

See if you can spot the shooting star.

The trees that look like they’re on top of the building?  They’re actually “behind.”

There are lots of people crowding on top of the building because they want to see the fireworks.

School Art : Seasons

 

School Art : Tiger

 

This is supposed to be a man picking apples…

but a tiger is waiting for him when he comes down from the tree.

School Art : Buildings

I think it’s cute of him to put what he thinks are the company names at the top of the buildings.  He probably got the idea from seeing the neon lights atop the buildings here in Hong Kong.

School Art : Spooky

 

This must have been a project over Halloween.  The two white strips you see are “doors.”

They open up to reveal… a ghost!

School Art : Paper Plate Composite

It’s so funny how the eyes are upside down.

School Art : Seaside

 

It’s almost the end of the school year and Josh had been coming home with bundles of art.  Here is one of them.   Ever since N, the daughter of Chris’ cousin, helped him draw a picture of the beach, complete with coconut trees, Josh has been very enthusiastic about drawing seaside pictures.  Here, he has two coconut trees, a red crab, some seashells, a boat, a couple of gulls, and the bright yellow sun against a blue sky.

 

School Art : Snowman

 

Out of Whack

 

Josh came in and showed me this drawing he made and he could barely talk through his laughter.  He was explaining how he made everything out of whack  (as enumerated by Josh)--

• A sun-moon tricking all the people into thinking they could go sunbathing, when it was actually a moon
• Instead of a beach umbrella, a banana umbrella
• A boat on land
• A flower growing on the beach (sand)
• A man fishing, but caught a boat instead of fish
• A cat in the water
• A car in the water

 

Seascape

 

Josh drew this looking out from our window.  A lone tugboat on the water.  The green on the right side would be soccer pitch.  The round orange things are buoys hanging on the side of the sea wall.  And then there’s the view of the building next to us, visible from our window.

Mother’s Day Card

 

I was looking through Josh’s Student Handbook and out fell a card.  He immediately rushed over and told me, “It’s for you, Mommy.  I made it.”

Back cover / Front cover

 

The inside of the card

He told me that he and D were the only ones in his class to make the cards and that the teachers did not have to help them with spelling (obviously!).  That rainbow of hearts on the right?  He added that here at home after I’d seen the card.  He said that it’s a really special rainbow.  I could see that.  Josh is really sweet like that…  He lights up my world in many, many ways.

Self-Portrait #1

 

Josh as Superhero

A Fox and Ducks

 

Josh brought home today Nine Ducks Nine by Sarah Hayes as part of his school’s Big Book/Little Reader Program.  This was the drawing he made in his sketch book after reading it.

At the Beach

 

Initially when Josh showed me this drawing,  there were no crabs.   Zoë saw it and asked him why there were no crabs.   Josh was happy to oblige and added in the pair of crabs.  By the way, the “6” that you see?  They’re seashells, okay?

A Gift for Zoë

This is one of my favorite paintings that Josh did. He said that it’s a surprise for Zoë and refused to let Zoë see it. I thought it was a woodpecker, but he said that it’s actually a parrot. See the beautiful colors, Mommy? I love the little nest of eggs…