In the Art Room: Weaving, Part 2

Woven pouch created by one of my fantastic fourth graders.

Hello, crafty kids and grown-ups alike! Today I am going to show you how to add a flap to your woven pouch. If you've no idea what I'm talking about, you can quickly get caught up to speed by reading Weaving, Part 1. I do hope you'll join in on this weaving adventure. Ready to start? Okay, let's weave a flap!

You know you are ready to weave the flap when your weaving is at your desired height. I tell the kids that their weaving must be between 4-7", no taller, no smaller. Once there, you might want to trim those pesky pieces of yarn you tied together so your weaving looks a little less, er, hairy. The above is my trimmed-up, desired-height pouch.

For flap weaving, you will only be weaving on one side of your loom, not all the way around as you have been. Your first step will be to pick a side to weave your flap on. It does not matter which.

For pouch weaving, you will need to eat a delicious popsicle, stat. Preferably something chocolate. Rinse well. Weave your popsicle stick into your weaving, making certain to weave the opposite of the previous string. See above.

Now rotate your stick so that it lifts up every other string. Simply slide your needle into this string tunnel. This is where the kids Freak Out:

"What?!"

"Why haven't we been doing this the whole time?!"

"That is sooooo cool!"

Pull your needle all the way through so there is no excess yarn just like above.

Flip the stick down and use it to pack the weaving down. This means no more fork to pack the weaving. The kids like to refer to it as the "weaving guillotine". Where do they get this stuff?

Slide your guillotine, er stick, to the top of the weaving. Do not remove the stick. If you already did (tried to jump ahead, didn't you? Humph!) just reweave the stick back into your weaving. And don't do that again.

Remember, we are only weaving on one side of the loom. This means our needle will be going back and forth across our loom instead of around the loom. So, for this next step, you will not be turning your loom over but making a u-turn and weaving back. Notice I am not using the stick (I'll explain why in a moment). Be certain to weave in a pattern that is the opposite of the previous string.

Pull yarn all the way through at an arch. This will prevent some terrible thing called Draw In. More on that shortly. Slide your weaving stick down and pack the yarn.

Okay, if you smarties haven't figured it out, here is why you cannot use your stick when you are weaving in the opposite direction: you will unravel your weaving. This is why you can only use the stick when you are weaving in one direction. Sometimes the kids will draw an arrow on the stick so they know when to use the stick.

Ewww, this is bad! This is that dreaded thing called Draw In. This happens when the weaver is pulling too tightly. The year before my fourth graders tackle this weaving, we create a tapestry weaving. That's fancy talk for weaving on one side of the loom. This gives them lots of practice at avoiding and fixing draw in. You can see those weavings here.

The best way to avoid draw in: don't draw in. Stop pulling so hard when you are weaving back and fourth. Pull the yarn at an arch, like I showed earlier. The best way to fix draw in: remove it. That's right, unweave the unwanted. This might leave the end warp strings on the left and right loose making it difficult to avoid draw in again. If you notice that, turn your weaving over, pull up the slack on those strings and tape them taunt. Flip your weaving back to the flap side and resume flap weaving. Fleaving. Wlapping. Call it what you like.

And viola! Finished flap! I tell the kids their flap should be around 2" in height.

A sunglasses holder by a fourth grader.

Feel pretty good? Easy enough, right? Feel free to ask questions if you've got 'em. Next week I will show you how to remove your weaving and add a button. From there, we'll weave a cord which is the kid-crowd favorite. Happy weaving!

What the Art Teacher Wore #21

Rainy Stormy Sticky Monday: Oh this silly weather. On this here day, I was productive, finishing my Nashville sign and spray painting a couple of those plant holder thingies (behind me). top: Ann Taylor, garage-saled; skirt: Anthro, purchased at The Paris Market; sandals: Sseko with DIY straps

 Well, kids, here's a lil round up of my weekly wears and some lovely works of art that I just happened to match. Each one of these paintings comes courtesy of pinterest (gah, what did I do before pinterest? Laundry? Sleep? How foolish of me!). If you'd like to follow my pins of all things vintage/art teacher/craft/sewing/painting/not-cooking-but-drooling-over-images-of-food, you can click on that wee button I finally figured out how to install to your right. Let's stay up past our bedtime with glazed-over eyeballs and pin together, whatyasay?

BTW, I managed to score a batch of lovely tops at a recent garage sale (J.Crew! Ann Taylor! Anthro!) several still with their $68 price tags for just a coupla bucks. So, of course, I promptly wore one each day. Hence the numerous outfits of separates. In case you were wondering. 

Enjoy and I'll be chatting with you again soon...I want to share with you some other treasures I recently scored.

Woman In Blue Irving R. Wiles

Exploring Nashville's finest food and thrift Tuesday: The art teachers I work with and I spent this day exploring Nashville. Have you ever been to a Goodwill Outlet? You must. And, if you are local, you also need to get yourself to Los Paletas ASAP as they are now dipping their popsicles in...wait for it...Olive and Sinclair dark chocolate! I almost died. top: J.Crew, garage-saled; skirt: made by me with vintage and Anna Maria Horner fabric; sandals: same Sseko as above

I am in love with all of these paintings by Lulie Wallace.

Adorable hair clip by the ever-awesome Peachy Tuesday.

Estate-saling and more Nashville-exploring Wednesday: A buddy and I hit the road with a list of addresses promising The Biggest Estate Sale Ever! We walked away with a trunk full of treasures. dress: vintage, thrifted, I've had this beauty since high school; rope sandals: by Nomadic State of Mind

Andy Warhol, Butterflies 1955

Catching up with a buddy Thursday: I have so enjoyed my days of catching up with friends this summer. It reminds me that I need to do more of that. Just sitting and chatting. dress: vintage, thrifted; sandals: Target, old; kitty: Asha, big, sweet and fluffy

I love Mary Blair.She's the reason I must ride It's a Small World every time we visit a Disney park as she designed the interior of the ride.

Errand-running and DIY'ing Friday: I started this day out strong and then wound up losing my steam around noon. Trying to get jacked up on B-12 didn't seem to do the trick. I suspect getting off pinterest and going to bed at a decent hour might solve this problem. top: J.Crew, garage-saling; skirt: Anthro, sale last summer; sandals: Target; belt: gift from a friend

One of my favorite artists of all time, Isabel Bishop.

In the Art Room: Weaving, Part 1

Woven pouches created by fourth grade artists. You can see more of their masterpieces at our school-wide art show here and here.

Since I shared with you photos from our art show, I've had several questions about the woven pouches that were featured. Because this project is so easy and fun, I thought I'd share it now that the kids are out of school and getting a little...well...restless. It's the perfect summer what-can-we-do-now-? craft.

In the art room, this project has become a rite of passage for my fourth grade students but can easily be created by kids as young as second grade.  Because this craft involves multiple steps, I've divided it up into four posts: Weaving Part 1: Getting Started; Part 2: Weaving the Flap; Part 3: Removing the Weaving and Finishing; Part 4: Weaving a Cord

Please, fellow art teachers and parents, leave comments below on how you teach this lesson differently. And, of course, questions if you got 'em. Have fun!

 Supplies: 

• Scissors
• Tape
• a loom. I purchase ours through Sax but you can create your own with thick cardboard.
• Thin cotton string. This was bought for a couple bucks at Walmart but in a pinch, you could use yarn.
• Big-eyed needles. Again, Walmart would carry these in their craft department.

 Preparing your loom:

These looms that I purchase through Sax have notches in them that are too far apart. When you weave with them like this, it creates a pouch that is a little too loosely woven, in my opinion. So I have the kids cut the part that sticks up (we call them "teeth") in half. It's a struggle because the cardboard is thick and there is some moaning and groaning but they can do it. 

If you are creating your own loom from cardboard, you will want to space your notches about 1/4" apart. I'm not really into exact measurements, so I say just eyeball it. However, make sure that you have the same number of notches on the top as the bottom.

 Warping your loom:

Warping your loom is the process in which you are putting the string on your loom that you will weave over and under. To do this, start at one corner of your loom and tape your warping string into place. I have the kids put the tape at the bottom of the notches. This will prevent the kids from accidentally weaving over or under this small string.

Now begin wrapping the warp string all the way around the loom. For example, from the taped end, go down to the bottom cut notch, wrap string around the back and up to the top notch and then go to the bottom again. You should have strings on both sides of your loom, making certain not to skip any of the pre-cut or notches-you-cut.

While you are warping, keep the string attached to the cone. I do not allow the kids to cut the string from the cone unless I have checked their loom. If they have skipped a notch, this allows them to go back and fix it without wasting any warping string.

 Once you've checked the loom and are certain no notches were skipped, cut the string and tape it down. Again, tape as close to the notches as possible. Use your creepy bending finger (shown above) to scoot those other warp stings over to tape the string underneath.

 Weaving:

The process of weaving is that of going over and under the warp strings in an A-B pattern. The string you weave with is called the weft. No long needle like this one? Tape your string to the end of a pencil or skewer stick.

 Pull yarn through until you have left behind a 1" tail. Turn the loom over and weave over and under on the back. Once finished with that side, turn loom over to the original side.

 Now, this time, weave the opposite of the previous string. For example, in the photo above, I wove over and under because the string underneath was under and over.

 You know you are weaving correctly when you see something like this. Looks a little like the netting of a tennis racket.

 But it's too loose. Do you see all of those white warp strings through your weaving? Well, you don't want to. Use a fork to pack down your weaving until those warp strings disappear and all you see are the weft strings.

 Adding a new weft: 

Okay, this one is debatable. Technically, you are not to tie two stings together but overlap the strings to add another. Or something. But at this point, if I throw one more piece of info at the kids, they are likely to have an aneurysm. So, we simply double knot tie a new string to the old, snip the "tails" and keep on weaving.

 Incorrect weaving: 

How do you know if you are weaving incorrectly? Well, you'll see a lot of vertical warp strings, like you see in the yellow portion of my weaving above. This happens when you are not weaving the opposite of the previous string, but weaving the same over and over again. If you see this, you have to take it out and redo.

 Weaving away...

I tell the kids that their weaving must be somewhere in between 4-7" tall. This allows room at the top of the loom for weaving the flap and tying off the weaving. This should keep those kiddos all tied up (heehee, tempting, right?) until next week. I plan to take mine on an upcoming trip to keep me occupied.

Remember, you are weaving on both sides of the loom, front and back. Ya hear?

 So stay tuned!

Next week, we'll learn how to weave that flap. Again, feel free to leave any questions or comments and happy weaving!

DIY: Ode to Nashville, Tennessee

Greetings, outta-towners and in-towners alike!

You may recall a couple of weeks ago I showed you around my Tennessee-themed home. In that post I mentioned wanting to create another Tennessee-inspired painting. Well, here 'tis! All 2' X 5' of it. I'm all about the Go-Big-or-Go-Home, can you tell?

The original postcard that inspired the painting.

Interested in creating your own city/state souvenir postcard? Well, it's actually pretty simple. You'll just need the following: 

• Canvas, any size 
• Enlarged copies of the postcard lettering if you are not comfortable drawing your own
• Acrylic paint, brushes
•  State/city maps (I picked mine up for free at AAA)
• Chisel-tipped sharpie and black brush pen
• Tissue paper and stick pins
• Modge Podge

DIY Disclaimer: I am prone to take the more-difficult-and-frustrating road when crafting. Don't ask me why. For your sanity, I've also included an easier version of the same directions which you will find under the heading "Or you could just...".

Eye-ballin' it. Not something I recommend as it wears out the eraser and the patience.

I began with a sketch. I started with a line that all of the letters would rest on and then created a parallel line 8" above that. Lightly, I drew in the letters giving each one about a 3-5" width. 

Or you could just...enlarge copies of the postcard. Enlarge each letter, cut it out and play around with the positioning on your canvas. Once you've got it where you want it, tape them down and trace around the letters with pencil.

The color in this photo is slightly off, as it's much more a mustard-yellow, not a poop-yellow.

From there, I mixed up a giant batch of the background color. Always mix up more paint that you think you'll need. Why? Because it is impossible to mix the exact color twice. You may think you can and then you put brush to canvas and realize Homer-Simpson-slap-to-the-head-"duh!" style that you needed more white/yellow/black/wine. Trust me. Keep paint covered in Saran Wrap until the very end of your project as you never know when you might need to touch up a spot (this I did not do and you'll see why I wish I had shortly).

Or you could just...take the easy no-paint-mixing road and just buy the color of paint for the background. In that case, buy two tubes.

Tissue paper tracing.

To insure that my map letters were going to fit my canvas, I created letter patterns using tissue paper.

Or you could just...remember those letters you so cleverly xerox copied? Those will be your letter patterns.

Creating the map letters.

With my letter patterns pinned onto my map, I cut out each letter for my sign. If you are using your original xerox copies, you could do the same.

Ta-dah!

Making the letters three dimensional.

With the letters cut out, I began the background painting. Before putting paint to canvas, I used a pencil and lightly sketched in where I wanted the drop shadow to be. This shadow helped the letters really pop out and gave them a three dimensional quality. Again, mix up way more paint than you'd ever thought imaginable and dive in.

Once the drop shadow was complete, I began Modge-Podging the letters into place. Using the matte Modge Podge, I covered the area of the canvas where the letter would go, placed the letter on top and then added another layer of 'podge on top of that. Once dry, I began using the chisel-tipped Sharpie to create a black shadow on the right side of the letters. You can see this best in the photo below

Guess who can't spell Tennessee? Although, I do believe Teene-see would be a pretty cute name, don't you?

Now, when it came to adding the other written text, lemme just say I thought I was so clever. I wrote out the text on tissue paper and then traced it with a Sharpie. The thought being that the Sharpie would bleed through just enough for me to trace them with my brush pen. Sounds great, right?

Sure it woulda been had I been able to spell correctly. My horrendous spellin' ways always take me back to that Frightening Fifth Grade Spelling Bee where I spelled...wait for it..."morning" incorrectly. That's right, I thought it should be "mourning" as in "We are all mourning the dreadful spelling of this poor dimwitted girl." 

Thankfully, this spelling error was corrected with a little bit of acetone (that'd be nail polish) and a q-tip. I managed to wipe off my boo-boo just enough...as well as remove a wee bit of paint. Remember how I told you to save your paint? Yeah, this would have come in real handy if I had. Der.

Nash, Tenn., yo.

Just a closeup of my Sharpie-outlining skillz. There is no way I'm ever going back to painting hard edges with a brush. No. Way.

My vintage record player has the best acoustics. I decided to sample my latest thrifted records during a painting lull.

Finished sign now hangs out in my kitchen.

So you can handle this, right? Just follow my much easier or you could just... and you'll be well on your way to your very own souvenir sign!

Or you could just...take a nap. That's my plan anyway. 

Thanks for stopping by!