Reflections Art Projects

A few weeks ago, Aubrey brought a paper home from school about the Reflections Art Contest. It's an art contest the PTA puts on every year. I read to Aubrey all of the categories and the theme, "The Magic of a Moment" for her to start thinking about what she wanted to do. She pretty much wanted to do a project in every category, but I had to limit her to 3 categories. This girl loves to do any kind of art project.

Next I had her tell me about some of her most magical moments. 3 of those times were, the first day of Kindergarten, going to Disneyland & Mr. Moon.

We decided she could represent the first day of Kindergarten with a diorama for the 3d category. I had some sculpy clay for her to model some little sculptures of things in her classroom. She painted them and a shoe box. Then she decorated the shoe box and put all the sculptures in exactly where she wanted them. The only thing I helped her do was glue them in since it was very powerful glue that was not safe for her. For the most part I wasn't even in the same room with her as she worked so that I wouldn't be tempted to help her. (The rules state that the child is to do it on their own without any help from parents.)

Anyway, I think it turned out really cute.

 Here's Aubrey with her representation of the first day of Kindergarten.

Next she wanted to take a picture of the sun and moon. She has always loved Mr. Moon. As a toddler she wanted to go out every night and look for him. She thought he went to bed every morning. She learned in preschool that he did not go to bed, but that the earth moved in a circle and so you can't see him during the day. Now every time she sees the moon or a sunset she will tell us all about the earth's rotation and how cool it is that the earth is moving and we can't even feel it. So she represented this with photos of a sunset and a moon.

She took the photos all by herself. Then I showed her a couple of tricks in photoshop (cropping and levels) using an entirely different photo. Then I pulled in her photos and let her edit them without any help from me. Once again I left the room so I wouldn't be tempted to insert my input. I expected them to look really funky when she was done, and was shocked when this is what she ended up with.

Here's my little photographer in the making! She's asked several times since then if she can take some pictures and play with them in photoshop.

  Last she drew her favorite ride at Disneyland, Jumpin' Jellyfish.

 She was really excited to go and turn them all in for the contest. I was hoping they would have them all on display in the gym or something so I could see all the kids work, but I guess they don't do that. Someone said that they usually will put them up in the hallways in a few weeks. I'll have to check out the hallways then. I love art and would love to see all of the kids creations! I did see several neighbors with their artwork that morning and it was fun to see what they had done!