Thursday, July 22, 2010

Nathan's Fish Tank Painting (stART project)


We read two books for this week's stART project (story + art = stART).  The first one was Peanut Butter and Jellyfishes by Brian P. Cleary. 


The book is about the alphabet and actually doesn't have anything to do with peanut butter or jellyfish, it's just a silly title for a silly book.  But we went with it anyway and made a "jellfyfish" lunch.  I saw this idea used a few times recently with other stART project blogs and wanted to try it too.  We used Pasta Roni (but you can use plain old spaghetti) and poked the noodles through cut up hot dogs and then cooked it according to the package direction.  The effect was pretty cool! Nathan, of course loved helping and he ended up eating everything on his plate and asked for seconds (which is a pretty big deal for him, since he is such a picky eater).






The second book we read was In The Pond by Anna Milbourne and Mat Russell. 


This book was about the progression from tadpoles to frogs.  We decided to make our own hodge podge pond, complete with tadpole eggs.  We used some bubble wrap dipped in paint to represent the eggs.  Some tissue paper ripped into strips for seaweed or whatever.  And then I cut some sponges into fish shapes to use as stencils.  We also used fish shaped cookie cutters as stencils too.  His painting came out really cute and......then, he decided to "feed" his fish, which is what all those green splotchy dots are - food.  I told him it looked like a fish tank.  He LOVED it! It is now hanging next to his big, huge whale on the kitchen wall.









Linking to A Mommy's Adventures and stART....



It's Always a Good thing to have your nose stuck in a Great Book...

8 comments:

An Almost Unschooling Mom said...

I like the pond, and bubble wrap painted frog's eggs. But, I'm so disappointed, that the first book isn't really about peanut butter and jelly fish - that just sounds like too much fun!

Sofia said...

My son would totally love the hot dogs with noodles! Will have to try it out soon!

Eastlyn and co. said...

cute hot dog/noodle jellyfish! It's nice that you have the time for lots of one on one with the youngest of the bunch for such fun projects. -EW

Helene said...

You are such a fun mom!! I love that you were able to tie the books into art projects!

The spagetti and hotdogs look super cool!!!! My kids would love that!!!!

Anonymous said...

I love his pond picture. It's so colorful. Cute lunch too!

Michelle said...

What a neat project! I bet my girls would love to do something like that. Thanks for sharing.

SITS visiting. Lovely blog - now I'm following! Peace. ;)

Anonymous said...

The books look wonderful. The multi-media art project came out so well.

Natalie PlanetSmarty said...

Your project turned out beautifully. We tried hotdog octopus before, it was quite a hit, especially with mustard eyes :)