Fiber Train

 A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to photograph a local event called Fiber Train. It's a sustainable arts festival that mainly focuses on all things "fiber" from sheering sheep and alpacas, to how to spin and dye your own yarn. I was so excited to see so many people do something they love and most of them making this their full time career. It was truly inspiring. Not to mention there was a rainbow sheep for goodness sake. The boys enjoyed petting all the animals the most.

I am really starting to fall in love with this little town of our. There is just so much to do if you dig a little. It's the first place that feels like home since our first tiny studio apartment in Portland when we were newlyweds. It's taken many years for the stirring inside to finally settle and for the first time in a long time I feel like I have time to step back and really enjoy our life. It's a great feeling and I am going to enjoy this moment.

If you want to learn more about Fiber Train here's the link.

Monet inspired art

       

The great thing about kids is that they typically take a liking or at least a small interest in what you do. I have recently taken up watercolors. It's something I tend to do late at night after the boys go to bed. (it's kind of taken a little time from the ol' blog) but the boys will typically see my work left to dry on the kitchen table. Bear has especially taken some interest in joining in . I decided to make a little lesson from it and talk about one of my favorite artist,Claude Monet. We used  the book The Magical Garden of Claude Monet
and talked about the textures and lines in the painting.And a very brief description on Impressionism.  We discussed how he was inspired my nature and light. How the same subject during different times of the day can have a different feel. 

After a few day we found an app with all of Monet's most famous painting and the boys picked out their favorite. After  reading the Magical Garden of Claude Monet I was not surprised  they chose the Japanese garden and bridge. We mixed a few paints trying to match colors they identified in the painting after that I let them run free with their work. We set them to dry and after hung them in their toy room. It's so cool to see them identify the artist whenever they pass by their work. This was such a fun study for all of us and I look forward to doing a few more with different artist throughout the summer. 

Key notes to discuss with you child 

• What do you see?
• Are the painting strokes soft of hard?
• If child is older discuss Impressionism in more detail (show other famous Impressionist artist Mary Cassatt is a great example since she was directly influenced by Monet) 
• What time of the day do you think this was painted based on the light
• do a day long nature study about light on subject. Have them paint or photograph the same subject and discuss the differences. 

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