Happy Birthday to Miss Ruby!

Yesterday I had the distinct pleasure of returning a favor to a woman who helped me so much when my three children were young.  I will never be able to truly pay her back for all she did for me so many years ago, but it was so great to be able to do something for her, even if it was small.

Three little ones under four meant I could use all the help I could get back in the day and I could not be more grateful for the time, energy and love given selflessly by this amazing woman to our family.  Although my three children are adults now, they still remember her as a loving and important part of their very early childhood.  She will always be considered family in our home.

And so when she asked me to come out to her home and do an art lesson for her youngest daughters' birthday party, I could not of been more thrilled for the opportunity to hopefully help create the smallest happy memory for her kids.

Ruby wanted a bird theme party and the bird dye painting project I have done several times before seemed perfect.

There were eight very sweet little girls and we started by letting them rummage through the reference material I brought of birds to help them along.  At first we talked about finding all the shapes that make up the birds to help make the process of drawing them a little less challenging and then using copy paper, they began to work out their sketches.

Once they were happy with them, I showed them how to shade the paper on the back so they could just lay their final sketch over the watercolor paper and trace.  The best part of working out a drawing this way is that they can now take their working sketch home and transfer it onto any paper, to do as many different artworks as they like, using whatever medium they choose.

Once they had the pencil image on the watercolor paper, they went over the lines with a sharpie pen and then we brought out the dye paints.

I showed them several techniques they could use with the dyes.  Wet on wet, lifting, salt, and blooming.  More exciting was watching them make their own discoveries with the dyes.

This little girl in particular came up with a beautiful way to interpret the dyes all on her own. Below is the final artwork.

An

Here are the other lovely creations made during the party.

The owl is Ruby's big sister, Summer.  She chose such a challenging idea and I loved the way she decided to interpret it.  I think she was quite proud of herself in the end, I know I was proud of her!

And then there is the birthday girl, Ruby, who loves peacocks.  Her enthusiasm was catching as both girls sitting next to her decided to do peacocks too.  It is interesting to see how each girl creatively rose to the visual challenge of interpreting the reference material.  Each one is unique and beautiful.

the birthday girl!

What was suppose to be an hour and a half project turned into more like two and a bit hours as the girls all got lost in the process of creating their artwork.  It was such a privilege to be able to be part of such a special day for the little girl of a very special woman in our lives.

Happy Birthday Miss Ruby!