Fun Art Activities to do with Children

Here are some really great Art Activites for you to try with the children in your life.
Enjoy!

• Crayons with salt water wash: Draw with crayons on dark construction paper. Then paint the entire picture with a mixture of lots of salt and water. When the water dries, the picture will sparkle.
• Crayon Rubbing: Put light paper or newsprint on top of what you want to rub (paper clips, leaves, coins, tagboard stencils, rick-rack, etc.). Keep everything still. Color hard with the side of the crayon.
• Crayon Shaving: Make crayon shavings by peeling off the jackets of various colored crayons and inserting them in a pencil sharpener. Then spread glue over a sheet of paper, or moisten the sticky side of a length of paper tape and press the crayon shavings into an interesting design or picture on the paper.
• Crayon Reverse: Children cover all of the white paper with a heavy layer of colored chalk. With a black crayon color heavily over the chalk. Put a second piece of white paper on top of the colored paper. Draw a design or picture with pencil, pressing hard. Separate the drawings and there will be a positive and a reverse.
• Newspaper Painting: Use sheets of used newspapers instead of ordinary paper. Wash background colors of paint over the paper so the printing shows through the paint. Then paint designs or pictures over the wash so that they will have a transparent effect and the printing will show through the paint.
• Hide and Seek Painting: Tie a blindfold over children's eyes. Allow the child to feel the brushes, paper and area before starting. Child then paints without seeing what he is doing.
• Baby Oil Drawing: Use any color bond paper, cotton balls/cotton swabs, paintbrush, baby oil in small dish, newspaper on table. Dip the cotton ball into baby oil and draw on the paper with it. Dip the cotton swab or paintbrush in it and draw some more. After it soaks in, have the children lift their pictures up to the light to see their works of art.

Safe Sleep Class for Tonight - Cancelled

Rae Eberle will be in contact with you if you were signed up for this class tonignt to reschedule.

4-year-old's 911 call makes him Kid Hero

Fort Wayne -- Alex Hayes has received Fort Wayne's first Kid Hero award.

The 4-year-old boy, who four weeks ago called 911 after his mother was knocked unconscious in a fall down a flight of stairs, was honored Friday in a ceremony with Mayor Tom Henry, the city's police and fire chiefs and the 911 dispatcher who answered his call for help.

"With the littleness and the shrillness in his voice, it was hard to get the address at first, but he was very awesome and repeated it over and over," said dispatcher Manda Overly. "He told me that Mommy fell down."

The emergency began when Alex's mother, Jamie Coder, lost her balance and tumbled down the stairs. Alex found his mother lying unconscious, then called 911 on a cell phone. Alex began singing his address to Overly, a song he learned from his mother when they moved into the home just nine days earlier.

"I took child development in high school, and there I learned if you teach a child any kind of music or a rhyme, they will actually pick it up quicker," said Coder, who suffered only a headache and assorted aches and pains from the fall. "I taught him his phone number, his address, and he knows how to spell several words because of the songs."
Alex will begin kindergarten in August

Original article: http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009902020336

Groundhog Day

Let's hope Phil does not see his shadow today!