Kids Art: Winter Holiday Card

Although we don't usually get much snow, or perhaps because of it, the kids seem to love wintry scenes with piles of snow, roaring fire, trees laden with white, snowflakes and all things magical.

That was the inspiration for this particular set of cards done by the ten year old.

Together, we pored over wintry scenes online to fill our hearts with the cool beauty painted by various artists. Then we decided to make up a simple winter scene with pine and birch trees.

Items used:
White oil pastel
Some Cobalt and Prussian Blue water color paints
Salt crystals - either table salt or rock salt for bigger crystals
Flat brush for wash
Water color paper and card stock paper
Light and dark blue, yellow/orange, and brown oil pastels
Green, yellow, and purple color pencils
Silver glitter glue


What we ended up doing:

1. We cut the water color and cardstock paper to required size
2. We used white oil pastel for masking - to draw a hint of snowy foreground, pine tree outline, bare birch trunks
3. We did a graduated wash with blue watercolor; and while still wet, sprinkled salt as in the usual Salt Sprinkled painting exercises we've done many times before
4. We allowed it to dry completely, which didn't take long because we left it by the heating vent
5. We then took the green and purple color pencil and filled the pine tree in
6. We then highlighted the pine tree with dark and light blue oil pastels and some brown for the trunk; added a hint of blue oil pastels to the birch trees
7. Finally, we painted a thin layer of glitter glue - both to seal the work and to add sparkle

To finish the cards, we mounted the water color paper on to card stock with dimensional tape, adding framing layers as we fancied.