Art Classes Without the Cost or Commitment

YouTube is amazing for how to tutorials on just about anything.  We've learned how to put down faux wood floors and crochet all sorts of things including several blankets, borders, wraps, toys, ornaments, scarves, and appliques. When we need to see how something is done, YouTube is often the first place we turn.

Earlier this year, Sam and I decided we wanted to learn how to become better at painting. I looked in to signing up with several good art classes in our area. But since a big part of the fun of being creative (and of homeschooling for that matter) is pursuing what is most interesting to you and your student, (not to mention the fact that neither of us wanted to commit to being somewhere at the same time every week for any great length of time), we took a fraction of the money we would have paid to an instructor and spent it on our own art supplies after finding a great teacher for free on YouTube.

 Amy Pearce has got be our favorite online art teacher so far. You can also follow her on Facebook under Her Art From The Attic as well as Mr. Otter Art Studio-Free Children's Art Classes. We love her teaching style as well as being able to choose what we will learn to paint, when we feel like painting! I definitely recommend giving some of her lessons a try. You don't have to spend much at all to paint with acrylics. You can find small bottles for less than a dollar each at Hobby Lobby and they contain plenty enough paint to get you started! :)

Here are some pics of a few of the messes we've made over the past several months:

Disclaimer: In case you wanted to paint the Gerber Daisies, that tutorial was from a different instructor. Her video was very long, and a little less helpful for an active 8 year old, in my opinion. I chose to watch that one ahead of time and then just passed on the basic info to Sam when we pulled out the paints.

Just Keeping You in The Loop

Get it? Loop?...Crochet?...cuz it's all loops and this a recap and...yeah.....

So in case you were wondering, Sammy and I did finish our afghans in time to meet our Christmas deadline. They weren't presents for anyone other than ourselves, and we enjoyed lazing around with our new blankets on a very wintry Christmas Day. Ooohhh so cozy. :)

We both just learned how to crochet in October and these were our first projects. If you've always wanted to learn crochet too, here is the link to the video we liked best for learning the basic stitches. And here is the granny square tutorial we followed to make our blankets. FYI we love The Crochet Crowd tutorials. Michael Sellick (aka Mikey) is so good at clearly explaining and demonstrating what needs to be done. Here he explains how to join the granny squares,  explaining the advantages and/or disadvantages of each method. Sammy and I both chose the single crochet option.

After we finished our blankets, we decided to try some faster, smaller projects. Sammy made this beautiful scarf.

She made all the flowers using this tutorial (again from Mikey) and then decided to join all the flowers together as a scarf.

I followed this tutorial, roughly, and made a camouflage beanie for my husband on Christmas Day. (I told you we loved The Crochet Crowd.) I used an "h" hook because I didn't have the size "g" used in the pattern. So to make if fit snugly, I had to stop increasing 2 rounds earlier than the tutorial called for. But it fits him perfectly and he loves it!

 Right now we are working on crocheting a rag rug. I have wanted one forever and after cleaning out our office closet (again!) I realized I just might have enough scrap material to try and make one. Sammy has been a huge help ripping and rolling the material. I won't take the time to explain much about the rug at this point but I can show you a picture of how far I've gotten. It is currently 2'x6' but should measure at least 6'x10' when I'm done and hopefully will replace that dirty old rug seen under our dining room table. :)

We've actually got a lot more fun (and inexpensive) projects to share with you that you might enjoy trying too, but we can't sit at the computer all day so....next time! :) 

Hint: Our next post involves paint!