So – How is everyone’s Composer Studies coming along?  Are you still on the same path? Did you start with good intentions and then fizzle? Did you write your review for the product offered this year and then move on to another topic? Are you still going strong?

I can tell you – that Wednesdays have become my favorite day of the week – almost almost above outdoor sunny day nature studies. Definitely more than rainy day nature studies.

Today our challenge was to view Monet’s Bouquet of Flowers, and wrap up our Joplin studies.  We looked through the links on Harmony Art Mom’s study, and then went over to Hodgepodge Mom’s site to look at her Sunflower Pastel Study from Nana – and then combined the learning.

We kept Nana’s instructions up on the computer for reference, and then went about using Oil and two different kinds of Chalk Pastels as mediums.

Picking a sunflower from the yard to use as a point of reference helped our drawing.  For all of our drawings, the one based on the flower in front of us looked the most real. Go Figure. Over a year of Nature Observation paired with the drawing lessons – Woot!

Nathan the Funny Man.  Dark Sunflower. Foggy Sunflower. Chicken Sunflower.  He’s a funny funny boy. (One of the lessons in Drawing with Children is to turn a mistake into part of the picture – or change the picture.. . .)

While we drew, we listened to some more Joplin music, and then worked on our final Notebooking Page.

The pages above are Nate’s – He really wasn’t into a Sketch an image that comes to mind sort of mood – and went with silly.  He had quite the story for the first notebook page.  I did tell him, that one of the main reasons for Wednesday is to study the greats, learn from them, and then practice the skills or details we learn from their works. We have plenty of open creative drawing time, but this hour is not the silly part. I did have him re-do the entire notebook page.  This question has been asked, do you ever have them re-do poor work.  I did on this one – because it was disobedient work.  His picture of a bar fight in front of a saloon with a horse is not his best work – but it was obedient and answered the question.

We have enjoyed the combination of studying art and music together from Harmony Art Mom!  This unit is from her Grade 4 package. I look forward to purchasing Grade 7 soon, and have been able to secure Artistic Pursuits to use along with it.  Grade 4 uses Drawing with Children.  Today – we took the liberty of using Option 2 Art Appreciation – and did the pastel option of sunflower drawing.  Option 1 is a Picture study – Option 2 is Art Appreciation with a follow-up activity (the pastels today), and Option 3 has a small lesson portion of the Drawing with Children. Some weeks we have combined all 2 and 3, or a single option.

If you have been encouraged to start a unit of Art and Music – I have a giveaway to offer!  Harmony Art Mom will offer one of my readers a free mini-unit as a giveaway on this blog to help get families listening to classical music.

Here is a link to her mini – units.  The page also includes one free download – that is available to anyone. http://www.squidoo.com/harmony-fine-arts-mini-units

Visit the link above, and then comment here with the mini unit you would want if you are picked by random drawing! Feel encouraged to also download her free mini unit on the site!

This giveaway is open to anyone!