Open-ended Art: Fall Colours (Red, Yellow, Orange And Brown)

To be honest, I have almost zero knowledge about “Fall” because in Singapore, it is either a “Dry Summer” or a “Wet Summer” throughout the year. Although I have travelled to many places before, I have NEVER actually seen “Fall”. So it was hard for me to design an art session based on a season which I have not personally experienced before. In any case, the Open-ended Art theme this week is “Fall Colours - Red, Yellow, Orange and Brown” at Growing And Learning By Leaps And Bounds.

First of all, I imagined “Fall” to be romantic and yet melancholic… with all the leaves changing colours and eventually falling onto the ground. Nothing seems to create that feeling better than watercolours. And the effect will be even more outstanding if the watercolours are applied over drawings in wax crayons. Of course, we need glitter glue to give it a finishing touch.



Great planning, but it would never be so straightforward with Sophie. When she was drawing with crayons, she tends to use very light and gentle strokes. That was all fine and good, except the lines would not show under watercolours. So, I had to coach Sophie to use more strength when she drew.



Sophie has never used watercolours (cake palette) before so she started out very polite. She gently dipped her brush into the water before dabbing it onto the watercolours. But soon, she was jabbing her brush into colours after colours, “destroying” the palette. Actually I never liked watercolours in a palette because they smudge (tough for children to gauge how much water to use) and end up tearing the paper. But I cannot find any non-toxic and washable kind in tubes or bottles so I bought this.

I forgot all about the colours during the session. There was no way I could have restricted her use of all the colours in the palette. In the end, it looked nothing like "Fall"



I let Sophie try again in hope for a more "Fall" looking picture. But it turned out like a volcano erupting with green lava.

I think the first one looked more appropriate so I got Sophie to add some glitter glue to make the painting look magical (not really...) and it hardened the paper a little.

So here is the end product. Despite the colours (not Fall colours), it looked rather nice.

Unfortunately, my watercolours palette was a mess! I had to wash and air it dry after the session.