Days with the Dorans

After last year's awesome experience painting, I figured it was time to do it again.  I put it on Facebook and almost all the kids had a friend that came too.  Poor Z's friend Alex tried too late so didn't get to come this year, but will come next year.  They fill up pretty quickly! The 3 Bigs and I picked up Ali's friend, Maddy and headed off to the studio where we met Ryan and his beautiful mother, Nan (who happens to be an amazing photographer... I need to change these pictures out to her pictures before I make the book... too lazy right now!). Nan and I sat at the back couch and watched our little artists get to work.  We really only had a good view of Z and boy did he make us laugh.  His snowman looked like he was melting a little- but he didn't sweat it and his snowman turned out super cute! Here are some quick pics I took with my phone! The kids ALL did a great job and I'm excited to have some new Winter art hanging in my house! ...

 On Black Friday when everyone was shopping, we were hitting the roads too, but to do something FUN!  PAINT!!  I mentioned a while back that for Jodi's birthday we did "Painting with a Twist" (and I'm actually going there for a party tomorrow too).  I found out that they have 'family days' and thought it would be fun for my little artists!  Now Joe has always loved to sketch and draw (mostly comic type things).  He has a great way of catching facial expressions in the characters he draws.  I was curious how he would do with following directions from a teacher in art class.  He actually did really well but I LOVED that I still saw some of 'Joey' in his painting.  He certainly made it his own which is what makes this place fun!  All the paintings look similar but each is unique in its own way! Ali too, was just like I would expect her to be.  Unfortunately, she can be a bit of a perfectionist (wonder where she gets that fro...