Bead Amigas

For our first class of the session we worked on a special project, lead by Linda, Austin’s grandmother. Linda is visiting from Nicaragua where she works with a group of women called “Bead Amigas,” who make beads and jewelry out of paper. Linda offered us the opportunity to have the children create paintings that will then be made into beads, necklaces and bracelets. Here are some examples of the finished product.This photo shows how the paper is cut into strips and then wrapped around a dowel to form the bead. For more information, check out their website.
We started the children off with thick paper, sponges, and brushes to apply the paint. The sponge helps to keep the paint thinned out, so the paper doesn’t become too saturated. This makes the bead-making easier.

Eventually, the children asked for more tools to work with- and of course the cars and necklaces found their way to the table!
The kids began to move around the studio, but we kept the paper on the table in case they decided to continue working on their bead paper.
Logan looks at his stack of cars that he created. Maybe this is a clue as to who stacked the jars of paint so well in our last class!
Zander is painting with the cars on his first day of art class- Welcome Zander!

Karuna and Austin peel the paper away from the easel and experiment painting on the board.
Rogan is checking out the goodies in our basket of recycled materials.


Linda helps Karuna make hand prints on her bead paper (while Austin looks on, combing his hair with a paint brush).

After class we sang Happy Birthday to Austin- 2 years old, what a little man!