Lily was inspired by a Manga drawing book at our friends home in Southern Germany. Such a different style and she took it up so quickly. Fascinating for me is the eye mind hand sequence of drawing, I celebrate her skill!
I would like to practice more. X
A long awaited Lily illustration. Welcome to the Big Top at The Famous Flea Circus!
Class 5 geometry lessons are underway! It’s exciting for me to revisit the beauty and symmetry of compass art, Learning about polygons, prisms, pyramids, solids, quadrilaterals, angles, lines and circle language. I enjoy the artistic focus in presenting this work with Lily through the Waldorf curriculum.
On an adventurous day out recently we were happy to find this playground in a small village. (Neustadt near Metzingen) Soon there where exclamations about how this whole place was framed on polygons, prisms and even a quadrilateral pyramid supporting the tree! We are all looking at the world through geometry glasses now! 
I hunted for four leaf clovers (unsuccessfully) and enjoying watching while the two spent half an hour cleaning the sand out of the water play basins and creating waterfalls. I know Lily gets lonely for friends her own size when we travel and I cherish the richness of her relationship with Cedar and their ability to play together despite 6 years age difference.
They where really engaged with the water pump and this initiated more conversations about living in historical times, continuing on from visiting Lichtenstein Castle earlier in the day. Shall we detour there right now, it’s a lovely late summer day in Southern Germany….
We took the tour so we could snoop around inside the castle. I was especially enthralled with the detailed paintings on walls and ceilings. Photographing strictly Verboten! So you will have to go there yourself.
Afterwards we sought out the Easter Egg museum, decorated not chocolate !unfortunatley closed but the glimpse in the door was inspiring for our own Easter festival. After studying ancient Egypt lily was taken with the egyptian artwork eggs in the centre.
Anyway back to geometry!
We have been playing with toothpicks and modelling clay to create a sample board. It began with lines, which naturally flowed into the exploration of what can you make with lines.
glimpses from Lily’s main lesson book.
It is fascinating the different polygons and patterns which are made when you follow the times table…
Draw a dozen intersecting straight lines, then identify and color the various types of triangles.
Mamas exploration. 
Lily’s
Cedar’s
Practicing rays by imagining starlight that shines on forever.
The city map practicing all different types of lines. See if you can spot them!
First freehand circle explorations before introducing the compass.
Cedar watched the above flower of life developing, later he sat quietly and recreated his own very beautiful version. I loved making and colouring this mandala as a child also.
The hexagon creations are beautiful, followed by a dodecagon.
The fun side of mathematics for us!
I am unsure how time passed so swiftly
But here we are
Thinking a lot of home and our return in a couple of weeks
What is happening in my garden?
Many stories not shared, I can’t claim I am a proficient travel writer!
Four people in a small space, so much outside to see and explore, where is the plug anyway?
Packing sorting packing
Being held lovingly by a friends home
Watching Lily make a travel bag for her birthday dolls and small things
The treadle machine is a new experience and has a gentle sound and rhythm
I am impressed with her independent skill revealing itself with sewing this project
She began as a wee girl sitting on my knee ‘steering’ fabric or ‘driving’ the peddle for me
Look at her now!
The fun outweighs the squabbling and wrestling! Thank goodness!
I hope they have so many good memories of each other and may they be friends in the end x
Cedar has discovered drawing in such a new way! It’s very exciting to see him coming more freely into expressing his own visions and ideas as it’s been many months of encouraging this little one who was frustrated as his hands couldn’t do what his thoughts could see. He only wanted to direct us to draw for him. Now I see this fantastic leap in self confidence blooming!
He has invented some fantastic trailer/home/hay makers and the theme is tractors and machinery, trains, maps, gnome homes in trees, apple orchards and landscapes. He’s not often drawing his own wheels or people yet which I find intriguing.
Each comes to these things at their own pace but I’m glad as I see it brings him much happiness and us much entertainment!
This picture was a surprise to me this morning. The piglet on the left is having a birthday and wears a ribbon around its neck.
Both children draw a lot while we travel, we have a good stock of visual diaries with quality paper and we have an extensive collection of Lyra pencils. I find the thicker pencils easier for little hands to hold and the smooth bright colours very satisfying. The enjoyment of the materials inspires more use.
I gained a lot of confidence drawing alongside Lily as she grew and now with Cedar. The children don’t need a perfect replica of something, they just need a suggestion and their imagination fills the rest. I learnt to draw like a child again and it’s brought me a lot of happiness and a fun connection with my children.
Even after years in art school I needed to de program and lose the critic. So many of us are thinking “well, I can’t draw” do you want your child to think this also about themselves? I was determined not to say “I can’t draw” in front of my child but to say, well I will have a try, and be able to laugh if it turns out oddly and have another go or ask my child for ideas. Begin with them as they start to scribble at age 2, mimic your child, for they are free. Look to nature for simple gestures, a grassy field, a tree. Then put a swing in the tree or an apple. And so grow slowly. It takes a lot of slow to grow, I heard this recently.
My people began as stick figures and gradually became 3 dimensional as I drew more and more with Lily. The children also like simple art they can mimic. To just sit with them and begin putting color down can begin a new pleasure (and healing) for you both.
What are your children drawing?
What are you drawing?
it’s been a long time since i’ve archived Lily’s art so here are a bunch for her fans x
On Cedar’s request. Lily and Cedar with his favorite birds. Blue Fairy Wrens and the brown Fairy Wren girls and some babies.
Lydia had an ice-skating 10th birthday party! such a great experience Lily has been longing for since I told her stories from my childhood ice experiences.
a Family portrait.
Lily has an incredible connection with birds. She talks with the kookaburras each morning and has names for those whose call she recognises. at the river a kookaburra alighted less than a foot away and connected with her for some long moments before returning above us and watching our fireside rest. Lily revealed that morning she had asked the kookaburras to come close to her, when she heard them singing in the dawn. Biscuit, her pet as she crowned the river kookaburra.
the following three illustrations are from summer in Tasmania, we where exploring The Norse Myths for Lily’s main lesson and enjoying the legends and the creation concepts. Lily and her dragon. Yggdrasil tree of creation. The creation of man and woman from an Ash tree and an Elm tree.
a fairy house. my guess is that’s lily upstairs reading..
during the genie days… Ringo my miniature Genie is the caption.
Cedar is becoming a fine artist in his own right. drawing brings us all together at times. a happy squishy moment for me to witness.
x
Drawn After visiting Jugiong on the Murrumbidgee river and reading stories about bushrangers in the area in the late 1860’s. as we left town the Yass-jugiong-Gundagai mail coach pulled up at the pub drawn by two grey horses. Happy lily!
You can see more of Lily’s illustrations over on the L’illustrations page.
Lily captured this family portrait, but she could not make the two children fairies sit still for the image!!
I really love this one. What a sweet reflection of our family. The ripples in the water are a delicate touch.
Xx
A few additions to L’illustrations
A friend gifted lily an insect drawing book which guided the dragonfly.
RosaLindenTree 