Ive decided to write a blog post each fortnight with our Funky Fingers activity. I hope this will be useful, but will also be a great reference for me to nip back and remember what we’ve done…

Happy Sunday, everyone! Man, I can't believe the weekend always flies by SO quickly! It's hard to believe that tomorrow is already Monday. At least I have The Walking Dead to look forward to tonight. Although, I can't believe it's already the season finale! AMC needs to have their shows last longer!!! :( Well, today I have another polish brand that is new to me - Fresh Paint. These polishes are sold at Five Below and all have a 3-free formula. The following photos are of the Once Upon A Time Collection *I think*. I bought these a couple of weeks ago and took a picture of the sign, but must have accidentally deleted it off of my phone. Boooo. Check out the photos! FYI - All of these polishes are shimmery and dry semi-matte, but since I love shiny-ness, all of my pictures have top coat. :) The first polish up is Enchanted. This polish is a beautiful light pink. It's so girly - I love it! The following photos are of two coats of Enchanted and one coat of Seche Vite. The second polish I have for you is Hakuna Matata - only named after the best Disney movie, ever! This polish is a dusty orange. Orange is definitely my least favorite color, but I really like it more than expected. The following is two coats of Hakuna Matata and one coat of Seche Vite. Finally I have Glass Slipper. This is probably my favorite of the three polishes! I just love the light blue! It reminds me a lot of Cinderella by Sinful Colors. I may do a comparison on here the next few days to see. I believe this main difference is that Cinderella actually has pink shimmer, whereas this one has a blue shimmer. Check it out! So what do y'all think? I really liked these and definitely thought they were worth the money! The formula on all three polishes was good and they were all easily opaque in two coats. You can get these at Five Below - 3 for $5! BTW, when you have these on you can see the shimmer - especially in the light! It was tricky to catch it on camera.

(str8fromadrive4fingerpeopleonflickr111605) My finger as as scarecrow. If the hat weren't "fringed", I would say Pilgrim. LOL Enjoy. If you even crack the slightest bit of a grin, would you please post a comment? Maybe someone could design some paper doll type clothes for Finger People. This photos addresses "My Life As" someone who loves to be playful and silly as long as it doesn't cause anybody any harm. I think this group could be a lot of fun, and it is inexpensive. The photo also addresses "My Story", not only because of what I have written above, but I will add a bit of information. This outfit started out as using some old pill foil punch packets as a shiny foil outfit for what I really had in my head was the "Tin Man" from "Wizard of Oz". I put it and some other stuff on a Fisher Price Little Person, and thought my friends would "rave" about it. They didn't say very much. Later on, I realized, that just because it was silver foil/metal colored didn't make him a "Tin Man". He actually looked more like the "Scarecrow". Get it notarized right here, if you want, because I am admitting I made a mistake. LOL For Snap Game on 121005 this is one guy in a silvery costume. No alcohol at this party.

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you know that I love papier-mache, but the truth is, I also adore plaster bandage. While there are similarities (use them both as a final 'skin' over an armature) there are many differences as well that make one material or the other better for certain projects. For example, there's the smooth texture of papier-mache vs the rougher texture of the plaster bandage gauze. The big bonus about plaster bandage is that it sets quickly, whereas papier-mache takes a while to dry. So a project like this one would not have been possible with papier-mache. Most of the photos in this post are from one of my earliest blog posts, 4 years ago, and the rest are from a post in 2013. I'm sharing them today as the first of several posts that will bring back some of my favorite projects, techniques, and more. The project is begun by casting a finger. The only finger the kids were allowed to cast was their pointer (for obvious reason). To cast the finger, coat it first lightly with vaseline. Then wrap cut pieces of moistened plaster bandage for at least a couple of layers to make it strong. (We pre-cut the plaster bandage into pieces maybe 1"x2" or 3".) Remove from finger when dry. Most of my students were able to make two finger casts in one 40 minute class, if they followed directions. How you set up for plaster bandage makes a HUGE difference. We cover all tables with large sheets of paper or cheapo plastic dropcloths that can be discarded. Sorry, this isn't my most eco-friendly project. All materials - scissors, plaster bandage, and water bowls - are kept in one location and returned there at the end of art, so that no painting water bowls are used by mistake, or good scissors. (I have junky scissors designated just for plaster bandage. You don't want kids ripping the strips.) The cut strips are placed in microwave dinner dishes, in the center of the tables. Water is placed in containers near the students. By the way, the warmer the water, the better/faster the plaster bandage will set!!! By putting the bandage in the middle of the table, and the water on the sides, basically you prevent water from getting unnecessarily dripped into (and ruining) a bunch of plaster bandage, which is too expensive to waste. Paper towels for blotting excess moisture are placed near the students. To the left above is snowboarder Shawn White before he cut his long red hair. The finger casts are left to dry, and in the next class, the real work begins. I plug in several low temp hot glue stations, and put out a heap of materials, including pipe cleaners, cereal box cardboard, and Styrofoam balls. If a Styrofoam ball is desired for the head, it is hot glued on for a temporary hold. Arms and legs might be added with pipe cleaners, getting glued on the back (two arms = one pipe cleaner piece). Wings would be cut out of cardboard. Kids are very ingenious about what to add to get the desired effect. (For example, beads make great 'boobies' for ballerinas and cheerleaders. I wish I had photos of them to show you!) *Note: the Mad Hatter in the photo above left is not complete. Somehow I never got a photo of the completed puppet. Below are an unfinished Elvis, and the 5th grade teacher who claims that Elvis is her husband. Once the features have been hot-glued on the finger cast, then it's time for another round of plaster bandage. We use it like tape, attaching permanently heads, wings, arms and more. The kids could choose to leave the pipe cleaners partly uncovered if they wanted to be able to bend them. *Note - you cannot hot glue onto wet plaster bandage. It has to be completely dry. Important - plaster bandage cleanup: pour water gently from containers into sink, leaving plaster sludge settled in the bottom of the water bowls. Do NOT pour it down the drain! Next class, the dried plaster can be tapped out of the bowls. All other materials are returned to starting location, and table coverings are rolling inwards from the edges and discarded. Tables are swept as needed. Do not sponge if you can avoid it; you'll leave a white haze on your tables! Next up is time to paint! We used Nasco's Bulk-Krylic for a nice result. Once the painting is done, then the kids can embellish, using fabric, yarn, buttons, tissue paper, wooden sticks, colored foam, glitter glue, wiggle eyes, and so much more. Here's the sun. There was also a moon. The Easter Bunny! An Egyptian mummy case My students always loved making these puppets, so much, in fact, that they built puppet theaters, and even once held a puppet wedding. (Oh why didn't I take photos??) They made book characters, movie characters, every animal imaginable, crazy creatures, and even puppets of favorite teachers! Below is a box of some of my (many) samples, in many different stages. There's Professor Dumbledore, a frog, an eagle, a penguin, and out of sight, a ballerina, a teddy bear, a rock 'n roll band, and more.

Today we are going to celebrate the unsung heroes that are... our fingers. I think it's pretty safe to say that all articles of Hongkiat are written by

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