The Mischievous Mommy

A Collaboration with my Toddler

by Eve & Ruth Oosterman

Eve is obsessed, and I mean obsessed, with every single Octopus she sees. We make up stories on the daily and do so by incorporating the things we saw and did that day. Inevitably, Eve ends up being the heroine of the story and saves the day by making friends with the villain (by persuading them to change their ways.) Her latest and favorite story is that of the Sea Monster Octopus.

It all began one day when Princess Eve decided she no longer wanted to be a princess. I mean, why on earth would you want to be a princess when you could be a PIRATE!? So off she went to find her very own pirate ship and gathered a loyal and boisterous crew to join. Many adventures they had, whether the high seas or monsters, they overcame them all and soon Captain Eve's reputation was known and feared by all. 

One day though, on a day like no other, everything changed. As Captain Eve's eyes scanned the horizon she noticed the strangest of clouds with an odd, dark, stormy purple hue to them. The wind began to pick up as the clouds raced towards them and the calm sea began to ripple, and ripple, until sea foaming waves began gnawing at Eve's ship. Knowing something was amiss she called to her crew to stand their ground. All of a sudden, out from the crashing waves, came the longest tentacle she had ever seen. She watched as it ever so slowly climbed into the air, soon joined by several others. She peeled her eyes away from the tentacles and looked straight ahead and found herself staring directly into the eye of a giant sea monster. The famous and feared Octopus seemed to peer into her very soul and for once she had no idea what to do! 

Eve heard a deep, bellowing sound that shook them like an earthquake. A few minutes passed and all you could hear was the knees of Eve's entire crew knocking together. THERE! There it was again, that sound that shook the world!

Eve couldn't believe her ears and took a step forward," Excuse me, did you just say... Hello?"
"Yes" thundered the Octopus, "I did." 
"Oh. Hello Mr. Octopus." Eve replied, "Might I be so bold to ask what you want from us?"
"You are the very first person to ask me this," a surprised Octopus said, "thank you for taking the time to see past my intimidating appearance. Every other ship tries to run away from my hugs and get all tangled up in my tentacles, but you ... you actually listened to me!"
Eve could not believe her ears, Mr. Octopus didn't want to harm them, he was just lonely and wanted friends. "We shall be your friends, Mr. Octopus!" And so, after some convincing, her crew saw what Eve saw. They saw a gentle, giant Octopus who was just simply misunderstood, and by not judging him on his looks they all gained a fabulous friend.
Mr. Octopus, Eve and her crew spent the rest of the day enjoying each other's company, he even let them use his giant tentacles as water slides! From that day on, their Sea Monster friend joined them on many adventures and their friendship was one that legends are made of.

THE END


Eve and I created this story as we painted "Sea Monster," and has become one of her favorite stories. Collaborating through stories is so simple yet amazing, you just begin a story and pause at the end of every sentence to let them incorporate a new aspect. Between the two of you, you direct the story through many different pathways to create something completely unique. It reminds me so much of the story games you play in camp when you are little.

The painting began as most of our recent pieces do, with a simple pencil sketch. I always ask Eve what colors we should use and she pours them out of the tubes onto the palette. After a year of collaborating I have discovered the best way to keep her incorporation at the forefront without taking it over, which is sometimes very easy to do. It is difficult to balance what you put in to ensure it doesn't overpower your partner's work. What I have begun to do is wait for her to put color down, then I will take a wet paintbrush to dab some of the color and use that to paint with. This way I am not introducing any new or distracting colors, it is all Eve's color scheme. My favorite part of this piece was her dark purple clouds and large blue waves and for her I know she loves painting in all the little fish.

I do hope you enjoy this piece! This will most likely be our last collaboration for the year as the next two weeks will be a whirlwind of family, friends and holidays. We wish you a very Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas and New Year. Thank you for following our journey thus far and hope you continue to do so in 2016!

Don't forget to watch the video timelapse!!


https://youtu.be/VI_OM_zQBsg

A Collaboration with my Toddler

by Eve & Ruth Oosterman

VIDEO TIMELAPSE of "ADRIFT"

A Collaboration with my Toddler

by Eve & Ruth Oosterman

CONTEST ENTRIES

"What Do YOU See?!





On August 15th I began a contest in which anyone could participate by entering their art, the catch was, that everyone had to use the very same drawing (pictured above). The drawing was created by Eve using her toes and was used to collaborate an original, "Collaboration with my Toddler" that we later named, "Edge of the Earth." 

(Watch the time lapse)

A Collaboration with my Toddler

by Eve & Ruth Oosterman




"Into the Wild" started off with Eve and I playing around with some acrylic on a wooden panel and slowly morphed into a new collaboration. I had broken out a bunch of plastic utensils with the intent to show Eve how to create texture and patterns using tools other than a paintbrush. Although at first  intrigued, she quickly explained she would rather just use a paintbrush and I had to leave it at that. As a parent you quickly learn that lessons are better learned when the desire is present, forcing knowledge is the quickest way to turn them off of something! 

This led to me playing around with a plastic knife, mixing colors Eve had picked, to create the grass at the bottom. As with most of our collaborations I had no idea where this one was headed but something seemed strikingly familiar about it! As the paint dried and the more I stared, I saw a similarity to "Under the Red Birch Tree," and a forest grew before my very eyes. The inspiration for this piece had been so clearly laid out through Eve's wonderful strokes of paint and the stories we have been creating together.

Bear with me as we go off topic (although I promise it relates).... Eve isn't necessarily a picky eater, but she IS a slow one. Slow isn't even the right word... let's just say you pretty much have to tie her down to the chair to get her to eat, as her mind goes a mile a minute. It simply does not make sense to sit still and eat when she could grab and go do a million other things, she loves multitasking... which leads to crumbs galore and the unfortunate discovery of "leftovers" hidden all around our home. O joy. However, I recently made a fantastic discovery on how to get this kid to finally eat at the table!!!  We have now turned meal time into story time!

At the beginning of our meal we determine the characters or our story, usually the lead role goes to Princess Eve, and her two knights named after her best friends join her on these quests. I will begin spinning a new tale and she will add her input in between each bite, guiding the story's direction and leading to all sorts of adventures. Of course, these stories have multiple cliffhangers that conveniently happen when she has stopped eating, if she wants the story to continue she must take several more bites.

I have never seen her eat so much!

To get back onto topic, these stories we have weaved through verbally collaborating have begun to inspire our visual collaborations. Princess Eve's adventures almost always happen in the dark and magical forest filled with creatures, both good and bad. It is a forest unlike any other with trees that move and talk, clinging to stories of their own that beg to be told. In one of our stories, Eve must save them from certain doom and so she releases her beloved butterflies into the wild to help her, together they save the day! (One day I hope to actually write out all of these collaborated stories to create children's books, illustrated by Eve and I... BUT one thing at a time right :P )

The girl in the painting is wearing red on Eve's request. That morning Eve decided to dress herself (as you can see below) and had chosen her favorite red dress with plenty of accessories to compliment. Eve watched as I painted the piece, providing her input, and asked that the girl be dressed just like Princess Eve. It is always important to me to not only include her vision, but to keep as much of her brush strokes visible as possible. For this piece I tried to limit the number of branches and trunks so the magnificent colors she chose could shine through.

A Collaboration with my Toddler

by Eve and Ruth Oosterman



It is has been quite some time since Eve and I collaborated using one of her Black Pen drawings so I thought I would give it try. These collaborations can be a little tricky since the pen marks immediately begin to bleed when water touches them. While it can allow for beautiful and spontaneous effects, it also creates a fine line between collaborating with her drawing and the ink bleeding into invisibility. It's a line I am still learning the dance to, I love collaborating with her and always want to make sure her work is represented, which is one of the reasons we began searching for new ways to collaborate.

This drawing had an amusing start seeing how Eve actually drew it with her toes!! My mom stayed with us for a week and she is notorious for her strangely talented toes... yes, I said toes. She pretty much has four hands, that is how capable she is at using them to do a variety of activities one would not normally do with their feet. Drawing and writing are two of said activities, which of course, absolutely fascinated Eve. It will come at no surprise that since my mom's visit, Eve has been trying to use her toes to do pretty much everything, including drawing this piece of art.


The longer I stared at this drawing the more I saw a ship begin to form. Something about it reminded me of a broken ship headed to the edge of a waterfall, perhaps even the edge of the earth.

Growing up one of my absolute favorite books to read was the Narnia series, I couldn't get enough of them. I had flashbacks to the adventures of Prince Caspian out at sea searching for the seven lost lords of Narnia in "The Voyage of the Dawn Treader." This adventure filled quest came to an end when their final task required them to sail to the edge of the earth and leave one crew member behind. They sailed through all sorts of enchantments and trickery in order to reach the edge where the water became so shallow the ship could go no further, and dear Reepicheep, the mouse, continued on alone.

That beloved story became the inspiration for this piece as I imagined Prince Caspian's mangled ship sailing out of a cloud of enchantment only to find themselves literally at the edge of the earth.



Don't forget to check out the Video Time Lapse down below to see how Eve used her toes!
http://youtu.be/2cUeCJbQTik


Buy a print: https://www.etsy.com/listing/243188595/edge-of-the-earth-toddler-collaboration?ref=shop_home_active_1

STAY TUNED TO FIND OUT HOW TO WIN A SIGNED PRINT OF THIS PIECE AS WELL AS AN ORIGINAL PAINTING BY EVE!

I'll be hosting a contest shortly where you can win the above and the way to enter will be to collaborate with a copy of Eve's original sketch!! I am so excited to see what unique pieces come to exist through the beauty of each individual's imagination matched with Eve's!! 

A Collaboration with my Toddler

by Eve and Ruth Oosterman



It has been just about a year since Eve and I began to seriously collaborate together and we have come such a long way from where we started. I am so blessed to not only be able to share one of my greatest passions with her, but have her fully embrace every aspect of it. What once began from her scribbling with a black marker and using watercolor to create collaborated paintings has now evolved into something so much more complex. Although she provided me with inspiration, color and theme suggestions in the beginning using the limited vocabulary of a two year old, we are now able to sit and paint simultaneously as we discuss the art piece's vision and journey together.

 I have loved being able to connect with Eve on such an intense, creative level that has bonded us in ways I never thought possible. Along with those priceless memories there has been an invaluable amount of teaching and guidance, from Eve. She has taught me how to accept my "mistakes" as part of the artistic process, to see and use colors in ways I never thought possible and most of all patience.

When we were painting "Red Lips"I , ironically, had to keep mine zipped shut. (which is not an easy feat for me) When I saw her take the red paint and cover up the lips followed by using black (her favorite color) all over the face I felt myself cringe. As an artist you can have such a clear cut idea of what you want that it is easy to forget and ignore all of the other amazing possibilities, she is my constant reminder of what could be. I kept my mouth firmly shut and continued to paint at her side, reminding myself that she sees things in ways I never could or will.

I am so thankful I kept my big mouth shut. Although it was far from my original vision, the painting was miles beyond what I thought possible in all the best ways. Eve made this piece sing with color, energy and passion in ways I couldn't, just by using her beautiful and creative mind.

 It may be hard to let go but that is the beauty in collaborating. It is going on a journey with someone else and taking turns holding the reins with no judgement or criticism, but simply being open to any and all possibilities. It requires patience, an open mind and the ability to compromise, all skills that I definitely need to work on and so Eve has truly become my teacher.

I only hope that one day she can grasp just how much she has taught me in life.

So here is what we created side by side.

Make sure to watch the Time Lapse Video to see how "Red Lips" was created.
http://youtu.be/QsVMxPfURmM



Prints will be available through our Etsy shop: https://www.etsy.com/shop/EvesImagination?ref=hdr_shop_menu 

A Collaboration with my Toddler

by Eve and Ruth Oosterman

A Collaboration with my Toddler

by Eve and Ruth Oosterman

Here is the time lapse video of "Blue Eyes" coming into creation, Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tReSYbqIkKQ