A while back we started making tree books. It’s basically this book with  a lot of things inside and outside like poems, arts and crafts, and more. We got help from an artist named Peg Gignoux. When we finished we got to put them in an art gallery! I’m going to tell you how we made it and the process we went though.

At first we started screen printing and making blue skies. Screen printing is where you take this stencil and take paint and use this tool to spread the paint around which prints words on are trees. We also painted blue skies for the inside of our book.

Next we took the blue sky paper and started folding it. We folded it in a way so that there is a secret hole in the middle where we can put pictures and stuff about us in.

Next my favorite part was akua printing. A lot of people don’t know what this is. I didn’t know ether. Basically it is this special ink and pad where you put the ink on the pad and spread it and it won’t dry on the pad. What we did was we took plants and printed them using the ink. It was really  cool.

Next we collaged our book. We took the akua prints and glued them on. We put them on the inside and outside of our book. I also put them in the secret area of our book. It looked really nice after that.

Then we added pockets. We put 3 pockets on our book. I put them all in the secret area. Then we put are akua prints on them so it blended in with the background. Later we would put stuff in them.

After that we did a salute to my roots writing. Basically you make a writing about who you honor. It can be several people. I did my mom, dad, and sister. It really felt good writing about how nice my family is.

Next we did a life list. Basically it’s this list of thing we want to do. It doesn’t need to be realistic like you can put to take over the world in your list. It’s just thing you want to do. I wrote a lot and some things I already accomplished!

After that we did a poem. It was about COVID. We wrote was we wouldn’t take for granted and when COVID will be over, what did we develop. It reminded me when I was writing this what life was like before COVID.

Then we made a wish. This was based off a book called Wishtree that were reading. What we did was write our wish on a ribbon and tied it to a tree branch. Mine was for COVID to be over. I hope for my wish to happen soon.

We also read Wish Tree by Katherine Applegate. It’s this really good book that I recommend reading. It is really touching and it is about friendship. I really love reading it and it reminds me of what good friends I have.

When we were done are books got to be displayed in a gallery! It was so cool and we got to see the, on display. It was displayed at the Frank Gallery. It’s so cool knowing that we got are project in a gallery and artist try and get there’s in a gallery to but sometimes can’t. Here is the link to its website:https://www.frankisart.com/

Also a big thanks to Peg Gignoux for taking her time to help us with are books. She helped me a lot with mine and mine probably wouldn’t look very good without her help. Here is the link to her website:https://gignouxart.com/