ABOUT

////////////////////////// ART AND CRAFT CLASSES FOR BIGS AND LITTLES //////////////////////////

Our goal is to expand creativity and create real art with kids--not stuff that ends up in the trash after a brief stint on the fridge!

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I’m Annie Kershisnik Blake, and I’m runnin’ this joint in the shade of Y mountain in Provo. I blog at Annilygreen.com about things I love and things I make. Bear Cave Studios is a place for people who appreciate the Annilygreen style enough to send their kids (or themselves) to make art. I automatically like these people.

This all started at the beginning of 2012. My 3-year-old daughter and I took an art class through the city--Art Discovery--and it was fun, but it also sort of broke my heart.

See, one day, the lovely teacher passed out clay for the kids to roll out and press their handprints into. I cut the clay into a square, and my daughter took the pieces I cut off and was making a structure—very focused and clearly enjoying herself. While I completed the assignment, carving her name and the date by her handprints, someone asked her what she was making. It's a bear cave, she said. 

The teacher asked us to put any extra clay back in the bag. I wanted to let her keep it, but we were the only ones with scraps, so I felt singled out, and a weird sort of shyness/desire to blend in took over. So I took her cave. She asked to keep it, but I took it. Squished it. Put it with the extra clay.

But it wasn't extra! It was a bear cave. It was "art discovery" and she was the one who got it.

The point is, kids are creative. They are artists, every single one. Fostering that creativity and teaching good design is important for their brains and their happiness, and creating with them is just fun. So. That's what we're going to do! We’ll throw in a few awesome craft classes for grown-ups too—don’t worry.