Dairy Delight Dogs

This is a book that I've loved forever, ever since I bought it for my oldest daughter from a book order:

It's a sweet little story about a dog who decides an ice cream parlor should be his home.  I've wanted to use it in my art classroom for years, and decided this is the year!  Reviewing neutral colors is part of our second grade curriculum, so it fit in nicely.
To begin, students used their sketchbooks to draw things (with crayon) that were neutral in color.  They brainstormed and shared and drew.  Then I gave each student a 12 x 18 white paper and had them write their name in the corner with crayon.  While they were writing, I gave each student a single half-sheet of newspaper.  We drew large bumps with our crayon on our newspaper (for a dog body), cut them out and glued them onto our white paper.  Next we drew large rounded edged triangles on our newspaper (for the head) and cut them out and glued them on.  Finally, we drew small rounded-edge triangles (two of them, for ears), cut them out and glued them on.  Once everything was glued down, it was time to paint the background.  Students got paint shirts on and we reviewed correct painting techniques.  I gave each table yellow, turquoise and pink, giving students the choice of mixing colors for the background or painting one solid color straight from the bottle. Two classes had enough time to read Lisa Campbell Ernst's charming book at this point, before art was over for the day.
The next time students came to art, they got paint shirts on immediately and reviewed correct painting techniques again before painting their dogs:

This student wasn't there for the background painting day,
but it's still adorable.

 At this point, the personality of their painting style and dogs really started coming through!  The last class got to read the book at this point (and laughed at all the appropriate places).
The only thing left to do was to use oil pastel for details and give each one of our dogs their own ice cream cones.  For the past few years my sixth graders have made their own sketchbooks using cereal boxes, and I had lots of leftover pieces I put to use for making the ice cream cone.  Students used patterns I made to trace cone shapes on the brown side of the old cereal boxes and used oil pastel to add details:

Finally, students used Model Magic and Cloud Clay to make the "famous vanilla-chocolate swirl." I don't know what happens with Cloud Clay sometimes, but this is what my light brown looked like when I opened it:

It's super sticky and is reminiscent of baby poop.

I decided to open another package, and believe it or not, it was even worse.  I really tried and showed it to my classes, and students decided vanilla was just fine for their dog:

This student added marker to make it a 'swirl'.

I love this dog so much!

It's a blueberry flavored cone with a double ice cream!

This dog has such a personality!

These are going to look ah-mazing in the hall!