Your Favorite Artist

My kids are constantly begging to paint {who do they get that from?}. And it's a pain to get out the paints, the brushes, the paper, the cups of water, the old shirts, and so on, so usually I try to think of something less time consuming and messy {Why don't you go collect rocks? Lots of them.}. But who am I to deprive my own children of such a gratifying experience, especially when I needed something to fill the empty space on the top of the entertainment center in our family room? Genius!

The nearest Michaels is about 35 minutes away, and it was worth the special trip to pick up four 18x24 inch blank canvases and some extra paint brushes. Paint was not on my shopping list. I don't know what kind of paint artists usually use on canvas, but my artists were going to use house paint because 1. We have tons, and 2. The colors they'd be using were colors used throughout the house - instant match!

Oh how happy were the kids when I announced our new project. I set out five or six brushes and bowls of paint and gave each kid a canvas. My only stipulation was that I wanted the entire canvas covered - no white patches please!



Pure joy!





Look at the texture in this piece!

The finished product? Happy mom and happy kids and happy wall space!

So for less than a total of $30, I have three pieces of original artwork. And, yes, I did say I picked up four canvases. One is tucked away, waiting for the day Louisa says, "I want to paint something."