If someone were to ask me 10 years ago what my ideal job was, my answer was always “professional artist”. I grew up with art, spent my high school years pulling all nighters as I finished paintings after inspiration struck me like lightning. Art was my life. In my late teens, and into my 20’s, I taught art classes to K-12 grade at a little art studio. I loved it, and I loved teaching the kids an appreciation for art. I wanted every kid walking out of the class feeling happy and confident over the process, and proud of the work they did. I loved my time there, loved spending those hours with the kids. Some would hug me as they left. It made me realize I wanted to be a parent some day.
Now that I have my own little kiddo, I’m so excited to work on art projects with her. I can’t wait to see what ideas come from her imagination, and how she utilizes the same tools I grew up with. I want her walls to be full of colors, shelves full of craft projects. I want her to have fun.
Today, I did a quick project with her. It was easy, and essentially mess free. The mess came from H poking a hole through the cling wrap.
I used cardboard, cling wrap, tape, Liquitex acrylic paint, and watercolor paper.
I taped the paper to the cardboard, then dropped various paint dollops all over. After that, I wrapped cling wrap over the sheet of paper, making sure it wrapped around to the backside of the cardboard. I taped it, a bit excessively, so there was no way paint could get out. A foolish endeavor.
And then I let H go to town on it. She enjoyed squishing the paint around, and really enjoyed stepping on it. We even got a car and bead in on the action. Lots of mixed media went into this. I loved seeing her manipulate the paint, as she watched, fascinated at how the colors changed.
My plan is to make a bunch of these to hang at H’s level, so she has some toddler friendly art to look at. She loves looking at the artwork that my father in law or I made, and I wanted a place for her to make a mark.
Next time, I’ll use thicker plastic, and thinner paint. This painting has been drying for over 18 hours, and still has more drying to do.