Organising Children's Artwork
Sorting, Storing and Sharing Children’s Paintings and Drawings
Young children love craft projects, and are often prolific artists. Here are some ideas for displaying and storing children's art.
Young children love to create their own art masterpieces. Children attending pre-school or day care and infants’ school students regularly bring home artwork to add to those completed at home. Storing or displaying everything is impossible and without a system in place, these beautiful artworks can simply become another contributor to general household clutter.
Displaying Children’s Artwork
Children love to see their pictures on display. The refrigerator door is a convenient space for this, however at best there is only room for a few pieces. A fridge covered with magnets and paper can also create a messy, cluttered feeling in the kitchen.
Paintings and drawings can be secured to a fishing line or wire secured along a free wall, such as a hallway, with wooden or decorative pegs. Once the line is full, older drawings can be replaced with new ones.
An art gallery wall is a creative way to display children’s artwork. Use a removable adhesive putty such as Blu-Tac to fix artwork to the wall. Remember that these adhesives may leave marks on some surfaces, so consider preparing the wall with a suitable paint to minimise damage.
Special artwork can be framed to decorate walls in living areas, hallways, or bedrooms.
Useful Craft Projects
One way to reduce artwork clutter is to give children craft projects that have a purpose.
- Decorate wrapping paperChildren who love to paint will be happy if supplied with a roll of plain coloured or brown paper to decorate. Avoid gloss paper. Unroll the paper, allow them to paint or decorate and then re-roll once the paper is dry. Large paintings (A3 sized paper for example) are often large enough to use as wrapping paper. Small pages (A4 or smaller) can be used as they are or trimmed to make gift tags or cards. Alternatively, buy blank cards (plain inside and out) and allow children to decorate them for special occasions.
- Laminate artwork to create a placemat or bookmark. Create a Christmas art project as a gift for grandparents or other family members by creating a laminated placemat or bookmark
- Embellish an object. Hardware and craft stores often have a variety of plain homewares and craft items that can be decorated. These include picture frames, tissue box covers, and jewellery boxes.
- Make a jigsaw puzzle. Draw a picture of family or grandparents and make into a jigsaw. Place into a plain gift box, which children can also decorate. Some craft shops have blank jigsaw cards that can be used for this if desired.
- Decorate a calendar to give as a Christmas gift. Create a calendar by printing calendar pages and drawing a picture to go with each month. Alternatively, personalise a bought calendar by decorating the pages and adding activities for specific days throughout the year .Activities could include: sleep in, walk along the beach, go out for coffee, visit your grandchildren, read a book etc.
- Fabric art. Decorate a shirt or calico library bag with fabric paint or fabric crayons.
- Transfer the art onto something else. Many printing businesses have facilities for decorating mouse mats, coffee mugs and other items that can be given as gifts.
Storing Children’s Artwork
Purchase a document folder to store the best artwork. Label and keep on a bookcase.
For prolific artists, provide a storage box for their finished artwork. At the end of each month, go through the box with them to select a set number of pieces that will be kept. Dispose of the others by finding other uses (see above) or discarding them.
A scrapbook for toddlers is a great way to keep a record of their earliest artistic attempts. This book can then be easily stored with other mementos.
