This Grandma loves to read the New York Times real estate section. I have done so for most of my adult life. One of my favorite recurring articles is about going into someone’s home and viewing their favorite things through beautifully staged photographs of magnificent New York apartments.
Who would have thought such a recent article could be the inspiration for a great Mother’s Day activity to do with grandchildren. In one of the photographs, on the wall was a framed and matted collage of owner’s children’s artwork. Of course, it was compiled by a famous artist friend of the homeowner, but it clearly was gorgeous. . . .and doable. The best ideas for a grandma project are ones we can make WITH grandchildren. This project is extra special because we can complete it with grandchildren of any age.
Our own grandchildren make us “presents” of artwork. We have framed them individually in inexpensive lucite frames all over our home. Now with four growing grandchildren, we have so many that we keep only one lucite frame for each grandchild in various areas.
Other pieces of artwork sit in drawers and cabinets. The collage of grandchildren’s artwork is a great way to exhibit many pieces of art in a creative and artistic way.
If you go not have artwork with which to create a collage now, for Mother’s Day, ask the grandchildren to go through artwork they have already created and add two or three new pieces they would like to have part of a collage. If they do not know the word, ‘collage,” they now have a new vocabulary word, and it is easy to find pictures of collages on line.
We grandmas do not need to be an artist to create a collage. Yes, it may involve the grandchildren cutting up their artwork in a cloud shape or a shape of their favorite animal or object to make it more creative, or not. There are many on line instuctions for creation of a collage. Just put into google, “how to make a collage of artwork on a canvas.” See for example.
We do not even need to make a collage of grandchildren’s artwork. We can take photographs and selfies and make a photograph collage. As a grandma, I do annual photograph albums for each grandchild and there are many pictures from which the grandchildren can select their favorite photographs through the years for this Grandma to duplicate and for them to add to a collage. We have all on the computer and we can make a collage on Shutterfly and similar websites. There are 524 options for collage on Shutterfly, even making a mousepad!
This art project is a great one for anytime, but with Mother’s Day upon us, there is no better time to start. Even if we are not inclined to do this project with grandchildren, we can forward this post to the mothers of our grandchildren and have them make a collage for the grandchildren to give us for Mother’s Day. After all, they are always asking what we want for Mother’s Day and now we can quickly answer.
Happy Mother’s Day 2016!
Joy,
Mema
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