Who says art has to end after the project is complete?
We made a guitar Valentine for the Farmer (silly me forgot to take a picture of the final project and it is now at his office) and painted the pieces. Sweet P loved to paint so I knew she'd enjoy making this. What I didn't know is that she'd have more fun cleaning up the aftermath of the art than she did actually making the art.
I laid down a drop cloth (it's a plastic sheet from a Potty Party we had last year) and when we were finished, I asked her to help me clean it up. I handed her a wet washcloth and she happily scrubbed off the paint that had dripped onto the sheet during our project.
Sweet P LOVES playing in the kitchen sink and would happily wash dishes all day long (think I can bottle that for the teenage years?) so I asked her to pull a chair over so we could wash the paint brushes. This turned out to be the highlight of Sweet P's day! She poured out the water we had used to rinse the paintbrush while we painted and after we'd cleaned up our breakfast dishes, I plugged the drain.
I handed her the foam brush and watched as she marveled over the water changing color while she rinsed the foam brush.
Once the brush was clean she moved on to the smaller brush and said, "He is taking a shower!" as she rinsed it with the sprayer.
Sweet P also loves to pour so I handed her our painting cup, her pitcher, a measuring spoon and medicine cup for some water transfer fun.
I'm slowly learning to encourage Sweet P to be part of the entire process because each step of creating art has something to teach her.
