displaying kids' artwork

[z-girl]

I posted this on The Childhood Years and didn't get any responses, so I'll try you crafty women here!

How do you display your kids' stuff? DD is 2+ and loves painting, drawing, gluing, etc. My house is getting filled with artwork and I don't have a great way to display it. I was thinking of hanging a clothesline kinda thing on the wall in DD's playroom, but I want it to look nice. Any ideas on how to do this, or other suggestions of how to display artwork? A large corkboard?

Thanks!

[zealsmom]

We have an art wall in our kitchen, which is also where we keep art supplies. It is the pantry doors (basically an 8 foot by 8 foot area of wall) He chooses what will go up, and when there is no more room, what to replace. As we take things down we put them into a "portfolio" of sorts (a large blank book). It's becoming a nice collection. He is now almost 3.

[z-girl]

Sounds like a great set-up, zealsmom! Cool!

[pb_and_j]

I think the clothesline idea is a great one! You could use nice clothespins (your child could even paint them different colors) and hang up a lot of stuff like that. I saw an episode of Trading Spaces where they did that!

We use the fridge, sides of the pantry, and back of the kitchen cabinets to display art. I want to put a clothesline thing in the playroom, but haven't gotten around to it yet.

[intymama]

This idea came to me last night as I was setling down to sleep. What if you get some clear plastic table cover, the one that you can get in the fabric store by the yard and put your child art under it for everyone to look at and comment at mealtime?

Kisses

[cj'smommy]

Connor isn't old enough for artwork just yet, but I know what I'd like to do!

They sell a magnetic "paint" that you put on the wall, and can paint over it with regular paint. That way you can have a large area that is magnetized and display artwork. I'd like to do that in his bedroom.

[Jillerina]

I've put up a clothes line type think in DD's room. I used picture wire and sewed a sleeve for it and bunched it up (like a scrunchy). This way the line looks quite nice then I bought some clips from Ikea that are supposed to be used to hang curtains. I really like the final look of our fancy clothes line!

Laurel

[Mama Lion]

Originally posted by cj'smommy
They sell a magnetic "paint" that you put on the wall, and can paint over it with regular paint. That way you can have a large area that is magnetized and display artwork. I'd like to do that in his bedroom.

Oooh, what a cool idea! Thanks for passing it on!

[Joi]

I just finished a project for River's art. What I did was this.....


I went to my local crafty store and bought some of those cardboard picture matting things and painted them in bright primary colors and tacked them to a wall on the top and bottom leaving the sides open to slide in artwork. Now when she brings new art home or completes another masterpiece I can change them out and they are framed like at a gallery (this tickles her a lot)

[michelle1k]

Oooh, I made an art clip rack like this one:
http://ww1.potterybarnkids.com/cat/p...art&gids=pk089 just the other day for under $10 and feel **so** proud of myself!!!!

I bought a 4' piece of molding at the local hardware store ($3- and-change), 5 bullclips and blue craft acrylic paint for 99c on sale at a craft store.

I painted the molding by rubbing on the paint with a rag a little at a time and when almost dry (you have to work quickly!) rubbed it off a little (more on the edges to give it a vintage look).

Then I glued on the bullclips (spaced out evenly) and had my dh drill two holes and hang it in the corridor outside our kitchen (high traffic area) where my son's beautiful drawings and paintings will be much admired. :-)

Warmly,
Michelle in NY - mama to sweet ds (5) and dd (16 months)

[Bearsmama]

DS isn't quite of the art-making age, but I just read of someone taking their kids' artwork and putting it under a plastic table cloth and thenusing little clips to kind of hold it in place. So,everytime you eat, you can all see the pieces.

[MamaMonica]

My 4 year old is very prolific and has been since 18 months- we just tape it up on the walls and take down the old stuff after awhile. Her latest is to draw, color and cut out animals and these look good on the white wall in the hallway and dining room (not very formal, but fun).

[Mama Lori]

At IKEA they have magnetic strips that come with cute magnets for hanging artwork. Each strip is about 24 inches long and comes with 3 magnets - only 99 cents! We hang ours in the kitcen, above Eli's art table.

[pb_and_j]

Originally posted by michelle1k
Oooh, I made an art clip rack like this one:
http://ww1.potterybarnkids.com/cat/p...art&gids=pk089 just the other day for under $10 and feel **so** proud of myself!!!!

I bought a 4' piece of molding at the local hardware store ($3- and-change), 5 bullclips and blue craft acrylic paint for 99c on sale at a craft store.

I painted the molding by rubbing on the paint with a rag a little at a time and when almost dry (you have to work quickly!) rubbed it off a little (more on the edges to give it a vintage look).

Then I glued on the bullclips (spaced out evenly) and had my dh drill two holes and hang it in the corridor outside our kitchen (high traffic area) where my son's beautiful drawings and paintings will be much admired. :-)

Michelle~ That is a great idea! Did you get the clips at the hardware store too? How did you glue them to the wood? I really like that idea!

[amanecer]

At the beginning of the year we made this hang up thing out of burlap and two medium sized sticks that we found on one of our nature walks.

The sticks are probably a foot and a half long and a half inch circumference. Then we took the burlap and cut five strips 2 inches wide and two feet long.

We glued one end of the burlap around the top stick, and the other end around the bottom stick. We did that with the five strips where all of them would be next to each other but leaving some space between them.

Then I tied string around the left and right sides of the top stick and voila! We hung it on the wall in the kitchen and we use clothespins to hang the art work on the burlap panels. I made sure to hang it really low for them to see and to hang whatever they feel the need to hang.
I think it was by far the cheapest thing we ever made, and the most fun to collect materials for!