drawanyway.com

I’ve had sole charge of my two-and-three-quarters daughter for the last two days, so I’ve been trying to find ways to keep her entertained. An opportunity presented itself when our first Christmas card arrived from a nursery pal the other day. Once I’d got over the panic, I thought we’d better get moving with ours. What better activity for a mum and daughter to bond over than a bit of creative card-making?

So, after she went to bed last night, I got a few things ready. That’s my first tip: kids get excited about activities like this, but the excitement soon fades if you’re having to hunt high and low for materials while they are impatiently waiting to start. I collected together:

> Some A4 sheets of card, cut in half and folded, ready to make cards

> Some rubber stamps

> Her poster paints, wax crayons and felt pens

> Shapes, like stars and circles, cut out of silver foil and wrapping paper

> Last year’s Christmas cards, happily stashed away in a rare fit of organisation last year. I cut these up so that I had several small pieces of card featuring things like snowmen, Christmas trees, stockings, angels, and reindeer.

I put all these things in a box, because I she is currently delighted with anything that comes in a box or a bag, and I made sure I also knew where the glue and scissors were.

Bingo! Straight after breakfast we were able to clear the table and get a production line going. Now, no-one can pretend that the cards we ended up with are great works of art, but she had a lot of fun making them. I think one of the keys to her enjoyment was that there were a lot of different materials to choose from, so when she got bored with drawing, she could switch to sticking, and when she got bored with sticking.. .what am I talking about? That girl will never get tired of sticking.

The bit I enjoyed the most and which worked the best as well, was me drawing something with wax crayons, and her sloshing paint over it. No refined technique required from her, and a chance to practice some fun drawing for me.

My final tip, if you want to produce cards that you’ll actually be proud to distribute, rather than just trying to entertain your kids for a while, is to draw and paint onto pieces of paper rather than blank cards. That way you can pick the best and glue them onto your card blanks, not wasting them. Oh, and as a time-filling activity? Well, despite all my best preparations, the whole thing was over by 9.30 am, so don’t bank on it to fill a whole day. Not at two-and-three-quarters, anyway.