A family paint night is a great way to share time together. Painting is great activity for all ages allowing for lots of flexibility and creativity to accommodate every member of the family. Here are some ideas to use waste items you have around your house to make fun upcycled painting projects.
Alternative Canvases for Painting Projects
It is common to grab a fresh clean new sheet of paper for each painting project but there are many creative upcycled alternatives that will add interest to the project and reduce waste.
Old Book Pages
Using book pages as painting paper adds a textured background to your image. It works great with watercolours where the words will show through the paints but works just as well with opaque paints such as gouache or acrylic.
If the book pages are thin you can glue them onto a backing made from an old cereal box of other similar cardstock. This is especially important if you will be using watery paint such as watercolour.
Map and Atlas Colouring Pages
Maps and old atlases are a common thing many of us have lying around collecting dust. Instead of these ending up in the recycle bin consider using them for your next paint night.
Maps are great as upcycled colouring book, teaching kids geography as they create a beautiful unique hand-painted maps. They can also be used much like old book pages as a textured background to a painted picture.
Reworking Old Artwork
There is a lot of painting that happens in my household. Occasionally one of us comes up with a frame-worthy piece of art but more often painting is about process over final product. This leaves us with a lot of artwork lying around. Old artwork can be a great beginning of a new painting. Adding to the old picture can create a whole new masterpiece as well as reduce paper waste by reusing paper for more than one painting session.
When setting up for a paint night I often give my kids their own or my old art work to build up on. Some of my favourite paintings came from a piece of art that was used by a few family members over multiple painting sessions. They are family art pieces that are filled with memories.
DIY Painting Sketchbook with Waste Paper
A painting sketchbook is a fun way to encourage painting anytime. It can be made with any scrap paper around the house with this simple bookbinding method.
If the scrap paper you used is really busy you might want to use paint to paint a solid background. I find I often have extra paint on my palette after a paint night and using it to paint a few pages background is a great way to not waste the extra paint.
Look at Your Waste Paper In a New Light
Keep an eye out for great paint papers in your waste paper pile. The ideas of what makes a great painting canvas are endless. Reducing waste and growing creativity one paint project at a time.
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