Unique Ways to Save Your Child's Artwork

It's a problem every mom faces, the huge stacks of messy paintings and tentative sketches of your children. As mementos, they are priceless, but where do you put them? Many women resort to saving only a handful of their children's art pieces because it is simply too difficult to save them all. Here are a few ideas to help you preserve those memories, all of them!

Get some suitcases. Buy old suitcases, the cloth and leather kind, or the cardboard/wood types and stack them at odd angles, one on top of the other. These work well if you have three different sizes, with the smallest on top. The stacked suitcases make a cute décor table, especially if you paint them to match your colors, and make the perfect storage place for all those piles of art.

Turn them into pillows and quilts. Do you know how many pieces of toddler art you can fit onto a quilt? A lot! That means you can get rid of the paper and you have a warm blanket to remind you of all those little scribbles. You will need plain cotton, light colored is better, or muslin. Transfer the drawings to the fabric any way you like. This can be scanned into the computer and printed onto transfer paper, or laid over the fabric with carbon paper and then the lines are all traced, etc. Leave them as is, or you can embroider along the lines to make them stand out more. Once you have enough squares, join them together into a quilt.

Photocopy or and shrink them. Get color photocopies made of the larger pieces of artwork and have them reduced to fit on a postcard. Alternatively, scan the work and print in smaller versions. Now all you have to do is buy one of those handy photo albums with pockets for photos and slip the newly reduced artwork into them.

Add a layer to your coffee table. Set a piece of wood on top of your coffee table, all polished up to look like the real deal and just slip all those extra pieces of art underneath! This keeps them neat and tidy, but they are readily accessible, just lift the table top off!

It's hard to toss those sweet pieces of paper that are the first drawings of your precious children, but with these cool storage tips, you won't have to give up all that art. You can save it for enjoyment now and for years to come!