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Doodle heart painting is an awesome way to make collaborative art as well as connect and explore with your child. When everyone is engaged in the creative process, conversations flow freely and children show their feelings. This is also a great project to give to grandparents or special relatives for Valentine’s Day.

When making art with my kids, I often hear stories like this, “Mom, my friend Jack played with me for recess and we chased the girls on the playground,” or “Mom, my friend Kate shared her glue with me today at school.” These are the small moments that make me feel connected with my children.

3 Simple Ways to Guide Your Kids While Making Art

1. Ask open-ended questions.

Tell me about the color you chose.

What is your favorite part of this painting, so far?

How would you make this painting different in the future?

2. Offer your children choices. Let them choose their own paint colors and brushes.

3. Lead by example. “I really like the way I put the color ‘pink’ in this space. I think it looks nice next to your ‘green,’ what do you think?

Doodle Heart Painting Materials

18″x 24″ Gallery Canvas

Crayola Round Tip Brushes

Acrylic Paint (bright colors, try to avoid brown and black)

Pencil

Process

This past winter break we traveled to Florida to spend time with my parents and enjoy the heat, sun, and beach. Meanwhile, I had to constantly keep my children engaged so they wouldn’t fight and drive the adults crazy. I came up with this super easy doodle heart painting for all of us to try.

The first step is to draw or doodle various shaped hearts on the canvas using a pencil. Draw hearts within hearts, turn the canvas upside down and draw more hearts. Larger hearts will work the best for this process.

Next, give everyone a paint brush and some acrylic paint. Each person must paint a different color within each shape. Eventually, the hearts will become rather abstract, and that’s okay. At various points turn the canvas so everyone can work on a different part of the painting.

My only regret is that I didn’t buy a bigger canvas. Next time we are going to go bigger! If you don’t want to spend money on a brand new canvas, consider buying an old painting from a thrift store. Take a look at this thrift store painting project from Meri Cherry.