22 Fun Projects to Rainbow-ize Your Art Room!

If you have been joining our book club weekly LIVE chats where we have been reading The Wild Card then you can relate to what I'm about to say. If you've not been joining us here and here, YOU TOTALLY SHOULD! We are a fun group and do not exclude folks who've not read the book. In the chapter I was reading just last night (because y'all know I'm all about catching up on my reading the night before the book club chat!), the authors Hope and Wade King were talking about classrooms that had lost their magic. Rooms with faded posters just barely hanging on the walls, rooms with non-sensical stuff just everywhere, rooms that LOOK EXACTLY LIKE HOW MINE DID THIS TIME LAST YEAR. Seriously! They were describing my art room perfectly. I'd gotten into the habit of just adding more and more clutter to an already clutter-tastic space. When I went in last summer, I was seriously struck by just how junky my art room felt. It really bothered me. I noticed a poster coming down at the front of my room where I gave instruction and I took that as a sign to just TEAR IT ALL DOWN. And I did. I promised myself from that moment on that I was going to Decorate to Educate. And that's what I took a year to do.

My art room is still a work in progress. I still have Early Finisher areas to set up, job charts to figure out and create and just little fussy things that I know would make my art room happier. But the bulk of the work is done...and I'm thrilled with the result. 

I hear from a lot of y'all that you are feeling overwhelmed...especially with the new school year starting. I knew that would happen to me as well. So I made a promise to myself to think of my art room as a big ole elephant that I had to decorate one lil bit at a time. I couldn't do it overnight...and stressing that I should was not going to allow me to enjoy the experience and really decide what was needed. I wanted everything in my art room to serve a purpose: to educate and, of course, decorate. I promised myself to take my time. 

Today I thought I'd share with you my favorite fun projects to rainbow-ize (and energize!) your art room. When you click on the links attached, be sure and check out the timestamp on each of them. You'll see that this was not done overnight but over the course of the year! So...if you feel inspired, just know...you got this!

First, if you've not taken a tour of my art room yet, here you go:

More room tours to come! This will allow me to explain certain areas and aspects in greater detail. This here is an overview. Feel free to drop me any questions in the comments if you have them!

Paint Brush Color Wheel

One of the first things I made for my art room were these paint brushes from wooden oars I found at Michael's. You can check out a complete blog post with how-to video right here. 

I decided to use these to create a huge color wheel in my art room. The blobs of paint were created from cardboard. Everything was hung with 3M Velcro hangers that you can find just about everywhere. I always use the ones that hold 12 lbs. or more.

Here's a view from the area I call Command Central where I do all of my instruction. Another thing I decided to create last year were my ART room rules. 

Art Room Rules

I've been doing a lot of reading on growth mindsets and really wanted to put them into play with my art room rules. These were so much fun to paint...I think that is what I enjoyed the most about redoing my art room, having the chance to create so much!

Pencil Picket Fence

As y'all might know, I got super in to finding things at the craft store and making them into something else last fall. This small picket fence was no exception. Video tutorial included in the link!

Color Mixing Cans

When I spotted these small rectangular canvases as the craft store, I knew immediately that they would make the perfect shape for a spray can. I created a video tutorial to show you how to make your own right here. 

 Crayon Color Families
EVERYONE loves these crayons...especially the kiddos who get to create their own! These are a crowd favorite and are displayed prominently to help my students remember the color families. Tutorial here! 

 The crayon boxes are what I get the most questions about...they are made from cereal boxes! Even my kids created their own box when we displayed them at our school-wide art show! 

Each of the crayons is held in place with a little Velcro dot on the back. This makes the crayons look like they are about to jump right out of the box!

Pencil-tastic Paint Stick Cabinet

I needed just a little cabinet to keep at the front of my art room to hold the art tubs for the classes I would see that day. I popped by the thrift store and scooped up this rather boring black cabinet. With a bunch of pencil-painted paint sticks and hot glue, I made this guy! Video tutorial and details right here. 

Color Wheel Gong

I've had a Clean Up Gong in my art room for years now...and it used to make such an incredible sound. But it was not cute, says me! So I decided to create a color wheel out of it! It is actually my favorite teaching tool as it is so stinkin' big! It also...sadly...no longer makes a fantastical sound as the paint deadened the sound quite a big. You can see more of my gong here. 

Color Coded Trash Cans

Y'all, these were so fun and easy to make! All you need are some trashcans, some painters tape and some spray paint. Easy to follow tutorial right here. 

Crayon Bins

So there are crayon bins like this...but they are not cheap. Turns out making your very one is much cheaper! Now if I could only find that elusive ORANGE bin...seriously, I've looked everywhere! You can learn how to make your own version of these right here.

 Rainbow Ornaments

Did you know you can make an art room ornament outta ANYTHING? Turns out you can! And then use them to decorate your...

Rainbow Tree

Y'all, this rainbow tree from Treetopia was just about the best thing my art room has ever seen. It totally inspired me to go ALL RAINBOWS, ALL THE TIME and it is alway there when I need a smile or a slightly prickly hug. All the details on my rainbow tree and how to get your very own right here.

Rainbow Wreath

No rainbow art room would be complete without the addition of a wreath on the front door. This wreath is also from Treetopia...and decorated by me. The tubes are created from toilet paper tubes and the brushes were just recycled. More details including a video tutorial right here. 

Small World Mural

I did paint my share of murals in my art room this past year and this Small World themed one is one of my faves. My kids love how happy and colorful it is...and I love being able to refer to it for shapes! More details here. 

Rainbow Trippy Mural

Of course, the other mural I painted this year was this beast. I had so much fun creating this backdrop...and balancing it out with a "calm" curtain and a wild rainbow flooring. All the details here. 

 ROY G. BIV Paintbrushes
If my kiddos leave my art room and STILL don't know the order of the colors in the rainbow then, y'all, I just don't know what. This one was SO EASY! Just paint brushes, some letters and Duct tape. Video tutorial right here!

I mean...c'mon!

Tints and Shade Sign

This one falls into the category of NO WOODEN ITEMS AT THE CRAFT STORE ARE SAFE FROM CASSIE category. In case you didn't know there was one. 

Gradation Sign

As does this one! Oh my goodness...it's a good thing I'm outta wall space.

Color and Line Rainbow Wall

LOVE this resource for referring to line names! Another easy one to accomplish with just Duct tape.

 Alphabet Cabinets
I love having tons of cabinets...but I've always hated the way the look. I don't want to paint them tho...I mean this won't be my art room forever...and I'd hate to ruin the beautiful faux wood (ahem) that are my cabinets. So this seemed liked a fun way to fix that drab brown wood. 

I've since decluttered that hot mess at the top of my cabinets!

 Early Finishers Rainbow Stuff
Seriously, y'all, nothing was safe. I spray painted these pots AND flowers in rainbow colors. They are used both in still life drawings and when my kids finish early and want to draw from observation. 

Even my wooden models and dollar store dinos got a make-over! These are also in my early finisher drawing area.

 Happy Little Signs -n- Stuff
These random bits were created just to further decorate, educate and promote kindness with color. You can spot all of them with details here. 

 Who doesn't love a good chalkboard?!

 The things I find at the flea market! This mermaid had to get a makeover before coming to my art room. The canvas was a new one painted by me as a message to my students as they come and go.

More thrift and flea market finds! I even rainbow-ized my class tubs!

Rainbow Seat Sacks!

While Dollar Tree had some seat sacks...they didn't one one in each color of the rainbow. So I had to make my own. Here's how!

WHEW!! I just went back and counted 22 rainbow-ish things?! I hope you find some that inspire you!  

In the Art Room: Art Room Decor

 Well, I'm back at it: picking up more things from the Wooden Thingies You Can Paint aisle and goin' to town. I've painted paddles into paint brushes, a picket fence into a stack of pencils and now this fun Tints and Shade sign! 

The other day, I was at Hobby Lobby and spotted this fun little fence. I picked up two of them and used a coupla coupons to bring the price down a pinch. I wasn't sure what I'd do with them until the idea of creating a value scale of tints and shades came to my mind. 

Over a couple of evenings, I managed to get this bad boy complete. It was very similarly to my Stay Sharp pencils. I will say, mixing up a gradient is no joke, especially when you do it over the course of a couple of days. I did struggle a couple of times getting colors to great an even value scale.

 Once the pencils were complete, I added the lettering and the fine lines. I love using black and white lines to give things a cartoon-y look 

 I was going to go with "value scale" or "gradation" but those aren't words we use a lot in my art room. We do talk a lot about mixing up tints and shades...so this was what I went with!

  Don't be throwin' no shade now, y'all. 

I also had a chance to hang my Color Families display today! I used Command Velcro strips to hang these and my Tints and Shade sign.

Because I want to be able to remove the crayons and use the as teaching tools, I used velcro dots to add them to the crayon boxes. You can see them in the secondary color box. 

 Now I did mention that I purchased two of these wooden thingies...the other will go over the door to the left of my clock. I plan to paint that in a rainbow gradation...but not sure what I'll write on it yet, if anything. I'm really excited about this area of my art room now! I am loving the new look so much...I am slowly working on giving my entire art room a make over! This is an area that the kids see a lot so it gets first priority. I even painted my easel to match some bookcases I recently redid. I'll have to give a complete tour once complete...although who knows when that will be!

 Until then, this will have to be my happy place!

 Thank you for letting me share!

DIY: WPA-Inspired Smoky Mountain Paintings

When I first moved down to Tennessee from Indiana, I didn't have any intentions of staying. I mean, I was fresh outta college and was looking for a job and an adventure. When I got a job offer in Tennessee I was all, "huh, why not?" with plans to move away in a coupla years (as a kid, I had this crazy notion that I'd live in each state, one year at a time). After settling into Tennessee and meeting my hubs, we realized we just love this place too much to move. And now it's home.

Over the last coupla years, I've been Tennessee-izing our house. You can see my first attempts at TN decor here and a painting dedicated to Nashville made from maps of TN here. Recently, I decided I needed a coupla new paintings for a sad little area at the top of our stairs and was inspired by some WPA paintings of the Smoky Mountains. 

So the WPA program (aka the Works Progress [or Projects] Administration) was established during the Great Depression to give jobs to millions of unemployed Americans. Their job was to work on public works projects like public roads and buildings. Many schools, libraries and government buildings were constructed during this time. An offshoot of this program also employed artists, musicians and actors to do works for the public.

Incredibly talented artists were employed such as Romare Bearden, Thomas Hart Benton (one of my personal faves), The Soyer Brothers (also a fave of mine), Stuart Davis, Mark Rothko, Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning, just to name a few. Without this program, millions of people and their families would have been left destitute during this difficult time in our history.

Some of my favorite work created by WPA artists are the national parks posters. I love the almost paint-by-numbers/propaganda style of these works. They are ab fab. In fact, these paintings here are my SECOND time to copy a WPA painting; you can see my first one here. Now, on to the latest ones...

 I started by adding that yellow ochre color to the top and creating texture by scrapping the wet paint with a chopped up plastic card (I have a mountain of hotel key cards just for this reason). Then I began sketching out my plan in chalk.

And then I really went at it paint-by-numbers style. I love painting this way! Y'all, it's so easy and I personally dig the flat look to the painting. Side note: I use our glass dinner plates as palettes. If you ever dine at mi casa, kindly check your plates for paint before eating.

This painting was pretty basic so it came together quickly. I work with acrylic which dries super fast. I like that because I could move on to the next portions of the painting without waiting forever (ahem, oil paint).

 I added a lil bit of texture to the ground by using a super crappy, paint-dried-on-the-bristles brush. Sometimes those brushes have their purpose too.

And last came the trees. Since this painting was super basic (and is going to hang next to one that is uber busy), I decided to add the lettering to the top and bottom. 

Y'all. I hate lettering. It involves measuring and math and both make my abnormally small sized brain hurt. But what's the worst is painting lettering as I always screw up with letters that gradually get bigger and bigger as the painting goes on. So! My solution are Sharpie brand paint pens. I loves them! They work great and create a clean even line. 

The neighbor to my first painting started much the same. Chalk outline (ahem) and color blocking. Cake.

 Howevertown, this painting has a whole lot more details. Which were super fun to paint but did take me a while. So I power watched old episodes of Project Runway and just blasted through.

 (One of these days, my dining room table will be used for...dining.)

 Although it's super busy, I do love how this painting turned out. The colors are my fave part. But I also love how it does remind me of the Smokies. 

Now to get 'em up on the wall! I'll have to share that snap with you when I get to it. Later, kids!