Family Portrait Masterpiece- the story behind the art

Working with this mom and her boys was ridiculously fun!   She had repainted her house and pulled all her framed artwork off of her walls.   What to do with everything?   My first suggestion was simple, to show her the magical brilliance of spray paint.   We used white and black spray paints to give her wooden frames a face-lift and then re-hung them in various spots around the house.   So easy!   Next, we headed to, yes, a local thrift store and found a MASSIVE print.  It was almost 5 feet long!    My friend has a gift for finding a deal and the day we went shopping the store was offering a senior discount.   She called her mom-in-law and asked how old she was.   We made her day, because, quite frankly, we didn't think she was old enough to qualify as a senior.   She did though (it's okay "P", you know who you are, and you so look 30!), so the frame was purchased at 25% off and my friend paid around $35.00 for it!   What a STEAL!   The art was blocks/cubes and black and reds.  We actually just painted over the picture and left the frame because it looked nice for our purposes.  
 

Next, she couldn't decide what to have her little artist paint.   In this case, I like to suggest things for my artists to draw to give us inspiration.  "Let me see a family portrait, let me see a house, tree, ect."    Both mom and I ADORED the family portrait he drew.  We were especially in love with his sister's curly cues!    So, the project was born.   Here it is, nearly completed....

Oh, was this fun!  It took a few times to complete, and a few "paint-overs", but as it came together, it was just so darling!   One mis-hap was after "W" painted his mom's hair, he went to paint his, "because we have the same color hair".   A 6 year old's fine motor skills don't always paint the way they draw.   His little hands ended up creating a hairstyle pretty much identical to the mom's.   You should have seen his face!  "Umm, my hair looks like a girl's!"   Priceless!   That's when I show them how easy it is to erase with a small coat of paint.    I helped him out with the sizing and placement of the people.  This is a difficult task for a child, especially on such a large canvas.  (Quite frankly, it can be difficult for an adult too!).  I also sketched in the tree trunks for him as a guide to help fill the painting.   His little sister is still a baby/toddler, so when he drew her small size, she was "floating".  Super cute, but we decided to paint a swing for her to sit on as well.   Because it is hard for a six year old to paint in detail what they draw, I would paint/trace areas that were difficult for him....if you notice the curls of the little sister, you see one brown blob painted by my 6 year old picasso, and then little curly cues which I paint/traced from his sketch.  

Did I mention we had help?  Our youngest helper (little brother, wearing an orange shirt in the portrait because, "orange is his favorite color"), came over on the last day to paint some grass and fill in leaves.   What I LOVE about the painting is that mom can tell which ones this little guy did, and you probably can too!   Hint:  This age paints in blobs :)  LOVE IT!  We had one more detail to add before it was completed though....the background was so similar to the skin tone that I wanted to make more of a distinction so I outlined the faces....very minor, but helpful.

You can see the outlines here, as it is up on the wall in "W's" house.   Great work Little Picasso!  

Look at how proud he is!