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A few months ago, I shared my new picture book, Same, Same but Different, with my long-time client Karen Capp of Oopsy Daisy Fine art for Kids. She had an idea to host a craft to connect young artists with my book and my travel-inspired Oopsy Daisy art, while encouraging children to create art about our world — just as Elliot and Kailash share with each other in my book. In addition, Karen generously decided to make it a contest for kids and schools giving away several of my Oopsy Daisy canvases and signed copies of my books as prizes!

Children 12 and under are invited to submit their art for the random drawing. Parents and teachers, this art project can be a great conversation starter for learning more about geography and world cultures, or even starting a pen pal exchange. And Teachers, please note there is a special prize for the school with the most participants!

So, how to play? Look around you. What colors YOUR world? What do you love? What sounds do you hear? What makes your world unique from Elliot and Kailash’s and other kids around the world? Create your own art inspired by an imaginary or real pen pal, your travels or ideas about the people and cultures of our world. Draw, paint or collage a picture of your world, and share it with us. Please include a sentence explaining the child’s drawing. I posted the craft on Oopsy Daisy’s blog. The official contest guidelines and instructions are on their “Budding Artists Contest” page. It runs from today thru March 14th!

Your child’s art can be SIMPLE! A line drawing, simple shapes collaged to form a picture, watercolor or even finger painting for the toddlers. It could even be drawn words. It’s endless. :) Just have fun! I am excited to see your art and hear your thoughts! And please share with other parents, teachers, librarians, your children’s schools…

To start, Tulsi and I created a picture of “our” world. We are working on another picture of a little girl we are reading about who lives in a very different world than ours (how we imagine her to be). These are just two examples of endless approaches to this prompt.

by Tulsi Shaw and Jenny Sue Kostecki-Shaw Tulsi
In our world, 3 baby chicks are riding on their mama’s back or hiding under her wings. Little Red Rooster is singing, we are dancing outside in our garden, and the Milky Way shines right over our house.

Tulsi and I had Valentines on our minds yesterday and after making one very involved one and deciding it was “so much work”, we embarked on a little print-making play like our friends Veda and Penny. Tulsi’s Valentine is of her holding a flower (for her friends). The two circles on her body are her nipples, of course , since she is a girl. :) We transferred it to a rubber pad, and I did my best to carve her drawing. She figured out that kneeling on the stamp really helped to make great prints.

It was all fun, especially the ink pad and glittering and gluing hearts! And what an efficient way to make a lot of Valentines. I think the most fun will come when Tulsi gives them to all her friends and family, or surprises neighbors with them, accompanied with giant hugs. I haven’t “played” Valentines Day since I was little! We are excited about going to a Valentine’s Dance with Last to Know to benefit the Birth Center in Taos. Maybe we’ll bake some treats, too, or explore some of these fun ideas. How do you celebrate with your kids?

A couple days ago, Tulsi pulled a piece of paper and a few new markers out of her “Christmas Calendar” we made together (more on this soon), and the note read, “You are an artist. Your art makes people smile. Make a picture for Nama and Tapas and mail it to them.” She was SUPER excited and wanted to get right to work just moments after climbing out of our cozy bed. She stared at the paper and said, “Me don’t know what to draw,” and I suggested, “You could draw a picture from the time you were with them when I went to New York City.”

Tulsi stayed with my parents for a whoppin’ 52 hours while I went to NYC for the children’s book art show, etc., and I can’t tell you how much my heart and head ran around with this decision before I made it (supported by Patrick and my parents). Some of you might not think a couple of days is a big deal, but it was huge for me. And for Tulsi. We had not spent more than 5 hours apart since the first day of her life, when we’d been separated seconds after her traumatic birth. So it was not an easy decision. Would she feel secure that I would come back? How would she sleep? Would she be distant from me after? And of course, I worried about something happening to either one of us. I know it might sound silly to some mothers who have already grown through the early years, but as a mother, I know your whole heart and being are in every present moment, and you feel each phase fully. It is “everything” in that moment. I knew ultimately she’d be ok, but of course I still questioned if it was necessary. And when some friends quickly responded, “It’s fine — growing pains are good for her,” I cringed and hesitated even more. I mean, she’s only 2 1/2. I didn’t want to force growing pains — or push her to grow up faster than she needs to. But the more I felt into it, I knew I needed to go to NYC for me, and well, it’s a big step for a mama to ‘take time’ for herself. It’s always easy to put that aside for later.

And so I went. And she stayed. And she wailed when I left (but for a mere 30 seconds my mom said), and I cried in line at the airport, too. In an instant, I was on my own, and it was odd. I didn’t know what to do with my hands. Or how to walk. There was an open space. And even though Tulsi was on my mind a lot, I breathed deep and appreciated my mind and back relaxing. I had lunch at a sidewalk cafe with an old friend and a sweet dinner with two mama-friends, relating in that mama-to-mama way, with a glass of wine. It felt slightly like a forced vacation (albeit work), but I was happy I went. Tulsi learned to walk like a penguin, that monkeys like hammocks, too, and she learned all about baseball.

When it came to night, I didn’t sleep much at all. My mom said Tulsi didn’t sleep well either and that she rocked her a lot of the night. I loved that my mom said she didn’t mind at all, because she knew it helped Tulsi feel secure, and I immediately wondered if my mom misses those rocking-her-babies days, like I know I will miss someday.

As I watched Tulsi draw Nama and her, and describe all the details, I knew how important those 52 hours were, for her, too: ”This is Nama holding me like a baby, rocking me. Her arms stretched out. She has boobies. I have nipples. She has a belly button. I have a belly button.” She drew both their eyes wide open and said they ”were looking at each other”. And then she colored purple over her own face and said, “Me close my eyes and sleep with Nama. She hold me like a baby.”

What a beautiful moment, a gift, that she will always carry with her, that came from those 52 hours

This is a collaboration Tulsi and I did together although I only made the left eye and mouth. She is in a phase of wanting me to paint or draw with her. She knows the word “collaboration”. Ha. So I play, too, but I try not to screw up anything she has done so effortlessly. Tulsi calls this one, “Talking guy”. She loves to look at Picasso’s books. It shows. Watercolors have always been scary for me, but Tulsi is helping me get over my fear. Kids have no fear.

Here is another collaboration — she made the drawing a few months ago. It’s a family portrait: That’s me on the left, Oso got cropped off a bit up top, Tulsi is on the right with her mouth wide open, and Papa is big and center with the funny hair and big nose and smile. I added the 3 creamy collage shapes and used an antique varnish to mesh it with a wooden box frame. It was our father’s day present for Papa.

I love playing art with Tulsi. We get lost in it and forget about the world. I hope she always remembers that sacred place she can go to.

How awesome every single “first” is. Side by side this morning drawing, Tulsi draws her way into her first “fun guy”, all by herself. She laughed out loud cause it was “fun” to make, too. Don’t you wish you could remember your own first “fun guy”?

Above: Tracy McGuiness and her son Roy, at work on a mural at Roy’s school in the U.K.

Eight years ago when I was first in Nepal volunteering at Sunshine School, the students and I created a 60′ mural in their playground on a brick wall. I didn’t have any paint supplies and ALL that was available was big pales of white paint and teeny dyes of primary colors. Still, we did our best and had a really fun time. And it was the perfect activity to practice English. Sadly, the dyes were no better than food coloring, and the mural slowly washed away with the monsoon rains. :)

Kid art has always been a HUGE inspiration to me. They are so free spirited and see no rules or boundaries. When Tulsi started coloring, I gave her a 3′x4′ sheet of foam core and she would sit in the middle and twirl around, coloring with two crayons at once. She seemed to be sculpting her world as she felt it. It was amazing to watch.

Have you ever heard Picasso’s quote, “All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.” It’s such a huge responsibility to ‘let them be’ with their art, don’t you think? To inspire without drowning their spirits. They are such sacred years.

I’ll never forget when I first sat in on an “art class” in Nepal. The 4th graders were at their desks copying exactly what the teacher was ‘attempting’ to draw on the large black board: Mickey Mouse. My heart literally sunk. I had never “taught” art before then, so I looked to my favorite instructors for inspiration. The first thing I did with them was to leave the school grounds. The rooms were small, stuffy and dark and way too small to stretch out. We walked around their ancient village and just looked at the intricate, wood carvings on the temples and the old palace and all its sculptures. And we drew “on location” — my FAVORITE painting class in art school. I honestly don’t think the kids had ever drawn from their own eyes before because they stared blankly at their paper and pencils and asked, “How should we draw the temple?” I don’t remember what I said, but I’m thankful I didn’t say too much. And truly beautiful, unique interpretations came to life that were ALL different. I’ll never forget Bina’s temple that reminded me of an ornate wedding cake and Niraj’s very circus-like houses and temples patterned with jester-type clothing. Watching these kids discover how they saw and find joy in expressing themselves was just awesome. I’ll never forget it.

Whew. I didn’t know I was going to write about that when I started this post, but my friend Tracy’s mural photos brought up those memories. Tracy is a painter/illustrator/mother in the U.K. who I knew from way back at Hallmark. I liked her instantly, especially her free spirit and vision. She has sent me quite a few quirky photo shoots with her son in hand-made costumes and his drawings of robots and monsters that always get my own imagination going. Sometimes she sends her illustrations inspired by his drawings. She recently sent me these photos of a mural project she created at her son Roy’s school (which she and her own mum also went to as kids). The coolest thing about this mural is how she collaborated with the kids, collaging their art with her’s. Check out all the photos of the process and details on her site here. She explained how they “coated local ne

I got such a nice surprise the other day when I received a big pile of thank you notes from the kids at the Lunenburg Primary School. I love, love, love letters from kids! During my visit this past week, we brainstormed story ideas for pirate characters, so I thought it was SO cool when many of kids had decorated their cards with their very own pirate characters. These weren't your run-of-the-mill pirates, matey! We had elephant pirates...



and giraffe pirates (no crow's nest needed)...



and even these two dangerous looking characters. I especially like the orange guy wielding the mace...



I wish I had time to show them all. They were all terrific! Argh, thank you for making my day, me hearties! I had a great time at your school!