No Fuss Seasonal Decor

Looking for an easy way to save your kids' artwork that doesn't involve shoving them in a box somewhere, never to be looked at again, until your child is an adult and you finally make them get their junk out of your house? 

 Here's one way that purposefully upcycles artwork into something more polished.  First, pick one spot in your house where you will consistently display the artwork.  I set aside this shelf in our entryway just for seasonal decor.  I also used a shelf because it's easier to accomodate frames of various sizes.  You don't have to worry about nail holes or if the nail is too high or too low.  Next, select a few frames that are dedicated for this purpose.  My favorite ones are some 12 x 12 scrapbook frames from Michael's.  They are meant to hold decorated scrapbook pages, so they will hold artwork that is three dimensional.  I can also place multiple pages in them, rotating the pages as the seasons change.  Last, pick the artwork you want to use.  I have stuck with mostly handprint pictures since my kids have made quite a few of these for the holidays.   Don't be afraid to do a little modifying to the pages.  My older two made handprint turkeys in preschool, 2 on a page for a total of 4.  But they were a bit wonky looking, off center, and just didn't fit into a frame very well.  So I trimmed off the excess and fashioned each handprint into a 3 x 5 rectangle.  Then I glued each handprint to a piece of scrapbook paper, so that each handprint looked matted.  The handprint art in the photos below also benefited from a bit of scrapbook paper embellishment.  I really didn't spend a lot of time on it; just enough to make the handprint art fill my frame.  (And in the case of the flowers, I used it to create a grass/sky type background.)  Over the years, we've collected quite an assortment of various seasonal pieces.  Turkeys for Thanksgiving, reindeer for Christmas, snowmen for winter, a torn paper heart for Valentine's, a flower and butterfly for spring, and an autumn tree for fall.  I always add a few extra seasonal accents and it has turned into a quick way to change out our entry way for the holidays as well as an easy way to showcase the things my kids have made.

What our entryway looks like this week
(At least until yesterday, when I shut the front door too hard and one of the pictures fell off and the glass broke.

My red stools-I actually have a collection of red stools which is probably odd.  The middle one was my Granny's, one the kids almost always sat on at her house.  I found these two (plus another one that's in our living room) at an auction for a couple dollars a piece.

The rake and hoe are children's garden tools with wooden handles and metal (ie definitely poke your eye out) ends.  They were my mother in law's.  They are definitely cute but potential weapons, so the shelf is the best place for them.