Decorate Your Child's or Teen's Room

You don't have to be an artist to make interesting art!

Here's one of my latest projects that ANYONE can do. My daughter already had a brightly colored, striped bedspread, so I used some of those colors to make her some wall art. Her last room-makeover took me several days to paint her walls with lots of polka dots and inspirational sayings. She really liked it, but it was also a whole lot of work.

Now, we live in a different house and the walls are (boring) white. Yuck! Yuck! BUT, I didn't have the time to paint the walls yet I still wanted to get a similar result. So, I came up with a quick and inexpensive way to transform her room.

First, I already had 3 -20"x16" stretched canvases. They may be purchased at any craft store for about $5 a piece. At Hobby Lobby, I bought 3 different materials of not only different colors, but also different prints: a solid pink, plaid blue, and floral--each measuring 1 yard each (I had more than enough left over). I also bought a couple of yards of burlap, not sure exactly how I was going to use it.

Back in my studio, I cut the material (blue plaid and floral) about two inches around my canvases. I used TACKY SPRAY ADHESIVE on the back of the material and laid each canvas upside down on each piece of material, pressing my hands into the canvas to make sure it was sticking to the material.

I then used a glue gun to secure the material edges onto the canvas backs. I used the same spray adhesive to glue burlap on the fronts leaving about 1-1 /2 inches of the material showing around the edges. Then, using Apple Barrel Craft Paint, I painted random circles on the burlap to match the colors of the rest of her room. VOILA! QUICK WALL ART! That ANYONE can do!

Another piece I made for her was a little more complicated but still easy. I had a box of 24 metal wall tiles that I've had for a while--just in case I wanted to use them for an art project. I'm sure you can find these at any do-it-yourself store: Lowe's, Home Depot, etc. I cut squares of material in the same 3 colors/patterns: blue plaid, solid pink, and floral. The squares of material I cut just a little bit larger than the tiles. I then sprayed a square of material with TACKY SPRAY ADHESIVE, laid the tile upside down on top of the material, then folded the material around the tile. Once all the tiles had material around them, I used the little adhesives that came with the tiles to stick the squares onto a piece of wood I had "laying around." It already had the wall hanging mechanism attached.

My daughter is 11, and so the colors and materials I used still have that "girly" feel. If you are planning to decorate for an older girl's room, you can still use this concept--just pick different colors and more sophisticated materials. Black and white, with one bright color is what I would've chosen had she been a teenager. Hopefully I've inspired you....