What to Do with Artwork/schoolwork?

If you have another child going to preschool, you might want to save the important things to help the youngest get a head start. (Especially if they are in a Camino's program and you don't understand Spanish)

GL

I have no answer for you. I have the exact same issue and it drives me crazy. It's so hard to decide what to keep because you certainly can't keep it all. And where do you put it? By the time my daughter graduates I'll have 12 tuperware pins of stuff. I had to laugh last year because the theme at the school was all about being "Green". The paper my daughter brought home from that school probably killed ten trees!

I keep the things that are really special and the rest gets tossed. You just cannot keep it all as much as you want to. I have a file that I put the things I want to keep in. Some gets put on the fridge for awhile. I also have a husband that cannot stand clutter so all the school papers drive him crazy! Good luck.

I scan or take photos of everything. That eliminates guilt of throwing it out. I keep some precious pieces. As my children get older stuff gets smaller so a three ring binder of everything seems to work well. I have a kindergarten binder and am starting a 1st grade binder now. Must go through the pile every month or it gets too much to deal with (just look at my desk lol).

First - let me tell you that my oldest is now in fifth grade, and by about 4th grade, the stuff that comes home is not so cute any more, and you wish for the days when all this cute stuff came home. So - SAVE THE REALLY SPECIAL STUFF !!! I tend to keep the various holiday stuff and break out it at each holiday. My oldest gets a real kick out of seeing the decorations that she made back in preschool - especially the Halloween and Christmas ones. But even all the holidays - Valentines' Day, St. Patrick's Day, etc.. For the stuff that is nonholiday but that is really special - I kept one display area. It could be a cork board, a section of wall, etc.. For me, it was a glass door. I limit myself to that one area, and put only the really special things on it. If something is new and my child loves it (but I think truthfully it's kind of junky) - I'll put it on there for a little while to make them happy - but it gets taken down when something better comes along. I limit myself to that one space, and must choose to take something off if something better comes along. For all the kind of "iffy" projects that my child is happy about but I don't really care about, I take a photo of it. My intention is to get a digitial frame they can have in their room with the pictures of their projects rotating on it. When my oldest got to be in kindergarten and wanted to keep EVERYTHING - including math homework, etc. - I advised her against it but gave her an expandable and told her at the end of the year she'd have to clean it out and keep only what she really wanted. Well, all year long she saved and saved every scrap . At the end of the year, it took her so long to sort it out - and she realized that she never should have kept it to begin with - it taught her a real lesson and the next year when she had the option to use the expandable again she just said, "Nah. We can just recycle it." I've also heard of programs at local nursing homes where you donate your kids pictures - the residents LOVE to get any kind of scribbled picture and the child feels good that someone is going to appreciate their work. I think that if there's not a formal program in your area, you could just approach a nursing home to see if they'd like them.

Hand it out to grandmas, grandpas, aunts, uncles, great-aunts, great-uncles etc... After that, ask your daughter to pick out her favorite five items to put up on her wall then pick out your five favorite to put on an artwork wall in your home. All of the rest should be either put away long term in some sort of storage solution or thrown out. I know it's tough, but she's only in preschool! You've got years of this left! Save some room....

You are not alone -- the volume of artwork is unbelievable. I display new stuff for a week on the fridge and taped around the kitchen. Then I clear when the kids are not around and I save a few of the best projects in a scrap book. I always feel terrible tossing my kids' creations but it gets easier.

I have a large plastic binder with clear sheets in it which I put all my son's artwork. That way it is all in one place and can be looked through like a book.

You can get a 3 ring binder to put special papers from school and write the date on each. Not everything needs to be saved, but a nice representation of each year of school would be great to keep. Artwork is tricky since many things they make can be quite large/bulky especially science projects etc. You can scan artwork and save the scanned photos on your computer (then burn them to disk at the end of each school year). Big projects can be photographed and saved the same way. It will still make you feel a little guilty for trashing some of the items, but honestly, you can't keep it all. Believe me, I've tried Ha-ha-ha!! Even if you try to save it all, most will get ripped, ruined or simply lost without a little system in place. Hope that helps!

my MIL has a trunk in her basement of stuff that my husband and his brothers did as kids. it's great now every once in a while she'll go through and pick something out and pop it in the mail to my husband, and it's very enjoyable now that we have kids of our own. especially the cards that he made for his brothers on their birthdays or the mothers day cards he made her.

BUT i agree with you we just can't keep it all. so i have a small rubbermaid bucket with a lid that i keep in her closet and i put all her stuff in there as it comes home. then every 3 months or so i go through it and pick some things out. her school curriculum is run by a letter a week - so i pick the best piece that represented that letter. and i keep the holiday stuff too.

It's the digital age - so i scan everything or the stuff that is "not flat" i take a picture of it.

I love the kodak gallery photo books. so stuff that i scan, i upload to kodak gallery and make a book out of - they have Large hard cover books that a great keepsakes (for the kids when they get older). they also have smaller soft cover flip books - they have about 20 pages - and these are great for the grandparents for holidays (mothers/fathers day, vday, birthdays, christmas)... i use a few pictures of the kids that i've taken over the months and then i add in some of their artwork from school.

also the larger "poster" size pictures i keep and use as wrapping paper for the grandparents or my husband's birthday/fathersday/christmas presents. my daughter loves to paint and and we have an art easel with a roll of paper on it... she'll make 6-8 paintings when she's painting , i dry them all and put them with the rest of my wrapping paper and use them. if a holiday is coming up i try to "influence" her color choices, red/green/gold/silver for christmas, red/pink/purple/silver for v-day etc.....

I used to keep all of the papers and all the artwork in a clear plastic bin until the end of the school year. Then I would go through and take out some of the best work ( and all of the autobiographies) and save those and toss out the rest. I would let my child look at some of their work at the beginning of the year to compare it to their work at the end of the year to see the progress he had made. It does pile up very quickly!

Before my children started elementary school, I bought each of them this large expandable storage case with pockets to separate the artwork for each grade level. Here's a link for something similar to the one I bought:

http://www.amazon.com/Alex-Toys-Art-Expandable-File/dp/B0...

I would pick out a few special pieces of artwork(your daughter can too) to save. I have some very colorful paintings that my daughter has made so far (she was in a 2-year-old program last year and starts 3-year-old preschool this month) and have put them in frames - I think they add a nice touch to our home. I also framed one that we made with our handprints.

You can share some with grandparents, etc. - you can even frame some and give them as Christmas gifts, etc. You can also take digital photos and use those to make calenders, books, etc. along with pictures of your daughter on a website like Shutterfly.

We mail artwork to great-grandparents, who live out of state. They love to get mail. I don't know whether they throw any of it out (my grandmother at least puts some of it on the wall by her apartment door), but if they do, at least my kids don't see it in the trash. No matter how sneaky I am, they always find me out if I throw their art away, and I don't want them to think I don't want it. Mailing it to far-away relatives is a great solution because my kids love to mail things, my grandparents like it that the kids are thinking of them, and it helps my kids to feel like the great-grandparents are part of their lives even though we don't see them a lot.

We pick a few favorites and tape them to her mirrored closets. The rest are snuck into the trash when she is not looking.

You may want to sit down and review the work with your child first.

I have two kids so twice the problem. I purchased an under the bed storage box and at the end of the year I put a folder in there with the grade marked and pick out a few favorites and have the kids pick out a couple of their favorites. So far I haven't come close to filling the box. Another thing I have done is have my daughter(who is the one wanting to keep everything) spread her work out on the floor and I take a picture of her with it. She knows I find her work as important as she does, but understands that it gets to be too much to keep it all. They also get to hang one special thing on the fridge..they are really good about keeping it to one...of course next week they replace it with the new special thing.
Hope you find something helpful :)

I keep them in a plastic box or you could put in a folder and then at the end of the year I take pictures of them and make a photo album online. I've used Shutterfly, Seehere and Snapfish. I wait til they are offering a photobook for free or next to nothing and then make one. I don't keep all things. Just mainly the ones they actually drew something or made something-not coloring sheets or cut and paste sheets.

Keep the best ones, date them and put them in a large plastic bin. I've done this for my kids and I have two large bins each full of their artwork and projects throughout their school years. Don't try to put them in albums, or you will be overwhelmed. If you want to keep an album, buy a large one, and only put the most special art/projects in it.

Date them right away!

Save one piece per month unless there is something special around Mother's Day or a holiday or something else significant. You can also send one piece a month to Grandma or someone else. You've only begun to see the pile of things - with experience, you'll see that your fascination fades over time. We also have a large bulletin board in an upstairs hall - it's a good place to put a few things but not have them all over the main floor. When it's full and it's time to put something else up, something has to come down.

Over time, you'll clean out your once-a-month file and save 1-2 pieces per year. It makes a nice gift for your child on the 18th birthday or high school graduation or whatever!

It's not the absolute cheapest solution, but what I did was buy a laminating machine ($60 - $100.) Now we make placemats, ornaments, suncatchers, etc., using the artwork. My son likes helping with the machine and there are many things you can do, including cutting shapes out of finger paintings, using stamps on existing artwork, etc.

I also use his more, um, "abstract" work to make cards: I cut out shapes or glue a whole piece to the front of a cards and use stamps or paints or pens to write the message. This works particularly well for thank-you notes for his birthday & Christmas gifts.

I understand what you mean-all too quickly my counter is covered or drawers are stuffed full of every drawing my children have done. Something that I have found that works for me is to not keep doodles or regular color in the line papers...obviously, some I put on the fridge, but I rotate them, and when they come down-they go into the bin and with something new up, my kids don't even notice. If you get a photo album with plastic sleeve inserts for each year, then you can slide special projects and papers in there and keep those forever with your family albums and scrapbooks. If there are projects, like they've built a house out of toilet paper rolls- then take a picture of it and put that into the album. Some people have even gotten an art portfolio for each year. Whatever works for each person is great, I've found-but these are a couple of easy ideas and a great way to keep life clutter free:)

I take digital pictures of everything and use the file as my screen saver. That way they can see their art every time I am not using my computer. Then I send the actual work to the grandparents, who display it for a while and then throw it away. I have kept a few pieces that I thought were very nice. I plan to frame one they each did.

I purchased some nice white boxes from Uline :
http://www.uline.com/BL_1403/Literature-Mailers-White

I had to buy 25 but have used them for other things as well. I make a shipping label for the front of the box for each grade/ year and then once a week or so, load the papers in. It keeps things neat and we have fun looking back at other years. They stack nicely in a closet of shelf in the garage as well.

In addition I have a Little Davinci frame in my office at work:
http://www.dynamicframes.com/store/p/56-8-5x11-Lil-Davinc...

I change out her artwork every couple of weeks. Easy as pie and my co-workers love it!

B.

Hi M.,
I agree! I bought 2 huge plastic/tupperware bins (like the size you would store clothes in). I keep a fraction of the artwork sent home in the bin, and the rest goes away : ) The bins will be 0-5 yrs, 5-10 yrs, etc. And I just throw mementos in! It's really not that organized, but it will be fun for them to go through when they get older!
R. b.

I have turned my son's room in to his art gallery...all of the actual art (not pen doodles and dots, but paintings and collages) are taped to his walls. Instead of having framed art to look at, he has his own creations surrounding him. Sure, there are still a couple of special framed pieces in his room, but otherwise it is all his. We love it, he's proud of it, and it makes his room even more personal than before.

I get photo boxes to organize the best and most special by year. Some of it you DO have to just part with -you know, the ones that they just scribbled or you know the teacher did most of the work! It's hard to throw any of it away, but you'll be buried by 3rd grade if you don't! I display special works on the fridge until more stuff comes home and rotate it out that way. If you have a good place in your house, you can get the clips and hanging wires from places like Ikea and The Container Store and you can string up the wire and hang special stuff from the clips.