Keeping Your Art Supplies at the Ready

Good intentions. We all have them, especially when it comes to offering our children our best in our homeschooling. Sometimes we just need a little nudge to get us going and then we wonder why we never started before this....I'm talking about art. It is one of my favorite topics and yet I am guilty of letting this slip through the cracks just like you. Not so much anymore but in years past I was not as diligent about pushing it to the top of the "to do" list as I am now.

One big factor in keeping our art times regular is to have our supplies organized. If you start a project and can't find the materials needed, you will spend too much time hunting down the illusive paint brush or the perfect kind of paper. Here is how we solved the organization problem in our family.

Photos are better than words so here you go.


You can view the photos on Flickr and they will have notes explaining exactly what each photo is all about. I will include some of the photos in the blog entry but there are more on Flickr.
Art Supply Organization Photoset on Flickr

I use two rolling carts to store most of what we use everyday. The drawers are labeled so we don't have to guess which drawer holds which art mediums. The cart on the right has a drawer for each boy to keep their own special things in and no one else touches that drawer. Everything else in the carts is available to anyone at any time.

Inside the drawers we have also organized our pencils and markers in plastic bins, clearly labeled. This makes finding what you need and then cleaning up again much easier.

I also use two shelves in my utility closet for art supplies. I keep a list hanging on the door of what is exactly on each shelf. This way I spend less time digging through the closet looking for what I need. This is something that I started years ago when I was teaching art and was spending far too much time looking for things than I should have. The list also helps the boys know where to look for something that they need and it helps them be more independent in their work.

Here are the shelves. Make sure to click over to Flickr for the explanations.
Art Supply Organization Photoset on Flickr


Here is the list.


This photo shows how I organize the paper supplies and other misc items we use during the week. This is right next to our work space so it is handy when we need it. I actually have one more place for paper but it is just a shelf on the bottom of a bookshelf...nothing fancy.

Click over to Flickr to find out why I have such a stash of pastel paper.
Art Supply Organization Photoset on Flickr

Okay, here is one last photo that shows you that not everything is so neat and tidy. This is the top of the two rolling carts where we keep all those misc tools and items you need during the day. The boys just throw all the little bits and pieces of homeschoooling into this space. We don't have desks so this is where they keep their pencils and calculators and anything else necessary to a boy's school day.....like a hunk of wood and a tape measure. :) Do you see the scissors? I don't either. They are always missing even though this is where they should be when not in use. I need ideas on how not to lose scissors.


So that is how we organize our art supplies. I love the rolling carts because we can actually move them to where we are working so they are close at hand. I appreciate my daughter labeling the drawers a few months ago because that has helped us find things quickly. I try to limit the amount of art supplies that I have to keep organized by knowing just what I do have on hand and then try to never have so much that it doesn't fit into our space. Keeping things organized and having a place for everything keeps the boys accountable for cleaning up after themselves which makes me happy.


Less time looking for things means more time to actually spend *making* art!

Hope that this helps you and gives you some ideas for your own home. Keep it simple.

Barb-Harmony Art Mom