By Meredith Lamothe, CMNH Early Childhood & Literacy Coordinator

I love art. I love going to art museums and looking at masterpieces—I always have. I’m pretty crafty and have managed to make some art-like creations. I enjoy coming up with activities in our Muse Studio and finding ways to make them about the process of art rather than the final product (a subject that deserves its own blog post!). As I sit at my desk right now, I see Experience Guide Amanda outside doing our “Chalk Art” kit—no visitors have joined her yet, but she’s happily drawing a lovely rainbow near the entrance to the museum.

There’s just something about art, isn’t there? It can be whatever you want it—or need it—to be. For Amanda right now, it’s a calm moment before she gets back to her many tasks inside the museum. I’m more of a crafter and get a lot of joy from giving finished crafts to people I love. Art can be purely fun (have you seen the projects where you throw water balloons at a blank canvas?!). Art, especially with kids, can be a great way to visually see some of the fascinating growth that is happening—from drawings of stick figures with arms coming out of their heads, to beautiful clay sculptures and beyond.

As fun as art is on it’s own, just for yourself, it’s also great to have skilled instructors help out sometimes. They open our eyes to different art forms we may not have thought about before, introduce new materials to use to create, and have an abundance of knowledge and encouraging words to share.

And what do you know, lucky us, we have five incredible instructors visiting the museum next week! We’re thrilled to announce our first ever Visiting Artist Week here at The Children’s Museum of New Hampshire.

We will have five wonderful local artists joining us for workshops the week of July 24-28, 2017. A few of these artists were guests at our “Visiting Artist Camp” last year and the final products that those campers produced were nothing short of remarkable.

Workshops will be from 11am - noon each day and are included with museum admission and free for members. Workshops may be best for children 6 years old or older, but would be fine for younger children with some help.

Neva, the Communications Director here at the museum, will encourage families to tear up, rip, cut and glue painted paper into collaged sea monsters! If a mermaid or pirate find their way into your scene, even better!

Neva is a multimedia artist and illustrator who is not the least bit ashamed to admit she spends a ridiculous amount of time with paint on her hands.

Tess, the curator of Gallery 6 here at the museum, will be sharing some of her watercolor knowledge! Did you know all birds start from eggs? Of course you did! But! Did you know that bird paintings start with egg shapes?

Learn to draw and paint birds using simple geometric shapes with Tess!

Tess has illustrated numerous scientific books and articles and she is going to share some tricks of the trade.

Cindel, an expert seamstress, will be here explaining a bit about the process of sewing—from patterns to fabric to putting it all together into a fabulous final product! What will be the final product of your hard work on the 26^th? An adorable felt dinosaur that you can put on a pillow, apron, or frame and put on your wall!

Learn how to draw imaginary creatures with children's book illustrator Gina Perry. She will show you, step-by-step, how to draw a Unicorn, Bigfoot, Loch Ness Monster, and a Mermaid. Watch out - you might even learn how to draw a Dragon!

Seacoast pastel & acrylic painter Francois Lamothe will be here to share his skills. Francois will be sharing some tips and tricks about painting flowers using chalk pastels! Be sure to come prepared to get messy—this unique art experience is sure to accidentally travel onto clothing (it’s washable!)

We hope you will join us for a day or two of Visiting Artist Week. It’s sure to be a lot of fun and you’ll learn some unique new skills as well.

Oh! In case you’re interested, some visitors have joined Amanda and her chalk outside now and have added frogs, fish, a yellow submarine, and some very large flowers alongside her rainbow!