Mori Holt’s 3-year-old daughter Brielle first eyed the open canvas and collection of paints, brushes and other mess vectors laid out on the floor at Heathen Brewing’s Feral pub Sunday with suspicion.
“She’s always willing to get into anything. But she knows,” Mori Holt, said. “I think at first she was kind of like, ‘Well, Mom’s gonna be mad if I get too dirty.'”
But once Brielle got the OK, Mom said, she dived right in. She then spent much of the hour session covered in paint and shaving cream.
“She’s not shy and she’s not clean, so it’s right up her alley,” Mori Holt said. “I think she’s enjoying the fact that there’s no boundary today.”
All rules and parental preferences about tidiness were suspended that morning for one of Art ala Carte’s Messy Madness events. The mobile art activity business set out paints, brushes and shaving cream for the 10 or so toddlers and small children to experiment with, and a big sheet for them to work over as they swish around, and in, finger paints.
Messy Madness is one of Art ala Carte’s most popular programs, co-owner Aria Leighty said.
The company puts on events for schools, birthday parties or companies — for any age — where guests can do art projects.
The Messy Madness events are a means for small children to create some art and experience new tactile sensations, like a face covered in finger paint or a towering handful of shaving cream, she said.
Likewise, parents who learned well their parent’s rules about being messy get to de-program a bit as well.
“It’s all washable,” Leighty said.
As part of the events, the company also brings in a photographer, so parents can focus more on playing with their kids than documenting the memories themselves, Leighty said. The photos, and a canvas for the kids to create on, come with the $20 ticket.
They’ll often get around 15 to 20 kids participating, but it depends on the space, she said.
“I just know when babies are watching their peers then they’ll pick up on a lot of stuff, more than if we just throw them in a highchair at the studio and have them do it themselves,” Leighty said.
Sometimes, the company sees kids who start making art at Messy Madness a]nd come back to more organized projects later.
Where some of the children jumped in right away, others needed to warm up to it, like 1-year-old Kellen Erwin.
Kellen started the session with a skeptical look, and ended it looking like a Smurf from the neck down.
“He was a little shy at first, but he’s definitely found his niche,” Steve Erwin said.
Others kids, like 1-year-old Olive Schlaefli, preferred to observe their peer’s artistic process from their parent’s arms.
Mom, Ashley Schlaefli, said her 2-year-old, Hazel, who went to two other Messy Madness events, was a lot more enthusiastic.
“We have some great pictures of her, you know, paint all over her face, taking turns painting kids, it was very cool,” Schlaefli said.
The events are special because of the freedom they offer the kids, she said.
“They get to do what they want, and it’s safe,” she said. “Its just fun to see them explore.”
It’s also nice the kids get to explore and create on someone else’s floor.
“I would never do this at home,” she said, laughing.
