Browse Activities by Age of Baby

Month 1-3Month 4-6Month 7-9Month 10-12ToddlerPreschooler

Activity #305: Alter your board books

by Whitney Moss on August 16, 2012

in Crafty,Free/Cheap,Month 7

We had a board book that I didn’t like too much. The illustrations were too wishy washy and there were too many words. We also had a board book that I loved, by Todd Parr, called This is My Hair. Bold illustrations and simple text. Plus funny. I decided I wanted the first book to be more like the second book. And I needed a Father’s Day gift for my husband.

So, I painted over the cover of the book, put stickers on it and pasted all sorts of stuff on the inside. The main theme was “This is my dad”. I made a cartoon-like image of my husband’s head and copied enough of them for each page of the book. Then I pasted it over various environments that I cut out of magazines. I hand wrote the captions. I did not worry about letting the original contents of the book show through. It was obviously hand-made.

I think it looks really messy and amaturish, but visitors to our house seemed to be very impressed. So, I share this idea with you so that you can impress your own visitors. Feel free to copy my ideas exactly.

Apparently there is a whole art form called altered books, where people collage on the pages of regular books. They make some amazing stuff. My version is less than amazing, but it is a board book that my son and husband read together – and it’s made by me.

a d v e r t i s e m e n t

Previous post:

Next post: