When there are just too many kids.. *UPDATE*

What do you do? I'm painting at my daughter's preschool Christmas party and due to budget constraints I'll be the only painter there. There could be 80-100 kids there for me to paint in 2 hours (though some may not want it done or will be too young).

Do you think I should make up a board of 2 or 3 designs each to choose from? There just won't be time to sit and negotiate what each kid wants and then let them choose colours and stuff.

Thanks

What I was told that I thought was a good idea is just bring a word board - crud - cant read. So yah maybe a few designs on a board and then when they get to you, you ask do you want a rainbow, kitty or butterfly and ask favorite colors. Then you don't have them complaining that the photo shows the extra dots or whatever.
Does that make sense?

OneFirefly wrote:What do you do? I'm painting at my daughter's preschool Christmas party and due to budget constraints I'll be the only painter there. There could be 80-100 kids there for me to paint in 2 hours (though some may not want it done or will be too young).

Do you think I should make up a board of 2 or 3 designs each to choose from? There just won't be time to sit and negotiate what each kid wants and then let them choose colours and stuff.

Thanks

Preschoolers don't read. By the time they sit in your chair and make up their mind about butterfly, clouds, rainbow or whatever else plus the color you are taking more time asking and waiting for answers then you would be just painting. So, your are right, there won't be time to negotiate.  You will be loosing precious time here. Letting them choose their favorite color is good enough and most are pretty certain on what their favorite color is. I wouldn't ask their color if they don't ask. But most girls will. I assume you have a variety of rainbow cakes. You don't have to put anything on your pic. that you think takes up too much time. I would do 3 for boys 3 for girls and really easy ones. You said budget constraints, so there won't be a line handler. Even with a line handler these kids change their minds as fast as the wind. You need to tell them that a parent should volunteer (I think) for this if they are not paying for one and I don't think they will be. A parent that doesn't know the ropes can be a pain in the back-side too and can cause more grief then a child. It there is a volunteer you need to have a serious talk with her before you start. Also, pick a design that takes 2 minutes or less. Do the math, if a design takes 3 minutes that is 90 minutes for 30 children. Then the child has to get in and out of the chair and they can be slow getting out of that chair. Put that mirror away from your chair so that child wants out fast to go see his/her face. Let's say you do a 2 minute design with no interruption in between and it flows easy. lol That is a total of 30 kids in one hour at 2 minutes each and in 2 hours 60 kids will be painted. That still leaves 20 to 40 children to be painted. Don't go with the assumption that all won't want to be face painted and may be too young. Be prepared! So you need to do swirls,teardrops,  and a simple flower, rainbow w/ star or heart, something that will take a minute or so and no more then that or all the kids won't get painted and you look bad. I do hope you are a well seasoned face painter and have speed on your side. That is a lot of children in a two hour span. Girls or easy and I can wipe out a rainbow with starts, clouds and teardrops in a minute or under. But then there are the boys...How fast can you do a dolphin, snake, spider, or something similar that boys are attracted to? Just suggestions only you know what you can paint, how fast and what the boys in your area go for.  I wish you the best. Also, there are simple fast butterflies that you can do and do one eye only. Or a simple butterfly on the side of the face with a flower. Again you know what you are capable of.

Hi Onefirefly, I painted earlier this year at an event exactly like this.

Set up - I set up in a corner and had a rope on the ground that stretched around both me and my kit - no one was allowed inside the rope - this set a real boundary and worked fantastic. The children all lined up in order in one line - I would ask the next child in line which design they wanted then I'd ask who else wanted that and get three children who wanted the same - then I had 3 placemats on the ground (on the "victim" side of the rope haha) - the children would each stand on a mat and I painted 3 of the same design at a time. Base for whole three then back in same order to do details - this would give base time to dry. I found older children/adults would catch onto this and often get the next 3 ready for me! (I usually paint standing with a high directors chair - there is no time for children getting in and out of a chair.)

Mirror - I painted an older child or two when I first started and had them sit over a little ways with the mirror and sent children straight over to look at their faces. This worked well.

Design choices - I had 6 super fast designs to choose from that were all fast but still showed enough skill.  I had word board and also had the designs sketched inside my case for easy reference.  There is usually enough older children / parents around to read the word board and the info gets around quickly, especially when they start seeing the designs after they are done. I also used a rainbow cake per design and most often did not give a colour choice. I consciously packed a minimal kit because with an event like this there WILL be a line - we are used to this but some parents get anxious to "help" (nope there's just enough for me), if any comments were directed to me about the line up I would smile good naturedly, (while still painting of course!) and offer for them to time me painting - this focused them on how fast I was actually going - not one actually went ahead and timed me ;-)

If you could get the children to line up according to the design they wanted it would be even faster - I always find over siblings a great help - if I do the same event next year I was thinking of doing away with the word board and painting the 6 design choices on 6 older children and then get the little ones to line up in front of their choice - then the older children could take turns getting 3 ready to be painted.

So that's how I tackled it - or what I can remember at this late time at night!  Def not the most enjoyable painting experience but sometimes unavoidable ;-)

Ok so I just realised I have written the longest post I have ever written! I know this is hard to imagine and I feel silly feeling this way as everyone here has been fantastic - but I always feel shy posting but really want to offer some help on a topic I have some experience with. I hope it will be some help, and although it is approaching an essay of some sort if you have any questions about my post please feel free :-)

Erica

Oh yes and I nearly forgot - hopefully there will be other activities on offer there for the children? With 80 to 100 children there really needs to be.

being blessed with some kids deemed "tough to handle" by many early childhood professionals, I can tell you:
don't give them a choice.



you sit down, set your paints up, and just have them line up.


as each kid comes up to you, don't ask "what would you like"

instead, just say "hi, what's your name!?"
conversation as you paint whatever you feel like it.


I promise you, you will BEAST through that line, and every kid will be so happy because they will have had one on one attention, and a special face just for them, and they will be so surprised.

make sure it matches their outfit-if they have a red shirt, use a red design.if they have a blue shirt, use a blue design.



even if you do something they normally hate-such as "aww man, I wanted a butterfly, not a flower", you can just say "the flower matches your shirt perfectly, you look so cute!" and they will walk around repeating that they look so cute because it matches their shirt perfectly...lol, love the lil ones



but that's the trick-don't give them an option, you just sit them down and paint!

make sure you have a few designs ready in your head-or, print out a little cheat sheet of designs that ONLY YOU can see.

then, go to town!

and for the love of jimminey crickets-do NOT let them see your paints.

otherwise ever single girl will pick neon pink or neon rainbow.

and also, I say pick a design that takes 30 seconds or less.

if the kids move anything like my babies, you don't have time to mess around.get it on quick.


the fastest designs in my arsenal are:

rainbow-I do a quick swipe of a rainbow one-stroke.at the end of the rainbow, I put:
star
heart
smiley face
peace sign
rose
regular flower
spider man head
power ranger head
iron man head
ninja turtle head
yin yang
skull
unicorn
dolphin
spider
3/4 tiger
bird
wolverine head (the dog)
wolverine head (the cartoon man)
bob the builder
tiara
shark

sometimes I just do a rainbow band all around their forehead, topped with stencils and swirls, and put a lil blush on the cheeks with starburst.

My other quickie is the 30 second butterfly, I do it with my huge 2" flat that picks up the whole prisma cake at once....much faster than loading a sponge.


I say to choose a 30 second design, because then you can spruce it up with an additional minute of outlining, dots, teardrops, sparkle starburst, glitter..but, at the same time, the kid is good to go and still happy with the completed look.


I like to finish the looks off with lots of big fat white teardrops all over one side of the face pointing to the design, or I do a big black tribal design around the design that takes up the whole face.

not more than 10 lines extra either way...depends if the next kid is ready or not.

Wow thank you all so much for the advice! Some brilliant ideas there. I like the idea of not giving them a choice. I'll have to have a few designs up my sleeve for me to choose from though - no time to sit there and be creative!

I've just signed up for a month of Fabatv and thanks to Mark Reid my linework and swirls and stuff are way better, so I'll definitely be incorporating them into a design!

Thanks again - this is the most helpful forum ever!

Thanks for asking this question! I'll have an event like this next year, and all the suggestions are great.

erica21 wrote:Hi Onefirefly, I painted earlier this year at an event exactly like this.

Set up - I set up in a corner and had a rope on the ground that stretched around both me and my kit - no one was allowed inside the rope - this set a real boundary and worked fantastic. The children all lined up in order in one line - I would ask the next child in line which design they wanted then I'd ask who else wanted that and get three children who wanted the same - then I had 3 placemats on the ground (on the "victim" side of the rope haha) - the children would each stand on a mat and I painted 3 of the same design at a time. Base for whole three then back in same order to do details - this would give base time to dry. I found older children/adults would catch onto this and often get the next 3 ready for me! (I usually paint standing with a high directors chair - there is no time for children getting in and out of a chair.)

Mirror - I painted an older child or two when I first started and had them sit over a little ways with the mirror and sent children straight over to look at their faces. This worked well.

Design choices - I had 6 super fast designs to choose from that were all fast but still showed enough skill.  I had word board and also had the designs sketched inside my case for easy reference.  There is usually enough older children / parents around to read the word board and the info gets around quickly, especially when they start seeing the designs after they are done. I also used a rainbow cake per design and most often did not give a colour choice. I consciously packed a minimal kit because with an event like this there WILL be a line - we are used to this but some parents get anxious to "help" (nope there's just enough for me), if any comments were directed to me about the line up I would smile good naturedly, (while still painting of course!) and offer for them to time me painting - this focused them on how fast I was actually going - not one actually went ahead and timed me ;-)

If you could get the children to line up according to the design they wanted it would be even faster - I always find over siblings a great help - if I do the same event next year I was thinking of doing away with the word board and painting the 6 design choices on 6 older children and then get the little ones to line up in front of their choice - then the older children could take turns getting 3 ready to be painted.

So that's how I tackled it - or what I can remember at this late time at night!  Def not the most enjoyable painting experience but sometimes unavoidable ;-)

Ok so I just realised I have written the longest post I have ever written! I know this is hard to imagine and I feel silly feeling this way as everyone here has been fantastic - but I always feel shy posting but really want to offer some help on a topic I have some experience with. I hope it will be some help, and although it is approaching an essay of some sort if you have any questions about my post please feel free :-)

Erica

I like this idea but with my luck I would have too many angry moms because I took a kid in line or 3 kids in line before her child. That would be a problem I think. And what if that same kid has a problem or is shy? He or she will just get pushed back to never never land. Also I find that most kids don't listen and will cross that rope and I would be careful with a rope on the floor. What if it tripped someone? I would use duck tape if I used anything to mark a space. I also know that pre-K starts at 3 and goes to 6 in my state. So I don't think many will be under 3. But to each his own or works for me may not work for others. I block my space with a narrow long table in front of my painting table and I too go into a corner or up against a wall. It stops kids from going on that side of the table and bumping your table that water starts to splash or dump on your paints.. I don't like to keep telling kids to get back and repeating myself. Kids or going to be kids.

OneFirefly wrote:What do you do? I'm painting at my daughter's preschool Christmas party and due to budget constraints I'll be the only painter there. There could be 80-100 kids there for me to paint in 2 hours (though some may not want it done or will be too young).

Do you think I should make up a board of 2 or 3 designs each to choose from? There just won't be time to sit and negotiate what each kid wants and then let them choose colours and stuff.

Thanks

i forgot this, it's free and everyone will want it. That says it all.

No there were no angry Mums because children were not being put off for very long before being painted. I was also asking what the next child in line wanted then getting two to join them so the line was generally getting done almost in order. There was NOT that much line jumping and sometimes i would just take the next three and do three different designs to be honest - I was using a sponge per child anyway. I was always asking children in the line what they wanted as I worked (especially if they seemed quiet/shy).  The rope basically enclosed a very small area - there was nowhere for anyone to trip on it the way I had it - not one person tripped. It is true - different things work for different people - I was only putting forward what I did when in the situation put forward in this post.

yeah i haven't run into the angry mom situation yet....but i am also always aware of the lines when it gets busy....maybe all my years of restaurant management experience helped me in that area...


i just tell the kids to remember who was in front of them...every once in awhile, i will ask them to check again.they like answering questions while they wait...



i think all of the advice in this thread is excellent-i also use only 1 sponge per child...i put out 25 sponges at a time, and as soon as they are gone, i find out what time it is-that tells me how fast i'm going and let's me accurately guage whether or not everybody will be painted on time.especially when there is this many kids.


another thing i will do is line up all the kids who want the same thing, if i hear them saying it in line....that lets me knock them out faster....for any kid that says it isn't fair, i just offer them the design...and if they say they don't want it, i say well, i'm only doing this design right now.

With events like this it has worked best for us to have just a few quick boy designs and a few girl designs with them posted beside the line. On the sign I just post a notice that they must know what they want before getting in the chair. Anyone that doesn't know, I just ask them to hop back in line so they can figure out what they want. They always pick something immediately after that to avoid getting back in line.

Also I make sure to keep my mirror behind me so that they will want to jump out of the chair just as soon as they are done to look at themselves.

Also, for any event like this where they don't want to hire more than one painter, we ask them to provide a volunteer to help with line control. This way all I have to do is just paint.

Look up sushi cakes, they are amazing bases for spiders, peace signs, etc. Crazy fast, and still super fun. 
Good luck. 
One thing I would add- You may not enjoy this type of painting, so have your drug of choice (dark chocolate with almonds and blueberries anyone??) ready and just keep telling yourself that it is waiting for you.

Excellent advice!!!!
If you take notes of this thread, you will have smooth sailing.


Personally, I love being mobbed by a bunch of kids..... my only issue is when its a bunch of kids unable to follow directions, but preschoolers are already trained to be obedient of rules! You just let them know right away your rules, and they will keep the other kids in order for you.

They love tattle tailing.they will tell the other kids "she said not to touch her paints or you won't get painted" or "excuse me miss, he wasn't in line"....


Good luck to you!

nikkili26 wrote:Excellent advice!!!!
If you take notes of this thread, you will have smooth sailing.


Personally, I love being mobbed by a bunch of kids..... my only issue is when its a bunch of kids unable to follow directions, but preschoolers are already trained to be obedient of rules! You just let them know right away your rules, and they will keep the other kids in order for you.

They love tattle tailing.they will tell the other kids "she said not to touch her paints or you won't get painted" or "excuse me miss, he wasn't in line"....


Good luck to you!

You must have met my granddaughter! lol She is a tattle tale but not obedient. I don't want to be mobbed just some order and not chaos. Organized chaos is OK.

Thought I would post an update. It went really well! Thanks to the tips in this thread I was well prepared. I went in with an action plan and it worked beautifully. I even finished with about 20 minutes to spare! I had lots of people comment on how fast I was and how great everything looked.

Glad not every gig is that frantic though!
Thank you all for helping me out

OneFirefly wrote:Thought I would post an update. It went really well! Thanks to the tips in this thread I was well prepared. I went in with an action plan and it worked beautifully. I even finished with about 20 minutes to spare! I had lots of people comment on how fast I was and how great everything looked.

Glad not every gig is that frantic though!
Thank you all for helping me out

So Glad to hear you planed it out and all went well. Congratulations on a job well done. Sometimes it's good to be under pressure and shows us what we really can do in a pinch.
Happy Painting...

so wonderful to hear!!!that's what makes this forum soooo great-so many of us have been there and done that!!!

no reason to go in experimenting with what works when we can just tell you

I had back to back gigs lined up this past Saturday that were supposed to be like that.
I took my own advice, as well as everyone else's. (thank you!)
The first one, I painted about 70 kids in 1.5 hours. It was great! Super easy stuff, with good "wow factor".
Everyone was happy, parents took my card, it was on a military base, so I was assured they would be calling me again.

Second one, I was told to be prepared for about 200 kids in two hours. They knew I wouldn't be able to paint them all, of course, but I was ready.

It was a parade downtown.

A DOG parade.

I painted three kids.

But I was paid for two hours and my card went into the hand of the man who owns Beale Street Landing.
If you lived here, you'd know what that means.   

Meanwhile, I was on time.

I was professional.

I did those three faces like they were the only faces on the planet.

And I walked away with my check and a smile.

OMG, I love, love, love Beale Street. Of all the places we have been delivering cars, Beale is near the top. Here I am on the bar at Coyote Ugly   

Beale Street Landing is the new dock on the river where the Memphis Queen and all the other riverboats dock.

I know, we walked by there when we were going to Beale Street. We got on a trolley right in front of the landing (I am assuming it is in or near that weird red spiral building) and took the trolley around to Beale.