Creating a Masterpiece with Kidzaw.com: A Review of Master Kitz The Starry Night

One of our children's favorite things to do is create art. They were so excited when the box arrived containing Master Kitz The Starry Night produced by Kidzaw.com! Our five-year-old son and three-year-old daughter couldn't wait to take everything out of the very well-made box to explore the different materials included. Children and adults (ages 5-105) will have a great time learning about the artist, creating an individual masterpiece, and sharing their work with family and friends just like we did.

What Do You Get with Master Kitz The Starry Night

• Reusable Artist's Tool Box 
• "Instructions Inspiration" in English, French, Spanish, German, and Italian 
• The "Instructions Inspiration" in English is a foldout, colorful poster-size paper
• Van Gogh Learning Materials (biography and a presentation of the styles of Van Gogh compared to other artists)  
• Two rollers – a plain yellow sponge one and a custom Van Gogh roller 
• Paint (in custom blue, black, and white)
• Oil Pastels (in white, blue, yellow, and orange)
• Two pieces of 16" by 20" paper for your artwork 
• Sheet of temporary star stickers 
• Stencil for countryside scene 

Creating a Masterpiece

When our Master Kitz The Starry Night first arrived, we took everything out of the box and looked through it all. Our younger two children and I talked about the different products and what they would be used for in the kit. I then laid out the rolled up paper to flatten out under books. A few days later we read through the information on Vincent Van Gogh and watched the videos on Kidzaw.com to see some examples. Our five-year-old son was very excited to see all the different products that are available. (We want to try the Claude Monet one in the future!)

After putting on the temporary stickers, you need to paint your paper with the special roller using the blue and then white paints to create the night time sky.

I was very happy that everything we needed was included in the reusable box. So if you wanted to create your artwork the moment it arrived, you could very easily roll the art paper back and forth a few times in the opposite direction, as the instructions suggest, to get started right away.

The directions are broken down into 12 steps for you and your family. From preparing your work space to using the different rollers, paint colors, and oil pastels, the information is clearly presented with illustrations and text to let you know what to do.

Once the temporary stars have been removed, you attach the stencil and paint the scene using the black paint and the yellow sponge roller. 

Our children's favorite part was getting to paint using the rollers with the different colors. If they had been a little more proficient with the rollers, we would have seen the pattern of the Van Gogh roller show a bit more in the final product. They tended to use the rollers more like paint brushes rather than rollers.

The final part was adding the finishing touches to the stars and buildings and trees using the oil pastels. 

We are all really pleased with the completed products. They look beautiful! 

Our five-year-old son's masterpiece

Our Thoughts

It was definitely helpful to have our teen helping our two younger children create their masterpieces. The recommended age is 5 to 105 so it was a bit complicated for our three-year-old daughter but with my help and her older brother's help, we were able to help her follow the inspiration.

I love the way the finished masterpieces turned out! The only problems we seemed to have was the temporary stickers were too attached to our paper when we tried to remove them. The paper tore a little as our teen and I were removing them from the two paintings. This then meant our fingers were covered with blue paint as we tried to slowly remove the stickers.

As our two younger children get older, I would purchase another Master Kitz from Kidzaw.com. They enjoyed getting to paint – to use different materials and techniques – to create their own masterpiece. I loved that we could allow them to be creative but still learn about a famous artist and his work.

Reviewing Master Kitz The Starry Night also started a conversation up with an aunt-in-law through which I learned that The Starry Night is her favorite art piece. I love learning new things about the people in my family. And that is one of the features of the Master Kitz – Learn – Create – Share.

Our three-year-old daughter's masterpiece

Because each artwork created can look different – which is a great feature of using Master Kitz – please be sure to check out the the other reviews from the Homeschool Review Crew!