Thinking over the forthcoming meeting of the children’s art-group, I decided that it would be a nice idea to devote the meeting to some certain topic/image. As we are only starting organizing children’s art meetings at our place, why not devote the meeting on Sunday to Shri Ganesha? Why to him? In Indian mythology Shri Ganesha is considered to be the Deity (or, in other words, an aspect of God Almighty) who protects children, their innocence and purity, he also helps when you start something new. Why Indian mythology? Our government announced year 2009 a year of India in Russia 
(well, we just like Shri Ganesha and we try to show children the understanding of and respect for different cultures).
Today there were three kids at our art-meeting: Soniya (1,5), Kirill (3,5) and Bazhena (5,5). We showed them a picture of Shri Ganesha and asked them what qualities they thought he had? “He is kind, honest, wise and he is very obedient to his mother. He also wants us to have such qualities!”
Then we told the children the legend about the creation of Shri Ganesha (why he’s got an elephant’s head).Red flowers (red is the colour of Shri Ganesha) and sweet things (Ganesha likes them very much) added special atmosphere to our today’s meeting.
The art&craft part was also devoted to Shri Ganesha. We discussed his appearance beforehand: he’s got a trunk, big belly, one tusk, four hands, one of which gives blessings, another holds sweets and in the other two hands there are weapons to fight with evil things. His transport is, according to the legend, a little mouse. And again this craft was appropriate for both a 1,5-year-old and a 5,5-year-old. I think I have already got used to such conditions
On the cardboard I drew the contours of a boy-elephant. The children put glue onto the elements of the image and then poured semolina mixed with kum-kum (Indian clay) there – Ganesha should turn out red.
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