How to Plan a Paint Your Partner Night
- Brooke Amidei
- Jun 7, 2024
- 4 min read
Updated: Oct 15, 2025
These are all the rage on social media, but not only is it not too late to jump on the bandwagon, you absolutely should! We recently had grandma and grandpa come visit so we decided to give a "paint your partner" night a try. None of us consider ourselves artists, but this was such a great family activity. Here's how we did it...
I ordered a few items in advance that are obviously key to get the party started...
You are definitely going to need the canvases. This was an 8 pack of 8"x10" panels and they worked perfectly, plus gave us the option if anyone screwed up majorly that we would have a couple of backup canvases.
The other thing that is not only necessary but makes you feel like you really are Monet are these wooden easel stands. They also came in an 8 pack and I love that we are set-up now for many more fun art activities at our house because you can use them again and again.
I wasn't really sure what to get when it came to paint, but after some research I chose this package Acrylic Paint that came with 2 sets of 12 colors and 20 paint brushes. We each had plenty of options and could mix paints to get just the hue we were going for.
It was easy to just pop everything in my Amazon cart and have it delivered to my door so I was already for our activity.
It was really nice out so we set-up a long card table outside and had each kid draw names to see who would be partnered up. As you can see it worked out where each one was partnered with a grandparent so my husband and I got to paint each other.
You can do it however you want, we decided on a 30 minute time limit and that was about the only rule or direction we gave. There was discussion about how much of the person you should paint and we all decided to do what you could see- so shoulders and up. We put paper plates in between each pair and they could squeeze whatever paint they wanted on the plate. I would definitely wait to squeeze any paint on the plate until you need it, there were several colors that went unused. Then we went to work!
As you can see there was some early judgement on each other's talents.
Check out this Instagram post for the full process and reveal of each other's paintings. It was hilarious! Below are most of the results (the teenager ran off before I could get a photo of his).
We had so much fun we made up another game to keep our artistic fun flowing! We took another blank canvas and each of us had one minute to paint whatever we wanted and then we would pass it to the next person. There was no discussion of what we were trying to make, just up to the artist of the minute to bring whatever you wanted to our collective painting. There were surprises and battles and a lot more laughs. Here's how it ended up...
Yeah, we're not really sure what it is either...
I would 100% recommend anyone do this with your partner, your kiddo, your immediate family or extended family and friends at your next gathering. It was inexpensive, so much fun and memorable. It was also insightful to see who's artistic abilities really shined through!
For a twist on Paint Your Partner Night, try this festive idea!
We went to Goodwill and purchased old paintings that we would update ourselves to give them a spooky and festive Halloween feel.
Get your table set-up with all of your supplies but don't forget to put on some Halloween music to really get the spooky vibes going!
We started out by displaying all of the artwork that we purchased and we drew numbers to see who got to select their canvas first.
After everyone had their paintings we got set at our stations. Very similar to the Paint Your Partner night, we used the easels and had a variety of acrylic paint and paint brushes as well as water and some paper towels on hand. The easels not only make you feel a little more professional, but they are great to give everyone some much needed space for this activity. As you can see from the photo below, it would've been really tough if we all had our paintings lying on the table.
Then we got to work! Most people started by adding some orange and brown leaves to the trees and turning whatever landscape we had into more of a fall feel.
It was also popular to add ghosts, bats, pumpkins, a cemetery, a black cat or two and to blacken the sky and add a moon.
It was so fun to see everyone's artistic skills come out (and we do NOT consider ourselves artistic)! We all had happy little mistakes that turned into part of our finished products. Here are some of ours for your inspiration.
This was a fun activity for the whole family! We decided you could do this for a lot of different occasions- Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving, Fourth of July and others! For a very small amount of effort and investment, you can create a really fun activity for all ages with something each person takes with them and memories that last!
Same supplies as above:
Easels are a must!
For this one you don't need canvases
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