The month of October brings so much seasonal joy with the weather cooling, leaves beginning to change, pumpkin patch adventures, etc. But with it also comes a strong focus on the rosary… it’s also the Month of the Rosary.
This year, it is a personal goal of mine to carve out more time for this incredibly inspiring reflection through prayer and meditation of the lives of Mary and Jesus. And if you’re anything like me, you are always looking for ways to include your children in prayerful activities that lift up the importance of Christ in our lives when we live in a world that seems to be pushing Him out.

Here is a FUN and colorful way to engage your children in the rosary this month! We made a simplified version of a rosary that focuses on the Sign of the Cross, the Our Father and the Hail Mary. This art project just uses one decade of the rosary.

Here is a summary of the project and book recommendation along with a time-lapsed tutorial of the art project.

Let Us Pray: A Child’s First Book of Prayers by Katie Warner is a great book to accompany introducing the rosary to children. We adore these board books. We take them to Mass, read them before bed and use them as a great source of inspiration for combining art with prayer. I love that my 5 year old, 3 year old AND 1 year old can all enjoy the illustrations of these prayers. It’s worth checking out along with their other board books that really help talk about the Catholic faith with little ones.

Here is what we used for this art project:

*FOR THE SHAPES: My girls picked what colors they wanted and I cut out the shapes ahead of time to focus on the painting and gluing and praying that goes along with the project. Your children can certainly help cut if that is something they enjoy. ☺️
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Watercolor Rose Background: Using the red oil pastel or crayon, draw swirls all around the white paper. These are the start of simple roses. Press down hard so the color will show or resist through the watercolor!
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Paint over the red swirls with pink or red liquid watercolors. Swirl the brush around the lines to make roses.
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Paint the background green. It’s okay if a little green mixes with the pink.

Arrange the shapes on the space to make sure they fit properly and glue them down. We said the prayers as we glued!

Here is a packet you can download for free to help guide this art project. It includes a worksheet rosary activity you can use this month to reinforce the importance of these prayers, printable prayers and more.

​CLICK THE BOX BELOW TO GRAB YOUR FREE DOWNLOAD!

Check out how retired art teacher, Susie Ellis, used this project with her parish VBS!