Bob Ross for Kids: Happy Lessons in a Box

I bought this for my 12 year old daughter as a change from electronics. I was hopeful from the other reviews but not really holding my breath.She *loves* it! It came in on Tuesday and in 4 days she's painted 3 of the paintings, one of them 3 times, and is trying to do some of her own. She is now asking to move to the adult Bob Ross lessons (on youtube) and has created a plan: she'll do all of the kids' ones from this kit, then the "easy" Bob Ross paintings (one YouTube channel lists the easiest paintings for beginners), then move on to the harder ones.So there's the enthusiasm part. But what do the paintings really look like?Amazing. Simply amazing. The video tutorials are simple, clear, and concise, with steps that most kids can do. My husband came home from work and was amazed at how good the painting was. It was an honest reaction and compliment, not the "Uh, yeah, that's really good" that you sometimes give to kids when you don't want to crush them.Now for the cons.1. There aren't enough canvases. As another reviewer stated, there are only 3, but there are 6 paintings, and believe me that your child will want to do many. Be prepared to purchase more.2. The plastic painting knife is chintzy. I came here to purchase a metal one when I decided to leave a review. For a 7 yo you might want to stick with the plastic, but for an older kid, grab a metal paint knife.3. Managing expectations. My daughter just did a painting solo and is disappointed that it didn't turn out as nice as when she followed the tutorials. The tutorials are so clear and it's so easy for the kids that they can think they're wonderfully talented artists on their own who don't need instruction. We are talking about the difference in painting solo when you're a beginner vs painting with an instructor, and that both are important and you'll learn different things.4. The clean up instructions on the video links are at the very bottom of the page. We missed these for several days and I was grumbling about how hard it was to clean the palette. I found the instructions this morning and it made clean up so much easier (use dish soap and water to clean the brushes, scrape the wet paint off the palette with the scraper, then use a scrubbie-type brush and dish soap to clean the dried paint off the palette)

We got this kit for our 10 year old son. He has been able to paint the most amazing paintings with no prior experience with painting. He just follows the directions and it turns out quite spectacular.

This is seriously the cutest paint set I've seen in a long time. At one point, I struggled to do Bob Ross painting while with my kiddos and felt concerned about the toxicity of oil paints and thinners. Little did I know this little gem existed. My 11-year-old daughter became interested in painting, and at first, I let her use my version of Bob Ross colors I had mixed from my acrylics. This is way better than what I was able to give her to work with, and I'm really happy with this. My youngest kiddo seemed very frustrated working with my brushes, supplies, and tools -- but this is completely different, and the step-by-step instructions are helpful. It's very happy-making -- and far better than what we were coping with when my youngest kiddo was attempting a Bob Ross tutorial and her "happy little trees" were more than a bit sad. This is the best thing I got from amazon all year. My youngest kiddo wanted to enter her paintings in a craft fair and she is committed to making one painting a day. This takes the frustration out of her commitment and on-ramps her skills, helping her to gain confidence. It's great!

I got this set for my 11 year old grandson. The step by step instructions are fantastic! He has done 2 of the 5 paintings in this kit.

Nice set, but some brushes are rather cheap and fell apart. Great for kids but had to get better brushes.

Received this as a gift and it was still sealed but had no how-to comic book included as listed.

was a gift to a future artist and she loved it!!!

Very easy step by step. Gave my granddaughter ( age 11) a confidence to paint.