Ikea MALA easel, hacked for two!

I have two boys, and inevitably, when one wants to draw or paint, both want to do it. We recently moved and reorganized/resized our art/school/creative play area, so we needed to replace our old easel, a Melissa and Doug adjustable height easel, with one that folds flatter when it's not in use.

We picked the MALA easel (not on the US website right now) at Ikea because it's really flat when folded, and that's what we needed. It's the same height as the old one, so my boys won't notice much of a difference in use.

The only issue I had with the new easel is one I've always had, and had previously solved with an additional sheet of paper and another clip, but it meant that if one boy is still using the roll and the other is done, boy one will have to wait for more paper. Not practical, and really a setup for sibling rivalry!

Well, Ikea also has a small, portable paper roll holder, also in the MALA line, and it happens to fit perfectly on the rails of the easel's roll holder/tool bin. So, I've combined the two, and with the assistance of clips, converted the easel to work for two artists at one time. This is the back side of the easel, where the white board is:

And this is the front, where the chalkboard/paper path is (say hello to underpants-superman, my assistant):

I've altered the paper path for optimum tension, as well as to make it easier to fold when not in use, and to make it a bit easier to trim off fresh masterpieces without having to re-thread the paper through the retaining slit. It goes through the slit, up and folds a bit over the top, where it is held with the clip.

The clips are repurposed garment hangers with integral spring clips. I like these, because they are sturdy, easily replaced, and the clips are widely spaced. This means that you only need one for a big sheet of paper, instead of two.

Here's a repeat of my initial image, so you can see the paper rolls and the paper paths from the side without having to scroll up and down:

The tabletop paper holder has one of its removable crayon trays removed (I just set that aside) and sits on the rails of the easel's paper holder, the paper goes up over the white board and is clipped with a second repurposed hanger. It's not attached permanently to the easel, because I want to be able to remove it easily so I can fold the easel flat for storage.

ETA: If you want to secure the paper roll holder to the easel, use two to four long velcro cable ties, and just wrap them around the foot of the roll holder and the tray bar. The structure of the easel and the roll holder help to keep it in place, but if you need extra peace of mind, this works quite well .

All I have to do to fold it flat is to un-clip the secondary paper at the top, pick up the small paper holder, roll up the paper, and put the other crayon tray back in. Then I can put it up, and fold the easel flat, slide it next to the desk, and both are put away. Even adding in the crayons, that's less than 2 minutes for cleanup, which is fantastic with 2 busy kids in the house!

Underpants Superman gives the idea The Purple Crayon of Approval. So do I!