At age 4 Garé was allowed to send a Halloween postcard, which she had made by herself using crayons, to a neighbouring doctor whom she liked very much. The good man kept it only to consent to have it added to Garé's scrapbook many years later. Garé drew on both sides of the card and the inner side is rendered to the left. This drawing constitutes Garé's first 'published' artist work of thousands to come...

When Garé was 10 years old she was credited for the design of the front cover for a program for a school play Ye Blue Knight set in medieval times. The cover shows a knight's shield, and it was Garé's first published artwork! Unfortunately, the program was stenciled on very course paper resembling blotting paper, which explains that the contents of page two shows through.

From an early age Garé dabbled with woodblock prints, i.e. a block of wood onto whose surface a design is engraved. Here are two early examples carefully printed on tissue paper. Later on, when she attended art school in Boston, she made multiple woodblock prints with themes for book illustrations typical of her native islands; floral studies, animals and birds, and decorative design.

Garé's father was an architect and she often helped him with minor tasks, which brought about a basic understanding of the art of drawing. It would seem from these two surviving drawings that Garé intended to produce a portfolio of architecturally interesting buildings. The motifs are both French and depict the triumphal arch and the Notre Dame cathedral in Paris.

During her teens Garé undoubtedly made many still-lifes as these two examples illustrate. They are undated but clearly some of her first attempts in this field.

In general, Garé was never too interested in portraying people, and this study is the only surviving from her teenage years. It might be supposed that she drew it from a contemporary magazine, as the vampy looking woman would not seem to be the first choice for a girlfriend.

Apart from Garé's first attempt of making a program front cover for a school play when she was 10 years old (see above), she would sometimes volunteer to make this sort of cover for many years. This program dated 1935 clearly depicts how a typical modern font of that time would look; stylish but hard to read.

In the mid 1930s Garé sketched her pet dog on two occasions with the subtitle My Peke 'Mai-Mai' (Peke is American slang for a Pekingese dog). Although the sketches are quite simple and quickly jotted down it is clear that Garé had come a long way in her strive to become an artist. For the remainder of her life she would make countless sketches and paintings depicting all sorts of, primarily wild, animals...