I’ve been getting inspired by a lot of blogs recently (especially Mumma Made It) and the activities these moms are doing with their young kids. Jack loves to do activities, but his mom *ME* is afraid of making messes (you’d never know that walking into my house!). He especially loves to paint, but we rarely do more than get the watercolors out every few weeks.
I’d love to know what kind of paint (and supplies) I should have on hand if I want to paint with Jack. When I read these blogs, they say “we painted on rocks/paper/walls….” and I’m always curious about what kind of paint they used. I want something that cleans easily. Any suggestions for me?
Anyway, I finally figured out a few ways we can take the painting outside. It’s a win-win situation for us. Jack’s happy to be painting, and I’m happy to be keeping the mess outside.
First, we’ve been painting on our blacktop driveway with water and paint brushes.
Jack really liked this, because he could splatter, drip, and swipe the water all he wanted and I didn’t say a thing if the ‘paint’ got everywhere. I liked how it dried up pretty quickly, so we could basically stay in the same area and paint all day.
Jack started drawing roads and I tried to spell out his name (and get a picture before the first letter dried). The bigger brush was a lot more fun to paint with in this activity.
The next paint we tried was sidewalk chalk paint.
I loved this! It was a little hard to work with only because the brushes got stuck in the paint mixture a bit, which made it more likely to spill. The recipe was super simple. Basically, it’s equal parts cornstarch and water. The original recipe I used called for 1/4c of each, so that’s what I used. I liked how it wasn’t too much paint, and we did end up using just about all of it before we were done. I used 5 drops of liquid food coloring in each cup.
I recommend using shorter cups if you have them. Maybe it was our tall cups that made them easier to tumble. The paint goes on very watery, but dries to look like regular sidewalk chalk. The thicker you put it on, the shinier the final look will be. The spill looked wet, but was actually dry after just a few minutes.
Jack loves to paint. I love easy clean up. If I can figure out how to marry the two, we’ll have a wonderful time!
That is one of the things on our bucket list (sidewalk paint) I haven't got around to it yet.
ReplyDeleteI used crayola washable paint and it was pretty good but I was buying to from Wal-Mart and it was frustrating because they only sold it in small quantities. Then I bought some washable paint from Joanne's because they had bigger bottles but I am not really crazy about it. It washes off just fine but it just doesn't look that pretty to me. I am placing an order at Discount School Supply of their paint so I will see how that goes. Also, I have read that if you add a little bit of soap to paint than it makes it washable. I have never tried it yet though. Whenever we do watercolor at our house, its just water and food coloring.
We have also tried paint makers, and fabric paint, both of which we bought at Joanne's.
ReplyDeleteLovely pictures and also "great" painitng by the kid.
ReplyDeleteOkay, if you are ever feeling really adventurous you can take a tennis ball and roll it in the sidewalk chalk and let Jack bounce and roll it all over the driveway. I did a post about that for No Time for Flash Cards. My kids just went nuts for it. I had a lot of fun with it, too. But I like to make a mess. I just don't like to clean it up. For the record that one can get cleaned up by a hose (for the kid and the driveway). ;)
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