Tag: puffy paint

Extra-Easy Melting Snowman

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Veronika has enjoyed snowmen crafts lately, but since she’s too young to draw a snowman shape herself, the activities have required a lot of mommy guidance. The solution to letting her paint her own way? A melted snowman!

We made puffy paint yesterday that she loved so much I decided to use it again for this craft, although you can use regular white paint in a pinch. In a tray, I mixed up equal parts white glue and shaving cream until we had a puffy, sticky mixture.

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She immediately started brushing it over a piece of construction paper. Anywhere at all was fine; this snowman has melted under the winter sun!

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I made a second messy painting alongside her so we could have companion snowmen. Once the puffy paint dried, we used a glue stick to attach all of the accessories. Again, these can go anywhere on the paper that your toddler wants!

We added hats, carrot noses, and mittens cut from construction paper, and red pom poms for buttons.

Questing Stone

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This painted rock craft is sort of a DIY riff on a “Choose Your Own Adventure Book”! Travis and I followed Highlights magazine’s suggestion for the two sides of our first stone, and also created our own alternate versions.

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All you need for the craft are rocks and puffy paints.

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For the suggested version, one side was a unicorn head. The opposite side was a dragon’s tail. Mommy’s art skills are noticeably lacking, but I like to think that adds to the DIY charm.

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Give the puffy paint ample time to dry. Then, instead of a traditional story time, we made up a tale together. Because Travis seemed antsy just sitting still, we turned it into game with action figures. Here comes Iron Man to the castle…

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Whenever we came to a crossroads in the story, Travis flipped the stone. We decided the unicorn would represent a good outcome and the dragon’s tail was bad outcome. Yay, Iron Man got into the castle!

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Oh no, the next flip was the dragon, so he was swarmed by enemies at the next turning point of the story.

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Travis didn’t like this turn of events, so decided the blob of paint he’d made on another rock represented  “water power.” If we flipped to the water symbol, Iron Man would win.

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And so on! Big kids can get truly sophisticated with their storytelling, perhaps even writing down the all the possible junctures. My 5-year-old just loved the novelty of flipping the stone and acting out a tale as we saw how it all played out.

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Fluffy-Paint Collage

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We tend to think of sensory art projects as toddler games, but sometimes, even four-year-olds just need to get messy! Queue this shaving cream paint project, a great suggestion from High Five magazine, that absolutely delighted Travis.

To make our fluffy paint mixture, we first mixed 1/2 cup white glue with 1/2 cup shaving cream (thanks Daddy!) in a bowl.

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Stir until combined. Divide the glue into cups (as many different ones as you have colors). Add drops of food coloring, and stir until mixed.

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Travis loves to play mixologist like this!

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We smeared our puffy paint over two thick pieces of watercolor paper (card stock would work, too). Let dry completely.

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Travis loved this step so much he requested extra cups of shaving cream to stir and tint with color. I was happy to oblige!

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Later in the afternoon, it was time for some fine motor skills. First, we had to check out how the dried paint felt. Very puffy!

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We cut the puffy pictures into pieces.

fluffy paint (10)Travis was proud to cut his paper any which way, and I made a few more exact shapes – circles, squares, triangles etc.

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Choose a piece of colored construction paper for a background, and glue down the pieces with clear glue for a creative collage. Older children may want to be very deliberate, and design flowers or other motifs. Travis just loved making piles of clear glue!

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Once again, he loved this step so much that when we were done, he asked for extra paper to cut up and glue down. I loved seeing him so busy!

 

Pineapple Pumpkin (and More Pumpkin Fun)

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We had so much fun at the pumpkin patch this year; Travis needed to come home and carve one right away. We even sorted and saved the seeds for roasting (full recipe below). With our final three pumpkins, we got a little craftsier, putting together these three painting projects.

First up was Mr. Pineapple Pumpkin. Paint your pumpkin with a layer of yellow acrylic paint and let dry overnight.

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Once dry, I added upside-down V marks with a sharpie to mimic the exterior of a pineapple.

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Travis helped glue on two eyes, and we used dot stickers (cut in half and slightly overlapped on the top) for the mouth.

For the pineapple stem, attach two pieces of green sticky-back craft foam together, leaving a sticky overhang on either side. Cut leaf-like shapes into the foam. Attach one sticky portion to the stem, then wrap tightly and use the remaining sticky edge to hold the “stem” in place.

Deck out your pineapple fellow with a blingy pair of shades for the final touch!

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Needless to say, this particular pumpkin craft required significant adult help for a four-year old. For something he could do entirely on his own, I set Travis up with puffy paints and a whole pumpkin.

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He loved squeezing out all the colors, which almost looked like goopy spider webs.

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Kids who are too young to carve might also love attaching feathers to a pumpkin, or sticking on pre-cut foam shapes for a funny face. Many sets of facial features come available in craft kits, and Travis enjoyed selecting this goofy look.

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What pumpkins are adorning your stoop this year? Please share in the comments!

I’ll leave you with this easy pumpkin seed recipe:

Scoop seeds from 1 pumpkin (about 1 cup). Rinse well and pat dry. 

On a baking sheet, drizzle with 1 and 1/2 tablespoons melted butter and sprinkle with 1 teaspoon salt.

Roast at 200 degrees F for 40 minutes. Increase the heat to 325 degrees F and roast a final 5 minutes.

 

Stained Glass Window Art

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Just about this time last year, when Travis was two-and-a-half, we made toddler stained glass. Now that he’s three-and-a-half, we’ve grown a bit more sophisticated with our designs! This project introduced a new art medium – puffy paint! – which absolutely delighted Travis.

First, place a piece of contact paper, sticky side down, on a work surface. You’re going to use your puffy paint directly on here, so make sure the contact paper is some place it can dry undisturbed for a while.

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I knew Travis wouldn’t be able to draw the exact outline of a house for our stained glass, so I set up two work stations side by side. While I outlined the house, he went wild with other puffy paints on his work surface.

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He told me he’d painted a castle, a prince, a king, and the girls visiting (whoops, too much Cinderella!). Meanwhile, he was ecstatic when he realized I had copied the house shape off of a template online. Next time I would make sure to have a large bottle of black puffy paint on hand – I had to switch to green mid-way.

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Let your puffy paint dry overnight.

To fill in the panes of our “glass”, we used glitter glue in lots of fun shades.

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After a bit of trial and error, Travis grew quite adept at keeping the glitter glue between the lines of the puffy paint.

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We did run out of puffy paint with a few spaces left to fill, so I mixed up some quick colored glue (glue and any shade of tempera paint). Let dry completely again.

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Trim any excess contact paper, and then your stained glass will adhere right to any window.

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It was so beautiful with the sun shining through!

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What other shapes or designs would you make to hang as “stained glass”? We’d love to hear in the comments!

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