What Can We Paint With?

Painting with paint brushes is always an engaging activity you can involve children in, but you can paint with many things you already have in your home. Try some of these items:

Apples - Cut apples in half, dip in paint and place on a paper.

Wet Chalk - Place sticks of chalk into a cup of water. You can add sugar to the water for a different effect. Draw on paper with the wet chalk.

Cars- Dip the wheels of a toy car into paint, then drive the car on a paper to make tire tracks.

Toothbrush - Dip a paint brush into paint and paint with it. Try an electric toothbrush!

Bottles - Paint the outside of an empty, washed, plastic juice or pop bottle.

Kitchen utensils- Wooden spoons, spatulas, flippers, forks, potato masher. use washable paint so it will wash off.

Toy animal footprints-Paint the feet of toy animals and have them walk across a paper.

Leaves and Rocks - Go on a nature walk, collect leaves and rocks. Paint one side of a leaf and stamp it onto your paper. Use silk leaves if not available. Paint the rocks and decorate them.

Ketchup - Provide a small cup  of ketchup, allow children to dip their fingers into the ketchup and paint on a high chair tray . Press a paper onto the tray to transfer their art to paper. Peel the paper off the tray and let dry.

Water - Small children can paint with a toddler paint brush, a small cup of water and paper.

Ziploc bag - Put finger paint in a ziploc bag and seal it. Tape it closed. Children can draw on the bag with their finger creating and erasing designs over and over!

Hands and Feet - Dip children's hands and feet in paint. Make handprints and walk across a large paper taped to the floor. Use different colors and watch how the colors mix.

Q-tips - Dip Q-tips in a container of paint and make dot pictures.

Potatoes - Cut a potato in half. Carve out simple shapes such as a square, circle, triangle and rectangle. Allow the children to dip the potato into paint and stamp on paper. Encourage them to arrange shapes to create characters, vehicles, houses etc....

Laundry Soap Caps - Dip into paint and stamp circles on paper or boxes.

Marbles or Golf Balls - Put marbles or golf balls in paint, scoop them out with a spoon, and place on paper cut to the size and shape of a cake pan or tin box. Roll the marbles around on the paper.