Homemade Fingerpaint

I learned something today, it is surprisingly easy to create your own finger-paint. Who knew?

The ingredients are-
2 cups water
1/3 cup flour
food coloring

Combine both in a sauce pan and cook over medium heat till thick (about10 minutes)
Portion it out into containers and mix in the food coloring of your choice.
Mix them together and set out for little hands to use. (please wait for them to cool first of course)
We used a muffin tin for our portions.

Cookie Cutters And Animal Tracks

We did a fun post-dinner evening paint session tonight.
We dipped cookie cutters in paint and made pretty patterns with them.
Then, we pulled out some plastic animals and had them trekking through the paint as well.
This did end up in a mass of finger painting excitement.
I think they enjoyed themselves quite a bit.

So grab your cookie cutters, small animals and paints.
What other items could you get creative with?

Post Christmas Week

Colored Salt Jars 

Enjoyed this little activity with Miss B just today.
Swirling colors and pouring abounded as we set these wee jars up.

You will need 
Mason jars or baby food jars
Food Coloring
Salt
Stir sticks
Large mouth funnel for pouring
Liquid Measring cups

We placed about 1/2 cup of salt into a measuring cup followed by several drops of food coloring,
and started mixing it up.
After the color was nice and full we poured our pretty salt into the jars.
We also discussed what colors would make other colors.
What a fun little project!

A sunny afternoon!

Ignore my nail stubs :)

Post Christmas Week

Potato and Apple printing. 

If you have not tried this before, it is a must do with your children.
We had lots of messy fun this morning while experimenting with scooting, sliding and stamping.

Mini Stamper 1

Forks made for excellent handles

Mini stamper 2

The World Of The Bingo Dot Pen

Bingo Dot pens are a world of possibilities when doing art projects. I learned of this at Miss B's preschool and then, quickly brought the idea home.
They have them at the Dollar Tree, and I have certainly gotten my moneys worth.

You can give the children cut-outs to decorate or just let them explore on blank peices of paper.
My 20 month old enjoys those the most I think. He gets very into the placing of the tip on the paper.

My Thanksgiving Round-Up

There is still time to plan a fun little activity to do with your munchkins.
Here are some that we enjoyed this week.

1. Paper Bag Pumpkin

Get a small paper bag and stuff with newspaper. Twist the top and have children paint it orange.
Print off leaf tags and twist onto the bag with pipe cleaner. Fun, easy and fast!

2. Leaf Crown or Indian Headband
You can print off pictures of leaves, have the kids color them and staple it all together.
Also, you can cut out a headband and have them add feathers. 

3. Thanksgiving Mini Book

Here are two links for you 
2 Teaching Mommies Turkey Unit
Thanksgiving Mini Book

4. Turkey Spelling
 2 Teaching Mommies

Who Wants A Turkey?

Materials
Construction paper
toilet paper roll tube or a paper towel roll tube cut in half
plastic eyes
glue
scissors
pen

Trace your child's hand onto the construction paper of your desired color.
We stuck fairly traditional with the red yellow and orange.
6-7 hand cut outs should do perfectly.
Cut out a waddle and little beak. 

Take tube and cover with a piece of black construction paper.
Glue on eyes, waddle and beak.
Place hands on back for feathers.
(Mine would be neater but I wanted my 3 year old to actually enjoy the craft so I had her place them)
I also attached a little clothes-pin so he could be clicked in different places to roost.

Bubble Painting

We filled up three different containers with a small amount of water and dish soap.
Then, I added some food coloring. I placed a straw in each container and told the kids to blow into it.
Away we blew! Once the bubbles were over the top we placed paper over them to create bubble prints.
My 19 mth old loved it, but is was difficult to convince him not to drink the liquid.
Thanks to Chasing Cheerios Blog for the idea.