Eggy Art

Weirdly inspired by My Kid Could Paint That, my own little artists and I are transitioning from a phase of primarily crayon-based art activities into a period marked noticeably by an increase in painting work. 

Today at Michael's, while my partner was busy across town losing a softball game to the employees of the hippie co-op grocery, the kids and I spent more of my Christmas gift card money on glue gun sticks and brown and gold acrylic paint so that we can continue making these magic wands, and two 8x10 canvases and orange and pink and another shade of pink (the big kid's choices--she calls dark pink "moge," for mauve?) acrylic paint and a couple of sets of bristle brushes so that they can also be painting prodigies. 

That's for tomorrow, however. Tonight, while the big kid slept, my insomniacal toddler had her own little private painting party. 

Her medium? Easter egg dye, y'all. 

Make a combo of egg dye (especially nice when you can grab the last 15 after-Easter kits for 10 cents apiece) or food coloring, vinegar, and maybe a single drop of liquid soap if you want to get all fancy and clean up after yourself later, stick it in a little Tupperware dish, and provide one paintbrush per color, to be used only with that color. 

When your baby's masterpiece is finished, pop the lids back on the Tupperware and stack them someplace out of the way. 

These make nice watercolors because they're already liquid--the big kid has trouble with dry cake watercolors, the wetting the brush and rubbing it on the color and painting and then rinsing and repeating, and the little kid just fiddles with the cup of rinse water. 

For little kids, also, one or two colors is plenty since it's all about the process and not the product, unless you really just like brown, that is, and then you can go ahead and throw as many colors as you want at them, confident that brown is what you'll get.

P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, dog-walking mishaps, encounters with Chainsaw Helicopters, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page!