I’ve been looking for a craft to do with baby that includes painting, but I didn’t want it to turn into a purple-gray mix of colors. My solution is a painted canvas by layering colors.
1st- Create your non-toxic paint. I chose the recipe below because I didn’t have any cornstarch. I added about a half cup more water because the original recipe is pretty thick. Even with the extra water, there wasn’t any splashing!
I also got out some acrylic paint for the words I painted on after baby was done.
Then, set up your canvas. You’ll need a small canvas to do the project the way I did. I added some masking tape, which creates some neat lines in case you’d like to add some text afterward.
Set up the highchair for painting by covering with an old table cloth or sheet. Dress baby in junk clothing or make a cute smock from an old shirt. You might want to get a sippy ready, because baby will most likely try to taste the paint, which is super salty! Yuck!
Pour a few spoon fulls of the first color on the high chair tray.
After baby has played in each layer of paint, press your canvas on the tray to pick up the pattern baby made. Rubbing hard on the back of the canvas gives the best results. Then, clean the tray and baby’s hands a bit, so as not to mix colors. After baby finishes with all colors, you’ll have something that looks like this:
You can flatten the texture with a brush if you’d like, but I didn’t want to change baby’s original design too much. If you added tape, remove it, and you’ll end up with some area to work your own magic. Choose a quote or a pattern to paint in the blank space.
Let the canvas dry; and then, write baby’s name and age on the back of the canvas. This idea will make a great gift for aunts, uncles, grandmas and grandpas. You could use red and pink for a sweet Valentine’s Day gift. Go wild!
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