Paper Mache Dinosaur Egg
Paper Mache Dinosaur Eggs are fun to make and are a great tool for imaginary play for young kids. If you place a plastic dinosaur toy inside, kids can have fun "hatching" the dinosaur: a fun idea for a dinosaur themed party...
Roller Painting
Inexpensive Mini Paint Rollers can be used to create some really eye catching paintings - and even the smallest kids will have a blast doing this easy craft project.
Stars and Stripes
Painters Tape and a sponge are used to create this very cool looking version of the US flag. Great for 4th July Celebrations
Inkblot Butterflies
These inkblot butterflies are intriguing for kids to make - simple dots of paint transform into beautiful symmetrical butterflies.
Car Track Painting
This is an activity for the smallest artists - and a particularly great activity for getting boys excited!
Foil Painting
Painting on foil is a great sensory activity for young children. They will enjoy the feel of the foil in their hands, and the shine of the painting.
Laminate Finger Painting
A piece of laminate shelving is an indispensable item in our craft supplies. It makes an excellent surface on which to do craft activities - it is easy to wipe clean, easy to move etc. Usually we place ours on top of the kitchen table to make craft clean up easy. However, it also makes an excellent surface on which to do finger painting. Fingers glide easily over the surface - so much fun for little ones! And super easy to wipe clean. You can't keep the art work - but you can take plenty of photos!
Salt Resist Painting
This is one of my favorite painting activities. Sprinkle salt over wet watercolors and watch interesting and beautiful textures and patterns appear. This is truly an activity for all ages - easy enough for preschoolers - but also plenty of potential for older artists too.
String Painting
My kids had so much fun with this - dipping string into paint and then dragging across the paper creates interesting designs.
Watercolor Leaf Rubbing
These leaves are deceptively easy to create - even a preschooler can create them with minimal assistance.
Sailing Boat Collage
I created this project as a way to experiment with various paint techniques. I love the way that they turned out! This is not an activity to do in an afternoon - rather one to spread over a week or longer - each of the underlying "paintings" can be created separately in advance.
Chalk Drawings
Drawing with chalk on black construction paper produces wonderfully vibrant pictures. This is a great activity for all ages.
Coffee Filter Art
Take a coffee filter, make dots using washable markers, add water and watch as the ink travels and merges and makes pretty patterns.
Bubble Wrap Prints
This is such a fun activity for kids of all ages. Simply paint on bubble wrap and then press onto paper to create dotty prints....
Glitter Candy Cane
Using masking tape to resist paint creates wonderful stripes, making this an ideal technique for making candy cane pictures with small children
Painting with Marbles
Roll marbles through blobs of paint, or dip them in paint and roll them over paper! So easy, so fun AND produces amazing results that event the littlest artist will be proud of.
Exploding Volcano
What could be more exciting than creating and exploding your own volcano? A craft and a science project combined!
Potato Prints
Potato prints are a classic kids project. The materials are cheap, the results are fantastic - what's not to love! At it's most simple you can just cut potatoes in half and use them as circular stamps. You can increase the fun by creating fun shapes as described below. The potatoes in the paint are wonderfully slippery making this a great sensory project too!
Watercolor Resist - Rubber Cement
When painted on watercolor paper, rubber cement will resist watercolor paints - keeping the paper underneath white. Simply rub off the cement when the paint is dry.
Sharpie Coffee Filters
We discovered this project by accident whilst doing a different activity. Simple scribbles of markers can be turned into the most beautiful abstract art.
Glow Stick Art
This is a favorite for our family camping trips. Super fun and produces amazing pictures, but also an opportunity to learn a bit of science: light, motion & photography!
Scratch Art
I was so excited to try this project with my kids, I remember seeing it demonstrated on the TV when I was a kid wishing I could try it.
Salad Spinner Art
You can create a spin art painting using a kitchen salad spinner: and if you use washable paints, you shouldn't have any trouble continuing to use it for your salads too!
Tie Die Sharpie Eggs
Come Easter we are always looking for new and interesting ways to decorate our Easter eggs. This last Easter I came across this clever technique by "Housing a Forest" for dying eggs using sharpies and rubbing alcohol. They have some beautiful examples on their website.
Shiny Art: Embossed Foil Pics
Using Sharpies to color on foil makes shiny art. You can also create embossed edges to your pictures by using glue to trace an outline underneath the foil. This is an especially cool effect for pictures of fish as they glimmer as if they were rushing through the water!
Sun Prints
Sun Prints are fantastic fun. All you need is a pack of light sensitive paper and your imagination! This is a great project for young and old alike. Younger kids will be fascinated by the magic of this project. Older kids will be able to use their imaginations to create pictures from objects - and a great opportunity to talk about the science of light and photography too!
Popped Bubble Art
I've done this activity with my kids a few times now and it never fails to fascinate them - and me! Simply color bubble mix with food coloring and blow bubbles onto paper - as the bubbles land and pop, they create beautiful works of art. It goes without saying that this project is best done outdoors. A great one for those lazy summer afternoons.
Mini Framed Art
These tiny works of art are adorable. Popsicle sticks are used to create a reusable picture frame, which is then filled with tiny works of art. You could put a photograph in the frame instead. Either way - they make great gifts.
Milk Art Science!
This project is incredible. The results are not only dramatic but are beautiful too - you'll be making art whilst learning about science. Your kids (whatever their age) will want to do this over and over so make sure that you have plenty of milk!
Blown Bubble Prints
What child with a drink and a straw doesn't love blowing bubbles? Not exactly behavior that we're generally encouraging (it doesn't exactly go down well at the dinner table). Which is why toddlers and preschoolers will love this activity: using straws to blow LOTS of bubbles in soapy water colored with food coloring - and then making art by placing paper on top of the bubbles.
Moon Paintings
One of our favorite activities is using salt to create texture on watercolor paintings. In this activity Salt and Glue are used to turn a simple watercolor painting into the surface of the moon! Leave as is for a great Space themed project or add some black card silhouettes and you have a spooky Halloween picture.
White crayon surprise picture
This is great for pre-school kids and is so quick and easy
Mondrian by Kids
These incredibly simple paintings in the style of Dutch Painter Piet Mondrian are a great way to get kids involved in learning about abstract art and the beauty of simple geometric images. The creation of the series of squares and rectangles is surprisingly satisfying and the creative process very rewarding. This project is ideal for elementary age kids and even older preschoolers can easily have a go. Older children may prefer to create their black outlines using rulers and black pen. That way the width of the lines can be varied.
Watercolor Flowers
These are SO SIMPLE to make and yet they look fantastic. It's worth doing a few and keeping them on hand as they are really useful to make gift tags and birthday cards. Or combine several to make a collage or a spring wreath. Preschoolers will have fun doing this project and older kids (and adults) will enjoy creating more complex designs.
Gelatin Printing Adventure
This project is seriously addictive! The process is extremely fun and interactive. And the results are amazing. In other words this is a great introduction to print making for kids - and one that even smaller kids can do and enjoy. First, you make a gelatin plate. This is quite straightforward and basically involves creating a slab of firm gelatin: a process that is fun for older kids to help with. then you have fun applying paint to the plate, and using everyday objects as brushes and stencils to ensure that when you place the paper over the top of the plate to make print, you get fantastic results. Note: don't be put off by the wordy instructions - the procedure is actually very quick and easy once you get the hang of it!