Homemade Paints

Since my daughter was running down to the last scrapes of paint in her jars, I decided to give some homemade paints a go. The recipe I used is this:

via Easie Peasie

It worked brilliantly!

I did exactly what the instructions said and dumped everything in the pan (I had my heat on medium/low which is 4-5 on my stove) and although the instructions didn’t say to, I did stir the whole time it was on the heat as I was afraid the cornstarch would settle and clump. So I’m stirring and stirring for probably 6 or 8 minutes, thinking Hmmmm, this really isn’t thickening at all. Then out of nowhere, this happened:

Ah, the magic of science! This was the coolest transition ever since it went from a white liquid to this awesome translucent gel in a matter of seconds. I was still stirring for all of this FYI.

So once it was all thickened, I gathered these supplies for the coloring process:

I just added in the new paint to the old paint jars, and the little container and spoon were for mixing each color (cleaning in between each color is super easy – just rinse with hot water and it melts away).

After mixing up all the colors and loading them into the jars it was time to paint of course!

She loved them! In all honesty they don’t make the best brush paints (they are labeled as finger paints after all) simply because when they are spread too thin they tend to turn clear. But my miss still loved them, and it cost me all of about 50 cents (if that) to make. Much better than driving to the store and paying $10 for a new set of Crayola paints if you ask me! And although this wasn’t a great activity for a two and a half year old to help make (let’s see, hot burner and food coloring – ugh) she did great! She understood she couldn’t touch but she did enjoy passing me the paint bottles to fill and picking which color of paint to make next. Bonus: It further reinforced her learning of color mixing!

While we’re on the subject of kid art, I was curious what you all use for your kids to paint on? I tend to use cardboard recycling as it’s something we always have around the house, and it’s free. Plus, the cardboard is thick enough that it doesn’t bend too much if my little one piles on the paint. And did I mention it’s FREE? The white pieces in the above images are actually inserts in between the cans of catfood we buy!

Cereal boxes (and snack boxes) never make it to recycling – I always cut them up for her to paint on! Do any of you have free around the house art supplies you like to use?