Finger Painting Without the Mess!

Hello, it is Jennifer again to share a recent kid craft that Cupcake and I had fun with a few nights ago. I read about this idea when I was working as a Home Visitor for Healthy Families and I used it with some of my clients. One evening, Cupcake and I were hanging out and she seemed to be a little bored. So, I thought I'd try the same activity with her! I wanted something fun and stimulating but not too overly involved or messy, so I thought this would work out perfectly.

To create your Finger Painting canvas you need a few supplies you might already have on hand: paint (I used finger paint, just in case my child-proof sealing didn't hold up), a ziploc bag, tape, and a craft stick (optional).

Then, simply squirt your paint in the bag and tape it shut. I taped my bag 3 different times, I didn't want green paint squirting all over the place on accident! And there you have it!

I showed Cupcake that she could use the craft stick or her finger to "paint" a picture and she loved it!

It is a great way to work on Letter Recognition, especially for children who are more tactile learners. My little one let me go through the entire alphabet! I would paint a letter, tell her what it was and then she would paint the letter too (yes her letters looked more like random lines, but she was having fun and was proud of her work!). I can imagine when Cupcake is older, she could have fun practicing writing words and numbers in the paint!

Cupcake also had a lot of fun creating her hand print in the paint. Later, she tried her foot as well! She loved it so much that the next morning, when I went to get her out of her crib, the first thing she said to me was "paint!"

Good thing I taped it several times!