Process Art for Kids

Mess Free Paint Bags

March 8, 2025February 14, 2016 by Stephanie Oswald

Recently it has been bitterly cold outside and my boys have been bouncing off the walls. I have always parented with the philosophy that if you remove the walls kids cannot bounce off of them, but our weather here just does not want to cooperate. This has left me in desperate need of activities that will engage both of the boys (9 months and three years old). The versatility offered in Mess Free Painting Bags has been the perfect solution to get the two of them exploring and playing safely together!

Mess Free Painting Bags are a fantastic educational activity for kids of all ages!

For this activity, we worked on both color mixing, letter recognition, pre-writing skills, and sharing!

Salt Painted Spider Webs

November 8, 2025October 31, 2015 by Stephanie Oswald

Spiders are not something I am very fond of…ok not at all fond of. They make me cry. and cringe. and can always get a scream – ick. But for some reason that I cannot wrap my head around both kids LOVE spiders.

Save.Me.

This simple spider activity was a safe way for us to explore this strange fascination of theirs. Plus these Salt Spider Webs turned out stunning!

Am loving how beautiful these salt painted spider webs are!

As I write this my dashboard is suggesting all these spiders images and wikis to include in this post…so excuse how short and sweet this will be. My skin is crawling and I cannot stare at this too long…

Painting with Pinecones

March 6, 2025September 11, 2015 by Stephanie Oswald

Fall is by far one of my favorite seasons. It is just absolutely magical. The crisp air, changing leaves, scents of cinnamon and apples, and of course the pinecones. You can’t forget the pinecones. Painting with Pinecones is a fun way to unlock some of the magic of fall while exploring the uniqueness of pinecones!

Painting with Pinecones

Every day when we go on our walk whether it be to the park or to pick Livia up from school, Meatball goes on a hunt for pinecones. Every day – it never fails. So far we have found at least 4 different types of pinecones. He is absolutely fascinated with them. So I just couldn’t pass up the opportunity to squeeze them into one of our afternoon activities!

Shaving Cream Clouds on a Mirror

March 8, 2025September 6, 2015 by Stephanie Oswald

Every day we head to the park, even if it is only for 10 minutes. It’s a simple ritual that I greatly enjoy. A brief time of silence as the kids run around and have fun. The other day while we were at the park Meatball noticed a couple grey clouds. Not being able to verbalize what he was seeing, he acted it out until I understood. Following his curiosity we decided on painting shaving cream clouds once we got home.

Shaving Cream Clouds on a Mirror

This activity turned out to be so much more fun than I expected. In the past we have had a ton of fun playing with shaving cream but, quite honestly I expected this activity to not hold his attention for that long being outside and all. If given the choice Meatball is not one to pick sedentary activities outdoors…but leave it to him, this one definitely was not what I expected it to be.

Painting with Water Beads!

March 7, 2025August 18, 2015 by Stephanie Oswald

Water Beads are by far one of my kids favorite sensory materials. The ways that you can play with water beads are endless and they are cheap! We have tried everything from adding scents to our water beads to freezing them! Our lesson this week had a craft that required Marbles and Paint to do it. While we had the paint, we did not have any marbles lying around. But…we did have water beads! We had an absolute blast with this substitution – Painting with Water Beads was a major hit!

Painting with Water Beads

What I loved about this activity is that while it was very messy, it was super adaptable to meet the needs of both of my kids!