I have been looking for some fun activities for me and little face to do while we are at home. I saw this and thought wow I have all this stuff to make this and the cost would be nearly FREE. I stocked up on several containers of corn starch for FREE during the baking season in November and December. Since then, I have found so many uses. I wish I had more! So this is how we made Homemade Finger paints.
Homemade Finger Paint
Ingredients:
- ½ cup cornstartch
- 3 tblspn sugar
- ½ tsp salt
- 2 cups cold water
- Drops of food coloring
1. In a sauce pan pour and mix all the ingredients together except food coloring. Little face enjoyed helping with this part. He loves to help me cook in the kitchen.
2. Cook on a medium heat for about 10-15 minutes. At first this is a real thin soupy mix. Not much too it. As the cornstarch gets hot the mixture will start to thicken. It’s is the same principle as pop corn. After the starch is heated it expands and thickens with the water. Keep stirring during this stage. You want to make sure you don’t have any lumps in your goo.
3. Now that it is really thick, take it off the stove to cool for a bit. You can’t finger paint with hot paint!
4. Bring the white goo to vibrant colors using a few drops of food coloring. The more drops you use the more vibrant the colors will be. We decided to stay with red, blue and yellow. Little face had so much fun making new colors and painting with his paint. You could probably even use koolaid to color your paints and make them smell good too! I thought this was a great way to mix the colors to see what new colors he could make. He know how to make green, purple and orange!
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The curiosity got the better of me. I just had to taste it, since this is a non toxic paint and all the ingredients are edible. It is a little sweet, but not that appetizing. Don’t worry if your little one wants to taste some, since all these ingredients are safe. This mix will keep for a few of days, so be sure to make lots of masterpieces quickly. I thought this made quite a bit for just using it a little while, I might try to decrease the recipe by half next time. We did not use all the paint before it started to get stinky.
My cost for this project I would say about $.10 for the sugar, salt and food coloring.
Amy Greene of Pounds4Pennies lives in Texas with her husband and blended family of three kids, two who are 10 and a 2 year old. Amy has been a frugal shopper for years. She enjoys couponing, cooking and crafts. She will be sharing many of her talents with us here.
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