Our snow is starting to melt around here, but fortunately we had enough for one more day of snow investigations. Today we focused our efforts on snow paint. In honor of Valentines Day, we got out some nontoxic water based tempera paint and some food coloring and set out to figure out our preferred methods of painting. First we tried out the spray bottle. I put a little bit of red food coloring in a spray bottle, and filled it with water. All three kids tried it, and they were sort of indifferent to it. Mama says, good for covering large areas of snow with color, bad for detail work. So use it to paint your snow fort.
Next we got out the paint brushes. I used the thick preschool brushes, which were easier for their mittened fingers to hold on to... First we experimented with food coloring, which was sort of a dud because it was too water-y and dripped everywhere. Next we tried out watered down tempera paint. We used 2 parts water: 1 part paint. I figured watered down paint would still transfer the color without wasting a ton of paint. The kids liked this style of paint much better, it was still a little drippy, but not as drippy as the food coloring. They particularly enjoyed writing their names in the snow. I can see them using this style of painting to add detail work to snowmen and snow forts down the road.
On a side note, after all was said and done, I'm sort of regretting choosing red as our color of preference. My yard vaguely resembles a war zone that saw many casualties. So if you come over to my house, it's not blood. I promise. 
2 comments:
Oh, Chris (my oldest "child") would have so much fun with the red paint on the snow and snow forts! Last year he had to teach a lesson about estimating volume of blood when spilled. To do this, he mixed up a batch of fake blood - all edible ingredients. Of course, it had to be tasted (by him). Boys! :-)
Somebody needs to teach Alex (and Matthew, and Simon, and Luke, and Ryan...) a better way to write their names in the snow. Jory? Chris? Craig?
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