Painting is a wonderful way for your child to express their creativity and polish up on their  fine-motor skills. Of course, offer assistance when necessary and needed, but for the most part, sit back and let your kids take the lead.  You’ll be amazed at how creative those care-free little hands actually are.

Painting can take many different forms. Don’t get bogged down with only using a paint brush, as the possibilities are endless. Painting with non-conventional tools/items is a fun and playful way to engage your child and puts a whole new spin on things. Have you tried painting with cotton balls? How about with feathers? Q-tips, pipe-cleaners, or maybe chop-sticks? The list goes on. Try them all! We used cotton balls the other day.

I knew I wanted to take the paints out for my toddler again this morning, but I wanted to try something different…insert TRUCKS! Not as in painting a truck, but using a truck as a tool and painting WITH it.  Literally, this was shaping up to be my son’s best.day.ever as these are pretty much two of his favorite things in life.

He marveled at the wheels as he pushed them through the globs of paint; and then as he pushed them across the paper and made tracks. Twisty, twirly and colorful tracks.  It was a mess and it was awesome.