Spring is almost here and even though we live in LA where it’s been 80 degrees for the past month, we’re super excited. I’m also really excited because today launches a great art series called Easy Art Projects for Kids I’m doing with some really special kid art bloggers. Each month we are going to pick a different art material and experiment with it to bring you some amazing ideas to do with your children. This month is art material is watercolors. We made these beautiful spring paper flowers from liquid watercolors, droppers and spray bottles. We glued them together by small, medium and big to create layered flowers that look gorgeous hanging on the wall. Spring is definitely in the air.
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Materials
Liquid watercolors
First I put some liquid watercolors in a recycled plastic apple container. I had precut a bunch of flowers from heavy watercolor paper in different sizes. The kids got to pick from a pile of paper flowers which one they wanted to use. They dropped the liquid watercolors onto the flowers and watched as the colors bubbled and lay on top of the paper. They could use the droppers as pens and scratch across the flower creating a neat writing affect. They could also use their fingers to move the paint around. This technique was quite popular with my one year old.
After moving the paint around the flower and using the droppers for a while, I suggested the flowers might be thirsty. I had several spray bottles on hand to feed the flowers with. The girls loved this part. They sprayed the flowers over and over and watched the colors as they absorbed into the watercolor paper. New colors formed as the colors bled together. There was also a beautiful “firework” affect that took place from the spray of the spray bottles. If you’re kids are a little older, there is so much to notice with this activity. You definitely want to give it a try. It’s a great introduction to watercolors on many levels.
After we thoroughly sprayed our flowers, the girls were quite happy to spray everything else in sight, including a vase of flowers I had set up close to our art table. With older kids I would have taken some more time to notice the shapes and colors of the real flowers and then used that to segue into the paper flowers. These toddlers were too anxious to get started. You can also let older kids draw and cut their own flowers, which they’d really enjoy. This would add a great study in shapes, along with all the fine motor building skills.
The last steps were to hang the flowers up to dry and glue the different sizes together. I loved hanging the flowers. That was my favorite part. Why does everything look so pretty on a clothesline? It gets me every time. Anyway, it was sunny out and the flowers dried really quickly. We had a quick snack and then we were able to glue the flowers by small medium and large on top of each other. Again, with older kids this can be a lesson in itself. With the little ones I just used the vocabulary and guided them with the glueing. We hung our paper flowers up in our art playhouse to big oohs and ahhs. This was a really nice project and great introduction to liquid watercolors, which I am a huge fan of.
To see other fantastic watercolor art projects for kids check out these blogs!
BlogMeMom does Texture on Watercolors
Learn Play Imagine does Erupting Watercolor Absorption Art
Artchoo does Drippy, Splashy Watercolor Process Art
Fun At Home with Kids does Exploring Absorption with Watercolors on a Texture Board
Housing a Forest does Pour Painting with Watercolors
BabbleDabbleDo does Watercolors and Oil
Willowday does Watercolor Stickers
These are so gorgeous!
Thank you so much Allison!
Beautiful! I love crafts that both combine working with a new medium but in a format that the kids will love and that we, parents, will enjoy having around! Looks like Spring is on it’s way to you!
That’s the trick right ; ) Parents liking it too.
These are SO beautiful! And what a fun process. We will be giving this a go for sure!
So lovely! I will try it too! Thanks for inspiration 🙂
Would love to see pics if you give it a try!
Yes 🙂 I will show you 🙂 thank you!
Hi, I found you via Housing a Forest, and I’m so glad I did! Just love all your wonderful ideas! This looks great for my little ones! Thanks!
Oh great! I love Housing a Forest. Thank you and so glad to hear you may do this with your little ones. It was so much fun!
Love it! Very cute flowers! They look awesome on the clothesline 🙂
Thanks Crystal. We have them hanging all over our house and they are so pretty.
Thank you so much for the wonderful ideas! I can’t remember how I came across your blog but I am sooooooooo glad I did! I teach kindergarten in a small community in IL. With our state not funding education like they should our school district had to make some cuts. For two years now we have not had an art teacher. Art class is up to the classroom teachers and trust me…..I’m not good at art! I rely a lot on Pinterest and other great teacher blogs to help me come up with great ideas for my kiddos. Your site is a true blessing! The methods part is what I love so much! I do not have an art background so reading about the methods part is crucial for me. There is a huge difference in teaching methods versus cute crafts. Thank you so much for your wonderful ideas and please keep them coming!
Lisa, thank you so much for your message. Ugh, those budget cuts are so frustrating. I’m so glad you stumbled upon my blog. I used to teach kindergarten for many years. I hope this post is helpful to you as well. xo http://www.mericherry.com/2015/06/04/art-project-5-year-olds-kindergarten/
So cute!! We tried this at home, but the colors would all blend and turn ugly and brown. Did you have to water down your liquid water colors at all? How do you “mix” the colors and stay somewhat separate too?
Hi Sarah, Forgive me, I did this so many years ago I can’t quite remember but I will say that sometimes with toddlers you have to know when to take an art work away and replace it with a new one so all the colors don’t turn to mush. Know what I mean?
Thanks for the idea. Looks beautiful! My children would love to try this activity. I will include it in my planning.