Creativity 521 #4 - Let the Fingers Do the Painting

I've been wanting to let Angel try finger painting for the longest time.
But due to my procrastination, my sluggishness in hunting for finger paints, or simply my disinclination to making my messy house even messier, I just toyed with the idea in my head.
Thanks to Creativity 521, I finally picked up the motivation to do it.
And in a sense, I'm way glad I did. Because my girl loved every bit of it and to see that happiness on her face, I guess it's worth mopping my floor a thousand times.
Anyway, to spice things up a little, I decided to make it a finger-painting-and-stamping session just for the fun of it and knowing how my girl loves to do stamping,
What you need:
For the painting
1) Finger paints
2) Plain paper
3) Newspaper
For the stamping
4) Small, sharp knife (Be careful not to let your child handle this one!)
5) Potatoes and carrots
6) Bento moulds / Cookie cutters (It'll be awesome if you can carve your own designs too)
For the record, I did try to carve my own design using the potato. But when my Hello Kitty ended up looking like she had just put on a hundred pounds and Angel was wondering what monster it was, I decided to stick to using the moulds.
Firstly, press the mold firmly onto a potato sliced in halves, making sure that it cuts and forms the desired outline. Using a sharp knife, carefully slice off a thin layer of potato (3-4mm) surrounding the shape.
Thankfully my Hello Kitty cutter included a stamper mold which could form the eyes, nose, mouth (what mouth?) and ribbon of the cute animal. Once it was done, Angel exclaimed "There! Kitty!" *Phew*
Make as many shapes as you desire using the potatoes which will act as stamps later on. I also decided to make use of carrots, whose slender bodies provide a better grip than the stout potatoes for my girl's tiny fingers.
Since you have only a small area to carve when it comes to carrots, we decided to make shapes (circle, triangle, heart, square) and take the opportunity to revise Angel's knowledge of them. 
When all preparation work is done, spread out the newspaper, put on an apron or old clothes for your child, and let the messy fun begin!
I told Angel that she could jolly well use all ten fingers to paint since it didn't make a difference in the cleaning up, but turned out my little princess was contented with just using her left index finger throughout the whole session.

Finger painting is a great way to teach your child to be creative, mix colours and see magic happen before their eyes. While it might be too early to expect toddlers to remember that Red + Blue = Purple, at least it helps to demonstrate to them how two colours can come together and form a brand new one.

Soon, we moved onto stamping and tried out our newly created vegetable stamps. There were how our potato stamps turned out. Not bad, right?


Angel's favorite stamp of the day turned out to be the heart shaped one. Which I thought the carrot looked the most hideous after I carved it but surprisingly, the stamped heart was the prettiest shape of all. I guess you should never judge a book by its cover, right?

Ta-dah! These were our works of art. Not all that pretty I must admit, but well, it was the process of having fun that matters, right?
Dear Angel, for your smile, mommy will remember to do the cleaning with a smile too and stock up more vegetables in our fridge, ok?
For more craft ideas and DIY tutorials, visit my gallery here.
I Blog on Tues with Diary of a SAHM.
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To fellow bloggers who have a fun craft session, DIY tip or any creative idea to share, do join in the party! Simply grab my button above, include it in your post/sidebar or text link back and add your link below. Do also visit other participants' blogs for more inspiration!
I will be hosting Creativity 521 every fortnightly and I hope you can join me on the 5th and 21st of every month. Remember: The sky's the limit when it comes to creativity!