Monday, October 5, 2009

Art & Craft time! Arm Print Autumn Tree (and stamping!)

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I’m working at having an art, craft or sensory-type activity for M on a daily basis.  Today we made a pretty fall tree.
You will need:blog pics 023
  • Paint in fall colors – we used orange, yellow, green, and red
  • Brown paint for the tree trunk and branches
  • paintbrush
  • paper – we used cardstock
  • leaf stamp
  • pieces of felt
  • something flat to use for a stamp pad.  We used saucers… more on this below.
First to make temporary stamp pads, begin by putting the leaf colors on the saucers.  We put two colors on each saucer.blog pics 024 Next, place one small square of felt on top of each paint glob. blog pics 025 Gently pat the felt down until the paint soaks entirely through.blog pics 026 blog pics 028Optionally, you could use a sponge and let paint soak into it, but I have found sponges do not give as clear a print with stamps as does the felt.  To keep from wasting paint, you really don’t need to use as much paint as I did.  You could also use something like a cd jewel case to do this, then shut it (possibly wrap it with plastic too) to keep your “stamp pads” usable for future projects.
Now, the fun part! 
Paint your child’s inside forearm and the palm of their hand with the brown paint.  You may want to warn them that you are going to do this, apparently it can be a bit ticklish. :)  We talked about how the paint felt slick and cool on his skin.  Here’s M showing you his brown arm.  He really did love this although you would not know it by looking at his face.blog pics 029
Next, print the arm onto the paper for your tree:blog pics 030
Start stamping leaves onto the tree branches and some on the ground, or falling in the air:blog pics 031 See how crisp the stamp is using the felt?  M wiggled the stamp some after he set it down sometimes, creating a bit more of a blurry leaf, but the felt worked really well as a stamp pad.
I let him put the stamp in different colors without wiping it off first, which turned out to be ok, because some leaves have a couple of different colors in them, just like real ones!
Here’s his finished tree:blog pics 041
The felt washed up nicely and so did the boy. :)
Have a beautiful day! :)

11 comments:

  1. What a neat idea! I'll be using the tree arm idea in the near future. Thanks for the felt tip, I've never heard of that before.

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  2. I love the felt turned stamp pad idea! Cute project! We will be trying it soon.

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  3. Hi Nicole

    What a gorgeous looking tree. I always love crafty projects where you can include your child's hands etc. - makes for a sweet keepsake.

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  4. I love this, how super duper cute. I tried to get my kids to make an arm tree, and they were having none of it.

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  5. I would love to try this one day! My daughter likes to do stamping but I am not sure if she would cooperate with me doing an arm print.

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  6. I think you missed one step in your project description - arm washing somewhere between an arm print and the rest :) This project looks awesome, but I have a hunch that she will be doing it in school in October - they do a lot of finger/hand painting projects there, and then she is completely uninterested in any projects at home.

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  7. I definitely think it's important to do something creative and artistic everyday!

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  8. Great project, he looks like he had so much fun. Thanks for the tip on the felt stamp pad idea!

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