Yousuf (3yrs, 2m) lovessss painting, but I’m quite lucky because he’s quite neat, he wont put random stuff in his mouth either and wont go on a rampage to start painting walls and my sofa. So giving him paints and a brush has never worried me!

However, my younger one (1yr 6m) has the opposite personality, and will happily paint everything he can, including himself!

So just before he turned one I remembered seeing somewhere a way to do mess free painting, Best thing ever! Both were so entertained with the small version, I decided to big, like A1 big! It went really well, and again both brothers enjoyed it so much, and so did I, as I had minimal cleaning to do 🙂

So if you need a quick and clean activity then this is ideal!

Version 1:

• Insert a paper into a ziplock bag
• then squirt in only 2 paint colours, either 2 blobs or squiggly lines (preferably colours that make a nice colour when they mix! Also any more than 2, usually turns into a nasty poo colour lol)
• Lock and seal the bag (add tape if that will make you feel better)
• and let your little one squish away!

  They’ll enjoy seeing the colours spread, for older kids you can use your nail or a cotton bud to create lines, shapes and letters!
  If you keep the bag sealed, the paint wont dry up so you could use it again, however I tend to take the paper out and let it dry.

Version 2

For this I went large scale!

• I put my waterproof play mat down (My plat mat is a huge thick plastic table cover)
• Then on top I stuck down a piece of white A1 paper
• I then squirted down lots of lines of paint
• and then with the help of my husband covered it with cling film and stuck that down too with tape! (You could use clearcellophane too)
• and voila, a maxed out squishy painting!

  Let them go wild and the best thing…almost NO mess!

Version 3

This is paper free

• Just squeeze in 2 big blobs of paint into a ziplock bag
• Stick it to the window and let your little one squish away.
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If your kid is older then try mixing two colours such as blue and yellow and ask questions about what colour they think will appear when these two colours are mixed. You can even get them to etch with their fingers or cotton bud letters, numbers and shapes.

Provided the bag is sealed the paint will not dry out, so either keep it stuck to the window or take it out for a quick way to keep your little one occupied!