Salt & Tape Trees

I was looking around on Pinterest one night gathering ideas for things I wanted to do with my kiddos. I found several boards just full or art projects and got so excited. I went to each of the blogs and spent way too much time looking around, but at least ended up with a lot of great ideas. Some where things I'd never heard of or done and others I remember from my own elementary school art days. This is one of those I remember doing.

I found this on Art Projects for Kids. It is full of great ideas. Even though this was suggested for fourth grade, I figured my kindergartener would do a great job. she has tons of other art ideas and they are even broken down by grade level.

We grabbed out blue painter's tape, some cheap water colors and salt and were ready to go. We dont't own watercolor paper, so we just used card stock. I taped it down and make a sample tree for my son to follow.

He added his own trees, ripping and placing the tape by himself. (This is some great exercise for this small fingers and helps their fine motor skills, similar to the magazine ripping I posted awhile back.)

Once the tape was all pressed down nice and tight, he began painting.

 While the paint is wet is when you want to sprinkle the salt on. This was a specific part of the technique I had forgotten and was glad to have the website refresh me. My boy added the salt when he wanted to, but some spots were still wet, so the effect still worked on parts of it.

As he painted his brush water would get dirty (as usually happens when painting with one brush). We were in my make-shift sewing "room" and the boys were painting while I sewed. We have an unfinished basement and no real easy access to water down there. So, I set up this little system for them. I filled a water bottle with clean water, got an empty bowl to dump the dirty stuff in, and let them change their water as needed. It saved a lot of running up and down the stiars, plus they go to be more independent.

Once the paint is all dry comes the fun part - pulling off the tape! My son was so amazed at how it worked.

He finished product. He opted not to add the additional details tot he trees, but click over to the original site for more info on how to finalize the painting.