Sometimes the gifts that are hardest to come up with turn out to be the most obvious in hindsight.  And that was so true for this project!  I wanted to create a useful Father’s Day gift for my husband that the kids would help create.  Since my husband likes to keep pint glasses in the freezer for a cold glass of beer, what could be more useful than a couple of new glasses?!  Add a little paint pen art from the kids, and voila! Look at these awesome beer glasses I found at Dollar Tree!  I’d never guess that’s where they’re from if I didn’t buy them myself!  They’re so nice and heavy!  (By the way, it is very difficult to photograph glasses!) So here are my supplies:

• Pint glasses (could also easily sub a regular drinking glass, mug, etc.)
• “Painters” brand paint markers (I bought mine at Wal-Mart)
• Letter stickers (optional – color doesn’t matter)

I already had all of these materials except the glasses, so it was a budget project for me!  I did a similar project a couple of years ago with plain white mugs the kids decorated for their grandfathers, and we filled them with candy. I read a lot about the best pens to use on glass that would hold up in the dishwasher, and these were a top contender.  You could stick with one color or choose complementary colors. Since my kids are too young to write, I chose to color on top of stickers to spell out a message on one of the glasses.  My son loves helping Daddy in the garage and yard, and he often uses his toy tool bucket to help out.  So I spelled out “Tools Rule” on the glass he’d decorate.  Then he colored on top of the letters (with a lot of assistance from me!), and we peeled the stickers off. I also let him draw / color on the back of the glass however he chose.  For my daughter’s glass, I wrote “I (heart) Daddy” on the front, and she also colored the back on her own.  The paint isn’t permanent on the glasses until it’s baked, so I was able to do lots of touch ups with my fingers while we were decorating.  I’m not sure how permanent the paint is on clothes, so keep a close eye on the kids! Let the glasses air dry for a few minutes, then place a pan in the oven and put the glasses on it.  DO NOT PREHEAT THE OVEN!  Once the glasses are in the oven, set it to 350 degrees, and set a timer for 40 minutes. Without baking the glasses, the paint will wipe off, so don’t skip this step!  I figure a little extra heat can’t hurt, so once the timer went off, I just turned the oven off and let the glasses cool off inside the oven.  After an hour of that, I carefully pulled the pan out to cool the rest of the way. Here are the finished products!  I put some white tissue in the glasses, so you can see the designs on each side.

I love how they turned out!  I will keep y’all posted on how these hold up in the dishwasher over time, since they’ll get washed a lot!