I’m all about keeping it simple when it comes to kid activities.  Most toddlers/preschoolers (well, at least mine) have the attention span of about 30 seconds, so I try not to over-complicate activities we do together.

This activity was super-simple, and the kids worked on it for half an hour (!!!).  If you convert that to adult time (like how dog years convert to human years), that’s the equivalent of 4 hours.  Lol!  In other words, that’s a long time for my kids to actively engage in a single activity.  And it only cost $3.

Supplies:

• Wooden cut-out for painting (this jack-o-lantern was $3 in Target’s dollar spot area)
• Paints (I used some colors I already had on hand)
• Foam brushes or paint brushes
• Aprons
• Newspaper to cover work area

I set the kids up outside to paint on a small table that they could stand at.  I learned my lesson the last time we painted inside and I was worried the whole time about my walls getting painted.

To keep mess as minimal as possible, I spread out newspaper and put aprons on both of them.  They started by painting the whole pumpkin bright orange.  Then I gave them smaller amounts of white, burnt orange, and brown to add in.  The different colors looked awesome after my son blended them in.  We repeated this process at least 4 times, so that pumpkin has a lot of coats of paint on it!

After the fifth coat of paint, they didn’t want to stop painting and requested something else, so I pulled out these extra wooden butterflies that were leftover from my daughter’s birthday party last month.

Isn’t he cute?  They did a great job and had a lot of fun!  I’m going to write their names and the year on the back, and it will be a fun & meaningful decoration to use in the coming years.

Here’s a close-up look at the blended colors.

Hope this provides some inspiration!  Kid crafts can be super-simple and lots of fun!