Stamped Hearts

You’ll need:

• Paper or card stock to stamp on.
• Cardboard tube (from a toilet paper or paper towel roll).
• Paint.
• Glitter (optional).

The short story: Form a heart shape from one end of a toilet paper tube, dip it in paint of your choice, stamp on paper.

 

How it worked for us:

I simply pinched a toilet paper roll in one spot for the bottom of the heart, then pushed in the top on the opposite side – super-quick heart shape!

I put out two colors of tempera paint and a white sheet of paper, and let E go to town with it. It did get slightly messy for us, including some unintentional spatter on the paper, but that’s just because I thought our artist’s watercolors needed to be watered down. That only led to the red paint ending up all over the place, while the orange was used as-is and didn’t make a mess at all.

E enjoyed it while she was stamping, although it only kept her focused for a few minutes. It was not as much of a no-brainer to get the top of the heart showing as I’d thought but we got the hang of it pretty quickly {I tried my hand a little bit as well 😉 }. The finished product is on our chalkboard and rings in the Valentine’s “season”, to be joined by many more toddler crafts in the days to come.

What I learned:

• Use paint with a consistency that’s more firm to avoid spatter.
• I could see this used on fabric or other objects for a variety of Valentines.

The idea: Henry and Jamie at hands on : as we grow did it recently, and I think it’s just a genius idea to use a toilet paper roll for this. So simple, cheap, fast and effective!

Edit: Upon reviewing Jamie’s photos again, I noticed that I’d made it unnecessarily hard for us by only pushing in the very front of the cardboard tube for the top of the heart. Simply fold along the entire length of your roll, and you won’t have trouble having the top of the heart show on your paper.