Arts and crafts for kids are a great way to engage little ones. And whenever I think of an art activity for my little Shaolin, I would either base it on a theme (e.g. Valentines, Chinese New Year) or on his very recent interests.

Recently, he’s been particularly interested in strings. He would pull the string in my shorts and also the strings attached to one of his toys. I took advantage of this interest by doing a “Yarn Painting Activity” with him. He enjoyed pulling and playing with yarn!

Enjoy your own arts and crafts sessions with materials that you most probably already have at home.

Materials:

• Strips of different-colored yarn
• Tempera paints (we used our very own Ma’am and Mom’s Nontoxic Tempera Paints)
• Paint tray
• Paper
• Used cardboard or board paper

Steps:

1. Dip the yarn in paint (I made him choose the colors and made him join me in dipping the yarn in the paint)

2. Spread yarn on the paper by forming shapes or some random figures.

3. Put used cardboard or board paper on top of the yarn and press gently

4. While hand is pressed gently on the paper, let the child pull the string out.

Depending on how you spread the yarn, it produces different results! This one produced a seahorse!

We did this repeatedly and there were times when I would just make him play with the yarn. So. he did what he loved doing — he repeatedly pounded the yarn. It still produced interesting images!

We used up four papers for this activity and produced seeweeds and jellyfish too!

It was indeed a successful painting activity. Not only did my little Shaolin enjoy the process of this activity but it also produced interesting images. Remember, arts and crafts for kids do not need to be Pinterest-worthy! It should be child-led… and yes, it should be messy too.