Watercolours and washi tape Christmas art

We use watercolours a lot at our house. I love that I can leave them out for the children to use whenever they want, and even when my 2-year-old chooses to paint herself blue (quite often!), she can just be washed down!

Coming up to Christmas I see lots of cute hand and footprint pictures, which are lovely but allow very little creative input from the children involved. So I’ve been working on a more open-ended activity, which also yields a recognisable picture which can be used to share the Christmas story. And here’s what I’ve come up with:

Watercolours and washi tape* resistance painting

*Washi tape is like masking tape only much less sticky and far easier to put on and off. I got mine online from Amazon for £1.25 for 8 rolls!

1. Choose what colour paper you want to use. This will be the final colour of the lines of your picture. This is an interesting part for children to think about.

2. Use the washi tape to create a simple line drawing of part of the nativity story. I did this Bethlehem town scene with a stable and manger and hills in the background in less than 5 minutes. My four-year-old even did half the tape. It’s really easy.

3. Paint over the tape with watercolours. Make them as bold as you like. The tape will ‘resist’ the paint leaving the area under it the colour the paper was initially. My two-year-old painted this one, starting with a paintbrush… then moved on to using her fingers 🙂

4. Leave it to dry. This doesn’t take long as it’s watercolours. We usually peg them on a piece of string hung in front of the radiator.

5. Peel off the washi tape. I thought this would be tricky, but even my 2-year-old could do it without tearing the paper.

Tah-dah! A lovely painting of the nativity. Use it to share the story together and on cards or even gift wrap.

I did one myself too, and it was very satisfying: a lovely piece of art which is simple and quite quick to do. You might like to enjoy doing one first before you invite the children to join in 😉