Chalk paint is a type of paint that you can create at home and use on various surfaces. It’s simple to make, easy to work with, and a fun activity for both kids and adults. It’s also inexpensive—in fact, you probably have all the ingredients you need to make it at home. Keep reading to learn how to make your own chalk paint and different ways to use it with the family.
What you’ll need:
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Cornstarch
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Water
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Food coloring
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Muffin pans or small bowls
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Paintbrushes
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Stencils (optional)
Follow these instructions for easy DIY chalk paint
Step 1: Combine cornstarch and water in equal parts.
Step 2: Next, pour the cornstarch mixture into a muffin tin or small bowls.
Step 3: Finally, add food coloring of your choice until it gets to your desired color. Now you’re ready to paint!
How to Use DIY Chalk Paint
One of the best aspects of chalk paint is that it’s a great way to get creative. Even better, it easily washes away, making cleanup a breeze. Chalk paint is similar to chalk, but you use paintbrushes instead of chalk pieces to create your artwork. DIY chalk paint is a great activity for people of all ages and you can do it both indoors or outdoors! Chalk paint, like traditional chalk, works great on the sidewalk or driveway. It can also be used to decorate chalkboards to display in your home.
Ways Kids Can Use Chalk Paint
Chalk paint is a great way to keep the kids busy for hours. With many extracurricular activities being canceled this year, it’s been more important than ever to find some at-home crafts for the kids.
- Practice letters and numbers: For the younger kids, you can use chalk paint as a way to help teach them their letters and numbers when they are out of school. It makes learning fun!
- Practice spelling and math: For the slightly older kids, you can also use chalk paint in the summer months, but up the difficulty level with spelling tests and multiplication tables. It makes practicing their schoolwork more fun when they can do it outside!
- Paint their pets: Challenge your kids to paint their dog or cat. Mix a bunch of colors and go crazy.
- Create games: Classic games that you would use with chalk are perfect for chalk paint! Hopscotch and foursquare are the most popular chalk games.
- Make fun stencils: There are many places that you can find printable stencils online, or you can create your own! Kids will love making different stenciled designs and painting them with the chalk paint they helped create.
Ways Adults Can Use Chalk Paint
No, chalk paint isn’t just for kids. There are many ways that adults can use it too. Here are some ideas for chalkboards.
- Create a weekly dinner menu: For those who are always dealing with the “what’s for dinner?” question, use your chalk paint to make a pretty menu so that your kids or spouse can check throughout the week.
- Use it for a daily quote, joke, affirmation: Using chalk paint as a way to display inspirational quotes, funny jokes, or daily affirmations can help start your day right.
- Paint your favorite bible verse: Painting the bible verse that means the most to you will be a comforting display to look at throughout the day.
- Christmas countdown: Make a Christmas, birthday, or special event countdown. We all need a little extra cheer this holiday season, so counting down to Christmas can help keep up the excitement this time of year brings.
Tips for Your DIY Chalk Paint
- Chalk paint doesn’t dry instantly—Unlike regular chalk, the paint takes some time to dry. Be careful not to touch your art for a few hours—otherwise, you may smudge it.
- Add more water or cornstarch depending on thickness—It’s hard to mess up chalk paint, so if you think it’s a little runny or too stiff, just add a little more cornstarch or water and you’ll be good to go.
- Chalk paint color will dry darker—As your painting, you may be tempted to go darker or paint more layers. Remember, the paint will dry darker than when you first paint, so you’ll get a good idea of what it looks like after it dries.
DIY chalk paint is a fun activity for kids and adults. It’s easy to make and you probably have most of the ingredients you need already in your pantry! Make some fun games for the kids and they’ll stay busy for hours.
