Valentine's Painting Playdate

What happens when you walk into Michaels or AC Moore with the PINTEREST app on your smart phone? 
My husband's answer: "My wife buys something that is going to cost me a lot of money."  
My answer: "Pure genius!"

My local craft store had a sale on canvas painting boards.  I wondered what I could do with these things.....because really.....who could pass up a deal like that?!?!
Pinterest to the rescue!  I saw lots of really cute ideas for painting words and holiday icons using finger paints and some painter's tape and decided it was the perfect activity.

So...we scheduled a play date!

Our Valentine's playdate would have a snack for everyone, a craft, some free time for the kiddos to play, and a Valentine's story.

The snack was the most fun for me (again, thanks to Pinterest for ideas).  I made Jell-O cut-outs in valentine's theme, white chocolate dipped pretzel stocks, mini corn muffins with heart shaped hot dogs in the middle, Valentine's Chex Mix, heart shaped watermelon pieces, X & O ham and cheese, chocolate heart lollipops, and some heart shaped jelly sandwiches.

Our canvas painting activity was done with washable paints....which is good because it ended up on walls, tables, chairs, and children.  Every parent was asked to either bring a painting smock for their kids or wear older clothes too.

The painting table all set up and ready for kids!

I pre-taped all of the canvases with Valentines' words and shapes.  The kids and parents got to pick the canvas they wanted, and everyone had a paper plate to put their paint color choices on.   The kids had brushes of different sizes or could use their fingers to cover the canvas with paint.  I told them they could use any colors or brushes they wanted - there was only one rule:  They had to cover the entire canvas with paint and leave no white spaces.

 As you can probably imagine, giving the kids a license to cover something with paint was pretty exciting for them, and they had a blast with their creations.

 After painting is completed, but before we removed the blue painter's tape.

 

The finished product! After paint is dried, the painter's tape is pulled away to reveal the white space. 

Once everyone was done painting and washed up, we gathered the kids for a special Valentine's story and some playtime before everyone headed home with their painted canvas creations!