Marbling with Oil
Generally, when the activity of painting comes to mind, we think of paintbrushes. There are other creative ways to make beautiful pictures, which the younger crowd is particularly impressed with! Oil and water don’t mix together, so it is intriguing to see what happens when we mix them with watercolors. It is also a good opportunity to discuss color names with young kids as watercolors are stirred and dropped in a dish. Let’s get creative and fun in this marbling with oil crafts!
Supplies
- Liquid watercolors or food coloring
- Vegetable oil (we also experimented with baby oil)
- Little bowls for individual colors
- Spoons for stirring/mixing the colors
- Pie dish
- Watercolor paper
Instructions
Pour oil into little bowls – it does not take much.
Put a few drops of either watercolor or food coloring in each bowl. Stir vigorously to be sure oil and color are mixed well (as they can be).
Fill the pie dish with an inch of water.
Use a dropper or spoon to transfer color and oil to a dish of water. You can use one color or many.
Lay a piece of watercolor paper on top of the water.
Lift the paper to reveal your marbled paper. We purposely left ours in there a few hours – our toddler loved “dunking” the paper in the water!
If you used different oils, did you notice a difference? We used baby oil in addition to vegetable oil and discovered that no matter what oil, it still repels against water. It was neat to see what happened when oil and water interact and the design outcome on the paper! Each was unique in this marbling with oil experiments.
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Photographs and content by: Heather Kucenski
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Take a trip to the farm! This Discovery Box explores matching and patterns, fine motor skills, counting, taking turns, and pretend play. Includes the following projects: Barn and Animals on the Farm Kit, Farm Community Sticker Scene, Farm Lacing Craft, Felt Carrot Counting Game, and Nose-on-a-Stick Pretend Play Craft.
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