I'm going to paint a pretty picture

Having done lots of sticking, colouring and playdough recently I thought it was about time to get out the painting. Little 2 is now old enough not to suck the paintbrush and control her utensils to that my kitchen doesn't get splattered (much), we don't do painting on the dining table anymore as no matter what size plastic mat I put on the floor the paint brush always seems to land about an inch off the edge and green paint does not easily come out of the carpet!! 

I didn't have anything in particular in mind so just gave her a brush and a small sponge and went with it. She was actually really good, choosing all the colours that she liked and then very carefully painting lines and swirls on her page washing out the brush after each colour and not creating that overly wet paper brown mess that usually comes with toddlers and painting.

She was very engrossed in what she was doing, it was lovely to see the concentration and the thought she was putting in, she informed me that she had painted a crocodile.

On a new piece of paper she did a little sponging, carefully one colour and then rotating the sponge a bit before adding the next so that they didn't mix (this is so her, even at 2 and a half she is very tidy and methodical, I didn't even need to wash her hands afterwards as she stayed perfectly clean) and dabbing them onto the page.

I then showed her how to roll the sponge over the page to get a kind of rainbow line which she thought was fab and then she drew a starfish (that's what she said) on top of it, for some reason although I took photos of all 3 of her mini creations, I can only find this one on the computer so goodness knows where it has filed the rest!

A lovely bit of time that we both enjoyed, next time I am going to encourage her to use her fingers and hands and get really messy!