We’ve always loved bath time in our house (myself included) and I’m always looking for ways to retain the excitement. Not just because I want my daughter to have a positive opinion of hygiene and cleanliness, but because there’s such a small window in her life where she can just sit back and have fun in the tub. Toys lose their luster quite quickly but she’s always loved coloring. So this past weekend, I decided to put my lazy Sunday afternoon to good use and make her some homemade bath paints! We’ve used store-bought bath crayons before, but they weren’t great quality and ended up making more of a mess than anything else. Check out this very easy tutorial on making your own, kid-safe bath paints. You probably have everything you already need!
What You’ll Need:
1/2 Cup Baby Body Wash or Shampoo
1/2 Cup Cornstarch
2 Tbls of Water
Food Coloring
Containers for Paint
Paint brush (optional)
In a small bowl, mix body wash, corn starch and water. The great part about this recipe is you can use baby body wash or shampoo, or even a mild adult body wash or shampoo that you have lying around. You don’t have to go out and buy a new bottle of anything. You will want to slowly add in the water so you get a medium thickness consistency. If you add too much, just pour in a little more cornstarch. You want the paint to be thick enough to stick to the bath tub walls, and not too runny.
I will say that I learned your little painter will be adding their own amount of water once they are in the tub, as they clean off their brush and dip into a new color. The paint started to get runnier as we went, so next time I may not add so much. After mixing well, divide up your paint into about 6 different containers. You can use a painters palette, ice cube tray, muffin tin or just individual cups. I had tons of leftover plastic containers from my attempt at making my own baby food, and they were perfect.
Using food coloring, begin dying your soap your desired color. I love these bright colors I used!
Before I knew it, we were ready to paint.
My daughter was willing to take a 3pm bath time once she saw what was in store, and you can see the excitement on her face:
After that, it was just all fun and games!
We had enough paint to definitely last multiple baths, even though it does start to co-mingle a little. I figure, we will have an all new palette for tomorrow!
Probably the best part about this recipe is that it does not stain! If you wash down the tub and walls immediately after the bath, there is no residual soap or dye remaining. It’s definitely a win win! We had such a long bath time, my daughter was a giant prune when she finally got out over 3o minutes later.
Enjoy!