It had been a long time since I'd done Q-tip painting with Emmy. I decided it would be the perfect time to make a fall tree - one for us and one for Uncle Don, who had just gotten out of the hospital. I free-handed a tree trunk on white construction paper. Then Emmy colored in the trunk with crayons and added grass, too. I asked her what color leaves were in the fall- orange, yellow, red, brown - and used those colors. They turned out super cute. In the picture below, she was half-way through painting the first one. Leaves ended up in the grass, too, because where we live the leaves were already starting to fall.
Here is one of my favorite painting tips. I once got this Crayola Washable Paint Set for a special project we were working on in my preschool class. When the paint was all gone in the jars, I washed them out and then added our school paint. Before I was using paint cups, but I was always throwing tons of paint away at the end. These Crayola jars have lids that screw on and will keep paint good for a really long time. I buy lots of colors in larger bottles of paint (like this) and refill the jars as needed. I'm wasting less paint and the jars are perfect for painting with small paint brushes, Q-tips and toothpicks.
