Beat the heat with art and ice

It’s getting hot here in Moab and we’re all looking for ways to beat the heat…and maybe get creative too!

You and your family can do both if you create these fun ice-pop painting tools. Making paint pops is quick, simple and once they’re done everyone from your little baby sister to your grandma will like to experiment with them.

Painting with ice-pops

Materials

An ice cube tray

Food coloring

Toothpicks or sticks if you want to keep your fingers clean

Take your ice cube tray and add 10 drops of food coloring to each cube. The more you add, the brighter and stronger your pops’ colors will be.

Then, add a bit of water to fill each cube – don’t let the section overflow!

If you want to protect your hands from the paint later, stretch a piece of plastic wrap over the top of the tray and poke toothpicks or other sticks into the cubes to make handles, just like making a popsicle.

Place your paint pops in the freezer for 24 hours.

After your pops are frozen, loosen them up by sitting the bottom of the ice cube tray in warm water. That way the pops will slide out and won’t crack. Then, it’s painting time!

Ice painting is messy – that’s part of the fun! – so be prepared with a cloth and maybe wear an old shirt. It’s even more fun to do this on a big piece of paper in the yard!

As the paints melt, the pops will slide around on your paper and the colors will mix in new and surprising ways.

With your family, be sure to talk about all the different colors that you made. What else did you feel when you used the ice paints? Could you feel the cool temperature of the ice? What about as the paint pop melted? What changed?

Once your painting is dry, try using colored pencils or markers to add new details. Ice pops don’t make fine lines, so your paintings will make great backgrounds for whatever your imagination wants to draw.

Stay cool, young suns, and we’ll see you next week!

Make ice paints

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