DIY State Fingerprint Art and Kids Art Gallery Wall

Hello hello! Well, as I mentioned Monday our winter break plans were on hold because Sweet P went down with a fever. Sadly, it is the flu and it has gotten all of us. But we have been hunkered down all week and let’s just say it has been quite the bonding experience. 🙂

Since I have been consumed with taking care of little people, I am happy to escape for a few minutes to share today’s post as part of the My Dollar Store DIY project this month. I absolutely love it! Not because it is really anything overly impressive, quite the opposite actually. I love it because it is one of those super simple projects that just makes me smile every time I walk past it.

This hallway wall between the boys bedrooms has been empty since we moved in. Well, it was actually worse than empty because I didn’t even bother to remove the nails that the previous owners had up! I had been meaning to put something up but inspiration had not struck and so it sat. And sat…

Two weekends ago we went to Sweet P’s school auction gala and each grade created a piece of art for the auction. All of them were adorable, and the kindergarten grade made precious state fingerprint art of the state of Georgia. Such a cute idea and wouldn’t you know it- inspiration struck!

I figured I would try to make my own with the boys fingerprints and grabbed a few supplies from the Dollar Tree. 

Supplies Needed for State Fingerprint Art:

• Finger paint (primary color set from Dollar Tree)
• Finger paint paper (pack of 20 pages from Dollar Tree)
• Print out of the state of choice outline
• Baby Wipes
• Frame of choice 

Optional:

• Black Poster Board (from Dollar Tree) for frame mat

To make this, I just found an outline of the state of Georgia online and printed it out to scale the 16×20 finger print paper. (I used power point to do this and printed the outline on two sheets of computer paper) Then I traced the outline onto the finger print paper. Once the outline was ready, the boys went to town dipping their fingers in paint and filling it. I had baby wipes ready in between colors, and the wipes also worked for clearing off any smudges and smears. 

Just make sure the state is completely filled, and don’t worry too much if they go outside the outline. Once the state is filled with fingerprints, cut it out and glue to a clean sheet of fingerprint paper to give the shape a clean outline. 

I had this white Ikea frame on hand so also grabbed a piece of black poster board from the Dollar Tree to make the mat and placed the finger print art inside. From there I grabbed other miscellaneous frames and set up a little kids art gallery. I have been keeping all of the boys precious art in a stash from over the years and the boys helped me pick out a few of their favorites. There is still a few spots for more pieces and I plan to add a few more frames. But now every single time I walk down this hall, I smile!  

Obviously we did the state of Georgia because we live here, but any state would be cute. I also think this would  be precious for Easter on a canvas with a cross shape and will definitely be giving that project a whirl soon. 

xoxo-

Heather

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