Reggio Emilia Wednesday: We Play: Kool-Aid Kraze + Whole Lotta Love Giveaway #8!

Guess what smells nice and sweet and can safely be used by children as a dye for art projects instead of a drink? Kool-Aid!
Kool-Aid works great as a dye for children to use on a variety of materials.
Over the course of the last few weeks, we have used a variety of Kool-Aid to dye large pieces of cotton canvas.
Every time we have set out to do another canvas piece, we loosely follow these steps:

• First, we prep our driveway by laying down big sheets of plastic. 

• Next, we measure, cut, and laid out several pieces of cotton canvas fabric. This fabric was cut from painter's tarps.

• Then, each time we have experimented with what works best as far as the ratio of Kool-Aid and water for the right colors the boys want for that piece...the key seemed to be less water and more Kool-Aid as the boys seemed to prefer more intense colors. This was probably Little Bro's favorite part, along with the actual painting and dying of the fabric.
• Then, the boys tried several techniques...from painting with different paint brushes, to using a variety of kitchen tools, to sprinkling, to sponging, to painting bubble wrap and doing a relief of the bubble wrap...such fun to try out new ideas!
• A few times, Daddy has joined in the painting fun with us. It has become a big family project. Daddy is mostly tackling the woodworking end up this project with the boys while I am kind of overseeing the painting and dying portion of this project, but really, the boys are largely driving the whole process.

• All in all, the boys had a great time experimenting with a variety of tools...think that Daddy had a good time, too...it was so nice, as the focus was on the process, but the product for this part of our ongoing project ended up turning out nicely as well.

And the smell, oh the smell...our whole driveway had a nice fruity smell!
We did find that the Kool-Aid really did not have any color that looked much like blue and Big Bro really wanted a deep blue so we ended up taking a half of a packet of Black Cherry and then, we added an entire bottle of blue food coloring to this.
Then, for green, we took Lemonade Kool-Aid and added one bottle of green food coloring. Again, Big Bro wanted a nice shade of green. Little Bro loves red and various shades of red, so he loved all that he was able to do with respect to reds with the Kool-Aid.
It was very fun for the boys to experiment with what seemed to work, what they preferred as far as painting techniques...just such a fun time.
Well, these big cloth pieces are going to be added to a bigger building structures project that the boys were inspired to do...but more about that next week...
So, the first part of their ongoing project has been completed...next week, the woodworking part of this structures project.
Please pop back next Wednesday to see the woodworking part of this project...so much fun playing and learning along the way!

Well, if you have done a Reggio Emilia inspired project that you would like to share, please link up.

Now, for Whole Lotta Love Giveaway #8:  A Lil' Reggio Emilia inspired giveaway...

UPDATE: 

The winner for Giveaway #8, as chosen via Random.Org, is comment #1, Johnson Tribe, who commented: How awesome I am following you! I am so going to have my kids do this...
Congrats, Johnson Tribe!

 


Disclaimer: 
I am to be held harmless if your child has an allergic reaction to the dyes in Kool-Aid. They are food safe dyes, but if you have a child with food dye allergies, I cannot account for this.
I was not asked by Kool-Aid to do this giveaway. We have just found that Kool-Aid smells great and holds up well in art projects. It is a fun way for children to get a multi-sensory experience while painting or dying fabric or paper. 
I did not come up with the idea of Kool-Aid as a dye for fabric projects for children but have been using Kool-Aid in this way since way back when I was in the classroom. There are loads of neat projects using Kool-Aid to color other materials that children use, including playdough, paper mache, and tie dye projects. This is just what we decided would be fun and would work for what the boys and I hoped to accomplish as the first part of an ongoing Reggio Emilia Structures project we are doing...

Comments and giveaway rules have been removed, as the Giveaway has ended and the winner has been chosen.