Art project: Colored Rice Mosaic

 

I wanted to try sand-art with the girls (30 months old), but after a salt-painting adventure that left our floor crunchy for a week, I decided it would just be too hard to clean up (maybe we'll do it on the deck in the Summer).  So we tried making mosaics with colored rice instead.  The results were fabulous, and we still have enough colored rice left for many other projects.  

This was my first time coloring rice and I was genuinely surprised by how easy it was.  We used food coloring, vinegar, and white rice from our rice sensory box.

First the girls poured the rice into plastic bags, and then I added a cap-full of vinegar and a squirt of food coloring.  Then, making sure the bags were tightly closed we shook and squeezed the bags until the food coloring we evenly distributed.

I put the colored rice into tupperware to dry.  I love how vibrant these colors are!

I made the mosaic with E while L was napping.  It was definitely easier to manage the mess with only one girl, and E loved getting some special time with Mommy without her twin.  I took a very thick piece of paper and used Elmer's white glue to draw a design, one part at a time (I just did this freehand but you could print out a coloring page too).  Then I gave E one color at a time to sprinkle on the paper.  After each iteration, we shook the paper over the try and collected the rice that fell off.

Here is our finished masterpiece:

E was very proud of her artwork and her whole face glowed when she showed it to her sister.  When the girls are older we'll try this again and let them make their own designs with the glue.