Painting with Ice Cubes

So last week we did an Ice Age theme. I was so excited for this because I've never done it before! I was looking forward to learning about a bunch of new animals and coming up with fun projects. I googled around to get some ideas and I hardly found anything Ice Age related. So I was kind of on my own. The first thing I came up with was painting with colored ice cubes. Ice Age -- ice. Get it? So I made some colored cubes with gel food coloring, put plastic wrap over them and added toothpicks.

The next day I took them to work and set them out for the kids to use.

First we used them on regular white construction paper. I LOVED how well they worked. I don't know if it was my food coloring or what, but the colors were so vibrant! I even got in on the action because the cubes were so fun to use! You could write with them, draw pictures or just make designs.

As they melted, the lines made by them were thicker. Very cool.

Then we decided to try painting on white paper towels. I thought the colors might bleed a little better.

They did somewhat, but not quite as much as I thought.

And then we moved on to coffee filters.

These would have made great suncatchers, but I just hung them on the wall with the others.

I would love to do this activity again, maybe outside on a warm day. And the kids got a kick out of painting with something other than paint and a brush!