Sustainability made simple

Homemade Finger Paint: Non-Toxic Paint for Kids

homemade finger paint
Photo: CC0 Public Domain / Pixabay – Hans

With homemade finger paint, you don’t have to worry about little kids putting their hands in their mouths during arts and crafts time. Check out this recipe for non-toxic, edible finger paint. 

Conventional finger paint from the craft store often contains questionable ingredients, and non-toxic natural finger paint is often disproportionally expensive. The solution? Make your own homemade finger paint. With just three ingredients, you can mix your own non-toxic, edible finger paint for your kids at home.

Three-Ingredient Homemade Finger Paint 

edible finger paint
Homemade finger paint is fun to make and only requires a few simple ingredients. (Photo: CC0 Public Domain / Pixabay – Kaboompics)

For completely safe and non-toxic homemade finger paint, all you need are these three ingredients:

  • 5 tablespoons flour
  • 100ml water
  • Food coloring 

This recipe is enough to make about one small glass jar full of edible finger paint.

Tip: Instead of throwing away old clothes, reuse them as smocks for kids, to help prevent their homemade finger paint from getting on their clothes. 

How to Make Edible Finger Paint

non toxic finger paint
Edible finger paint is safe and completely non-toxic. (Photo: CC0 Public Domain / Pixabay – Grandmom11)
  1. Pour the water into a bowl.
  2. Whisk the flour bit by bit into the water. Keep whisking until there are no more clumps. 
  3. Fill the paste into a glass jar.
  4. Add the food coloring slowly until the desired shade is reached.

Careful: Food coloring can stain, so make sure you are using old glass jars that you don’t mind getting dirty and try not to spill any on your clothes.

Homemade finger paint will keep in a closed screw-top jar for up to two weeks in the refrigerator.

Tip: You can also use natural food dye, like beet or spinach juice, to color your edible finger paint. (Find out how to make your own organic dyes here.) Simply use the juice instead of water in the recipe above, making sure that the liquid-to-flour proportion is preserved. 

This article has been translated from German to English by Christie Sacco. You can read the original here: Fingerfarben selber machen mit natürlichen Zutaten: So geht’s

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