I used to do cloud paintings with this easy mix yourself puffy paint, but it struck me while reading one of the books below that it would make a great moon surface! It’s a perfect space craft for kids. The paint dries puffy and looks like the uneven surface of the moon. All of that though is secondary to how much fun my son had, I was planning on posting this next week but couldn’t wait!
- Gather your materials. You will need some strong paper ( I am using craft paper but a cereal box or paper grocery bag would do), shaving cream, white glue, a marker and scissors. My son asked for crayons to color his moon first so I obliged.
- Start by drawing a “Big round moon” or any phase your child wants.
- If you want start by coloring it with crayons.
- Time to mix the paint. You will need 1/2 cup of glue
and 1 1/2 cups of shaving cream.
- Mix !
- Now explore. My son kept saying “Goopy mama, goopy hands!”
- Spread and explore it more on the paper.
- Let dry- I let it dry for 4 hours and the thicker parts were still goopy in the middle. I’d let it dry overnight to make sure.
- Cut out your moon !
Books!
“The Moon Might Be Milk” by Lisa Shulman was the inspiration for our activity. The book follows a little girl and her animal friends as they all share their opinions of what the moon is made out of. While reading this today with my son he kept saying “No no not milk, shaving cream!” The story has a cute ending and I like how no opinion is made fun of or wrong. When I asked my son what he liked about the book “The cat”. There youhave it, a cute book about a moon but the cat stole the show.
“Night Goes By” by Kate Spohn is a book that explains how the sun goes down and the moon comes out and the cycle continues. The sun , moon and a star are all very cheery and enjoy their lots in life. The star and moon play all night! The book is simple and while I wasn’t too into it, my son really liked it. I would suggest it for toddlers and young preschoolers.
” The Moon” by Robert Louis Stevenson and illustrated by Tracy Campbell Pearson is a beautiful book. The poem was written in the 19th century but my two year old loved it paired with these stunning and warm illustrations of a family’s adventures at night. I really am so impressed with how well the words were put to life by the pictures, and my son loved it. It’s inspired me to find more classical literature and poetry to share with my son.
Moon Rock
Pick Up !
“Night Goes By” by Kate Spohn is a book that explains how the sun goes down and the moon comes out and the cycle continues. The sun , moon and a star are all very cheery and enjoy their lots in life. The star and moon play all night! The book is simple and while I wasn’t too into it, my son really liked it. I would suggest it for toddlers and young preschoolers.
” The Moon” by Robert Louis Stevenson and illustrated by Tracy Campbell Pearson is a beautiful book. The poem was written in the 19th century but my two year old loved it paired with these stunning and warm illustrations of a family’s adventures at night. I really am so impressed with how well the words were put to life by the pictures, and my son loved it. It’s inspired me to find more classical literature and poetry to share with my son.
Moon Rock
Pick Up !
This is a fun fine motor activity that my son was all over. All you need are some mini marshmallows, a toothpick and 2 containers. Yes he ate many of the marshmallows but not all. He thought the toothpicks were very cool and when he was done transferring them we counted the “survivors”.
Emily says
Just found your blog and I love it!
Question: where do you find newsprint or giant pieces of paper like the one used in the moonscape? Do you go to a specialty craft store for it? I’ve never seen it in any local stores.
Allie says
Thanks!
No I got it at Wal-mart it’s just “craft paper” which is another name for packaging paper for mail packages. You can find it anywhere and it’s way cheaper than butcher block in my experience.
Mon says
Just wanted to say, thank you for taking time to share your ideas, projects and book recommendations. Really great. And the songs are hilarious, lol.
Your son is adorable and an expert photographic subject. 🙂
Miller Moments says
That is soooo cool!
Beverly says
what a great craft! thanks for sharing!
Allie says
You are welcome Mon- he is getting pretty demanding of pictures now. He will do something silly and say “Take picture mama” I’ve created a monster!
This has to be one of my favorite crafts ever! We had such a blast doing it and it’s up in his room already.
Babs says
Oh wow, I will have to do this with the girls sometime soon.! We make a point of sitting down, all three of us, and making art together.
🙂
Jen says
That is so cool. My oldest was fascinated with the moon when she was about three. She even wanted to see pictures of Neil Armstrong and learn about him. She would proabably still love getting her hands in that goop!
Jen
Creative and Curious Kids!
Tara @ Feels like home says
I love it! I’m thinking we could add one of those neon food colorings for some bright painting fun! 🙂
I think this would be great for an older kid, too. He could paint the moon to look like a map of the real moon.
Oh, the possibilities!
Heather - CROQZine.com - Dollarstorecrafts.com says
How fun is that!!? Awesome!
Preschool Playbook says
Thanks for the puffy paint recipe. I see this paint a lot a Discount School Supply, but the budget doesn’t always cover the little extras.
Lenetta @ Nettacow says
Just wanted to let you know I linked to this and the shape necklace posts on Sunday. Love your ideas – thanks!
PS – for paper, try contacting newspapers in your area for end rolls. Our small town paper actually is printed in the nearby “city”, so you might have to do a bit of detective work. But once I tracked that down, I was able to get two large rolls of paper (but not cut to size, so you can make pieces as long as you want) for under $5.
Nicole says
i LOVE using the shaving cream for a moon! we did something similar in my preschool, only instead of a moon we made chocolate chip cookies to go with the book 'if you give a mouse a cookie'.
we dyed the shaving cream part brown & covered smaller circles. then, the kids added brown pom-poms to resemble chocolate chips.
such a fun activity!
Ally says
Love this and just wanted to share we painted our moon with glow in the dark paint (apparently hard to find except at halloween season so I got an extra bottle). We then attached the glow in the dark stars with fishing line.
Turned out awesome helps my little one feel better about bedtime 🙂
Aly says
Great idea!!! I did the puffy paint project with three young kids (1, 2, & 3 yrs) that I care for today. I changed the moon to a snowman…because we have been reading, coloring, and talking about winter and snow. They had a fantastic time and it entertained them for almost an hour (which is no easy feat!!). Keep up the great work…we love your ideas!!
Kim says
My son loved the “moon goop” craft! Thanks for the cute idea. I’ll be linking back to you from my blog on that one. 🙂
.-= Kim´s last blog ..Snippet =-.
Alisha says
Love this idea!! My husband works for a label/printing company and they throw all the paper on the end of the roll out because it gets funny on the press. It breaks my heart to see such waste. I have my hubby bring home the paper! It is a huge roll and I use it for everything!!! If you have a printer in the area you can ask about it…but I am not sure if they are allowed to give it out…might be worth a try!
Thanks for all the brilliant ideas!!!
Melissa Meacham says
This looks like so much fun! I’m glad it’s starting to warm up here, because I think this will be an outside project for my 3 and 4 yo while the baby takes her nap. 🙂 Thank you for your wonderful website. You are always my first stop when it comes to craft time.
Debby says
Great idea! and fantastic site – I wish you had been here when my eldest was a preschooler.
Just a comment on getting strong large sheets of paper, we use lining paper (the plain wallpaper you use under patterned wallpaper to smooth out a wall if that makes sense?)comes in a big roll and very cheap from the DIY store.
.-= Debby´s last blog ..cooking for kids:Cream Cheesy Chicken Pasta =-.
Ashlyn Brunson says
That sounds SO fun! My 2yo would love that. The shaving cream and glue mixture being spread out all over the place…AWESOME! 🙂
marie says
I love every project you have on your web. You inspired me to do so many things with my daughter
Jessica says
Hi I did this with my 18 month old and 3yr. old today and we had a BLAST. I used blue food coloring in mine to make Blue moons since this friday will be a blue moon. I do have one question: I had a little bit left over and I was just wondering if there was any way to store it and use it for later? Should I put it in the fridge?
admin says
I have never stored it but I would just keep it air tight and see what happens. If you do let me know I am curious now!
Love and Lollipops says
Hi Allison,
We made your puffy paint and then made a lunar landscape. Thanks for the recipe and for the suggestion to use a cereal box. It worked really nicely. It was part of some A is for Astronaut activities we have just done. (http://love-and-lollipops.blogspot.com/2014/03/a-is-for-astronaut.html)
Take care,
Georgia 🙂
Lisa says
I’m a little late to the party, but just wanted to thank you for this idea. I did this today with my nearly 2 year olds as part of a space theme we are doing this week and they really loved it :-). We read the Usborne ‘On the Moon’ book to go with this as it has some great pictures ( it mixes nasa photos with cartoon illustrations so it’s nice for little ones).
Allison McDonald says
So happy to hear it was a hit!
Sarah T says
Thank you for sharing! We did the moon rocks and the moon painting today – so fun! I’ll be blogging about it and linking back to you! Thanks!
Alyssa says
What a great craft. I am featuring this if you don’t mind.