I stole then adapted this idea from this awesome silhouette my son made for me at preschool. Wanting to make it a little different I decided to add some letter recognition into it and make a canvas with the word Dad on it instead. What’s great is that it works for all ages, babies can finger paint, older children can add more than just “Dad” .
- Gather your materials. You will need a canvas, some vinyl letters, paint brush ( if you want little guys to cover a lot give them a big brush), paint and if you want a frame to display it.
- Start by placing the vinyl letters on the blank canvas.
- I placed the colors my son chose in a ice cube tray to make it easy for him to paint.
- Next start painting!
- Right after I took that picture above my son’s brush lifted off a letter – luckily we were able to move the letters and save the project, learn from my mistake use a sponge brush ( which we switched to) to avoid disaster.
- Let dry.
- Remove the letters carefully after the paint is fully dry.
- Give your child’s dad a true masterpiece!
Daddy Song
I love my daddy
He’s really smart
He’s got big muscles and a bigger heart
When I get all cranky and I pout
He gives me hugs and never shouts!
Books About Dad
Daddy Hugs 1 2 3
by Karen Katz is a cute little counting book for toddlers. I gave it to my husband two years ago for his first father’s day and my son hated it. However in the years since it’s become a favorite and nothing beats a board book for when toddlers get to that destructo stage. Also like Katz’s “Mommy Hugs” book it grows with your child. Now at 2.5 my son likes to find the number on the page and read it to us before we read him the text.

Amber says
I have to tell you that we learned this song from you last year, and we LOVE it. We sing it all the time! 🙂
.-= Amber´s last blog ..Yoga Class =-.
Catherine says
Love this idea — I was planning to help my grandson make a barbeque apron for Dad and Poppa. We will add the letter idea to my fabric painting idea. Thanks for ALL the great ideas.
Dara says
We made something similar to this for this family’s Daddy for his birthday in March. Each child did one and each had a different form of Dad on thier canvas (Dad, Dada, Daddy). If you don’t have vinyl letters, you can use masking tape to tape out the words. That’s how we did it. Then we outlined with black marker.
For my older son who still struggles with printing his letters, taping the words was great as we had to discuss the structure of each letter line-by-line.
Becky says
I love this! And I LOVE the silhouette! Do you know how they did it?
admin says
They took a picture of the kids, then blew it up on a copier, then added contact paper, cut it out with an exacto knife , put the contact paper on the canvas and had the kids sponge paint the canvas.
I love it too 🙂
Beth says
Where did you find the vinyl letters?
admin says
Walmart – in the craft section.
Shannon says
Love the silhouette! Last week, I had a similar idea but I didn’t think of the silhouette of the kids! Doh! That would’ve been great. I cut out some coloring book pages and layed them down on the canvas and the boys painted around it. I think it’s cute but boy did they make a mess! lol