A Splash of Paint

Today is one of those Saturdays where I managed to oil my hair. Ilham has decided to take a mid-day nap due to a fun-filled morning filled with paint and smiles. Her napping gives me some time to actually pay attention to the Man United game while writing this post. 

I am an Instagram mum (I am proud to share this). I spend some time scrolling through this social media platform looking for inspiration on places to go with the family. On weekends, we do have many where we rather just stay at home, especially when the working week was a long and tiring one. However, there are weekends when we look for something new to do or somewhere fun to explore. One of my searches had led me to Colour Cafe. When we visited Colour Cafe based in Hyde Park, back in February, Ilham enjoyed the experience thoroughly. Basically, the concept is you choose a ceramic object from the shelves. You choose your paint colours. You get painting with the helpful workers changing your water when need be.  We allowed Ilham to paint her own frog. Once you are done painting, your painted object gets left behind, it gets glazed and it comes back to you within a month or two. I think the fact that water paint is messier than pencil colours makes a world of difference in terms of the pleasure painting provides to the little ones. It was such a relaxing family activity that even her dad showed interest in.

In July, I stumbled across a relatively new paint store via Instagram. The new store is based in Saxonwold and is called The Paintbrush Paint with Love. The store also explores a similar concept as Colour Cafe, however, bookings are necessary as well. The way the store is set allows for a more intimate painting activity. The store assistant helps you to choose paint and provides the handiest tips and tricks for painting. The store is so beautiful and I think this grabs the children's attention just as quickly as those colourful lollipops and candy sticks do too. Ilham chose to paint a unicorn. I personally liked the choice of ceramics that you could choose from (big and small). Items painted are also glazed and ready for collection within 2 weeks. Ilham was exceptionally behaved all throughout our painting experience and managed to apply three coats of paint before feeling restless and needing a change of scenery (keep in mind Ilham is only 2 so 2 hours of quietly painting is an achievement for us). 

This weekend, I was too tired to go out and because I am feeling rather dissatisfied with my current weight, I chose to make a delicious breakfast so that take-out wouldn't be the order of the day for the Saturday afternoon. 

I know Ilham loves to paint so I purchased a glass painting tea set for Ilham from Take Alot a week in advance. Turns out our local art store had a similar set for much cheaper. Nevertheless, I planned to recreate those paint store set ups by placing the brown paper that came in my Take Alot package on the table. I neatly arranged the paint and allowed Ilham to paint on the condition that she finished all of her food. It worked out well. The activity kept her busy for hours. Plus she was developing her fine motor skills in the process. It cost R200  or R100 for the set and it kept her and her dad busy for a good few hours. We then placed the painted cups and saucers in the sun to dry. If you are a mum who cannot take your child out and still want to find something entertaining for him or her to do at home, this is an excellent idea. You must remember that you can even just purchase finger paint and let your child create a finger painting masterpiece. You decide how much it is that you would like to spend and work with what you have. You don't need to take your little one out to allow him or her to have fun. Children find fun everywhere, you just need to provide the right type of entertainment to keep them engrossed for minutes or hours (depending on the attention span of your child)

Ilham discovered that dried water paint can be taken off from rather easily a painted glass using water and a sponge. The good news is that she can now paint her glass tea seat as many times as she wants to. What a great discovery that works well for my pocket too.