I hadn’t seen paper doilies around for some time, so upon spying a packet of them in Wheel & Barrow, I bought some, thinking they would come in handy for our arts and crafts.

Dropping colours onto the doily.

Paper doilies are quite thin, and readily suck up liquid, so we used food colouring in water as our paint. We had some green, pink, yellow and blue coloured water, and when they mixed it made some interesting colours and patterns.

Tipping the doily to spread the colour.

moving the colour about.

We used a different paint brush for each colour, dropping the coloured water onto the doilies and then picking them up to make the colours run across the doily. After placing some drops of coloured water on the doily, we found that turning the doily around slowly like a steering wheel made some good patterns. A found it easiest to put some coloured water on, and then pick the doily up from one side and let that colour run off, and then put more drops on and pick up a different side so that that colour ran in a different direction.

Painting the doily.

Both kids also used the paint brushes to apply the colour directly to the doilies, painting the edges, and giving some of the doilies faces.

The doilies dried quickly and we placed them up on some of our windows. I like the way they have brightened up those spaces.

Displayed on the window.