help making wrapping paper??

[abharrington]

we have tons of brown paper and i want to just let dd finger paint on it. but, is there some kind of spray i can apply to keep the paint from coming off (after it dries). we are traveling for christmas and i dont ' want the paper to be a huge mess. thoughts? TIA

[dillonandmarasmom]

How old is your DD?
Here is a step by step tutoria; for some cute designs. But, it doesn't really go into preserving it. Are you set on using fingerpaint? What about Tempera paint?

My kids have done this, and as long as I watered it down so it wasn't too thick and clumpy, it stayed on the paper just fine.

[abharrington]

hmmm...not even sure i have some finger paints and some paint markers and brown paper bags. dd will be 2 in jan, so i was thinking about letting her do handprints on the paper.

[Jojo F.]

the only thing that comes to mind is using watered down glue over the paint after it dries.

This past weekend we were making paper mache bolws and I needed birthday wrapping paper, not something I have right now, so I decided to make it. I tore pieces of tissue paper, all different colors, layed them on a giant piece of paper, then went over the pieces with the watered down glue I was using for the paper mache. (I did have a tiny bit of flour in the glue mixture). Basically like decoupage and the paper came out awsome!! You could use a paper mache glue mixture to seal the paint

[gardenmom]

No ideas for preserving it, but we've done brown paper with potato stamps.

Take a russet potato, cut in half and then carve a picture into the end (christmas tree, star, etc.). Instant stamp for dipping into paints. If the potato is large enough, you can slice off the end and carve the next bit into a new shape...