by Debbie Chapman
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Making these marbled leaves is SO FUN and the fall colours are so pretty! This fall craft is super easy – simply press cardstock leaves intoshaving cream and paint and then squeegee them off to reveal beautiful paper marbling!
Marbled Leaves Shaving Cream Art
These marbled leaves are the perfect craft for fall! Who knew you could get such pretty marbling from paint mixed into shaving cream?! The patterns are so beautiful, and each leaf is one of a kind.
These leaves coloured by shaving cream marbling were inspired by the colours of fall here in Canada. I absolutely love going for a drive in the fall and admiring the beautiful sea of yellow, orange, and red leaves.
This marbled paper craft is such acool and tactile activity. It’s incredibly fun to swirl the paint around in the shaving cream and then to move the squeegee down the leaf to reveal the pattern. This is a great activity for younger kids to explore sensoryart and colour mixing.
Check out our MarbleFall Leaves Painting video tutorial:
*Note: Scroll down for the step-by-step photo tutorial.
Looking for more fall crafts? Here’s some of our favourites:
Easy Tree Painting with Broccoli
DIY Leaf Bowl
Fall Leaf Chalk Art
Pinecone Turkey
Here’s what you’ll need:
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The full printable instructions are at the end of this post, but here’s a list of products on Amazon and Target that are similar to the supplies we used:
What kind of paint should I use?
We used acrylic paint, mostly because of the variety of fall colours available. Acrylic paint is definitely a great choice for producing bold colours!
However, you can also do this art project with tempera paint or liquid watercolours. You can even use food colouring in the shaving cream to colour your leaves!
What can I use instead of a squeegee?
A squeegee works the best for making marbled leaves, but there’s a few other options. Something plastic like a ruler, putty knife, or expired gift card would work to scrape off the shaving cream and paint.
You can use a piece of cardboard, but I wouldn’t recommend it. We tried using cardboard first for this project, and it smudged the leaves instead of removing the shaving cream and paint cleanly. Cardboard also goes soggy after using it a couple of times, whereas all the plastic options can be used over and over again.
How many trays can I make with one can of shaving cream?
This will all depend on the size of your shaving cream can and the size of your baking tray. We used an 11 ounce (311 gram) can of shaving cream and it was able to fill 3 large trays (12 x 18 inches).
How many times can the paint be used?
We found that the leaves looked the best when they were pressed into the freshly swirled paint. You can definitely use the same spot again, but the marbling effect won’t be quite as clear.
DIY Fall Leaf Shaving Cream Marbling
These marbled leaves are SO FUN and are the perfect craft for fall! Make a beautiful fall leaf by swirling together paint and shaving cream.
Materials:
- FREE Printable Leaf template
- Cardstock
- Shaving cream (foam, not gel!)
- Acrylic paint (multiple colours)
Equipment:
Stir stick (can also use popsicle stick, butter knife, etc)
Instructions:
Print off leaf templates on cardstock and cut them out.
Fill a baking tray with shaving cream.
Smooth out any large bumps in the shaving cream to make it a bit more flat.
Start adding paint to the shaving cream.
Add more colours of paint until the tray is relatively covered. You can make dots and/or lines - whatever you want.
Swirl the paint around with a stir stick or popsicle stick. Start out moving up and down across the tray. Then switch to moving left to right. Finally, move the stir stick in a curved motion until most of the shaving cream is covered in paint.
Place the leaf into the paint (with the black outline side up) and press it down. You can use the clean side of the stir stick to press down the edges.
Let the leaf sit at least 10 seconds in the shaving cream and paint.
Carefully peel the cardstock leaf off the shaving cream and place it on a clean tray, shaving cream side up.
Grab the edge of the leaf with a fingertip and use a squeegee to remove the excess shaving cream and paint. Use firm pressure for the best results.
Repeat with other leaves and allow them to dry on paper towel for at least half an hour.
Your marbled fall leaves are complete!
Helpful Tip:
We used the medium size leaf templates from our leaf template page to make our marbled leaves:
>>> Printable Leaf Templates <<<
Making marbled fall leaves is SO FUN, and the results are really pretty! Try using the same technique with other shapes and colours for different holidays and times of the year.
Here’s even more fall craft ideas:
Easy Tree Painting
DIY Leaf Bowl
Fall Leaf Chalk Art
Pinecone Turkey
Our bookLow-Mess Crafts for Kids is loaded with 72 fun and simple craft ideas for kids! The projects are fun, easy and most importantly low-mess, so the clean up is simple!
Where to buy:
You can purchase Low-Mess Crafts for Kids from Amazon, or wherever books are sold:
Amazon |Barnes and Noble | Books- A- Million | Indiebound |Indigo |Amazon Canada
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About Debbie Chapman, the Author of this Post
I'm Debbie Chapman, founder of One Little Project and author of the book Low-Mess Crafts for Kids. I love creating fun and easy crafts and cooking up delicious recipes for my husband and 3 kids.
More by Debbie Chapman
Filed Under: Halloween, Holidays, Just for Kids, Kids Crafts and Activities, ThanksgivingTagged With: acrylic paint, art for kids, cardstock, crafts, crafts for kids, Fall, Fall crafts, kids activities, Kids Crafts, Leaf crafts, painting, shaving cream, squeegee, squeegee painting
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- Esther Bilbrey says
Love this
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- One Little Project says
Thanks Esther! 🙂
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