If you’re looking for an easy and inexpensive project to keep the kids entertained during the Covid-19 lockdowns, then here’s one for you. All you need is:

a piece of cardboard – can be from a cereal box, a beer carton – you name itsome PVA glue or other glue which can be squeezed from a bottlesome acrylic paint, preferably metallic, or some acrylic paint with glitter thrown ina picture frame (optional)



Find and prepare your ‘canvas’

First up, cut a piece of cardboard to your desired size. I had an unused picture frame in the house, so I cut my card to fit the frame. My card came from a beer carton, so I had to draw on the inside as the outside had been printed on. But first I traced the matting board from my frame so that I knew how big my picture could be.

Find and prepare your ‘canvas’ – I cut my card to fit a frame a wanted to use

Then draw a picture on the cardboard.

Draw a picture on the cardboard

With your picture, you just need to use clean outlines – nothing too sketchy or detailed.

Can’t draw? Perhaps you can get a little technical

I have to admit – I cheated a little. I had an image of a frog which I really liked from a teeny-tiny Steve Parish notebook. I photocopied the image and blew it up to a size which would fit inside the space. I then traced the main lines onto a piece of baking paper with a pen. I turned it over and scribbled with a 2B pencil across the pen lines.

I cheated and traced my image

Then I flipped it back, placed it on the cardboard, and drew over the pen lines again, which left a pencil drawing on the cardboard.

Then I transferred my image onto the cardboard



Grab your glue!

Once I had my frog outlined on the cardboard, I took the glue pot and squeezed it gently, leaving a raised trail of glue covering the pencil lines. I then waited 24 hours for it to dry.

Start applying PVA glue to the lines



My frog, fully glued!



Watching as the glue dries



After 24 hours the glue should be dry



Grab your paint!

The next day, I grabbed my tube of copper paint and painted over the cardboard, making sure to extend the paint past the lines where the matting board would come to.

And now the fun part – bringing your image to life by painting over it!



Frame that frog!

The day after that, when I knew for sure the paint would be dry and not at all tacky, I framed my frog. Isn’t he gorgeous?

My finished, framed frog – just make sure you wait 24 hours for the paint to dry!



Benefits of this project

A little project like this will teach your kids:

planning – they have to think about the finished product (size, image, paint colour etc), and what they’ll need and have to do to achieve thatpatience – waiting for the glue to dry and waiting for the paint to dry teaches them that there can be rewards for waitingfine motor skills – if they’re drawing, tracing or squeezing the glue, each of these processes will help with their fine motor skillsre-using and recycling – because you can use cardboard from any old box, this teaches kids to value things which would otherwise go to the big recycling pile in the sky!

If your kids (or you