Tyler came home from daycare last night with blue hands. They made kites and I figured his would be full of color since his hands were. But, his kite only had one squiggle from his finger. The rest of the color was droplets of paint which his teachers clearly put on the kite to fill in the white space. At home I scrubbed using soap & warm water but couldn't get all the paint off. So he played in the living room while I cooked dinner and Tyler figured out how to get the paint off himself by sucking on his fingers and turning his mouth blue. I was livid. I'm sure this was non-toxic paint but you never know. We went back to the sink to soak those hands, scrubbed them with the scrub brush and still couldn't get it all off. But now the color was more of a diluted green. So he ate dinner (baked potato, chicken nuggets & peas, of course) with green hands. The rest of it came off in the bath, except I still couldn't get it out from under two fingernails.

This morning when I took him in I was ready to complain but Carina's parents were already telling their story about how much they had to soak and scrub her to get it off. It was a new kind of paint and apparently doesn't react the same as the old kind, which they mix with 50% soap to make it. You can mix soap with paint?? Hey that's good to know if I ever get brave enough to try a finger painting project at home. Ms. Tricia assured me it was non-toxic and expressed surprise that Tyler even got any paint on his hands (they painted with their afternoon teachers) because she said the last time they painted, Tyler had fun watching his friends, but wouldn't get his hands near the paint. So, I guess he's making slow progress in the art department. At least now he's getting his hands in the paint but not putting much paint on the paper. Maybe he's more of a thinker than a do-er. Maybe he's like me, he watches and analyzes the situation from afar before jumping in to take action. Or maybe he just doesn't like to stick his hands in wet paint & I'm reading way too much into this.