Salt and Watercolor Fall Leaves

I came across this beautiful technique at the Happy Hooligans blog.  She practiced letter writing with glue, salt and paint.   I thought this technique would be a fun experiment for my third graders and make beautiful fall leaf paintings.

Here’s how this works.   First, we used real fall leaves for inspiration while drawing.  We drew leaves with pencil on watercolor paper.  Then, we used regular Elmer’s white glue to outline the leaves.

While the glue was still wet, we poured salt on the glue.  Shake off the excess salt like you do with glitter.  We did the salt shaking inside a shallow box, so we could reclaim the salt that had fallen off the project  (obviously don’t use for eating later.)

We waited until after the glue was dry, but you could actually do the next step while the glue is still wet.  Use watercolors to dot colors on top of the glued salt.  The paint spreads and makes a beautiful effect.

That’s it!  Super fun, easy and feels almost magical!