For children's games and the development of fine motor skills of hands, cereals, small pebbles, buttons, pasta, beans and peas are used. Elements painted in different bright colors look beautiful. In the article we will tell you how to color the rice with dyes, so that the pictures are colored, and the child was more interested in playing with them. To do this is quite simple, there are even several options for how this can be done.
You can make several separate cans, each of which contains cereals of the same color. Such material can subsequently be used to make DIY crafts, for example, paintings from natural material. You can mix different colors by combining the grits for the sensor box. How to color rice in different ways, read on in the article.
What is the best color for cereals?
There are a lot of coloring methods, but some dyes act for a short time, over time, the pictures fade, the colors fade and acquire a grayish tint. This happens if you paint the rice for children with gouache paints or watercolors. In addition, stains on your hands and things may get dirty during the game. However, if you make a piece of cereal on the table surface, this method can be safely used. It is simple to make coloring, and after working with the material it will be enough to wash your hands. In order for the craft to retain its bright colors, the picture after production is opened with acrylic varnish.
How to color the rice so that it is smooth, evenly colored, and the colors are preserved for a long time, without dirtying your hands? High-quality coloring is obtained if conventional food colors are used. Many have already used them for coloring Easter eggs. This method can be used to prepare the sensor box, where multi-colored small elements are mixed in a chaotic manner. The brightness of such paints persists for a long period, although the child often touches the rice mass.
There are mothers who basically do not want their children's hands to touch chemical dyes, so before dyeing rice, natural dyes are prepared. In the article we will explain in detail all the methods of coloring, what additional materials will be needed, how to dry rice and where it is better to store the colored cereals.
Necessary materials
- The first thing you need to buy rice. Some people like to work only with the elongated, but, in principle, you can buy absolutely any. Boil rice is not necessary, we will work with raw cereals.
- Before dyeing rice with food coloring, prepare empty containers for each color separately. It can be plastic cups for yogurt or sour cream, mayonnaise glass jars, etc.
- A metal spoon (it is easier to wash it after the dye than a wooden one).
- Paint, depending on your wishes and preferences. It can be kits with food colors, fresh gouache paints, watercolors in tubes, acrylic paints, or independently extracted from natural materials.
- Foil or sheets of polyethylene. They are used to dry cereals in the oven or in a natural way on the windowsill.
- Before you color the rice with gouache, purchase bags of fasteners. It is convenient to distribute the paint throughout the croup with your fingers.
- Strengthener.
Additional ingredient
It is not recommended to breed the coloring materials mentioned above in water, because the cereal will become sour from it, and the rice will dry for a very long time, and may even deteriorate over time. How to color rice with food coloring for a child? To stir into a jar of powder, you need to add vinegar or ethyl alcohol (some use vodka or antibacterial hand gel, which can be replaced with glycerin).
From vinegar, the paint lays evenly and does not crumble subsequently, and from glycerin or gel the colored grain will shine beautifully.
Step-by-step instructions for working with food coloring
Food colors of different colors are sold in sets at any supermarket. They are not expensive, so the work will not be too expensive.
Step 1. Pour the powder from the bag into separate containers and fill with alcohol. The more liquid in the jar, the paler the color will be. You can thus get a gentle or more saturated shades.
Step 2. Pour rice with a metal spoon into the mixed solution and stir for several minutes until the rice reaches the desired tone.
Step 3. Then with the same spoon, the rice is pulled out and spread on the prepared bedding. If you will dry the material in the oven, then take foil or parchment paper for baking. A separate rectangle is required for each color. If you dry the rice on the windowsill in a natural way, then you can take a plastic bag or old rags.
Drying time is different, depending on the ambient temperature and season. It is best to color the rice in the evening, and the next day to start playing or making crafts.
Using pre-made paints
Further we will consider how to color rice, using gouache, acrylic paints or tubes in tubes as dyes. For each color you need to prepare a plastic bag. It is most convenient to use those that have side fasteners, but a more spacious option is also suitable, only it will have to be tied to a durable knot.
Pour rice into each bag with a spoon. Then they pick up a tablespoon of paint and put it on top of the grits. For 1 glass of rice, on average, 1 tbsp. l paints. Then the bag is fastened or tied and shaken thoroughly. In this case, you can lightly rub your fingers through the package of the picture so that the paint covers all the elements from different sides. Then the rice is laid out to dry in the usual way.
How to color rice with natural dyes?
If you don’t have purchased paints at hand, you can use the gifts of nature and make them yourself. Consider some of the most popular colors for crafts and from which such paints can be created.
- The green color of the rice is obtained by pouring a little green in the bag. Another option is from greens, such as spinach. In a container, you need to pour it with boiling water and, after cooling, strain through a sieve.
- Orange - from grated carrots or tangerine peel.
- Yellow - obtained by stirring turmeric powder with alcohol.
- Red - can be made from any juice of suitable color berries - strawberries, red currants, cranberries, etc.
- Burgundy color is created from cherry juice.
- Pink will help make beets.
- Purple or lilac will turn out of black currant.
- A brown tint is made from natural coffee or cocoa powder.
Since the juices contain a large water content, after lowering into the container, the rice is kept for a short time so that it does not swell too much. Then the cereal is removed from the can and laid out to dry on a flat surface with a thin layer. So the cereal dries faster.
Kitchen interior decoration
The craft with colorful rice laid out in layers looks beautiful in the kitchen. To do this, you can use not only a beautifully shaped jar, but also an original bottle.
Rice is poured over a metal or wooden stick, put in a container in layers, alternating colors. The craft turns out to be bright and serves as a real decoration of the kitchen shelf.
Kids Games with Touch Boxes
Recently, all parents and teachers have realized the benefits of games for children with small objects. Tactile and sensory perceptions of the surrounding reality are developing. Children learn not only colors, but also work with their fingers, cognizing objects. For the touch box, colorful rice is often used. The colors in the container mix, a variegated coating of a few centimeters in depth is obtained. As a game, the child can be offered a treasure hunt, that is, collect coins scattered in the croup.
You can play with plastic glasses by pouring rice from one can to another, measuring how many small caps fit in a large bowl. It’s interesting to “plant vegetables” or just dig a groove in the groats with a small spatula.
Older children can be offered to dig an underground passage or build a road on which there will be pits and debris that will need to be dismantled. You can arrange a whole park of homemade trees. Imagine with the children, they will find application box. If there is a magnet, then coins can be collected with it.
DIY material
How to color the rice, you already know, let's look at how you can make a beautiful picture with it. For convenience, dried rice is poured into different bowls. On the surface of cardboard or fiberboard, a drawing of a future image is applied with a simple pencil.
Then the surface is partially smeared with PVA glue, and the pictures are laid out with the necessary color. Until the glue is seized, you need to adjust the orientation of the cereal with a toothpick or wooden skewer. The work will look beautiful not only with the correct placement of colors, but also when the rice is laid in even rows. This work is painstaking and lengthy, but the work is spectacular. In order for the work to be preserved, and the material does not fall on the floor over time, the painting must be covered with a layer of acrylic varnish.
As you can see, you can color rice in many ways, but they are all quite simple and cheap. With colorful cereals, you can play and make various crafts from rice, both for children and experienced handmade craftsmen.