DIY Safe and Easy Way to Preserve Child Footprints

This past Sunday, the kind ladies who run the nursery at my church asked us to bring our 4-month old child to get his handprint and footprint for the bulletin board. When we walked in the nursery, I saw a paper plate on the table holding a pool of blue liquid next to a sheet of construction paper.

I watched in mild horror as the ladies dipped my son’s hand in the blue liquid paint and attempt to press his hand flat against the construction paper. Only, my son closed his hand to make a fist. They had to pry his fingers open and feebly press down on the paper while he screamed and struggled to get away.

Afterwards, it looked like someone had spit a mouthful of blue paint onto the paper. It barely resembled a handprint at all. And even after the kind ladies scrubbed on my child’s hands to get the remnants of the paint off, there was still a slight hint of blue on his hand all day long.

I figured there had to be a better, easier way to get a handprint and footprint of a child. Here is what I’ve come up with.

Items you’ll need

• Crayola Washable Kid’s Paint
• A sponge – Any sponge will do. I found a rather large one in the automotive section in Walmart. Just make sure it’s big enough to cover a child’s or human’s foot.
• A white sheet of paper – The heavier the paper, the better. You can use regular printer paper, but the area around the footprint might start to wilt or warp over time.
• A child with a foot – This exercise is not limited to children, but within the scope of this article we’re focusing on a child’s footprint.
• Damp washcloth

Step 1 – Avoid the Hands
As I witnessed first hand (pun not intended), you want to avoid dealing with the hands if you’re doing this. The child is either going to ball up their hand, make a mess in an infinite number of ways, or stick his or her hand directly into their mouth. Bad idea, buddy.

So, just stick to the feet. Much cleaner and easier.

Step 2 – Apply Paint to the Sponge
Pop open the paint color of your choice and pour out a little onto the sponge. Don’t go overboard here, simply apply quarter-sized dollops of paint and spread it over the sponge until you have a paint spot big enough to cover the child’s foot.

Step 3 – Step In It
Now simply take the child’s foot and press it gently on the paint spot on the sponge. Because you’re using a sponge, the paint should be applied evenly so you won’t have dobs of paint on the final footprint.

Step 4 – Step On It
Press the child’s foot firmly against the sheet of paper. Try to press straight down and then lift straight up without moving or dragging from side to side.

Step 5 – Rinse and Repeat
Using your damp washcloth, wipe the paint off the child’s foot. If done correctly, the paint should only be on the child’s foot for under 10-15 seconds, so the paint should come off very easily. Now you can easily switch to the other foot or do the same foot again.

Step 6 – Display Your Work
There’s no official drying time indicated on the Crayola paints, but the paint seems to be dry enough to touch after 1-2 hours. Since there are no dobs of paint, you should be able to instantly hang the footprint on the way without risk of running lines of paint.

If you have a scanner, you can easily scan the sheet of paper (make sure the paint is dry!) for easy digital archiving or for use as design elements and compositions. Keep the size of the footprint at 100% (don’t resize) and it should print out as actual size.