I love homemade napkins, especially ones that are full of character and personality (i.e. the kinds that don’t show stains).   Thankfully, I also have kiddos who love art and painting, the bigger the better.   With a couple of yards of linen fabric, some elmer’s markers and acrylic paint we were set to decorate.
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napkin painting
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We used an old appliance box to protect our floors.   Thanks Lowes – every time we shop we head over to the appliance section and check if they have any boxes they are willing to donate to our projects!
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It was big.   It was crazy.   It was messy.   It was creative – the kids went and got spoons after realizing the paint brushes weren’t as effective as they would prefer.   It was expansive – especially when they started painting on the box, after they were finished with the fabric – just because.   It was crazy and fun.
.kid made napkins.

After they finished spooning and spattering paint on the linen sheet, we let the “artwork” dry completely for a couple of days.   Then sent it through the dryer for good measure and to use heat to help set the paint.   We then washed the fabric on hot with vinegar.   The vinegar and heat helped “set” the color in – we’re still going to wash these with the colored or dark laundry – just to be safe.
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napkins gift.

I think I like our tabletop valentines!



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19 Comments

  1. I’m loving this! I’m going to offer coordinating colors for the room and at the very end the accent color and a black (otherwise the rainbow of colors will end up brown when they’re done blending all the colors LOL!). Since sewing is not a creative outlet for me right now I plan on doing a straight or zig zag stitch around all the edges so when they start to fray it will look like it was on purpose 🙂