Even if this project didn’t result in softly colored, beautifully-swirled paper, my kids would have loved it. They had a blast squirting shaving cream all over their cookie sheets, and spent close to an hour smearing it all around, even though we ran out of paper after the first 15 minutes. They wrote their names in the shaving cream, drew pictures in it, rubbed it all over their forearms…just good, old-fashioned fun!
My little sister learned how to make marbled paper using shaving cream a few years ago, and it’s been on our list of projects ever since. It was so easy and the results were so cool that I can’t believe it took us this long to do! Once your marbled paper is dry, you can use it to cover handmade summer journals, as party decorations, or to write letters to your favorite far-away friends!
cheap shaving cream (Seriously, just the cheapest stuff you can find–no soothing gels or aloe or anything.)
liquid food coloring
cookie sheets or large trays
plain white paper (We just used cheap computer paper.)
paper towels
1. Smear Squirt a whole bunch of shaving cream on your cookie sheet and smear it around.
2. Swirl Drop food coloring onto the shaving cream. A little goes a long way! Use your fingers to gently swirl the food coloring around. My kids were pretty heavy-handed with this step, so their marbled paper doesn’t have much detail. But it still has a lovely, water color look to it.
3. Press When your food coloring swirls look the way you want them to, lay a piece of white paper down on top of the shaving cream, and gently press all over the back of the paper. Lift it gently off of the shaving cream, and set it down colored-side up on a paper towel on a flat, dry surface to dry completely. There will be shaving cream on the paper. That’s OK. Just ignore it for now.
4. Buff After several hours, the paper will be dry. It will still have dried bits of foam on it from the shaving cream. Take the paper towel your marbled paper was lying on, scrunch it up in a ball, and use it to buff the surface of the paper gently to remove the dried shaving cream. It will just flake off, and you’ll be left with beautifully marbled paper. It’ll smell pretty good too!
You can find the full list of Endless Summer Projects below:
- Mosaic Stepping Stones from Lulu the Baker
- A Family-Friendly Weeknight Barbecue from Alexandra Hedin
- Sharpie-Dyed Shirts from Pars Caeli
- Bug Habitats from Classic Play
- Mini Masterpieces from Lulu the Baker
- Bubble Paint Banner from Alexandra Hedin
- Memoir Boxes from Pars Caeli
- Friendship Charm Bracelets from Classic Play
Marbling is one of my favourite things these days! This looks lovely – I’ll have to give it a try!
Kathleen, I couldn’t believe how easy it was to do marbling this way, and the results can be really spectacular!