Fingerprint “I Love You” Book

Fingerprint book

Guest Post by Bridgette of Life Lesson Plans

 

Nothing says love like ten sticky fingers reaching up to touch your cheeks and pull you in for a kiss. My two year old, Grayson, has decided that’s the best way to get my attention when he needs a smooch… and who can blame him, it works! I wanted to immortalize his fleeting baby fingers, and so I decided to do a little fingerprint art project with my kids in hopes of creating a keepsake for this beautiful time in their lives.

 

Aurora is four and obsessed with scissors. She loves all sorts of cutting exercises, so I had her help me with the first part of this tutorial in which we made a book out of a cereal box!

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  1. Gather your supplies: a cereal box, scissors, paper, tape, a needle and thread, wrapping paper and ink.
  2. Cut off the front or the back of a cereal box and use wrapping paper to cover both sides of it.
  3. I used brown craft paper and made sure to neatly roll the ends at the bottom so there weren’t any raw edges.
  4. Add some construction paper pages, I used five. Cut them down to the right size for your book.
  5. Thread your needle, tie a large knot in the end, and thread it through your book so the knot is in the center seam.
  6. Poke it through the spine again and tie another knot in the center seam, make sure to keep tension on your thread so the book is nice and tight!
  7. You’ll have a nice minimal cover when you finish!
  8. Decorate it any way you like!

 

Once we finished the book, we set to writing our story. I chose to have the kids help me write a Valentine’s Day themed book, and I wanted to introduce them to similes, a comparison using “like” or “as,” so we titled ours ‘I Love You Like…” and then they helped me fill in the banks!

Our first page was “I love you like… a fish loves the ocean.” Here’s how we created each page together.

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  1. I drew the basic scenery, in this case a wave line so we would know where to position everything else.
  2. I had the kids place their fingerprints for the fish. I used this really cute Thumb Doodles Book, but here’s another free resource for fingerprint art.
  3. Aurora helped me draw in the landscape details. I showed her how to draw a seaweed and a bird and she copied my movements.
  4. I drew in the details on the thumbprints to make the little fish come to life!

Here is our book in its entirety, I would ask them questions like “What does a duck like to do?” They would reply “Quack” and thus, a page was born!

FingerPrint I Love You Book



This was a great bonding project for the three of us, the kids had to take turns, and work on another project while the other one was busy helping with the book. They learned about similes, new drawing techniques, and practiced scissor skills all in the span of a morning! The greatest lesson they learned though, was how much mommy and daddy love them as we read the book to them all afternoon! Seriously, ALL afternoon. :)

If you liked this post, then check out more of the science, sensory, and art activities I write about on Life Lesson Plans! Thanks for stopping by, and be sure to send Jenae some prayers as she gears up for the arrival of baby #3!

 

Brigette was born and raised in Nebraska, but since her husband joined the Air Force she has traveled around the world with him and their two young kids. First living in Hawaii, and now in Germany, her family has soaked up all sorts of cultural experiences that she loves to weave in to her writing. Brigette recently began blogging at Life Lesson Plans to share some of the art, science and sensory play ideas she does with her two and four year old. As a teacher by trade and a mother by choice, she enjoys the best of both worlds by helping her little ones discover the exciting world we live in!

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