Pete the Cat: Kid-Painted Watermelon Shoes

Kid Painted Watermelon Shoes | Mama Papa Bubba

Yay!  Another week means another instalment of preschool book club with our online friends, which Miss G and I both just love. 

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This time around, we went back to Pete the Cat {see our Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons activity here} and read Pete the Cat I Love My White Shoes.  While deciding on our book extension activity can sometimes be tricky, as soon as us book club mamas decided on I Love My White Shoes, I knew that Grae and I would paint shoes – it just fits too perfectly!  If you’ve not yet read it, the story is about Pete the Cat who loves his white shoes, but accidentally steps on things throughout his day, causing them to change colours.  Of course, being the cool laid-back cat that he is, he rolls with it and loves his shoes no matter what colour they are – gotta love an attitude like that, right?

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While I did have a pair of brand new pair of white high top shoes {just like Pete’s} on hand, we decided to breathe some new life into the very plain, very inexpensive pair white shoes Miss G wore last year as part of her homemade super girl costume.  {FYI, white shoes and life in the desert don’t mix well.  If you don’t live in the land of sand, dirt, and dust, plain white canvas shoes can often be found at big box stores like Target and Walmart, or they can be found here on Amazon.}

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After reading and singing our way through the full story once, we flipped back through our book to revisit the things Pete had stepped in during his walk.  First, it was a pile of strawberries {that turned his shoes red} and then it was a pile of blueberries {that turned his shoes blue}, which Grae thought was pretty silly.  Keeping on with the fruit theme, I asked her what she thought would happen if Pete had stepped into a pile of watermelon…  Her response?  ‘His shoes would turn all WATERMELONY!!’, which couldn’t have been more perfect.

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With that, we got started on creating our kid-painted watermelon shoes. First, we gathered our materials {all of which we already had at home – score!}… Plain white canvas shoes, green and pink fabric paint {acrylic will work too, though I may thin it out just a touch with some water}, a black oil-based Sharpie {black paint or a regular paint pen could also be used}, thick painter’s tape, a pair of scissors, and a couple of small paint brushes.

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Then we had to decide how we wanted to divide up the shoes.  We discussed several options, and Gracen decided that she wanted the toes to be the green rind part of the watermelon and the rest of the shoes, including the tongue, to be the pink fleshy part of the watermelon.  And of course, she wanted to start with the pink part first!  With that, I taped off the toes and she got started.

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For this part, I basically just let Grae go.  She worked hard to cover the white fully and I helped just a little bit by creating a border along the rubber sole so that it was easier for her to keep the paint where she wanted it.  When she was done, I smoothed out a couple big blobs of paint and we placed the shoes outside in the desert heat to dry.

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The next step was creating our seeds using our Sharpie paint pen.  I demonstrated the shape and spacing of the seeds a couple of times, and then Miss G continued on with the rest of them.  The nice thing about these pens is that the paint dries pretty much immediately, so she really didn’t have to worry much about smudging previous seeds.

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The last step was adding our green paint to the toes of the shoes.  Though I could have taped off the pink seedy parts and let Grae at it like I did  last time, this time I carefully painted a border on each toe and then let Gracen fill in the middles, which was great fine motor control practice.

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We let the shoes dry just a little longer, and that was it!  SO cute, right?  We haven’t yet decided what we’ll do for laces {I’m sort of hoping for a slip-on / slip-off option}, but Gracen just loves them and has already practiced running around the apartment with her new ‘watermelon feet’, so I’d say they’re a hit!

 

Ready to see the fun things our friends did with this book?  Take a peek…

SHOES Book Club

shoe sorting math activity     |      feet painting activity     |     diy walking sticks     |     kid-painted shoe cookies

Want to try a little preschool book club of your own?  See the entire series here.

 

 

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5 thoughts on “Pete the Cat: Kid-Painted Watermelon Shoes

  1. I love this idea; we have a pair of past-their-whitest canvas shoes just waiting for something creative – now just have to find something boyish to paint on them!

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