Fun Shaped Homemade Sidewalk Chalk

Homemade heart-shaped sidewalk chalks

Recently, we had a few days that felt like summer here in Southern California. My girl has been playing outside in the neighborhood with her friends, riding her skateboard, or trying out her new roller blades that she just got for her 11th birthday. Of course, today in SoCal, it is rainy and cold, but needless to say, we are definitely getting Spring Fever.

Roller blading tween girl

I realized that they had turned the street in our cul-de-sac into what looked like a racetrack. You see, the kids in the neighborhood had taken turns drawing stripes down the street with sidewalk chalk while sitting on their skateboards. My girl was complaining about her fingers getting scratched by the road since the sidewalk chalks were so small. I started researching how to make our own homemade sidewalk chalk.

I love crafty concoctions, like the borax crystals or homemade bath bombs we recently made . It is actually really simple to make sidewalk chalk. It’s just a little messy. It makes for a perfect outdoor weekend craft idea, though.

All you need to make your own sidewalk chalk is:

  • Plaster of Paris ( I found mine at my local Michaels)
  • Tempera Paint
  • Warm Water

We also used plastic cups to mix in, and plastic knives to mix with. That way, we just threw away the cups and knives after we were done instead of trying to rinse them out.

How to Make Your Own Sidewalk Chalk

We mixed 1 cup of Plaster of Paris with 3/4 cup warm water first. Then we added a couple squirts of tempera paint and stirred.

Note: don’t add too much paint, it will change the consistency of the chalk, and will crumble easy. A couple of squirts, or no more than 2 teaspoons will work fine.

Tween making homemade sidewalk chalk shapes

We used a separate cup per color, and then poured into shaped silicone molds like flowers or hearts and toilet paper rolls that we had lined with wax paper first. For the toilet paper rolls, we also created a base by taping off the bottom with duct tape.

Then they just needed to dry. They were hard and ready to pop out of the molds within a couple of hours.

Although, the toilet paper rolls made nice thick sidewalk chalks, we thought they were the hardest to peel away from the rolls.

Toilet paper tube homemade sidewalk chalk copy

We actually preferred the silicone mold chalks. They popped out really easily, and the molds cleaned up beautifully.

homemade heart shaped sidewalk chalk @clubchicacircle

Once I saw the Spring colored chalks and how cool they looked as shapes, I knew they would make great Spring Easter basket gifts. I used recycled plastic containers that I removed the labels from, and added Easter grass or gift wrap shredded paper. For instance, the photo above and below are recycled raspberry containers.

Flower shaped Spring homemade sidewalk chalk

Homemade sidewalk chalks easter basket gift idea

Try dressing up your containers with some pretty ribbon, or place right into Easter baskets for fun Springtime gift idea.

Next time you have a sunny day outside, have fun making your own homemade sidewalk chalk.

Happy crafting!

 

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Pauline Molinari

I'm the crafty maven, and I'm on a mission to spread craftiness. With a fine arts degree, over 15 years experience in children's publishing, and a savvy, stylish, sassy tween daughter, I come armed with perspective and passion to inspire tween girls and their mothers to be crafty together. 

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  7 comments for “Fun Shaped Homemade Sidewalk Chalk

  1. Shelly Boren
    February 20, 2013 at 3:13 pm

    I wonder if you could use kool-aid packets for the color? I have seen it used to dye eggs, just wondering.

    • February 20, 2013 at 3:38 pm

      hmmmm, I wonder. I know we just used Kool-aid packets to make homemade lip gloss at the slumber party. They worked really well for lip gloss, but we did notice that some of the colors weren’t what we expected. For instance, cherry Kool-aid turned out a little purple instead of the expected red.

    • Darla Smith
      April 2, 2013 at 7:37 am

      Im not sure about kool aid but while looking for my gluetin free recipes I found a recipe that calls for 1 1/2 c cornstarch and 1 1/2 c warm water then add your color with food coloring.. I made some it works..

  2. Erin
    March 25, 2013 at 5:14 pm

    How do you dry these? How long do they take to dry?

    • March 25, 2013 at 5:56 pm

      The chalk mixture starts to harden as you stir to a thick pancake consistency. They air dry, and we let them dry outside in our backyard. They hardened completely between 30-60 minutes in the silicone molds.

  3. Crystal Corritore
    June 1, 2013 at 2:14 pm

    Does the tempura paint stain the sidewalk..or driveway?? I think the koolaid might…it stains my countertops if I don’t clean it off right away..

    • June 3, 2013 at 9:33 am

      Hi Crystal,
      I have found since tempura paint is water based it does not stain the sidewalk, unlike food coloring, koolaid, etc in your kitchen.
      Hope that helps.
      Pauline

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