A Child’s Painted Crucifix

I have a few guest crafters that pop in once in a while to help me out. 

One of those guests is my sister, Ruth, who has contributed some serious DIY projects like this and this. 

My other guest crafter is Gus.

He just turned 2 years old. 

And he loves wheels and messes. 

He also loves to paint. 

During Lent, we made this project together and I still love it. 

A few weeks ago we pulled out the paint once again, we started talking about Jesus and made this colorful crucifix. 

They are simple, but I love them. 

He made three.  

We gave one to grandma, one is hanging in the playroom and the other is hanging above his bed.

Ready to get messy and make a beautiful crucifix?  Here’s what you’ll need:

Supplies:

• Popsicle Sticks
• Hot Glue Gun
• LOTS of acrylic paint and paintbrushes
• Black puff paint
• Red/Pink puff paint
• Glossy Mod Podge

First of all, Mom has to create the crosses out of popsicle sticks. 

Here is a picture that sort of shows  how I did it:

I laid it out like this, and then hot glued sticks onto the back to hold it together, then glued the horizontal and vertical sections together with the horizontal on top.

Next, let the mess begin! 

Strip off those clothes, grab ALL of your acrylic paint, lay out some newspaper, and stand back! 

Here are a few pictures I was able to snap while he painted. 

I couldn’t get many because there was a lot to manage!

I really love how he painted this!  And I just put out puddles of all the paint and he messes it around, which gives the whole thing a pretty cool look.

When the puddles of paint are finally dry, it’s mom’s turn again.  Grab the puff paint and add a corpus to the cross. 

I also added the “INRI” in black puff paint. 

I also used red puff paint to show the wounds of Christ. 

When the entire thing was dry I gave everything a coat of Mod Podge.