Washable paints have come a long way. Parents and teachers used to just add liquid dish soap to tempura paints to make their own washable paints for children to use in art projects. The problem with this, they learned, was that MOLD would grow. Why?
Apparently adding a foreign ingredient to the manufactured paint product was a breeding ground for mold! Now that parents and teachers know what great washable paints are on the market for kids, gone are the moldy soapy paints!
Buyer beware: Even washable paints can damage some surfaces, especially porous ones like certain clothing fabrics. Sometimes the darker colors, especially dark green and black, are harder to wash out, even though the washable paints are water-based and should come out with soap and water.
Tip: Wash out any paint from clothing or other surfaces right away. The best solution we’ve ever seen to getting out almost any kind of stain, is to use LAVA SOAP. Use the bar soap, not Lava in any other form. Get the fabric wet, rub the bar of Lava soap directly on the spot, then rub the fabric together at the stain. Rinse and repeat until the stain is gone. Tough stains come out too! The sooner the better, and do this prior to putting the clothing in the laundry.
We do Face Painting for birthday parties, and use Professional Face Paint Make-up, which is water-based, safe and non-toxic, for use on skin. It washes off hands and faces easily with soap and water, but the same rules seem to apply with this type of paints. Darker colors left on longer, will be more difficult to wash off. (Don’t use our Lava soap trick on skin! Just on fabrics.)
Thanks to a Los Banos, CA 1st grade teacher for the Lava soap tip, we have used it many many times with great success.
