As I was pregnant with my fourth and feeling like it was probably my last baby, we wanted to do something really special to commemorate the experience for everyone. After much research I decided I'd make a belly cast. This is a plaster cast of your pregnant belly. It seemed like th perfect idea.
The more I learned about belly casting, the more I wanted to do it. The only probably was, how would my children, then 8,7 and 2 deal with lots of plaster and a naked mommy smeared in petroleum jelly? My husband and I decided it was probably a task best left to ourselves.
We had a lot of fun doing the belly cast and it was really neat to see. I couldn't believe I was really shaped like that, but plaster doesn't lie...
The kids seemed really disappointed that they couldn't do something too. That's when I had the idea to let them paint my belly to look like a pumpkin. (I was due in the fall, just days before Halloween.) They thought it was great!
So we bought some poster paints, brushes, and set out for fun. We went to the backyard, to avoid paint all over the house. I wore old clothes and covered my lap with a towel. While I sat on the chair, the three kids began to cover me in orange paint. My husband recorded the whole thing on video and some still shots too.
My husband cleaned the edges up a bit, and then a serious discussion ensued: happy or scary faced pumpkin? Kevin and the kids designed the face and he went back to recording. I'll never forget listening to them laugh and then Kevin saying, "Hey Kool-Aid!" (Just like the old commercial goes.) Which of course, made my belly shake worse that the proverbial bowl full of jelly.
All in all we had a great time! Not to mention we had some great photos.
This time when I got pregnant the kids couldn't wait to do it again. Twins made the palette twice as big! My eldest daughter, now nearly 11 had really grown as an artist and would provide me with pages and pages of potential designs for the new belly painting. In the end, while she wanted to do it alone, we again allowed everyone, even the 2 year old to paint the base coat of the belly white.
Hilary had free reign on the design and choose a really cool idea, that was simplistic and yet abstract. We also found a neat stencil to aid in her design.
The cost of the whole project about $10 for paint and brushes. I choose to use a base coat to provide a background color. It also helps because of the stretch marks, which aren't a problem for everyone. Poster paints work fine, but they do start to crack fairly quickly. Face paints worked really well. Both wash off very easily in the shower.
The fun we had spending the afternoon in the backyard running, laughing, painting and playing? I couldn't even begin to describe it!
I highly recommend this as a project for nearly any aged child, or even something to do at a baby shower, mother blessing, or for fun!
