Whipped Cream Fingerpainting

Many 4 year-olds need help with their fine motor skills: strengthening their little hands to prepare them for learning other school-related abilities like holding a pencil, tracing and then forming letters, cutting with scissors, etc. In our 4 year-old who has also experienced severe brain trauma, the area of fine motor skills is the only one where we can actually see a deficit or a weakness, and the only one that his neuropsychologist pinpointed as "below average" in comparison to other children his age.

Cody will begin Occupational Therapy in the next few months, but until then, I thought we could do a few activities at home to help develop those FM skills. So tonight (deliberately scheduled right before bath...hey, I'm no dummy), it was time for some whipped cream fingerpainting!

Luke was all over this, right from the start. Give him the opportunity to make a mess (on PURPOSE, no less), and he's first in line.

You can just see the glee. He thinks he's getting away with something...ON the table, covered in goo. He thinks it's only a matter of time until Mama loses it. Little stinker.

Then Luke ventured down to the other end of the table to help Jackson paint. At first he wasn't sure whether Jacks would be willing to share.

At Jackson's invitation, he dove right in.

Jacks tried to show Luke that the "paint" was actually pretty good to eat, too, but Luke was skeptical.

And then distracted by the fact that it was all over his legs.

Undeterred, Luke decided it was time for his America's Next Top Model impersonation.

"And I do my little turn on the catwalk..."

Ah. Now we see where he's going with this.

Target acquired.

Confident he could make an already large mess even more satisfying, Luke attempts to empty the contents of the can into an already full tray.

"Hey, this thing is broken! Mine's broken!"

Meanwhile, Jackson continued to eat the paint. Yummy!

And where was Cody, during all of this artistic, fine motor skill-developing merriment?

Playing dress-up. Apparently Bumblebee decided that whipped cream was "Ew." :)