How to Make Homemade Liquid Watercolor Paint

If you have kids, chances are you have some old, worn out markers around your house.

Before you toss out those markers (or better yet, recycle the plastic cases), you can use them to create homemade liquid watercolor paint.

The paint is super simple to make, and your child will love using it for craft time, like this crayon-resist April showers craft.

I’ve been on a big decluttering spree lately, and this week my attention turned towards our craft supplies.   

I had the kids test out all the markers on a piece of scrap paper.  Those that were drying out didn’t get put back in the marker box.  

Instead we used the old markers to make homemade water color paint.   The paint was perfect for salt painting. 

How to Make Liquid Watercolor Paint

It’s super easy to turn old markers into paint.  

First, gather up all your old, dried-up markers. 

Organize all the markers by color.  This is a great activity for young children to work on sorting skills.

Once the markers are separated into groups, put them upside down into jars.  I used baby food jars.  You could also use small mason jars.

Then, add water and let the makers sit like that for 24 hours.  

The more water you add, the lighter your paint color will be.   So if you only have one or two markers of the same color, you may want to use less water. 

You can always add more water later.

After 24 hours or so, remove the markers.

At this point you could use pliers to take the markers apart and squeeze the last few drops of color from the inner tube into your paint.  

We chose not to do that step.  Skipping it means less mess, and even with skipping it our liquid watercolors turned out brilliant.

Store your paint in the jars, making sure to put the lids on tightly.  

To use your paint, pour a small amount of each color into the sections of a paint pallette or a foam egg container.  

A small amount will go a long way.  

My daughter loved learning how to make liquid water color paint to use for all her art projects.   It’s a great way to use up those markers before you get rid of them.  

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