Friday, July 25, 2008
Aint Nothing Paintastic About You
Posted by Missy W. @ 4:10 AM
I’m a big fan of Elmer’s. Love your glue, Elmer. What’s not to love? It’s sticky, it sticks things together, you can pour a lot of it all over your hand and try to peel it off in one go. Hours of fun with a bottle of glue. So when I saw that they had a line of really cool paint pens, I jumped at ‘em. Elmer’s Paintastics come in a set of five “pens” with paint brush tops. The washable, water color paint is already inside, so all you have to do is squeeze to activate and voila, paint oozes from the attached brush and a water color masterpiece is born.
Only, they didn’t really work. In fact, I was so irritated by our Paintastics, I think they should be renamed “Pain in the Ass Sticks.”
I’ve read other reviews that say this is a great set, so maybe it was just our package, but since every single pen had the same issue, I’m not so sure. Sy was very excited to paint with these. She doesn’t like a mess, so I figured the all in one brush would be right up her alley.
The process starts out easily enough; you push on the sides of the pen to get the paint moving up towards the brush tip and then start a-paintin’. I could never get the paint to saturate the tip enough to allow Sy to paint more than a couple of brush strokes at a time. She tried pushing the pen herself, but she could never get enough momentum going to get a good paint flow. That and every time either of us pushed on the sides of the brush, there was paint everywhere. Of course not from the tip where you’d expect, but out the sides where the brush tip is attached to the pen. The table, the paper and our hands were covered with paint. The child of mine who loathes to be a mess freaked out and refused to hold the pens. It took about three or four good washings to get the paint off of our hands. I soaked Sy’s clothes with a little dreft spray before washing them and it came right out.
Has anyone else tried this product with better results? I thought it was such a great idea. I was so nonplussed by the experience, though, that I am hesitant to shell out another $6.00 or $7.00 to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Snapshot:
Messy “No Mess” product.
Not worth the package it came in.
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July 25, 2008 @ 11:14 AM
jenny said:
Yep, tried these at a birthday party with a craft table. My four-year old tried to paint with them and BECAUSE NOTHING WAS COMING OUT, she said, “Mom, where’s the paint to go with these brushes?” Put them on the same shelf with Crayola Twistables I reviewed… (http://www.gearheadmom.com/review/comments/its_a_twisted_relationship_dont_fall_for_crayola_twistable_crayons/)