Magical Heart Art

Drew a Heart by @gilliansze (author) and @naokostoop (illustrator) is the perfect story to share during both Lunar New Year and Valentine’s Day. This lyrical and heartfelt book celebrates creativity, love, and a beautifully diverse, multigenerational family as a young boy spends the day drawing hearts inspired by his favorite people, moments, and memories.

After reading the story together, we invited the children to create their own magical rubbing-alcohol watercolor hearts. This engaging science-meets-art (STEAM) experience is both a creative experiment and a process-art exploration, blending curiosity, observation, and artistic expression.

To set up this invitation, the children were provided with paper heart cut-outs, Colorations liquid watercolors and paintbrushes, along with small cups of rubbing alcohol and pipettes. First, the children painted their hearts with vibrant liquid watercolors. Before the paint had time to dry, they carefully used the pipettes to drop rubbing alcohol onto the wet surface.

As the rubbing alcohol touched the paint, the children watched as the liquid repelled the water—causing the pigments to scatter, separate, and bloom into beautiful starburst patterns. The unpredictable movement of the colors created a truly magical effect, sparking excitement, wonder, and lots of thoughtful observations about what was happening on their paper.

This activity supported children in developing fine-motor control through painting and squeezing the pipettes, encouraged scientific thinking as they observed cause-and-effect in real time, and nurtured creativity and confidence by allowing them to explore color, pattern, and experimentation in an open-ended way.