Based on a project from First Art by MaryAnn F. Kohl

Required Equipment:

1 can of black cherry vanilla diet-coke (you can substitute coffee, earl gray tea, jasmine tea, etc.; it's a very flexible category)
two packets of gelatin
food coloring
small cookpot
small wooden spoon
four small bowls (I feel like I'm working for the teeny tiny woman in her teeny tiny house)
assorted small ziplock bags
a 9x13 pan lined with wax paper (actually any flat surface will do; I just like to contain the project)

1. Drink the caffeine. This is only necessary if you have had a night like mine: four wake-ups to nurse, three poopy diaper changes (there were actually four poopy diapers, but John did one of them), a total of 5.5 hours of interrupted sleep.
2. Let the child shake the gelatin into 1.5 cups water. So, you lose some sprinkles to the counter, the floor, the step stool, her shirt. This recipe does not need exact measurements.
3. Wait five minutes. I'm not sure how many renditions of twinkle twinkle this is—a lot.
4. Now it's definitely a grown-up's turn to stir over a low heat until the gelatin is dissolved. Even if your child asks repeatedly, even if your child reminds you that one time you let her stir over the stove, don't justify or explain again: stoves and streets are non-negotiable.
5. Pour the gelatin into the bowls and then put five drops of food coloring into each bowl. Do this very slowly just for the joy of watching the dense color spread through the viscous liquid.
6. Chill in the fridge for a while. (My directions say 10 minutes, but it's never long enough.)
7. At your child's direction, put various combinations of colored goop in ziplock bags.
8. Ok, all the prep counts as part of the art project, but here's where the kid really gets to go to town: squeeze, squish, smoosh. Feel the goop, slide through your fingers. Watch the red and blue become. . .purple! Watch the blue and green become . . .brown! This is a fabulous activity for the fastidious child, like mine, who does not want icky sticky jello actually on her hands.
9. On to the 9x11 pan. Hold the baby by wrapping your arm all the way around him, so the scissors are in your non-dominant hand pretty close to his arms and face. (You did know there was a baby watching all this from a bouncy chair who has now decided enough is enough and wants to be glued to your body and get a closer look?) Cut the corner off a ziplock bag. Your child can now play pastry chef and squeeze the multi-colored glop into lines and piles.
10. As a final step, actually reach in and fingerpaint with the now mostly brown mess.

This activity has been a big hit in our house. Just make sure the caffeine carries you through clean-up. Or, you have a partner like mine who graciously does it for you.