Fabric paint or pens? Advice please...

[Lastyearsmodel]

I'm thinking of making this teepee with/for the DCs this Easter but have never used fabric paint or pens before.
DCs are nearly 5 and just 3 (and 7mo but she will be mostly lounging in the shade).

What are your experiences? Paint obviously messier but will little hands be able to use the pens?

Am I buoyed up by unrealistic end-of-term optimism or is the whole thing hopelessly over-ambitious?

I use paint on cushions quite often and the results are very good.

Frankly it depends what you want to achieve... I think you might be wise to have a combination of the two and consider you doing outlines the night before and the children painting/colouring them in... or you could cop out and get the children to do hand or foot prints over the tent.

Thanks, LatteLady. Outlines is a good idea, as is hand and footprints. I've attempted hand and foot print things before without much success. I guess I would need a lot of paint? Whatever they're using at school isn't washing out of DD1's shirts, so that might be a start .

Make sure you put something in between the layers of fabric or the paint will seep through to the layer behind eg. cereal cardboard.

I second putting something down before printing,

we find the PVC cheapo tablecloths from the £1 shops great for all kinds of messy crafts & a good size for a job like this

personally I would go with drawn pen outlines & then let the kids loose with the paints - or if you want to make sure the shapes are kept neat, maybe cut shapes out & back them with some sort of iron on fusible to help keep shape & not fray - if you do this in a basic white cotton, then your kids can just let their imaginations run riot filling in the shapes with colour - & you can applique them onto the main Teepee afterwards

not sure I would let them do hand/foot painting though, as IME with fabric paints, they just don't wash off skin so easily

Thanks, folks, some great ideas.