The summer season is full of bright, inspiring colors, like green grass, blue waves, purple pansies, and pink ice cream. Bright colors are uplifting, energizing, and fun to play with. So, break out your food color, and let’s get through this last month of summer heat with some bright color fun!

Sidewalks make the perfect canvas for imaginative doodles. Chalk is a nice medium, but flimsy sticks can easily break, leaving you with knuckle scraping bits. Try this awesome DIY Puffy Sidewalk Paint recipe from Hip2Save. This recipe comes together easily and its pour-able texture allows for smoother designs. This is also a great way to reuse plastic containers, like squeezable ketchup and syrup bottles.

Creating abstract pieces worthy of The MET is just a bubble wand away. Visit Broogly and learn how to create paint by adding food coloring to commercial bubble solution. Bubbles can have a mind of their own, so you’ll definitely want to master this technique outside.

For those that love 3-d expression, we can’t say enough about this play dough recipe. The dough is the perfect texture for building whatever your imagination dreams up and can be colored to suit your aesthetic. Add your favorite Super Strength flavor for extra aromatic artistic inspiration. Just remember, this dough is not food!

Grab some old t-shirts and give them a facelift! Fave Crafts offers an excellent step-by-step guide for coloring your way to wearable art. Using squeeze bottles, the artist can be more careful and deliberate with color placement, compared to the standard dunking method. Be sure to check out Crafty Chica for some extra, advanced tying techniques.

For the beach lovers out there, you’ll love making your own sand art. These pretty bottles make great gifts, and can be personalized to suit the recipient. If you don’t live near a beach, no problem. You can color sugar instead! Just make sure the sugar is completely dry before you start layering colors into your bottle.

Whatever medium you choose, life is better with color. Now get out there and create!