We like to take our large standing mirror from the dress-up area and use it for painting. Typically we use finger paint, but any paint that's not too watery will do. We put the mirror down on a table so the kids can reach the mirror from both sides. The above picture shows the initial setup. For 3s I let them put the finger paint on with spoons from small cups. This is a fairly messy activity, so while I don't force smocks on anyone I am usually strongly upbeat about wearing smocks while mirror painting.
When the mirror is full, use light colored paper to make a print. The kids love to press the paper down, particularly if there's still a lot of paint on the mirror and you can feel it underneath. This is another great chance to talk about colors and mixing and to use some predictive skills in terms of what colors will happen. I generally stick to primary colors for this reason, sometimes adding white or black to see what happens to one or more colors.
For cleanup, a squeegee or plastic scraper is very, very helpful. We sometimes give the kids small sponges so they can help. If your mirror has a wood frame like ours does, it's a lot easier to get the paint off while it's still a bit damp.
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