Pages

October 30, 2014

Ice Cream Playdough






 I originally found the recipe for Ice playdough at Smart School House. There they have the exact recipe of how to make it but i left winged it. I'm going to tell you how i did it.

You need:

  • Frosting
  • Powered sugar
  • Food coloring 
  • Mixing bowl

Directions: 

  1. Put Frosting in to mixing bowl
  2. Add food color
  3. Stir
  4. Add about a cup of powdered sugar
  5. mix. Its going to start getting thick.
  6. Add more sugar into the dough and knead it in. In the original recipe she used a mixer with a dough hook attachment but i don't have that so i used my hands. 
  7. You'll want to add powdered sugar until the dough is soft but not sticky.  You'll use about 2 3/4 cups of sugar for a cup of frosting. I didn't measure because was to much works, so i just eye balled it.
  8. Add a drizzle of oil if you added to much sugar or it begins to dry out  




Storage:

Store in a Ziploc bag in the refrigerator . Take out 30 mins before used to soften the dough before play.

Our Experience: 

Haven loved it! he like making ice cream out off it and just simply squishing it with his hands molding it and having fun with it.





For me though it was very messy. Maybe if it wasn't sugar i wouldn't of had a problem with the mess but we have ants. All I could think about was if i didn't clean this really well the ants would be every where and I'm out of Raid. It dried out pretty quickly and flaked of a lot. 
It  was fun and i do think its something you have to try at least once with your littles. I mean come on is playdough made out of frosting, that is kids two favorite things combined.


October 22, 2014

Mickey and Minnie Ears Headbands (Includes Variation For Baby)




I'm so excited about theses ears! I'm taking the  littles to Disneyland tomorrow, YAY. I wanted them to have something special to wear and i cant afford to buy Mickey ears at Disneyland to be honest. So i took to Pinerest and found this awesome tutorial from tutorial from The Suburban Mom on how she made Mickey ears for a birthday party. She has a Youtube video and everything there.

I spent $5 at Micheal's for materials (for 3 Sets of ears) and used some headbands i already had in a drawer. I'm pretty sure that beats what you'd pay at Disneyland.

I did everything exactly like she said to in her tutorial for the two bigger kids ear but went i got to the baby's I had to changes things up a bit. I still used her basic concept but i used a elastic headband for his.

For this one when I covered it with the felt i couldn't glue the felt to the headband because i needed the the headband to stretch freely. This part was tricky . I started in the middle of folded the felt over then tucked it as tight as i could and folded over the other side and glued the felt to the felt. I worked my way all the way around the band going a inch at a time creating a felt tube around the elastic band. I did not seal the ends for the felt tubes together. Instead i left the lose because u need ed elastic to stretch freely.

I measured the band before i started and the circumference of my babys head. His head was about a inch larger the the headband before stretched any. So i began to add pieces of felt in between the original ends of the felt tubing and stretching it to the size of my babys head so it wouldn't be tight on his little head all day long. Its not even noticeable once he's wearing it.










October 20, 2014

Colored Rice Sensory Activity

You Need:

WE used this paint (Walmart)
  • Rice (white rice will show the color better)
  • paint
  • Ziploc bag
  • water (just a little to thin paint)
  • Baking sheet
  • A large Tupperware (or something similar)  
  • Cups
  • little toys (we used cars)

Directions:

  1. Put rice in to Ziploc bag.
  2. Add add. Just a squirt. you can add more if you want a darker color.
  3. Add a little water, just a little you don't want to make it too water just thin it enough to coat all the rice.
  4. Zip and shake and knead the bag until rice is fully coated. This is where you can decide if you want to add more paint or not.
  5. Pour rice on to a baking sheet and let dry.
  6. Once dry pour in to a lager Tupperware or something similar. We used the cover from a sheet birthday cake.
  7. Add toys and cups and have fun.
This is brown minute rice.
This is white rice.

Our Experience:

It was supposed to be glow rice but it didn't glow very well. It might have glowed better if i added more paint but i wanted to save some paint for other projects. I added too much water in the first bag of white rice i made and i had to soak it out with a paper towel, so be careful with that part. Besides that Haven had a blast with it. He buried his cars, poured rice in and out of different containers, he added googly eyes and raced his cars in it. Nearing the end of the play session he thought he wanted  to out his feet inside it to see what it felt like. He liked the feeling and decided it would be a good idea to just sit in it. Made me wish i had a bigger container and more rice. Definitely going to that one days sounds fun. I saved the rice and put it up for another day because this activity was a success.








October 17, 2014

Glow Jar On A Cold And Gloomy Day


You need:

  • Glow sticks (we used the bracelet ones but i think the thicker ones might be easier to pour
  • Scissors
  • A mason jar
  • Glitter 

Directions:

  1. Crack the glow sticks to make glow
  2. Cut end off over jar and pour it in. ( If you use the thin ones like us, cut both ends and blow out the sticks contents in the jar. Try not to get it in your month it tastes so bad but its non-toxic if you do.
  3. Add a pinch of glitter
  4. Put the lid on tightly
  5. SHAKE

Our Experience:

Glow stick guts splatted everywhere when i cut of the tips . First we tried to make cool glow effects in water with last Halloweens glow sticks. So much fail happened with that. We went in to the kids room to get some darkness and we sat on the floor and i started cutting. The carpet the sheets and us began to glow. Then just like any 2 year old would Haven wanted to put the glow stick in his mouth. Eww, so he started spitting every where.  To top it off the glow sticks didn't even glow that brightly because they were so old. It happens though projects fail. On the flip side I started painting on the baking pan with the grow sticks and it made pretty neat effects. I want to try this with Haydynn (6 Year Old) , outside at night some time.

 



 Back to the glow jar:


 I took the assembly of the jar to the kitchen. i should have went outside tho because now i have to rewash some dishes that got splattered. I let Havok pull up a chair and watch but i took over this one. Once i new what i was doing putting it all together to a matter of minutes.  It looks really neat. Just have to watch him with it because it is a glass jar. Its a cool thing to cuddle under a blanket on a cold gloomy day.




ATTENTION: Glow sticks have glass in them and the chemicals can burn eyes or mouth or throat if ingested. HANDLE WITH CARE. leave the handling part for the parents. 

October 16, 2014

Halloween Slime

What you need:


  • 4 oz white school glue
  • 1 tsp borax
  • 1 cup water
  • 1/2 cup water
  • two bowls
  • food color
  • googly eyes

Directions:

  1. mix the glue and 1/2 cup of water together in on bowl
  2. mix borax and 1 cup water together in the 2nd bowl until borax is completely dissolved
  3. slowly pour the glue/water mix into the borax and stir
  4. when thickened add googly eyes knead with hands.
  5. pour out excess liquid.

Storage:

Store in plastic bag in the refrigerator to keep from molding.

Our experience:

 I did not use Elmer glue, I used the 2 for $1 glue form the dollar tree so i knew it wasn't going to be as firm or thick but i messed this one up a bit. I did not let the borax dissolve completely. I was mixing and stirring the last ingredients together but it wasn't firming up enough. Puzzled i looked into the bottom of my measuring cup and saw the problem, a good part of the borax was stuck at the bottom of the cup. I was just trying to hurry up because i could tell by the look on Havens face he thought the whole process was taking too long.
I decided that it was good enough for sensory play and had him put in the googly eyes. When he started fling slime all over the kitchen I moved the party outside. He didn't like the goo on his hands so i gave him a big spoon and he was happy with that. He enjoyed putting things inside the goo, so he started adding his own Halloween decor to the goo...rocks. When clean up time came he used that as an opportunity to give his hot wheels a car wash. All in all it was a fun disaster. i think i might try to get it right another time. I'd say it's worth a try.







 Also wanted to mention i know the photo quality isn't that great right now and I'm sorry for that but i cracked my lens. Bear with me until i can get a new one thank you.
  

October 15, 2014

Homemade Playdough





You'll need:


  • 1 cup water
  • 1 Tbsp vegetable oil
  • 1/2 cup salt
  • 1 Tbsp cream of tarter
  • food coloring
  • 1 cup flour 
  • saucepan

Directions:

  1. add: water, oil, cream of tartar & food coloring in saucepan. Heat until warm.
  2. remove from heat, then add flour.
  3. knead dough until smooth. 
  4. *Optional: we kneaded in a little glitter after the dough was formed, just because.

Storage:

Store dough in a air tight container or Ziploc freezer bag. The cream of tartar makes the dough last six months or longer so don't leave it out.

October 10, 2014

Coffee Filter Jack-o-Lanterns

What you'll need :

  • coffee filter
  • washable makers
  • spray bottle filled with water
  • white school glue
  • glitter 
  • blow dryer (because we don't like waiting)
  • plastic sand sifter 

Instructions


  1. Color the coffee filter all over with the washable markers. We scribbled with orange, red and yellow for our Jack-o-lanterns. 
  2. Put the colored coffee filter in the sand sifter.
  3. Take the spray bottle and mist the coffee filter until the colors start to bleed together.
  4. Then use the blow dryer to dry the filter. ( or the can set it out somewhere until it drys by itself)
  5. After the coffee filter drys take the glue and draw the jack-o-lantern face you want.
  6. Shake the glitter over the wet glue.
  7. To add more coverage shake the lose glitter back and forth over the coffee filter until glue is full covered in glitter.
  8. Let glue dry.
  9. Ta-da sparkly Jack-o-lantern !

Havoks solo creation and the one we did together.

Our experience:

This was a quick and easy one. Haven really enjoyed the glitter part. He was covered in glitter by the time we were done. I filled up a bowl with water for him to wash his hands off. It made pretty glittery water that he drank when i was preoccupied cleaning up the work space. Oh my, that should be interesting later, ha ha ha.  Haven also doesn't  really enjoy loud noises so he didn't want to help with the drying part but he enjoyed doing everything else. so i give this craft a thums up. 

October 7, 2014

Bingo Marker Art Activity








Super fun, super easy.  All you need are bingo markers and paper. I bought our bingo markers at the Dollar Tree, so that makes this activity super cheap also. Bonus.








We let free and got pretty in to our art making session and pretty messy. I'm a spotted multicolored Mama right now. We where doting pretty hard to make a splatting effect and we achieved that effect on paper as well as all over ourselves . So I'd say wear old clothes and do this activity out doors.















I think this activity is a keeper as long as you have some clean up time available, which is the case with most crafty activities, so no big deal.





October 2, 2014

Simple Things I Did to Make a Week Day Birthday Special.

Haydynns birthday landed right in the middle of the week this year, and although we will be celebrating this weekend with a party and all the family, her BIRTH DAY is still special. So this is what we did for her to make her day special as she is. 

When we woke up for school I traded my coffee time to make her look extra special. So worth it she was beaming from ear to ear.
I made little goodie bags, with bulk candy. Easy enough.... 


Well kinda. Haven kept swiping the candies.


Then finally when he gave up our little kitty Dexter decided thought it be fun to try to steal whole bags.


This i where normally i would bag them up and place them in her back to deliver to her teacher as soon as she got to school, But we got lucky this year and grandma bought cupcakes and we got to visit her class room after lunch. It was so nice.


Then later at dinner time i made her the exact dinner she requested the night before, no questions asked. It was very yummy.


And of course in true birthday fashion there was cake. It was homemade and very homemade looking but that didn't matter because she loved it. We sung and then enjoyed this delicious cake. It was a absolute great day. She felt as special as can be which is very important to a little girl with two little brothers so close in age.