Melted bead wind chime

what you need
• beads
• muffin tin
• coil closures for bracelets or necklaces
• Clear string. We used bead n stretch
• nail polish or crazy glue to secure the knots
• and either nail clippers or wire cutters to cut off the excess coil after your beads are done melting.
• you're also going to need something to tie your finished melted beads to. We had an old winter time that I took part and just put back together with our new parts. You might be able to use a coke can or one of the wooden rings from needlepoint. Get creative.

What to do
1. First you can align the bottom of your muffin tin pan with the single layer of beads

2. Then you're going to add one of those little coils near the top but not too close to the top
3. Once you have all tins filled put them in the oven at 400 degrees leave in for 25 to 30 minutes 

4. Take out and let cool hang out and let cool the plastics released from the bottom of the pan on its own.

5. Once cool remove and cut off the excess coils. 

6. Assemble your wind chime reinforce your knots with crazy glue or nail polish.

Silky Soft Play Dough

No cook, 2 ingredient dough. 

You need:

• 1 part conditioner
• 2 parts corn starch
• food color (optional)

Directions:

1. Mix together the conditioner and corn starch. Add more or less for each ingredient to achieve the desired consistency.
2. After the dough is formed some separate the dough  for each color you like to make
3. Add the color and knead the dough until the dough is fully colored.

Our experience:

I had a hard time getting it to the right consistency.It ended up being dry and sticky at the same time. It reminded me of Moon Dough  but when we placed it down on the table and then went to pick it up i would stick. Using cookie cutters didn't work well with this dough. It flaked a lot like the Ice Cream play dough we made but it wasn't a big deal it swept up fine. It was very soft and smelled wonderful. Left our hands soft as can be. At first i thought i didn't like it but i changed my mind as we continued to explore the dough. It wasn't what i had expected but Haven enjoyed it and it kept his attention quite a while...for a toddler that is.

DIY Moon Sand ( 2 ingredient)

You need:

• 4 cups flour
• 1/2 cup baby oil
• container (we used the lid off a sheet cake) 

Directions:

1. Add flour to your container
2. Drizzle oil evenly over flour.
3. Knead the oil into the flour with your hands until the all the flour is completely coated

Our Experience:

Why haven't i done this sooner it was so fun. I love playing in sand and so do the littles. It was super quick the throw together and super fun. Haven enjoyed it lots also hahaha. It was pretty messy though. We were covered in white when we were finished. I wouldn't do it in a carpeted area or near upholstery because even tho the flour can be easily vacuumed the oil might stain. 

Toilet Paper Roll Monsters

You Need:

• Toilet paper rolls
• Tempera paint
• Pipe cleaners
• Googly eyes
• Tissue paper
• School glue 
• Shish kabob skewer (or something similar to make holes in the toilet paper rolls)

Directions:

1. Paint the toilet paper rolls and let them dry. 
2. Take the skewer and poke two holes on each side of the Toilet paper roll.
3. Put the pipe cleaner in a hole and feed it though the second hole.
4. Make loops at each end of the pipe cleaner and twist to make hands.
5. Glue on the number of eyes you want.
6. Bunch up tissue paper and put into the top of the toilet paper roll to make hair.
7. Add a little glue inside the role to fasten the tissues paper to the toilet paper roll.

Our Experience:

This was easy and fun. After we made them we plays monsters together. Roar, roar. It was a good time, even tho the eyes kept falling off. Haydynn was a little smarty and was the only one to paint eyes on hers under the googly eyes.

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.

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. 

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.