DIY Paint or Something

We have never made this type of paint but thought it looked interesting.  We mixed equal parts of flour and salt in a tray.  Then the kids picked which color of paint they wanted to make.  They put a few drops of food coloring in the bowls of water and then mixed everything together.  The result wasn't quite paint (or actually not paint at all) but was a fun, different sensory experience.  All we had was wheat flour so maybe that is why it had such a grainy texture.  Anyway, it was fun and the kids had a great time mixing and painting, not to mention getting a little messy!

Stamping Mania

I saw this idea at A Little Learning for Two and was inspired to make some ourselves.  If you haven't seen her blog you should go over and visit.  She has some fabulous ideas.
 The kids picked what they wanted to have on their stamps.  T wanted the letters of his name and R, a heart, flowers and a turtle.  We used the foam letters and numbers and some foam stickers that we had laying around.  I glued them to the lids and got out the stamp pad.  I taped a big piece of packing paper to their table and let them go to town.  Most of the stamping was done on themselves, but a few made it on the paper. Thank you Caz, for the wonderful inspiration.  My kids had a blast!
p.s. if you are doing letters or numbers...glue them on the lid backwards so when the kids stamp, the print is correct. 

Packing Peanut Delight

So we had ordered some stuff and lots of boxes, packing paper and packing peanuts to add to our collection of activity builders.  This will only work with the biodegradable peanuts.  First, we used them in our sensory tub with  toothpicks to build sculptures with.  Then I gave the kids spray bottles and let them soak the peanuts with water.  They immediately began to break down and become sticky.  We added a little colored water to the mix and squished it around.  So much fun and a good lesson on biodegradability. We had some other packing peanuts that were not biodegadable so it was an excellent science experience to compare the two.

Fishing for Ice

This was a major hit with my two.  We have done it many times.  We froze some colored water in snack cups.  When frozen, we popped out the ice cubes and put them in a tub.  The kids poured in some water while I cut some yarn pieces.  The process is simple enough, just place the yarn on top of a piece of ice then sprinkle with salt.  The yarn will stick to the ice and you can "fish" out the ice from the water.  There are a couple tricks that we have discovered.  You have to use a lot of salt, let the salt set for a minute before trying to pull up on it (a good time to practice counting), and, it helps if the yarn is wet before trying to fish with it. 

Happy Fishing!

Stuck on (rainbow) Glue!

This post is from awhile back.  We were doing this again today so I thought I would re-post it!  So much fun!



                      I took advantage of the back-to-school deals and bought gallons of white glue.



R loves to "puddle" it, so I thought why not make it a color-mixing, creative project. I put out the aluminum just to add a little variety from plain white paper.

I added a few drops of food coloring that "magically" turned the glue to rainbow colors....or the kids thought so anyway....squeezing the glue bottles is a great way to strengthen the hand muscles needed for writing. It is also a really good pre-writing activity.  Swirling, scribbling and of course, how can they resist getting their hands in it.  Creativity at it funnest!








Shoe Tread Prints

To do this experiment, we grabbed some of our shoes with great tread on them.  Then we flipped them over, took out the crayons with no wrappers and made "sole prints".  We just placed a piece of paper (I cut a 8x11 piece of paper in half) on top of the bottom of the shoe and rubbed it with a crayon.  It was fun to see if we could get the whole tread to print.

Rainbows in the Snow

We are lucky enough to still have snow (that is sarcasm in my typing).  My kids love to play in it put get tired of the wind and cold.  So I scooped some up into pans for them to bring inside.  We colored some water and used the droppers to color the snow.  I also got out some little colored sticks that we had in our craft drawer.  R made some snow trees and T ran and grabbed his tractors to "move the snow around".  I can honestly say, they played longer with the snow inside than they every have played with it outside. 



Spectacular, Slimy Spaghetti

We had a super good time with this rainbow spaghetti.  I had some extra noodles left over from our dinner so I colored it with different food colors and let the kids play with it.  I put down the wax paper so it wouldn't stick to the table and my son asked for the glue.  Squeezing the glue bottle is an excellent small muscle builder, and a great sensory experience.  They loved it!  We made rainbows, S's and my son made a swimming pool for the spaghetti.  Fabulous way to play and learn the letter "S" and the sound it makes!!

Spring Eggs in a Yummy Nest

We definitely have Spring Fever!  We made these very easy, yummy, birds nest the other day.  We buttered some muffin pans (although you really don't need to).  Then we put some chow mein noodles in the bottom and then butterscotch and chocolate chip pieces.  We placed them on the griddle so the kids could watch the candy pieces melt.  After they were mostly melted, I took them off and let them cool a bit.  Then the kids placed the candy eggs in the "nest" and I put them in the fridge to harden.  Easy, simple and delicious!

Painting with Jelly Beans

Ever notice how jelly beans leave their mark if they get wet....well, if you have a 2 year-old who tasted a black one, you might.  Anyway, it gave me the idea to try painting with them.  We taped a white piece of paper to the bottom of a box lid.  Then we picked out what colors we want to try.  We sprayed them with water and rolled them around.  The colors came out very pastel looking....perfect for Spring!!

RainbOw's

We love rainbows!  We made these fun rainbows with Fruit Loops cereal.  I drew a rainbow on paper.  We sorted out the cereal by color.  We sang the Rainbow Song, "red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, the colors of the rainbow".  Then we glued on the loops inside the lines of the rainbow.  Great experience for sensory (we ate lots of it), colors, fine motor and learning about rainbows!

Oh Sugar!

This was a super fun activity.  We started by stacking sugar cubes into various castles and sculptures.  Then we used droppers to drip drop different colors onto the sugar cubes. We watched the colors absorb into the sugar cube. We discussed absorption, solids and liquids. We counted how many we could stack until they toppled over.  We discovered just how to stack them so they wouldn't fall over. My son experimented and explored until every last sugar cube was gone and my daughter discovered how yummy sugar water tastes!  Super fun experiment!