Playdoh Play Date

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Today was play date day for my boys and my friend's 2 year old boy.  I knew we would have a 1 year old, 2 year old, and 4 year old navigating playing together so I made some playdoh up ahead of time.  My thoughts were that it would be a great ice breaker because it lends itself to parallel play. I put some items in my little tray I use for playdoh and the boys had a blast get.  My friend was surprised at the soft texture and lack of that weird smell that comes with the store bought kind she had used in the past.  When I told her that it was homemade, she was way more impressed than necessary because, to be honest, playdoh is the EASIEST thing in the world to make! 

Now before people comment that Playdoh is messy and a nightmare to clean up, let me just say two things.  First, as a former teacher, I want to point out that learning is often messy, embracing that kind of mess will benefit your children in so many ways.  Second, this playdoh is really a cinch to clean up.  Even on carpet, if you let it dry out, you can crunch it up into dust and vacuum it out. 

Some Benefits of Playdoh

My playdoh recipe is noncook and takes maybe all of 5 minutes, start to finish.  It is a great recipe for little ones to help with too, provided that you are the one that pours the cup of boiling water in.  My mom was a preschool teacher for 28 years and so as a kid we always had some of this around as a boredom buster.   Little did we know the benefits went far beyond entertainment.

Some of those benefits include:

• It strengthens tiny, and not so tiny, hands.  This helps down the road with scissor skills and writing.  Hand strength is a big component when it comes to holding a pencil, drawing, and cutting.
• It hones fine motor skills.  Fine motor skills are used to pinch and squish the dough, roll balls, make snakes, and sculpt their favorite shapes. 
• It is calming.  Kneading the playdoh provides sensory input, applies gentle pressure and stimulation to the joints of the hands and fingers, and creates a sort of rhythmic calm, much like squeezing a stress ball. 
• It promotes problem solving skills, creativity, and imaginative play.  Take this picture to the left here. My 4 year old and I set out to make a dino world. We had to think of the colors that would be needed.  then we had to figure out how to make the world itself.  We rolled out the grass and he decided wanted to cut it and put a river in. He wanted a volcano, so we tried sculpting one and when that wasn't satisfactory, we ended up wrapping it around a small cup to get the shape we wanted.  Problem solving and creative ideas were needed in every step of creating this scene.  Then we added the dinosaurs and imaginative play became the focus.  
• It can be used in tactile learning.  When I was teaching 3rd grade one of my options for word work was to make their spelling words out of playdoh.  the kids loved it and pairing the hands on creation of the words with the repetition of spelling them out, helped them retain the words more easily. 

There are lots more but these are the ones that really speak to me the most and the main reasons I make playdoh regularly for my boys.  That and it is just fun!

The Recipe 

Ingredients

• 1.5 cups Flour
• 1/2 cup Salt
• 2 tsp Cream of Tarter ***If you plan on making this often, I recommend getting a large bag from Amazon.  Click here for what I use
• 2.5 - 3 TBL of Coconut Oil* (Liquefied) *You can also use vegetable oil but I think the coconut oil is a little softer.  Start off with 2.5 tablespoons but then add more if you find it too dry or tough to knead. 
• 1 cup boiling water
• Food Coloring (Optional)  I prefer gel food coloring for more vibrant colors but any food coloring will work. 

Directions

1. Throw the dry ingredients in a mixing bowl and give it a stir.
2. Pour in the oil and the boiling water.  I usually just throw a microwave safe glass measuring cup in the microwave right before I start measuring out all the ingredients and it is boiling by the time I am done.  You could also use the stove. 
3. Stir it all together until dough forms. 
4. Let it cool a couple minutes and then begin kneading the dough by hand to make sure everything is mixed through. 
5. If the dough is too sticky, add more flour.  If the dough is hard to knead add a bit more oil to smooth out the texture. 
6. Once it is the right texture, I break it a part into several balls depending on the numbers of colors I want to make.
7. Make an indentation in the dough ball and add a few drops of food coloring. Fold the dough over the coloring and continue to knead in your hand until the color is worked through. NOTE: if you don't want to get coloring on your hands, wear gloves.  I don't personally care if I end up with some extra color on my hands but I also don't have anywhere to be where that would be seen.  You can also add the color to the water before you pour it in, if you want to avoid getting drops of straight food coloring on your hands and are only making on color. 

That's it!  It is so easy! I hope you try it and love it!  

We finally got some cold weather here in the south and I decided to whip up some cozy goodness with an educational twist.  My 4 year old is learning his ABCs at preschool and I thought alphabet soup would be the perfect way to have some delicious fun with letters. 


​I ordered the pasta on Amazon and it came in a box with several packages.  This is great because I can use some for cooking and some for sensory bins.  The awesome thing about this soup is that you can use any kind of veggies you have on hand.  I used a mixture of fresh, canned, and frozen veggies for this recipe.  It is also a very easy recipe for kids to help with because it is mainly just dumping ingredients in the pot.  The recipe is below, along with a link for the pasta I used. Check out the video to see my 4 year old assistant chef in action. 

Ingredients
1Tbl Olive Oil
1 Chopped Onion
2 Celery Stalks
2 Tbls Minced Garlic
1 can of Diced Tomatoes
1 Tbls of Italian Seasoning
2 -3 Tbls Tomato Paste (depending on how much tomato taste you like)
Alphabet Pasta (See Link Below Recipe)
2 Boxes of Broth (I used beef but you can use veggie or chicken, if you prefer)
Salt and Pepper to Taste
Veggies of Your Choice
I used:
1 Cup Broccoli
1 can corn
1 can green beans
1 bag of frozen peas and carrots
 
 Directions

1. Add a drizzle of oil to pot and sauté the onions, garlic, and celery until tender.
2. Add in veggies, diced tomatoes, tomato paste, Italian seasoning, and salt and pepper to taste.
3. Add enough broth to cover your veggies.
4. Bring to a boil.
5. Reduce heat and let simmer for 15 mins
6. Add pasta and cook until tender (approx. 7-10 mins depending on the pasta)

Y'all, I don't know about you but, true to my ADHD nature, I get super stoked when I see these elaborate play set ups on the mom groups that I follow and want to immediately set up the most beautiful scenarios for my kids to enjoy, completely forgetting that my boys are...well, how do I put this?  My boys behave in completely developmentally appropriate ways for their ages. In other words, they are tiny tornados of energy and emotions that can demolish my best laid plans in no time at all. 

Anyway, so I waited until the kids went to bed and spent an hour setting up an elaborate playscape, posted these beautiful pictures, and patted myself on the back as hundreds of comments and reactions came in through my FB notifications. I couldn't wait until the next morning when the boys saw it and explored it all while I drank my coffee and watched them. 

Needless to say, morning came and things did not go as planned. Within four minutes both of my boys were in tears. It seems that with my 1 and 4 year old boys, no matter how spread out the table activity is, someone is going to be a jerk to someone else and/or not play the way the other wants to play.

The one year old, also known as Thanos the Destroyer of Worlds, wanted to immediately rip everything off the table and put it in his mouth. I redirected him to the other area and showed him how to roll cars down the ramp. Then the 4 year old decided he wanted the car that the 1 year old had because I commented on how well it fit the 1 yo’s hand. Obviously, that was his sign that he should ignore the multiple other cars on the setup and take that particular car from his little brother. Next up Thanos decided to play a game of knock off and pick up with the wooden house big brother was using as a animal hospital. Big bro lost his mind over that but I persisted and went to grab some velcro to velcro the house in place so it couldn’t be knocked off.  While I was distracted doing that, Thanos lost interest in annoying his brother and decided he needed to go over and grab my coffee cup, pouring it EVERYWHERE. As I was cleaning that up, he went under the table and popped the cover off since the house was velcroed to it. Soooo, I velcroed the cover down.

In short, it was like that scene in the first Avengers movie where the giant worm thing flies through the portal and starts ramming into buildings in NYC and everything is chaos. My dreams of them nicely playing while instrumental music played and I drank my coffee went out the window. That being said, once the one year old lost interest and went in search of new worlds to conquer, my 4 year old loved the setup and played for a long while making up all sorts of scenarios. Included are some pictures of the devastation. I will be ordering some wooden counselors to come help the other wooden people through the trauma of being flung about and attacked by a mouthy toddler and a grabby preschooler.

 I wanted to share the reality of the day because I think sometimes we, or maybe just I do, look at these beautiful setups and think that “this mom here has her stuff together,” and picture everyone playing serenely with angels singing or some such nonsense.  Maybe that does happen somewhere.  Maybe there are kids that are unicorns and play gently side by side all day.  Given the comments I received when I posted the tragic update to all my mom groups the next day though, I think it is safe to say there are a lot more moms out there with spilled coffee and kids in time out for throwing an ice cream truck driven by a penguin at their brother's head.  If that is you, congratulations, you are not alone.  If that isn't, please share with us where you get the baby chloroform! (Please note, I am kidding and would never sedate or encourage drugging children).

Product Details:
Road Bin Inserts by Practically Playing 
Wooden People, Pets, Houses, Cars are from the Target Bullseye section of the store

As a former school librarian, I know first hand the importance of early literacy and making sure our babies have a variety of texts available to them at a young age. I have 4 yo and 1 yo boys and this week I have been working on organizing their spaces, including their books. I thought some of my friends might appreciate the what and whys of what I did book wise.

1. The 4 yo went through his board books and selected about 25 to give to his brother. He was so proud to help his brother build his library and this helped to reinforce that, when building a library, we have to make space occasionally for new books by finding new homes for ones we have outgrown. Anything beyond repair was trashed or will be used in arts and crafts.

2. I went through his picture books and removed a ton until I had just enough so that he could see the covers of all the books on the shelves. These are our bedtime and rest time reading books. Having the covers facing out allows him to pick. Removing the extra books from those wall shelves makes choosing less overwhelming.

I stored all the books we aren’t using right now in bins in his closet. I will rotate out the ones currently on the wall shelves next month and put some of the ones from the closet in their place. That allows us to not get bored with our selection and gives books that normally might be ignored, because they were behind a favorite, a chance to be in the spotlight.

3. I put a cube shelf in my 1 yo’s room that he could easily reach and put all the board books his brother had given him on there along with a couple toys and soft books. He has loved taking them off and on the shelves and looking through them on his own and with us. It is really important for children to be able to touch and chew on books at this stage, as well as being read to, because this is how they first become interested in interacting with books and leads to the development of concepts of print skills.

Pictured are:
- the wooden wall shelves I had my husband build when I was pregnant with our oldest.
- my oldest son’s little reading book shelf all with books that can be handled independently by him and his brother without being destroyed, so board books and the like. It gets a ton of use and is always filled with books going every which way. Also the side cushions are often missing because they make great shields when fighting off super villains.
-my youngest’s little book cubby
-my oldest reading to my youngest one of the books he gave him. Note, my oldest doesn’t actually read yet but he is retelling the story to his brother which is an awesome prereading skill.

Vapor billows gently from the humidifier, placed strategically out of reach of the one year old terrorizing the living room, and the smell of Vicks wafts from my four year old's chest.  Ah...It is beginning to look and smell a lot like cold and flu season around our house.  There is no doubt that the blissful time of year where someone's nose is always needing wiped is upon me.  Both the boys are sick with coughs and noses that are somehow  stuffy and runny at the same time. 

If 10 years of teaching elementary and middle school has taught me anything, it is that germs are the one thing that children share freely.  For the most part, it isn't a big deal.  Getting an occasional virus helps build their little immune systems.  We have vaccines to ward off or minimize most of the big scary viruses.  Thank you, science! However, as any parent that has dealt with a whiny snotty child sneezing directly into their ocular cavity will tell you, their germ sharing often goes beyond their little school friends.  

So what can we do to minimize the passing of germs to one another?  Well, the CDC and our mothers have been telling us for years that the best thing we can do is wash our hands thoroughly and frequently, cover our mouths and noses when we sneeze and cough, and stay away from each other when we know we are sick.  It is pretty basic stuff for adults, even though the pandemic has shown that some adults still don't comprehend it.  Children are new here and need to be taught these things though.  The best way I have found to teach kids these skills is a combo of modeling, reading books, and watching videos. 

Modeling is the easy part, it just involves consistently washing your own hands while reinforcing why it is important. For example, "Hey, buddy, we just came in from playing outside, time to get all those germies off our hands. Grab your stool and we can wash our hands together, but don't you dare steal my soap."  The "don't steal my soap" is a game I play with my 4 year old to get him to wash his hands longer.  I put soap on my hands and he "steals" it by grabbing some for himself.  Then I act all indignant and try to steal it back, all the while rubbing it on his hands.  He thinks it is hilarious and doesn't fight me with the typical, "I can do it myself," battle cry of independence when it is a game. 

As for the books and videos, I have put together a handy dandy list of resources below for you to use with your kids.  If you have any to add, please let me know.  The key to developing any healthy habit is repetition so read and watch your kid's favorites frequently and praise them each time they make the great choices to cover their mouth or remember to wash their hands.  Will any of this completely stop your kids from sharing germs with you and each other? Absolutely, not.  I share this in the hopes that it makes teaching our kids lifelong healthy habits easier and, fingers crossed, reduces the number of times you have to break out the vapor rub this Winter.