Cloud Dough, Fruit Roll Ups & 'Fireworks'

Me and the kids have tried a few new fun activities together over the past few days, our first was cloud dough. You mix 8 cups of flour with 1 cup of baby oil, it feels like flour when you play with it but is also can hold it's shape. This was MESSY! I put it in a shallow plastic box but with a 3 year old and a year and a half old it mostly didn't stay there, they both loved it though and were busy scooping, mixing, patting and making it 'snow'. It didn't hold it's shape very well- maybe a bit more baby oil? But they enjoyed it, I think this is a good activity for outside.

A few weeks ago on pinterest (of course) I found a recipe for homemade fruit roll ups. I never had the 'real' fruit roll ups growing up and refuse to buy that for my children but I have bought fruit snacks before that don't have too many bad ingredients in them. This was something I had to try so me and the kids got busy, after washing our fruit and cutting it into small pieces we began to cook it in a saucepan. It wasn't going as quickly as I have time for so we threw it into a blender to get a nice smooth consistency, then poured it onto our parchment lined baking sheets and put it in the oven. It was supposed to go in at 170 for 5- 8 hours, I put it in at 190 for 4 hours and it came out very crispy and not gummy at all, but still very tasty. A little disappointed, but now we have fruit chips instead! I'll definitely keep at it because they are so yummy and you only use fruit- whatever mixture you want! The first batch was strawberry kiwi and the second was strawberry, raspberry, blackberry and blueberry.

Me and my little helpers

strawberries and kiwis

Four berry blend

Ready to go in the oven

Inspired by my friend Michelle I wanted to try out this activity with the kids so we made 'Fireworks'.
So here is how you do it...

1. Pour water into a clear glass or pitcher leaving roughly an inch of space at the top of the glass. Water must be room temperature so either: let it sit out a bit -or- make it room temperature from the faucet.

2. Add some vegetable oil to the water till you've got about an inch or two of oil on top of the water

3. Add just a few drops of food coloring into the glass and watch the fireworks!

This is such a simple project and kids will enjoy watching it because the color beads drop slowly because of the oil. When they hit the water they are released and sort of explode into the water.

Very cool.

Both kids loved this, Jaxon loved squeezing drops of food colouring into the vase and Alivia ooooed everytime the colour 'exploded'!