Finger Paint Fun

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Today was a freezing cold, wet, windy day in Vancouver. It was miserable, really. But it couldn’t have been more perfect. Gracen and I had a wonderful day. We stayed in our pajamas until afternoon, played games and acted silly, read book after book, ate a delicious lunch, and got messy with some serious finger painting action. I don’t know what’s taken so long… We’ve painted her hands and feet and stamped them, we painted with brushes, we’ve done mess-free finger painting in zip-close bags, but we’ve never done full-on finger painting. My poor girl’s 18 months old and she’s never finger painted before! Bad mommy. So today we got started. And Grae loved it.

Ready and waiting.

Cautious in the beginning.

Getting into it.

Woohoo! This is fun!

Amidst a masterpiece.

Tie-dyed hands.

Le pièce de résistance.

So proud. (It turned out so beautifully that we headed out to Ikea to pick out a frame for it. There’s something special about having your little one’s artwork up on the walls…)

I told Grae she could choose its spot and showed her several potential places on her bedroom walls, but she simply shook her head at each suggestion. She took the frame from my hands and placed it on top of her little shelf where she insists on keeping all three of her other frames (I’ve tried moving one to a new location while she’s in another room on several occasions, but I always come back to all three back on the shelf).

I see much more finger painting in our future…

Homemade Bird Feeders

3 / 1 / 121 / 6 / 14

Despite the incident we had at Granville Island a couple of months back, our little lady remains a dedicated bird lover (unlike her mama). So today we headed out into our sunshiny backyard, supplies in hand, to make a couple of simple, toddler-friendly bird feeders. Here’s what we did…

Seedy Bagel Rings:

For this project, we used wild bird seed mix, some wholewheat bakery bagels, some ‘just peanuts’ peanut butter, some jute (it’s biodegradable and can be repurposed by birds when building their nests), a spatula, and some scissors.

First things first, cover one side of the bagel with peanut butter.

You want it nice and thick so that the seeds really stick.

Then plop it, peanut butter side down, into the seed mixture.

Really push it down into the seeds to collect as many as possible.

It should look something like this.

Next, spread peanut butter on the other side.

And cover it completely with seeds.

Almost done! While you tie a loop of jute through the middle of the bagel, have your little one wash the gobs of peanut butter off of her hands.

Tada! Here’s the finished product.

Now tie them up in a tree and wait for hungry birds to flock your way.

Toasted O Loops:

For this feeder, we used jute, scotch tape, low-sugar toasted O cereal, and some scissors.

First thing, cut a piece of jute, tie a triple knot at one end, and wrap a small bit of tape around the other end so that it doesn’t fray.

Next, string the o’s onto the jute, one by one.

It’s a slow process… Especially if your munchkin eats five o’s for every one she strings!

When you’ve got a nice long string, make a loop and tie it at the top.

Then knot it onto a tree branch. It doesn’t get any easier than that!

I’m sure we’re inviting all kinds of scary crows and seagulls into our yard with these tempting treats swinging from our trees, but if it provides some entertainment for our little bird watcher, it’ll be worth it.

Play Dough Day

2 / 29 / 128 / 11 / 13

Today I had barely finished mentioning making play dough and my little Lulu had already retrieved her apron.

Now, I have always been a fan of the 2:1:1 recipe (2 parts flour to 1 part salt and 1 part water). It’s fast, it’s easy, and it really only requires having two ingredients on hand. I’ve used it through many, many years of babysitting, nannying, and teaching without even considering giving another recipe a try. That is, until I decided to give this “fussy” recipe a go this Christmas. Yes, it requires both oil and cream of tartar – not to mention cooking – but if you’ve got the ingredients, extra time, and patience to let it cool, it’s totally worth it. It’s soft, super pliable, and lasts for a ridiculously long time. Plus, it’s really not that hard.

Here’s what you need: Some flour, salt, cream of tartar, vegetable oil, water, food colouring, and a cute little sous chef to help you along the way.

First things first, pour your water in a large pot.

Next, add your salt. Preferably into the pot. But hey, whatever works.

Then, add your cream of tartar.

And your food colouring. (Of course for this little one, purple was the colour of choice.) Give everything a little stir.

Then, over medium heat, warm the mixture until hot, but not boiling.

When hot, add your oil and your flour, cup by cup.

Don’t worry if it looks all chunky and gross. We’ve used this recipe several times and we’ve always experienced this stage. It’ll all work out in the end.

When you’ve added all of the flour, give the dough one final stir and plop it out onto a well-floured counter. Sprinkle some extra flour on top if the dough appears sticky. Be careful – it’ll be very hot still.

Once it’s cooled, kneed the dough well, incorporating all of the extra flour.

Then give your munchkin a chunk and let her go to town.

Fun for hours!

Here’s our slightly tweaked version of the recipe if you want to give it a try:

5 cups of water
2 1/2 cups of salt
3 TBSP of cream of tartar
5 TBSP of vegetable oil
Food colouring
5 1/2 cups of flour

Mix water, salt, cream of tartar, oil, and food colouring in a large pot. Cook on medium heat, stirring regularly until mixture is hot.

Add oil, then stir in flour a cup at a time, mixing in between each addition. Mix until playdough pulls away from pot and is no longer sticky.

Dump dough on a well-floured counter, let cool a bit, then knead.

Store at room temperature in an airtight container for several weeks.

Enjoy!

Homemade Finger Paint

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In preparation for Little G’s Valentine’s Day tea, this morning we experimented with making our own finger paint. I found the recipe on Pinterest a long while back, and knew it would come in handy one day soon.

Gracen carefully added all of our ingredients into a large measuring cup first…

And then enthusiastically mixed it up!

Then we warmed the mixture on the stove…

Separated it into small bowls, added a few drops of food colouring, and stirred it well. It looks pretty, right?

We’ll have to use the paint a little more (right now we’ve just got in zip-close bags for mess-free painting), but I’m not sure that I’m sold on this recipe. Although it’s very quick and easy to make, uses ingredients that most people already have in their kitchen, and has a great texture while warm, ours turned out like Jello when cooled. It did soften up again when stirred well, but I think next time we’ll try cutting down the amount of corn starch a little. The other important thing that the recipe doesn’t mention is that the mixture needs to be stirred constantly while heating. We didn’t do that the first time around and ended up with a clumpy, bumpy mess! We’ll have to see what it looks like when we actually put it on paper…