Good clean fun

Thanks to Pinterest, I found this fun project a few weeks back for the boys to do.  We'd also like to thank the workers who resided our garage and littered left their water bottles for us to use. 
Since Ajay will be starting school on Wednesday and since the weather was gorgeous this morning, I decided today would be the best time to go for it.
I put Aren down for his nap then sent the boys outside.  I gathered the needed materials and joined them.

I cut the ends off the bottles and let the boys slide the socks on.  On the blog where I found this idea, she speaks about taping with duct tape, or putting a rubber band around the sock to help it stay on, but I used kids ankle socks and folded down the tops and we had no problem at all with the socks staying on.

I poured a little water in the shallow dishes, squirted some dish soap in and let the boys swoosh it around a bit.  Then it was time to test.  Would it work?

 It sure enough did!!

Then I did something else the original blog post mentioned - I grabbed some food coloring and tried to make rainbow bubbles.  They had used liquid colors and we had gel colors.  I'm wondering if that's why our rainbows didn't turn out as bright?

The boys LOVED this.  They even went back out after lunch to do it some more.   They called our backyard The Bubble Yard!

And THEN they got the idea that they should go ride their bikes while blowing the bubbles so they could clean the street.

Watching as a clump of bubbles floats over a tree.

Hmmmm....Maybe blowing bubbles while riding a bike isn't a good combination!

I give project this an A+  and it is something we will surely do again!

Popsicle Cozy!!

This is the first summer I've bought these Popsicle for my boys - and I have to admit the only reason I bought them is because I saw these fun cozies for them.  (Pattern here.)

Ajay had a Boy Scout event (bike riding in the park) and he and Alex got to enjoy these frozen treats.  I got to take a nibble and I realized you really do need a cozy ... at least it sure as golly helps your hand not freeze. 

Ajay was eager to show the cozy to the family in India over the webcam today!

I'll try to come back tomorrow to post an action shot of the boys using them!

Hmm....need to get busy trying out some more things from Pinterest.  I have a project lined up for the older two boys, just need to do it.  I haven't even signed in to that website since last week!  I think it has something to do with a) visiting my family over the weekend and b) spending just about every moment of free time reading a wildly popular book. 

Overnight Steel Cut Oats

I finally tried steel cut oats a couple of months back.  I learned if you soak them overnight, it makes cooking them in the morning a lot faster.  However, I found this on Pinterest and this makes breakfasting with oats even easier!!

You basically toast the oats in butter - I use coconut oil - and then add water.  Let it boil for a bit, then let it sit out on the stove overnight.  In the morning you dress it up however you please.  We go for the old standby of cinnamon, vanilla and brown sugar.  Sooo yummy!  I call this Pinterest find a success.  Ajay and Alex are still trying to get used to the texture but Aren gobbles it up.

We've done this twice now and will be doing it many, many times in the future. 

Glop!

Towards the end of May, at the end of the school year, my eldest child asked if we could make some glop.  I guess he'd either done it at school or heard about someone who had made it at home.  He informed me all we needed was some borax and glue.  I kept putting off the craft but when I recently found the recipe on Pinterest, I pinned it and decided to give it a go. 

It was the first time I'd made something I'd pinned from Pinterest.

We already had everything we needed on hand so that part was easy.  The two older boys (aged 7 and 4) put on some new-to-them kid-craft-aprons and started helping me mix ingredients.   

It was really cool to see the glop start to set up as we combined the two bowls. 

I divided the mixture as best I could and let them have at it. 

Do you see how stringy and gooey that is?  In the eyes of a child, that means complete fun.  In the eyes of a parent, that means complete mess!  So much for aprons and paper spread out on the table.  This stuff got eh-ver-y-ware!  Luckily, it wasn't horrible to clean up.  Not the easiest, but it did seem to "crumble" a bit as I rolled it, which made it semi-easy to pick up. 

The next day, I decided we all needed some fresh air and figured this stuff was best played with outside.  Boy was I wrong.

The youngest boy (13mo.) managed to knock the play mat off of the tv tray and the slime  that was on the playmat ended up on the ground.  Do you see the orange goop on the brick?  Hoo-whee was he eldest child mad.  We tried picking most of it up but, as you can guess, it was full of dirt specks and was gross.  We got him settleed down and the middle child shared his glop with the eldest....and the wind knocked the play mat off the tv tray.  More glop on the ground.  I have not seen a tantrum to that degree come from the eldest since he was a toddler.  He informed me that I made a horrible decision when I told them they should play with the glop outside. 

The rest of the glop got thrown away.  We will not make more glop in this household. 

Oh, and if you can see the face on the youngest boy back there - he was mad, too, because he was not in the pack-n-play mood that afternoon. 

Sometimes reality gets in the way of fun afternoon plans.

At least now we know.  And maybe next time, I'll pin something a bit easier to play with.