Coloured Water Play

I loved this post on House Of Baby Piranha about Magic Colour Drinks awhile ago and wanted to try it out as a water play activity. It was finally warm enough today to have a go and it was very popular! Bubble didn't drink her coloured water but had an absolute ball watching the colours and then mixing them together.

WE USED:

* plastic cups
* plastic cutlery
* food colouring
* tub/bucket of water
* small jug

A spot of food colouring in the bottom of each cup.

I set out a large tub of water and a small jug so that Bubble could practice scooping and pouring. The cutlery was just for extra play value as Bubble had decided she was 'making a picnic' :-)

Once all the cups were filled Bubble started mixing them together to make other colours.

Balloon Rockets

I know, I know, you'd have thought we'd had enough of balloons and rockets, but well... no :-D This activity was easy and quick to set up, and major fun. Both Bubble and Squeak thought the noise the balloon made when we let it go and the way it shot down the string were HILARIOUS, there were lots of giggles in our house today.

Other Ideas: Why not run two or more lines across the room and have races? I think this would be lots of fun for a classroom or party activity.

WE USED:

* thin elastic (could also use wool, string, twine etc)
* drinking straw
* scissors
* sticky tape
* balloon
* our paper rocket from our Rocket Straws activity
(this isn't necessary, we just thought it would be cool to add a rocket :-D)

On the underside of our rocket we taped a drinking straw that had been cut in half.

Then threaded our straw onto one end of the elastic.
If you are not using a rocket just thread your half straw onto whatever you are using (elastic, string, wool etc..).

Tie your elastic/string across the room, making the straw/rocket end slightly higher than the other end.

We used a kitchen chair to secure one end and tied the other to Squeak's highchair.

Tape a loop of tape to the underside of your straw/rocket (so that there is a sticky side facing out)

Blow up a balloon and while holding the end so it doesn't deflate press the top of it against the tape underneath the straw/rocket so that it sticks. Make sure the back of the balloon is facing backwards as shown in the photo.

Have a countdown and let your balloon go - your rocket will shoot to the other end of the string faster than lightning (well, not really, but pretty fast :-D).

One of our rocket balloons at the end of the line.

“Come play at the Childhood 101 We Play link up”

Learning About Trees

After we made our flower we moved onto learning about trees. Bubble was fascinated by the roots so we Googled some pictures that showed how they were underground, and discussed the way trees use them to get water and nutrients.

WE USED:

* toilet roll
* scissors
* glue
* sturdy cardboard (the thicker the better)
* cotton balls
* green food colouring diluted with water
* paintbrush
* tape (we used masking tape)
* twine or brown wool

Lay the toilet roll onto the cardboard and using the top as a guide draw your branches. You want a flap as wide as the top of the roll at the bottom of the branches.

Cut a slit in each side of the toilet roll so the cardboard branches can slot into the top.

Glue cotton balls to each branch - as many as you like!

Using a paintbrush (or cotton bud) paint the cotton balls with the green diluted food colouring.

Lay a strip of tape along your work surface sticky side up, and attach short lengths of twine all the way along. The tape can then be stuck around the inside edge of the bottom of the tree trunk.

'F' is for Flower

We are up to the letter 'F' on our sound wall and our first project just had to be a flower of course :-) We learnt the different names for the parts of the flower as we put it together.

WE USED:

* toilet roll
* paint
* sticky tape
* green paper
* egg carton
* tissue paper
* scissors
* fragrant oil (optional)

Paint the toilet roll green and cut two leaf shapes from the green paper.
Cut the egg carton as shown above, with four cup sections.

Paint your egg carton section whatever colour you want your flower to be. Bubble chose pink because "that's a flower colour" :-)

Paint your tissue paper yellow. Alternatively you could just use yellow tissue or crepe paper, but painting it ourselves was a bit more fun! Make sure you put down lots of newspaper though, it ended up quite messy as the paper tore in a lot of places.

Help your child attach the leaves to their flower 'stalk' using tape by folding over the bottom of each leaf first.

Scrunch up your yellow paper and push it into the middle of your egg carton section to create the centre of your flower, then tape it to the toilet roll 'stalk'.
We put orange oil on the tissue paper before scrunching it up, just to make our flower smell nice.

I drew Bubble a diagram to follow while we put our flower together and practiced the different names for the flower parts.

Jelly Volcano Balloons

This activity was serious fun, both girls got really involved - and sticky :-D It was a great sensory play experience; there was the feel of the jelly, the fun of watching it 'explode' as well as the taste and smell.

WE USED:

* balloons (washed in warm soapy water and rinsed)
* jelly (2 packs)
* fridge
* scissors
* large container
* kitchen utensils for play

First we washed our balloons thoroughly, rinsing them well.

Then Bubble and I made some jelly using two packs of crystals and only adding a small amount of hot water to dissolve (about a cup). It was very thick and syrupy which is what we needed.

I filled each of our balloons with some of the concentrated jelly solution using a funnel, then filled them the rest of the way with water from the kitchen tap (cover the tap with the top of the balloon like you would fill a water bomb). The balloons were then tied off and left in the fridge for a day to set.
I had no idea if I'd added enough or too much water to make them set, but figured they'd be fun to play with whether the jelly was firm or watery!

Today we took our jelly balloons outside along with some scissors and things from the kitchen.

When the tops of the balloons were cut off they literally exploded jelly out the top - Bubble was very excited and thought they were volcanos :-)
All the balloons were different consistencies which was even more fun - the watery ones exploded the best when cut and the firmer ones were lots of fun to squeeze.

Bubble enjoyed cutting the balloons herself.

Once all of the balloons were 'erupted' we played with the jelly doing pretend cooking, whisking, filling and pouring and of course tasting :-D

Using ladels to fill cups.

Squeak was fascinated and inspected the jelly very closely for a long time. She ran her fingers back and forth and kept holding handfuls up to the light.

There was lots of squishing.

And plenty of eating too :-)

Elastic Aeroplanes

My brain was a bit stuck on projectiles last night after making the straw rockets, so I created another little activity for the girls to try out today as well. It was easy to make and a complete blast, and worked even better than I expected; the whole family got involved :-) My siblings and I used to play something similar with folded newspaper, except we used real slingshots!
This would be a great game to play outside using tree branches, and I love the way it could be set up anywhere. I'll be adding it to our little bag of travel games I think!

WE USED:

* craft paper
* texta/pen
* scissors
* glue
* elastic
* childrens table (could use any table or something entirely different!)

Cut a large sheet of paper to a width of about 10cm (I used a piece of scrapbooking paper). Fold down your sheet making the folds about 5cm until you reach the end.

You should have a rolled up piece of paper like this.

Fold it in half as shown.

Cut aeroplane shapes from contrasting paper (maybe get your child to decorate them for some extra fun) and glue the tails to the folded paper as shown. Make sure your aeroplanes are facing towards the 'folded' end, not the 'open' end.

To make our launch pad I turned the girls craft table upside down and used two of the legs to tie across some thick elastic. Make sure it's tied very securely, you dont want it coming undone when it is pulled on.
You could easily tie your elastic across the legs of a dining or kitchen table (right side up of course :-D) or the legs of a heavy chair. Tree branches outside would be fun too - be inventive!

We put down a towel for Bubble to sit on and pretended the table was her pilot seat :-)

Hold your aeroplane so that the elastic runs through the middle folded section as shown above. The open end should be facing your child with the elastic sandwiched in between and the folded end pointing forwards.
The idea is that you pull back till the elastic is taut and then let go so that your plane is launched across the room.

Bubble launching her aeroplanes.

They shot all the way across the room and would have gone much further had we had more space!

Daddy showed Bubble how to change her trajectory each time, so the planes shot up, down and straight depending on how they were angled when she let go. Although Squeak was too little to launch any planes herself she loved watching this activity and laughed at every single take off :-)