Rainbow Ice

Spring Activities for Kids ~ Rainbow Ice Sensory Play

We're back for the final post in our spring activities for kids series with Jaime of FSPDT.  Last week we shared our flower hop, a gross motor game to work on color recognition.  Other posts in the series include making color surprise playdough and painting with mud.  The theme for today is sensory play.  We've made colored ice many times before, and since it's spring and we have rainbows on the mind I made a big sensory bin full of rainbow ice!

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How to Make a Needle Float

Water Science for Kids - Exploring Surface Tension

Yesterday I shared the first post in a series of water science for kids.  The first activity we did to explore surface tension involved a jar of water and some coins.  Today I am sharing a simple trick to make a needle float.  Yep, you read that right.  We made a needle float on top of the water!  It was so cool!  I might have been ever more excited than my boys, or at least equally excited.  This is one of the coolest water experiments we've ever done.

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Ways to Play with Water Beads {The Sunday Showcase}

Ways to Play with Water Beads featured on The Sunday Showcase

These awesome ideas for painting with kids are from last week's Sunday Showcase.

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Exploring Surface Tension

Water Science for Kids - Surface Tension

Last year we did a week long unit study on water, including 8 hands on water experiments for kids.  We've been enjoying more water experiments lately thanks to JZ's first grade science curriculum.  Science is our favorite subject, probably because we enjoy hands on experiments, and because all four boys can enjoy these water science experiments together.  The theme for today was exploring surface tension.  We learned about waters "skin".

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Rain Paint Homemade Watercolor Recipe

Painting in the Rain - Homemade Paint Recipe

Living in San Diego we barely get a winter.  I'm not complaining, because I prefer warm weather.  We do, however, really need rain.  I got so excited this week when the weather app on my phone predicted rain.  Immediately I planned a ton of activities that can only be done in the rain.  We love homemade paint recipes, so my first project was making rain paint.  Painting in the rain is an activity all children should get to try at least once, and instead of grabbing watercolors and heading out in the rain I wanted to actually make paint with rain.

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Gross Motor Flower Color Hop

Spring Activities for Kids ~ Gross Motor Activity

We're back with more spring activities for kids, a month long series with Jaime of FSPDT.  Last week we made color surprise playdough, and the week before we made shared this recipe for mud paint.  The theme for today is gross motor.  Last year around this time I set up a simple color hop for toddlers, an active game to work on color recognition.  My twins weren't even two then, so I kept it very basic and simple and, of course, fun!  This year I set up a flower hop, and oh we had a blast.

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Melted Crayon Art with a Glue Gun

Easy Art Projects for Kids - Glue Gun Crayon Art

We're back with more Easy Art Projects for Kids, an art series we are doing along with several of our favorite kid bloggers.  So far we have made erupting watercolor absorption art while exploring with watercolors, and tape resist art on foil while exploring resist art.  The theme for today is crayon art.  We love melted crayon art, and I have been wanting to try this method of melted crayon art for some time now!  I would love to claim credit for this genius idea, but I saw it somewhere years ago and put it on my mental to do list.

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How to Peel Crayons

Peeling Crayons Quickly

Have you ever worn out your fingers peeling off tiny pieces of crayon wrapper bit by bit?  Have you ever started a project just to quit ten minute in, because peeling the crayons was just too tedious and hard? I am about to blow your mind.  Seriously.  This one tiny little tip makes peeling crayons quickly an easy task that even young children can do. 

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Painting with Kids {The Sunday Showcase}

Ideas for Painting with Kids featured on The Sunday Showcase

These awesome ideas for painting with kids are from last week's Sunday Showcase.

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Alphabet Flower Hunt

Preschool Activity for Spring - ABC Hunt

Spring is here!  Okay okay, in southern California winter isn't truly winter anyway, but I still love spring!  We are kicking off the season with a fun preschool activity for spring.  J-Bug had so much fun with our alphabet leaf hunt last fall, so I decided to set up an alphabet flower hunt for him.

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Frosting Paint Recipe

Homemade Frosting Paint - Recipe for Play

Our latest homemade paint recipe is made from just three ingredients, one of those being water.  Can I tell you how much I love simple recipes for play?  Any paint recipe that can be whipped up in just a few minutes is a hit in my house.  This frosting paint recipe is inspired by the frosting we use when we make sugar cookie cutouts.

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How to Dye Rice

Rainbow Rice - Recipe for Play

Have you ever met a toddler who doesn't love playing with colored rice?  We dye many batches of rice each year, because there is something extremely satisfying about digging into a bin of separated colors and combining them.  The best part about dyed rice is that it lasts pretty much forever.  I have a couple Ziploc bags full of rice from the past couple years.  The only time we throw away rice is when it gets dumped or spilled or accidentally left out after play.  With good habits this is a recipe for play that can last forever.  Since we enjoy mixing it up and creating new batches we often use up old batches in art and imaginative play.  As you may have noticed we've been on a rainbow kick lately with rainbow slime, rainbow flour paint, rainbow eruptions, and erupting sidewalk chalk paint, so I decided it was time to make a big ole batch of rainbow rice.

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Color Surprise Rainbow Playdough

Spring Activities for Kids - Making Color Surprise Playdough

We're back with more spring activities for kids, a month long series with Jaime of FSPDT.  Last week we made homemade mud paint using real mud!  The theme for this week is homemade playdough.  We've been slightly obsessed with rainbows lately and in desperate need of a new batch of playdough.  Instead of deciding on one color of playdough I decided to make an entire rainbow of playdough colors!  Better yet, my boys had so much fun with the color surprise eruptions we made last summer that I decided to make color surprise playdough, using this method from Teach Preschool.

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Rainbow Epsom Salts

Sensory Play with Colored Epsom Salts

Have you noticed our recent rainbow trend?  It's amazing how rainbows make everything more fun.  Seriously, we've made all of these recipes for play before, but I'm amazed at how much more gorgeous all our favorite play materials are when we make them rainbow!  Did you know that Epsom salts are incredibly easy to dye, making them perfect for sensory play?  They are so inexpensive, and they absorb color easily.  They are very versatile.  We use them in the bath tub, in sensory bins, for art and crafts, and for prewriting practice.

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Activities for Preschoolers {The Sunday Showcase}

Activities for Preschoolers featured on The Sunday Showcase

These awesome activities for preschoolers are from last week's Sunday Showcase.

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Plastic Easter Egg Prints

Painting with Plastic Easter Eggs

As you know we love to paint and experiment with print making.  Our circle printing was a big hit, so when I pulled down our stash of plastic Easter eggs the other day my first thought was that it would be fun to do some print making with Easter eggs.  I love simple art activities for kids!

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Mud Paint Recipe

Spring Activities for Kids - Mud Paint Recipe for Play

I'm so excited to kick off a month long Spring Activities for Kids series with Jaime of Frogs, Snails and Puppy Dog Tails.  Like me Jaime has a house full of little boys who love art and sensory play.  We thought it would be fun to join forces to bring you a series full of kids activities for spring!  We will be posting every Monday this month, so stay tuned.  Our first theme is paint recipes.  I am a bit obsessed with making my own homemade paint recipes, and since Jaime is also known for her creative paint recipes we challenged each other to come up with a homemade paint recipe for spring.  We finally got a downpour of much needed rain here in San Diego, so the first thing that popped into my head was to make mud paint!

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Tape Resist Art on Foil

Easy Art Projects for Kids - Tape Resist Art

We're back with more Easy Art Projects for Kids.  Last time we made erupting watercolor absorption art while exploring watercolors.  The theme today is resist art.  We recently made rainbows with contact paper resist art, and we have even taken tape resist art into the shower!  To put a spin on a favorite activity this time I set up an invitation to create resist art on foil.  

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St. Patrick's Day Crafts and Activities {The Sunday Showcase}

St. Patrick's Day Crafts and Activities featured on The Sunday Showcase

These awesome St. Patrick's Day Crafts and Activities are from last week's Sunday Showcase.

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Rainbow Art for Kids with Baked Cotton Balls

Baked Cotton Balls Recipe for Play

Continuing with our rainbow recipes for play I set up an invitation to create rainbow art with baked cotton balls.  This play recipe is inexpensive and simple, yet it's unique and tons of fun.  Despite the fact that I chose a rainbow theme, and one of my boys did in fact create a rainbow, baked cotton balls are perfect for open ended, process based art.  One of my favorites parts of this project was watching how each of my boys created.

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Rainbow Crafts for Kids

St. Patrick's Day Crafts for Kids

You may have noticed, we've been all about the rainbows lately!  I don't know if it's because St. Patrick's Day is approaching or because spring is near, but we are loving all of the gorgeous rainbow activities.  I keep pinning gorgeous rainbow crafts for kids, so I put together a compilation of my favorites.

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Shamrock Crafts for Kids

St. Patrick's Day Crafts for Kids

St. Patrick's Day is two weeks ago, so we are in full Shamrock mode!  There are so many adorable shamrock crafts for kids, and I pulled together my 12 favorite to showcase today.

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Colorful Activities for Kids {The Sunday Showcase}

Colorful Activities for Kids featured on The Sunday Showcase

These awesome colorful activities for kids are from last week's Sunday Showcase.

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