Rice Art

Caden is really into spelling his and everyone's name lately.  Usually he writes them all by himself and the letters are in reverse.  So Caden is spelled NEDAC.  Cute, huh?



For some reason he was a little scared of the glue today.  Not sure why.  He usually wants to cover an entire sheet of paper with glue.  So I helped him.  Not sure if that was the right thing to do.  I'm no education expert.  I probably should have crafted my own page right beside him. I know teaching them to do things by themselves is important at this age and I shouldn't just swoop in and say, okay, I'll do it for you.

What would you have done?

Simple Play: DIY Magnet Jar

We had a couple pipe cleaner scraps left over from our DIY snowflake activity so I decided to make a quick magnet jar.

SUPPLIES:

• Glass jar (this is a recycled Ragu jar)


• Strong magnet


• magnetic items (we used pipe cleaners)


• non-magnetic item (we used colored rice)

INSTRUCTIONS:

1. Place everything in the jar except for the magnet.


2. Shake it up.


3. Slide the magnet on the outside of the jar to see if you can get anything to move.  If not, put the magnet inside the jar to see what you can fetch!

"Look, mom!  A spider!"

Caden loved this so much and it was so, so simple.  I love it when we can find fun and creative things to play with around the house.

How To Make Colored Rice

Over the weekend we made colored rice.  It's provided endless amount of fun around here so I thought you might like to know how to make it.  It's really, really easy.

Ingredients:
-Rice
-Food coloring
-Rubbing alcohol
-Ziploc bags

1. Dump 2 cups of uncooked rice into ziploc bag
2. Add a capful of rubbing alcohol
3. Add food coloring (I added about 20 drops)
4. Mix together. (If you can't tell Caden loved this step.  "Wow, Mom look at it turning blue!")

It was even more fun for him when we started mixing different colors.  "What will happen when we mix blue and red mixed together?"

5. After your done mixing, spread out on a cookie sheet to dry overnight.  I sped up the process and put them in the oven at 200 degrees for about 10 minutes.
6. Lay out a blanket on the floor and start playing.  There will be a little bit of a mess so have a vacuum handy, but I promise it will be worth it.  The boys spent about an hour easy playing with the rice and now Caden begs me to "play rice."

Caden also started getting creative and making the green rice as grass.  "Mom, we need to feed the bugs."

Note: In hindsight I would have doubled or tripled the recipe.  2 cups isn't quite enough for 2 boys to share.  4-6 cups would be more appropriate.