Making Play Dough

I have a real love/hate relationship with play dough.

The things I love are:

1. It is a great fine motor activity, starting with the toddlers- the squeezing, squishing, pulling, pounding; up to the preschoolers who like to cut (with plastic knives or safety scissors) and roll and start forming shapes. It all gets the muscles in their hands working to prepare them for writing.
2. It is good sensory activity. It feels different then the toys they are used to playing with, especially for the young toddlers. Plus when you make it, it can be scented, you can put glitter in it, or rice, or anything else to make it feel different. 
3. The children get to be creative. Play dough can become anything! 
4. It's not too hard to clean up. Play dough picks up play dough.
5. It's just plain fun.

The things I hate:

1. The smell of the stuff you buy in the store.
2. No matter how hard I try, it always gets in the kids shoes (and mine too).
3. Little tiny pieces of play dough on the floor (see above)

So the good definitely outweighs the bad. And I decided to make my own play dough. I worked in childcare for 10 years (11 maybe? I don't remember anymore) and I have never made it before. That is just not acceptable. I got my recipe from this site. http://www.makeplaydough.com/ I did the kool-aid play dough.

Step one: Gather all the ingredients. I started with grape kool-aid simply because I like purple and grape.

Step two: Mix the dry together in the pot- burner off.

Step three: Mix in the wet.

Step four: Turn on the burner to medium heat and stir constantly. Sorry, no pictures, I was busy stirring.

Step five: When the dough makes a ball on your spoon, transfer it to another pot or bowl for it to cool a little.

Step six: When the dough is cool enough to handle, kneed it for awhile- this is the most fun step. After kneeding I formed it into a ball to cool. Then I realized the center would never cool so I flattened it.

Then all you have to do is store it in an air tight container so it doesn't dry out. I made three different colors/scents. The yellow/lemon didn't turn out too vibrant, but it still smells good.

Some tips:

1. The dough will actually form a ball while you are stirring it. I didn't believe it would, so the first batch I took off the heat a few seconds too early. It is just a little stickier then the other two batches, no big deal though.
2. After it cools completely kneed it one last time before you put it away, I felt like it helped bring everything together a little better
3. If you are using this with your kids at home, make sure your pets don't get it. The play dough smells like people food, so dogs will try and eat it, and it will cause a bad salt imbalance in their system. I only found this tip on one site, and I think it's important to know.
4. It tastes terrible. Yes, I did out some in my mouth, I needed to know what it was like, because the toddlers will taste test. It is like pouring salt in your mouth. Now I know to have some water nearby.

I go back to work tomorrow after being off for seven months! I am excited. And a little apprehensive. And excited again. Wish me luck!