Cloud dough

When I was a new parent, I was like all new parents...I wasn't afraid of a little extra work on my part for the sake of my child's happiness. In simple terms: I was all for messy games.

Enter, cloud dough:

Why do the things my children enjoy most have to require the most cleanup afterward??

This particular activity promised "easy cleanup" (which was irrelevant to me two years ago when I first made this stuff) but boy is that wrong. This activity may require the most cleanup out of everything, except maybe puddle jumping. This stuff gets everywhere!  Table, floor, and toys that enter the scene need to be washed, clothes need to be washed, kids bathed. This is the full deal, people. And while it wasn't daunting the first time or two, now with two kids and supper to make, orders to make and ship, and laundry to fold...it feels like a lot of extra work.

But look at this face (my look of concentration was passed down to her, apparently!)...

How can I say no?!

On days like today when the kids have been so incredibly good, and Levi finds the cloud dough and asks ever so nicely if he can play with it, I don't have the heart to say no. And when Kayden sees what Levi is doing, playing with pom-poms and pipe cleaners suddenly isn't good enough and she wants in on the action too. So here I am, with a mixture of flour and baby oil spread out all over my dining room table and two kids, who will need to be bathed yet before supper. But they are happy and so I'm happy. Today the mess just doesn't matter and I smile as I see the focus on those little faces as they scoop and dump and make a mess. Because before I know it, they'll be all grown up and in school and I'll miss the days when I had little mess-makers to spend my days with. 

So enjoy the coud dough today, my children, for tomorrow we clean. 

Cloud Dough:

Mix equal parts flour and baby oil (or coconut oil?)

This stuff keeps for years, as long as you don't use an oil that goes rancid such as olive or veggie. Whether you want it to last that long, though, is another question completely ;)

GAK

We made gak today. If you have never made gak, you definitely should! Whether or not you have kids. Make some. It's cool :)

Here's the recipe:

If you can't read it, let me know. 

Basically you make a glue/water mixture (equal parts of each) and you also make a borax/water mixture (1tsp borax/1cup water) and you mix them with lots of stirring and you eventually get a slimy, slippery, oober-fun substance known as gak!

Mix mix mix.

And then you let your kids play and sit back as they're entertained for going on 45 minutes!  Love it!  It's a bit of a mess as it sticks to clothes and stains (if you've used food colouring) and little bits of it tend to end up everywhere but I'm game for a little cleanup some days if it means I have some happy kids :) (notice I said "some days!"). 

Oh, and a random sidenote...Levi loves saying the word "gak" and says "gak" as many times as he possibly can. For instance: "mom I like gak! I'm going to make my gak even gak-ier!" In fact, I just heard him say it 3 times in the last 30 seconds while typing this. Oh, and there it was again!  Gak!