The next best thing since sliced bread ...

Shaving cream and glue!!!

You just mix together  "equal- ish" parts of shaving cream and glue ( please do not measure- that takes some of the fun out of it - just squirt and squeeze and mix!!) 

Because of the glue in the shaving cream it dries puffy and dimensional! 

I have used this fun stuff for all kinds of projects like snow and snowmen. Just use a spoon or paint brush to make the 3 circles and then because the mixture is half glue you can just stick the buttons eyes and fun foam nose right in the wet mixture - it will stick! We sprinkle Mr. Snowman with a little crystal glitter and then dip 2 q-tips in the glue mixture and add our arms, too.

It's great for Eric Carle's Little Cloud and weather units. We've made clouds and rainbows for our Creation activity. The possibilities are endless...

We've used it to make waves, too. So it's perfect for any stories or units about the ocean. Even Dr. Seuss. Here is a One Fish, Two Fish activity that's a lot of fun. We created our waves with the shaving cream and glue mixture. Sprinkled it with blue glitter. A few fun foam fish and some stickers.

Then we just matched up our  word and number stickers with the correct fish!!

You could add a little blue tempera paint and go for a Thing 1 and Thing 2 project!!

And then I just had to know if it would glow in the dark...

So I did a little spooky ghost test project....

 

I made a ghost with the "regular" shaving cream and glue mixture and added some google eyes.

Then I added in some glow in the dark acrylic paint and painted my ghost...

It makes the mixture a little yellow-ish but it GLOWS in the dark!!!!!

Yeah! How fun is that?? So now I'm thinking you could use this for some cool space unit projects!!!

Told you it's the better than sliced bread!! One can of shaving cream and a bottle of glue makes enough for a whole classroom to use. It's inexpensive and smells yummy - do your projects after recess- ha! You can color it with washable tempera, add glitter and little items on your projects and you can make it glow!!



Owl tell you what else I've been doing....

I have been moving College Girl into a house and getting her ready for another year of college and I have been helping the Chi O's get their house ready for Rush. I have been planting flowers and working in their yard ( it's my own yard that needs TLC now!!)

I have also been making a lot. I mean a lot. of Owl Pixy Stix (like I've posted about before) for one of their Rush goodies.

See? A giant pile of owls in Chi O colors. What do you call a group of owls?? Are they a flock like birds?? I need to Google that one:)

Kool Aid Clay and Cool (not Kool) Bowls

                                                                                                                                      

This is one fun clay to make. And easy. And safe. And smells yummy.

I have been super busy for the last couple of weeks - I have been presenting at Preschool and Kindergarten Teacher Trainings all over the state and I have promised (more than once) to get this clay recipe on the blog! Sorry that it has taken so long. But here it is. I have been making it for years and it always turns out great!

Kool Aid Clay

2 cups of flour

1/2 cup of salt

3 tbsp of oil

1 pkg unsweetened Kool Aid

1 cup of boiling water

Mix flour, salt and Kool Aid in a bowl. Add oil and then boiling water. Mix until well blended and ball of dough forms. That's it - takes 2 minutes!

This has so many uses in the classroom or for a fun time at home. First of all it is so inexpensive and makes a lot. It doesn't contain anything but food ingredients so if a child takes a taste it won't hurt them. It doesn't taste good - very salty, but safe. It's easy to clean up when it hardens. You can roll it out, use cookie cutters, etc. And it's fun to test the sense of smell. You can mix up all different flavors of kool aid and do a smell test- see who guesses the most flavors correctly!!

And now, cool bowls...

I found this little stack of bowls at Ikea the other day. I think they were less than 2 dollars! They are great for color sorting and color mixing activities. Sort M & M's or fruit loops or even colored paper clips. Doesn't quite work for  a Roy G Biv activity but any rainbow story activity would work with these bowls.

  They are just cute. And I had to have them!!