Melon Balls... An Edible Sensory Bin.

My youngest LOVES to play with fruit.  She would much rather smoosh it into tiny pieces than stick it in her mouth.  Her older two siblings are both huge fruit lovers so this is all sort of new to me.  I hand her a blueberry, she crushes it with her index finer.  I hand her a piece of watermelon, she squeezes it with her hand.  It really is quite comical.  I thought it would be interesting to see what she did with it if I presented it in a different way.  

This is also my back-up water bead solution.  LOL  I haven't been able to find water beads in Walmart (where I usually get them) in forever!!  Ugh.  It does work as a wonderful alternative for those of you that are concerned with water beads.  

The Invitation

I put out a few cups from the dollar store since she loves sorting/dumping/pouring.

On the white paper is a spoon, a couple different skewers, and a few straws cut in different sizes.  

For the fruit I used a mellon baller on watermelon, cantaloupe, and honey dew.  

Close up of fruit

                           

Of course she had to smell it first.  Hmmmmmm is this food?  

"Ball"  "Ball" "Ball"  "Ball"  

I'm sure I heard that with excitement about 50 times.  LOL  

Trying out the spoon. 

I love the way she thinks.  :-)  

She was having a hard time scooping with the spoon so she turned it around to try and stab at the fruit.  

Got one!  

Finally a taste test!  

Trying out a skewer

She really enjoyed the texture and shape of these.  She actually ended up eating quite a few... and smashing none.  Go figure!   

The left over fruit was devoured by my older two after she was finished playing.  

RL  

Edible Stained Glass

The other day on THIS post a "fan" said something along the lines "that it would be cool if the candy melted to make edible stained glass".  YES- that would be cool.  :-)  So we tried it.  We melted the gummies we used that day and had ONE BIG GOOEY MESS!!  That was fun.... NOT.  

When we were kids we used to make homemade lollipops.  I knew there would be a recipe out there where you could make your own.  After searching I came across THIS Very cool... but I wanted something that would be a little bit more hands on for the girls.  With a little more searching I learned you can melt hard candy down and have it reform.... Uh duh!!  Why didn't I think of that the first time around.  :-P  So here is our Round 2 go at it....

I bought 2 different kinds of hard candy.  Jolly Ranchers and Life Savers.  I knew the Life Savers would crush easily if we wanted to break pieces up.  

My 29M old was apart of this whole process.  Setting up the invitation was actually her favorite part!  So much fun learning going on as well.  :-)  Color recognition... sorting.... fine motor...

Taking the wrappers off. 

My 29M old was all over the crushing part. 

Again, true to form... my oldest (3.5) hard at work making her masterpieces.  We placed the pieces inside of cookie cutters and also canning lids (what I had on hand).  We also did a few free form.... these were my favorite!  

"I crushed it all up, Mommy!!!"  

Filling in the circles.  

This was as far as my 29M old got....

Design and Drill was much more appealing. 

My oldest's pre-oven.  She decided to do one more free from because "we needed to have 3 for each of them."  We baked these at 325 for about 5-6 minutes.  

Waiting.....

Finished!  

I placed the cookie sheet on top of a towel.  Before they harden you can use a toothpick to make swirls in your designs (we did this as kids... so much fun!).  

You can also make a hole to hang them.  You have to pop them out of the cookie cutters, etc before they harder all the way, while they are still warm or they will crack.  Oh... we also sprayed the parchment paper with cooking spray.  Next time we will spray the cookie cutters as well.  

After we saw how cool the free form ones came out my oldest asked to make more.  She asked if we could make a flower.  We did this one together.  

Heart

We made a couple lollipops as well.  Just place a stick in your design while it is still warm.  

Canning lid with toothpick swirls.  

Our flower turned into "it looks like a cloud... that's a pretty cool cloud."

"It feels so warm and cozy."  

She chose to hang this one up.  

Materials:

Cookie cutters/canning lids (or do them free form)

Hard candies

Parchment paper

Cooking spray

Cookie sheet

Place parchment paper on your cookie sheet and spray with cooking spray.  Place candies within the cookie cutters or make designs free form.  Pop in the oven at 325 for 5-6 minutes.  Let cool a little bit.  You an also make designs during this time or put holes in them to hang.  Pop them out while they are still warm to the touch.  Let harden.  

RL  

Edible Art Frames

The other day my oldest was "cleaning out the car".  She found a candy cane and got all excited.  Yes - we still had a candy cane in the console from Christmas.   LOL  (AK... slow down your breathing).  Every year at Christmas we make Candy Cane Bark.  She asked me if we could make it.  Of course the answer was yes... we just went a different route.  :-)  

The Invitation.

Cookie Sheet

Wax Paper

Various candies and sprinkles.

Pretzels put together to make a frame.

White Ghirardelli Chocolate Chips

You can use whatever chocolate you want.  I know Baker's makes baking chips.  I just LOVE Ghirardelli chocolate.  

You also don't have to use candy.  You can pretty much put in whatever you want.  Some other suggestions:

Crushed nuts

Dried fruit

Pretzels

Sprinkles

Marshmallows

Crumbled cookies

Graham Crackers

Raisins

Coconut

Popcorn

AK and her son stopped by.  :-)  

Whoa!!!  LOL  

As you can clearly see my 29M old and AK's son could care less about the art part of this. 

Look it's a flag

A couple of the girls friends stopped over so I set this up for all of them.  I originally bought 2 bags of chips... one for each of my older girls.  This one was just half a bag.  It was a little too thin so it cracked.  

My oldest way playing with her friend on the first round of these and came down to the invitation after they left.  We did this with one whole bag of chips.  

To melt the chips just pour the bag into a microwave safe dish and microwave.  Ours took around 3 minutes... stopping to stir after each minute.  

After melting, spread it out on the wax paper in the shape of a square.  Add your pretzels around the outside to make a frame.  

Decorating her frame.  (3.5 years)

My oldest had no desire to eat the candy during this process.  She was more interested in the art... totally true to form for her.  

She loved this.  :-)  

Finished!  Ours took about 20 minutes to cool and set.  

I used a spatula to pick it up off the cookie sheet and then peeled off the wax paper.

It was sturdy enough to handle!  

Proud girl/  

"Can I eat some?"

Enjoying some of her masterpiece.  

You could do this on a smaller scale as well. 

It would be cute with smaller pretzel rods, pop in a ziploc, and give away as gifts.  :-) 

RL 

Edible ABCs and 123s

This is a great activity for letter recognition....and a fun way to beat the heat on a hot summer day!  I bought these molds from Amazon.com.  For this batch, I wanted to make them edible, so I used -

• the juice of 6 lemons
• 3/4 C heavy cream
• 1/4 C sugar
• 1/4 C water

I poured the mixture into separate containers and added food coloring for color variations, poured into the molds, and froze them overnight.

My son is only 2, and I dont typically skips steps in the learning process, so we really only talked about letter names and sounds during this activity.  He actually has NO interest in letters, so I dont force it - but I try to mention the name and sound of the letter when I can.  (I think he knows more than he lets on, though.  LOL)  A GREAT idea, that I will try in the future, is to incorporate the ice bricks.  You can add tiny objects to the bricks that have the beginning sounds of the letters - when the child hammers out an object, he matches it to the ice letter!  FUN!  I think its important for my son to have the prerequisite skill of letter SOUNDS before we tackle beginning sounds - but Im sooooooo looking forward to that activity - NEXT summer - LOL.  :)

- AK


Letter/Number molds

Edible Paint

This is a "paint" I used in the classroom a lot when I was a teacher, particularly during Easter - because it dries shiny and with just one drop of food coloring, the colors are very pastel-like. Its edible (Holy SUGAR! - but I don't stress because my son doesn't eat a lot of sugar in general).  For those who are concerned about food coloring - Im guessing you can use natural dyes...

Food Based Dyes

I realized while doing this, that it would be great to use this for TALL PAINTING (putting the edible paint in squirt bottles)....

Tall Paintings


- AK



Clear plastic cups (Walmart), 1-2 cans of condensed milk (we only used 1), food coloring, shelving paper (optional - you can just use paper if you want).  Shelving paper is a great alternative to fingerpainting paper because it can be washed off and reused if you are just using it for sensory play.


Add food coloring.


Stir (he is stirring with a wooden skewer.  I cut some long ones in half because I use them to make him fruit kabobs and such - I saved the cut off part for activities like this.)



He liked the way it drizzled off the sticks - so he did some drizzle painting.  He said "it looks like lots and lots of snakes, Mommy".



Drizzle


He moved on to the paint brush - eh - not as fun


Its time to pour!


"That tastes like cake, Mommy.  Would you like to try some of my cake?"



Pretty cool when poured


He used the stick to run the colors together.



:)Food Based Dyes