Making rock candy is a fun and easy experiment to do with your kids while teaching them a little bit about chemistry and a lot about patience. Plus, there’s a sweet reward at the end. Candy making usually involves thermometers and lots of corn syrup. Not so with rock candy! You just need sugar and [...]

Borrowing another great restaurant idea: oil cloth (vinyl) tablecloths. Primary reason? Easy to clean. You can purchase the fabric by the yard from Fabric.com and simply sew fitted tablecloths so that your tots can’t easily pull them off!

My husband saw an info-mercial on upside down planters late one night and thought it would be a fun project to do with the kids. It was very easy to make but not very pretty. It was made out of a gallon jug container with about a 1.5″ diameter opening for the tomato plant. He [...]

Say goodbye to your tortilla press and use your stand mixer for fast(er) tortilla-making at home. For these instructions, you would need the pasta roller attachment (not just for pasta making)! Here’s how I make 32 tortillas in under 30 minutes (not including dough resting time or extra little helpers): Ingredients: 4 cups flour, all-purpose [...]

Here’s a healthy shake for the kids. It’s easy enough for them to make it themselves too. It’s just fruit and milk. Cut up fruits into blender friendly size. Freeze. This is also a good way to make good use of over-ripen fruits. Blend frozen fruits with milk. You can pretty much use any kind: [...]

Glycerin has many uses besides in soap and skin care. Add it to your standard soap bubble recipe to make it stickier and more like the commercial ones. Some recipes claim adding sugar makes better bubbles, but I say avoid it unless you want to invite sugar-loving critters to join in on the fun. Here’s [...]

Folding origami fortune tellers is my go-to kids craft for party favors. It is simple, inexpensive, and great fun for a wide range of ages. For the younger kids, I do all the folding and let them decorate with stickers, drawing, etc… For slightly older kids, I fold to make the crease lines, unfold, and [...]

At our house, we have a tradition of hanging candy canes made of salt dough. Then on the night before Christmas, they magically turn into real candy canes! Salt dough craft is easy and fun to do with the kids. Click here for recipes and instructions. They also taste pretty bad so hopefully, that alone [...]

Here’s my all-time favorite recipe for dough craft: Ingredients by volume 2 parts flour 1 part salt 1 part warm water acrylic paint or food coloring (optional) Directions Mix in flour and salt in a stand mixer. Plain salt dough: Add warm water. Colored salt dough: Add coloring to the center and pour the warm [...]

Traditional homemade play dough recipes are cooked over the stove top, then kneaded until smooth. With this one step method, you do not have to cook the dough or knead it by hand. Simply let your stand mixer do the work for you! Ingredients: 3 cups flour 2 tbsp cream of tartar 1 cup salt [...]