Fun with Food Coloring

I've been on Fall break all week, but this was the first day with the kids. The last 3 days have been cleaning and laundry days- kid free! I love my hubby! (he assured me that daycare was in the budget for this week)

So, today I had children and needed something to do with them. I had thought about going to the zoo, but it was cold and wet outside. I thought about being a good teacher-mommy, but I hadn't printed out and prepared anything yet.

Then I remembered THIS website. I considered this activity to be part of the Crafty Trinity- it was fast, cheap and easy. So, instead of going to the zoo, we made Aquarium Baggies. Great for... well, I don't know. But the kids liked it and now we have sun catchers that are sensory/ tactile oriented.

I collected my items...



I honestly can't remember when I bought that hair gel, but I'm glad I didn't get rid of it!
baggies
multi-colored sharpies
hair gel (the website said it would work with lotion too. but it wouldn't be as see-through for sun catchers)
food coloring to make the "water" blue
the white felt was for Isaac to see where he was marking

I stripped the kids of their shirts so they couldn't ruin them with the markers. I also read them their rights, should a marker find its way to a mouth, other body part, or the wall, all fun would cease for that child.



Abby chose orange and purple for her colors.



Andy chose blue and pink. He did well until I noticed him in his "thinking pose" with the marker tip in his mouth. No more aquarium fun for him!



Isaac had the rest of the colors.

I drew the fish, but they colored them and decorated the baggies as they saw fit.

Hmmmm.... what to do with Andy now that he can't have fun. Cupcakes. Multi-colored cupcakes.

I didn't take pictures as we made them, but we used a white cake mix, prepared the batter according to the box, then separated the batter into 3 bowls. Andy helped me choose the colors for the 3 bowls; blue, green and red.
Then we spooned 2 different colors into the cupcake cups.



You can't tell, but they are different colors on the bottom.



Abby loving her cupcakes. She's not exactly lady-like is she?

Here are the finished aquariums.



I'm so glad I thought to strip them first! Check out Abby's battle scars from the markers.



Ike is so proud!



My example is on top. They will look much better then the sun is cooperating!
Now Grammy Pat, don't you worry. I'll give Andy another chance tomorrow.

Speaking of tomorrow, while the kids were taking their naps today, I jumped on the computer and printed their activities for the rest of this week and next week.



Abby chose robots for her activities and Andy has been on a pirate kick for a while, so Abby will be working on shapes, and Andy on letter recognition and hand-eye coordination. (matching colored pom-poms to the circles)



Ike chose circus for his theme, and I printed out the ones for pirate too. These are the Read, Build, Write mats from Homeschool Creations.



This came from a teaching blog that I came across. It's a sight word phrase game. Isaac knows a lot of his sight words already, and he's really good about recognizing new words when they are presented to him, so this game should be right up his alley.



I got this idea from the 1+1+1=1 website. I chose a Level 1 book from McKays that I knew would keep Isaac's interest and had words that he could read. I typed each page and added pictures I found from Google Images and clipart. I cut the strips and now Isaac has a fluency game he can play!



And, I love how the book and sentence strips fit perfectly into this 97 cent pencil case! I can definitely see myself doing more of these! (another Crafty Trinity activity!)



Last, but not least, Isaac's new Memory verse. This is for the letter 'C'. Of course, this is also from the 1+1+1=1 website.

I think I have enough to keep the kids busy! :)