This weeks unplugged theme is plastic. I had a great, I mean insanely great project to share but I couldn’t get the supplies together in a timely manner. I had grocery shopping (3 different stores!) while the girls visited with MiMi (my Mom) and a library program also today. But trust me it was great! So instead I stole the idea to make shrinky dinks right off the Unplug Your Kids site!

I cut some #6 plastic (salad bar containers, lids to aluminum cake tins…) up into different size pieces. They shrink by about 40%.

The kids colored on the plastic pieces with Sharpies-permanent markers.

We placed them on a foil sheet and put them straight on the bottom rack of a 350 degree oven.

I grouped like size pieces together for each batch. The first ones to go into the oven were large pieces and they didn’t come out so good-they curled up and melted. All with in a few minutes-so watch carefully!

The next batch curled up and then flattened back out and worked great! This is what is supposed to happen so don’t freak out while watching the metamorphosis. We punched holes in them before we baked them and some of the holes closed up so be sure to make them large.

I don’t know what the packed “shrinky dinks” are made off but let me warn you-you may want to do this activity outside with a toaster oven because the fumes can’t be good for you! When I taught pre-school, 137 years ago, We used to use Styrofoam trays and a toaster oven outside for that same reason. I don’t know why I thought plastic would be any different. But these are way cool and easy. The girls wanted to do more but I radiated, I mean microwaved their leftovers and threw them out in the fresh air to eat dinner while the house aired out.

Then we rode our bikes to get ice cream. I had a tasty pink grapefruit sorbet with chocolate sprinkles-delicious!! It tasted just like OceanSpray Ruby Red! This shop has some crazy flavors! Fish and chips? Guinness? I tasted the pear Riesling sorbet but went with the pink grapefruit.

Tomorrow we are off to pick strawberries with Dawn, who I am so thankful to for making my blog look so great! I owe her 1 zillion dollars for all her hard work! But I don’t have any money so I will continue to publicly thank her and buy her dinner soon! Thanks Dawn web designer extraordinaire!!!!!

And I promise to share my most insanely excellent project soon!

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This weeks Unplugged Project is Metal. The long weekend threw me off a bit so I am posting a day late-but better late then never! This Mexican Metal Tooling project is super easy, no mess.

You will need some heavy aluminum-we cut cake pans apart-scissors, stack of newspapers, paint brushes, permanent markers. Optional materials list to follow.

Place your aluminum square on your newspaper stack and use the back of a paintbrush to draw a picture/design. You can flip your square over and draw on the other side too so that some of your drawing sticks out and some is concave.

Now use your permanent markers to color in your picture.

The next part took longer than anything. I punched holes in the corners and used jewelry wire to string the tiles together and tied them to a dowel rod. We hung some beads off the bottom for weight. This is optional but I think it really looks great. Because we used permanent markers I plan to hang this on our back patio but tonight could not find a single place to hang it to get a good photo. This was the best I could do.

Note–after cutting the pans up the edges are a bit sharp, you may want to use masking tape and tape the square down to the newspaper while working on it. Be careful!

Here is a photo I took this morning outside-looks a bit better!

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OK this is an easy idea! Bring some snow inside to play in. No huge, under the bed, rubbermaid, tubby to use, you say? Use a pot or a dish pan or a bucket. Just put down a plastic tablecloth and you can add any type of accessories you think your kids may want to play with in the snow. We used ice cream scoopers and muffin tins, some cars and trucks. Although with mittens on it was hard to play with small items.
This is a great activity if you have a little one that you don’t want to suit up to go out to play. I remember doing this with Jake when he was about 9 months old on our kitchen floor. They will love to eat it too!!

Now on to lunch. What stretchs, bounces and rolls? FLUBBER!! This is sure to be a hit with almost any age. It is a little messy. You probobly don’t want to use this in a room with carpet. This sort of like silly putty but a bit more fluid. It will wash out. Use another bigger piece to pick up smaller pieces.

It is a non-Newtonian (quarter word) substance-it appears to be a liquid and a solid at the same time. I have more recipes like this that I can post some day when I find them! But you can google non-newtonian substances too and see what you come up with!

1 1/2 cups warm water
2 cups white glue
1 1/3 cups warm water
3 tsp borax detergent
food coloring
mixing bowl and spoon
Helps to make it in a pail or bucket

In pail combine food coloring, glue and 1 1/2 cups warm water
In second, smaller container (I used a mason jar) combine 1 1/3 cups warm water with borax. mix till dissoloved
Pour contents of mason jar into glue mixture.
Gently lift and turn the mixture with a metal spoon until only about a tablespoon of liquid is left.
FLUBBER will be sticky for a moment or two. Let the excess liquid drip off, then the FLUBBER is ready.

It is fun to use scissors to cut this up and use washable markers to color on it. But beware you will probobly have to throw the markers away when you are finished.

And just so I am not misleading you into thinking I do all these crafty things WITH my kids. Today I set these up so they would stay busy while I got some other things done! It was a win win situation

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