Summer Fun: Sand Dough

My kids love play dough. I think they'd play with it every day if I didn't mind cleaning up the aftermath. Unfortunately (for them), I usually prefer the less messy activites like, oh say, reading.

But some days I decide to be the fun mom and let them play with playdoh to their heart's content.

And sometimes I decide to be the really fun mom and let them make the playdoh and then play with it.

(This happens, oh, about once a year. I certainly don't want them expecting such entertainment every day.)

A few weeks ago, I saw this recipe for sand dough on Blog Me Mom. It's called sand dough because it has cornmeal in it, which gives it a grittier (i.e., sandier) texture. The gorgeous pictures showed soft balls of dough in summery colors next to a pile of rainbow "sand."

Um, okay, even when I'm being a really fun mom, I'm not five-colors fun. Just to clarify.

So here you get the overly simplified version.

But you know what? My kids still loved it.

To make sand dough, you'll need:

1/2 cup white flour
3/4 cup cornmeal
2 tablespoons salt
2 tablespoons oil
1 1/2 tablespoons cream of tarter
One koolaid envelope (0.13 oz.)
1/2 cup boiling water

Stir the flour, cornmeal, salt, oil, cream of tarter, and koolaid together.

Add the boiling water (adult assistance required).

Adjust the ratios as needed. After the boys started playing with it, we ended up kneading in some more flour to reach a less sticky consistency.

Squish, roll, cut, smash, repeat.

 

We've had our sand dough for over a week now (stored in a plastic bag), and it's still good and playable. 

(For more of our summer fun, click here.)