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I love how these watercolor snowflakes – by Kindell  look like they almost sparkle.  She made them by flicking paint over paper cut-out flakes with a toothbrush.  Fun!

Make a giant indoor snowman out of trash bags.  This looks like a lot of fun!  If only we weren’t out of trash bags.  Thanks Karen – this is on our to-do list!

Sensory tub with fake paper snow from Make, Do and Friend.  She has shredded paper, glitter, strofoam ornaments, and winter animals/trees as part of her kids “wintery” play.

Puffy Painted Snowflakes.  By Share and Remember. These are gorgeous!  Great for the kiddo who lives to paint.

Super simple snow globe tutorial from – Life in Style.  Basically, you glue a figurine onto the inside of a lid, add glitter to the jar, add a few drops of glycerin (optional) and some water.  Put a dab of super glue inside the rim of your lid and screw your snow globe together.

Salt Dough Snowmen, Kim one of the Quirky Mommas, had a blast with her kids this year making salt dough snowmen.  I love how simple her recipe is and my daughter loves the addition of glitter to the fun.

Snowman Pancakes this is a great breakfast if you are snowed in, or wish you were!   Love the bacon scarf!

Maggy of RedTedArt has a fun winter craft, feed the birds.  She uses a cup, lard and an assortment of seeds to create this snowy bird cake.  Check out her blog for a more detailed tutorial (and lots of other activities).

Not enough snow for an igloo?  No worries, Midland Christian School made an igloo out of milk jugs.  They have a video explaining how they created their indoor full-sized igloo.

Mama Smiles, puts a smile on my face.  She had fun with her kids.  They brought their snow inside!

Snow Ice Cream is a traditional post-snowfall treat at our house.  We usually have to eat it for breakfast.  In Texas the snow does not last long.

Don’t want to make a milk jug igloo (me neither – but it looked like fun!)  Here is a more manageable igloo – one made out of sugar cubes.  Marie of Making Memories also has a tutorial on how to make an igloo with marshmallows.

Jamie, my It’s Playtime partner, had fun with her son.  They made sheets of ice and experimented/explored with them.  Her blog, Hands on: As we Grow has TONS of great kids activities!

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Looking for even more ways to play with snow??  I have a massive collection of ideas collected on my Let it Snow board on Pinterest.

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And you don’t need to “go somewhere” to enjoy making memories with your kids!  I love what one of our readers did with her boys.  She created a fire pit from an old metal tub, brought out some hotdogs and marshmallows for roasting…

… added a tent and a couple of sleeping bags.

And in her backyard she has two happy boys, making memories they will cherish for a lifetime!

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Thanks Leigh-Anne for letting us peek in on your fun!

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Hope you can join us for more tips in the KOA Campfire Community, this Wednesday night 9pm CST.

Prizes at the chat include a $150 Gift Certificate to Cabela’s and 10 backpacks filled with:

-  A copy of the Camping Mama game (Nintendo DS)

-  A Camping Mama branded backpack & water bottle

-  A kit to make smores

- And much, much more!!

Thanks KOA for supporting QM.

If you have pencils (or pens) toilet paper tubes and a hole punch, you can create your very own tinker toys!  Almost Unschoolers created a set with her kids.

We had a table like this growing up – and I should create one for my kids!  Old electronics, once the batteries are removed, are great toys to practice taking and putting things back together again.  Thanks Irresistable Ideas for the inspiration.

Have a Kiddo who loves to live outside?  Make mud or sand bricks for him to build with using an ice cube tray.

My kids personal favorite “building” activity is creating structures with marshmallows and toothpicks.  Looking for something more healthy?  Try Grapes.

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Use a set of lids.  On each lid paint a different element of the scene.  Stack the lids to create a 3D image.

Use Glue to create the “lines”.  After the glue has dried, paint over it and your “leaves” will have a great pop factor! Thanks Having Fun at Home.

We’ve enjoyed Ball Painting before, Casa Maria has a version where you squirt paint in the box lid, then smash it with a papertowel roll.  The results are stunning.

Here is a Whirly-Gig Toy that you can make yourself with just a bit of wire, add a “person” and your child can watch them swing.

Henry at Hands On: As We Grow enjoyed exploring in his yard with some scrap wood.  He made balance beam bridges.

Bowling.  WHo said it needs to be played indoors.  Here is an outdoor DIY bowling game.

Have kids and want to keep them outside?  All you need is some string and two sticks.  Frugal Family Fun shows us how to make gigantic bubbles.

Practice jumping and catching with a homemade Kick board.  Sometimes the simple activities are the most engaging.

We made these Marshmallow Guns for our nephews last year for Christmas time.  They were a huge hit!  Outdoors is best.  I am still finding a stray marshmallow underneath a dresser or two.

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Like this post but are looking for activities for other age groups of kids? Check out our other age sets:

Activities for One Year Olds

Activities for Two Year Olds

Activities for Three Year Olds

Activities for Four Year Olds

Activities for Five Year Olds

Now as a homeschooling family, recess is still the highlight of my day!  We enjoy playing twister outside with our neighborhood (also homeschooling) friends.  We recently made our circles on the driveway with chalk and colored a giant dice with the different options. Roll the dice to find out what color you need to move to next!  Don’t have an empty driveway?  You can spray paint twister onto your yard.

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Children have lost an average of 8 hours of recess a week. Danimals Rally for Recess is a national initiative designed to create healthy competition, pitting school against school.  They are offering a chance to win $20,000 for your Elementary school playground. Plus each day Danimals is giving recess-related prizes to keep kids healthy and active. Go to Rally for Recess for more information on how your school can win!
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What was your favorite recess game?

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This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Danimals. The opinions and text are all mine. Contest Rules.

We carved our pumpkin & put it on the porch to greet visitors.
After a few weeks, our pumpkin, who Reese named Rotty, began to get a little mushy.  We got a tray for Rotty to sit on so he wouldn’t rot directly onto the porch. We made a journal to record our daily findings. We got to work!

September 12
Friday, 6:00pm
“Rotty is turning soft like a sponge. It’s got black mold. It’s getting eaten by a bug & looks black and not so good.”

Each day, Mom recorded Reese’s observations. I drew the outline of Rotty & Reese colored in the mold spots & mushy parts.  If you have an older child, let them do the recording & drawing.

September 13

September 14

Sunday, 7:15pm

“It’s rotten. It looks kind of ashy. His mouth is getting all rotten. I see a spider on the pumpkin. There is more mold today. I see bugs. They must be looking for food in Rotty. He feels soft.”

September 15
Monday, 6:30pm
“He’s rotten & smells like a dirt pile. His face is all gooey. You can see where I stuck my finger in. Look at all the pumpkin juice! The back is falling & tipping over. I wish Rotty would stay a little bit longer. His color is black & orange.”

September 17
Wednesday, 7:15pm
“He is rotten. He is smaller because he’s going down. Inside there’s a lot of mold! It smells like pumpkin to me…and dirt. I don’t see any bugs today. There’s a soft part on his head.”

September 21
Sunday, 7:15pm
“He’s so small! Not big & bumpy. You can still see where I put my finger. He’s decomposing. Part is soft from decomposing, but part is hard because it dried up. There’s a fly on him. He must eat the pumpkin. The back is sinking fast!”

September 22

Monday, 7:30pm
“He’s not like that anymore…not full. He looks like rotten eggs. He’s all brownish. Look inside…mold! He is small. I see a Junebug in there…it’s laying in Rotty. I see a fruit fly inside…lots of fruit flies!”

September 26
Friday, 3:00pm
“He’s not big & tall. He feels hairy. He’s dry. It’s called evaporate. Our guess was wrong. I thought he would turn into goo. We see fruit fly larva from Larva Land. No, really, they came from fruit flies.”

This was a GREAT experiment to do together. It was Reese’s first chance at long term observation, and our record book helped keep track of the changes each time we looked. I had to put a note on Rotty that said “Please excuse our science experiment!” because I was afraid our dear UPS lady would think we’re nuts!

It’s been really, really hot here. I’m talking about 110 degree highs every day!

It’s hot enough to melt crayons in my van. Unfortunately, I know this from personal experience. We decided to see how well they would melt outside and experiment with an art project while we were at it. I am going to show you the art of crayon melting and how to have fun with it.

Each child placed some wax paper on a white poster board. Then they decorated their wax paper with bits of broken crayons that are too small to draw with anymore.

Nicholas made an outline of a house with some grass and the sun shining up above.

Once the crayons were placed and a little glitter was added (everything is better with glitter, right?) then the children covered their work with another piece of wax paper. They had to add a few sticks around the edges to keep the top sheet of wax paper from blowing away.

Then we let the sun do it’s work.

Some of the crayons melted rather quickly. Others took a little longer.

It was fun to watch them all ooze and change the look of the art work being created right before our eyes. It was like “living art”.

Being two years old, Rachel is compelled to touch everything. So of course she had to touch her art work as she saw it moving around on the page. I love letting them be free to test what will happen when they do something new instead of holding them back so they don’t “mess” up their art work. Art is about the process. It is about the act of creating.

By experimenting, Rachel came up with a whole new twist to our living art project. Instead of just letting the sun have all the melting fun, we decided to use sticks to draw and design with the melted crayons through the wax paper.

I think it turned out beautiful and the blends of colors are much more vibrant than they would have been if Rachel had just let them melt where they had originally been placed.

Nicholas liked blending his crayons with a stick.  He decided that his picture which started out as a house now looked like a volcano – grass on the bottom, blue mountain, red/orange/yellow lava.

Another example of the beauty of living art that changes it design and focus and outcome as the process unfolds.

We all know what baking soda & vinegar will do when combined.   Let your child discover this magical chemical reaction for themselves.  Make sure you’re somewhere that messes are easy to clean up (I prefer the cul-de-sac in front of our house!).

Choose a small plastic soda bottle, grab a box of baking soda, a jug of vinegar, & a funnel. Put a few drops of dish soap in the bottle ahead of time to make the result more visible.  Then throw out the rule book.  No measuring.  No input from Mom.  Just let the kids explore & see what happens!

If they’ve never use a funnel in a functional way before, show them that when you put the funnel into the neck of the bottle, it is easier to pour your powder & liquid into the bottle without spilling.

 You can talk together about what is happening.  The acid (vinegar) and the base (baking soda) are having a chemical reaction, releasing carbon dioxide gas.  The bubbles are visible because the dish soap captured the carbon dioxide.

I like to purchase a 5lb bag of baking soda from Sam’s Club.  It’s not too expensive & allows for plenty of experiments.  A gallon jug of vinegar is also relatively cheap & then you’ve got plenty of liquid to add to your baking soda for many more repititions!

Because….your child will not be satisfied with one go-round of this!  I guarantee they will want to do it again & again!

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This week my favorite outdoor play posts were:

Earth Sky Sea Child. I love the items they found while going on a nature hunt – they put them in an indoor bin for nature play.

Happy Little Messes had fun with her kids on a creek-bed.  They created lagoons out of sticks and leaves… then used their boots to scoop water for the river.  Love how resourceful they were!

Happy Hooligans has a great post with lots of different outdoor play ideas and tips on how to use natural items in fun activities.

Caro & Co had fun collecting and forming grasses into nests.  Their tutorial is simple enough for most two-year-olds to follow.  Love it.

Jardim De Infancia do Coto is a blog written in Portugese, but the pictures are phenomenal.  I love how they took their class out to have fun tracing and exploring with shadows and dirt!

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Just a reminder:  We love links back!!  And by linking a recent post you are giving us permission to use a photo from the post to feature you.  All posts must be family friendly and relating to kids and/or play   Happy linking!

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