I ran into a friend today. She is in the midst of it all – three kids under four years old.
She ran out for an hour to grab some groceries and a coffee by herself.
She looked at my kids as we chatted. Eloise was pushing Astrid in the grocery cart and giving her goldfish crackers. Esther was checking off the grocery list and picking out the best looking apples and oranges and placing them in the cart. I heard Eloise say “excuse me” to another shopper as she made her way down the aisle.
May I stop and just say that dragging my kids to the store is no longer dragging my kids to the store.
And my friend said to me “Don’t you just want to freeze time right here, right now? Just look at your kids. You have two that can make their own sandwiches – and clean up their mess yet they are at the ages where they still want to be with you more than their friends. And you can have meaningful conversations and see movies that aren’t stupid. It’s like that perfect in-between of them needing you constantly and before you rarely see them because of sports or friends or when they just want to hang in their room.”
I hugged her tight because I needed to hear those words. Also because she was going home to three that needed every little thing about her…which is amazing yet exhausting. And I told her that her time is coming.
That in a blink of an eye she will have three that are seven and eight and nine and she will wonder why the house has been so quiet for the past two hours and then she will find these kids in different corners of the house reading a book. These kids will walk past her to open the fridge and pour their own milk and grab some crackers.
And the next thing she knows, one of them will plop on her lap with legs hanging down as long as hers and want to talk about what they are reading. Or maybe to borrow her Mac. Which she will of course say no to because she needs to blog.
Anyway, my point of this whole story is that I hate Play-Doh. Hate it. I don’t buy it nor make it.
But I have this two year old who saw it somewhere and is obsessed with it. So we made it this week. It pretty much pissed her off though because we made it and I let her play with it for about 15 minutes and then we rolled it and cut it out and I baked it all so it really wasn’t any fun anymore.
But it did look like a yummy cookie and while I wasn’t looking she took a bite. Which kind of sucked since it tastes REALLY bad. So she spit it out and then got really mad that she could neither play with this stuff nor eat this stuff.
Which brings me back to my original point that Play-Doh is BAD!
However – you can make cute Valentines with it. We made cute conversation hearts, bookmark pendants/ornaments and if you use a smaller cookie cutter you can make cute little necklaces.
Homemade Play Dough Valentine’s Day Ornaments:
Mix together :
- 1 cup flour
-1/2 cup salt
- 3/4 cup water(add/subtract to make dough similar to roll-able sugar cookie dough)
- food coloring and glitter as you wish
Mix and roll and use a cookie cutter to shape. If you are making a pendant/ornament also poke a hold through before baking.
Bake at 350 for about 35-45 minutes
After they cool you can use them as is or you can paint and decorate as you wish. Such a fun craft for kids or for you if your kids are at school. Or a cool way to infuriate your two year old.
