messy play

[maizy]

What messy play do you do in your home with 2-5 year olds? Any websites that have good messy play ideas? Love to hear what you do.

[Jmo780]

We love to get cans of shaving cream, spray it all over the kitchen table and "draw" in it with our fingers. I have also used food coloring before in the shaving cream My kids are 10, 7 & 5 and ALL 3 of them love this!

That is about as messy as it gets I think, lol

[embers]

We do shaving cream in the shower/tub... but all over the place there! He can do it on toys, the shower wall, etc... and then has water guns to clean it up once finished drawing.

... can't go wrong with a sandbox!

My son has a wall in his room for this: We got several things of the cheap circle waterpaints (like that come in art kits or at a dollar store). I sit him down naked with a few cups of water, and he can finger paint on that wall! It adds color and spirit to the room, and the best part - it does not stain him or the wall! It washes off easily with water!!!

[roomformore]

We put an old shower curtain on the kitchen floor to get messy. The boys strip down to their britches, I get out the finger paints and some paper, and we paint. We often get more paint on ourselves than on the paper, but it is such great fun! Often we won't even get out the brushes and sponges. We've been doing this for years now and it's still a favorite.

[tnrsmom]

A friend of mine recently did a messy party for her dd's 4th b-day party. Everyone had a blast. She had poster paint with brushes (though these were not used for long) on the driveway (she ended up letting the kids paint her jeep and it is still that way a month later ), a pool with mud, a pool with water (though this did not take long to turn to mud as well), a sheet with a huge bag of flour and some bowl, sifters, etc... She had dough made up with bowls of sauce, cheese and toppings and the kids made their own pizzas for lunch and decorated their own cupcakes.

The only thing I would advise against would be the flour/water combo. My dd got her head wet and then dumped flour on top. She ended up with hair that was hard as a rock, kind of a paper mache helmet. It took a loooong time to get it all out. :

It was such a great party, one of the best I have attended and I have been to tons of parties.

[marieangela]

Just checking out some messy ideas on this thread. I've got a personal aversion to messes, but I feel like I ought to start letting my 3 1/2 year old do some messy play.

[roomformore]

Originally Posted by tnrsmom

The only thing I would advise against would be the flour/water combo. My dd got her head wet and then dumped flour on top. She ended up with hair that was hard as a rock, kind of a paper mache helmet. It took a loooong time to get it all out. :

Oh my! I can't imagine having to get that out of her hair. You either must have the patience of a saint, or she got a buzz cut!

[eminer]

They seem to get themselves messy spontaneously. Favorite activities include picking up handfuls of dusty dirt and dumping them on each other's clothes, splashing in dirty puddles, body painting, and applying nail polish (older one only -- I'd be scared to see what my 1yo could do with nail polish!).

[OakBerry]

Lol at the paper mache helmet!

My ds loves smushing things around on the table with his hands, like pudding, ice cream etc. I let him because it's easy to wipe up. Plus he otherwise doesn't like getting his hands sticky or dirty.

[sweetangelbrynlie]

homeade play doh. my son gets it EVERYWHERE!

[JuniperMama]

Oooh homemade play-doh! Recipe???

[sehbub]

Originally Posted by JuniperMama

Oooh homemade play-doh! Recipe???

Here's a good one!

http://www.mcps.k12.md.us/curriculum/pep/playdo.htm

[maizy]

www.ooeygooey.com This is the link I was looking for and finally came across it. It has great messy play ideas!

[shelley4]

subbing to get more ideas for my dd's upcoming Messy Party

[maizy]

We just did our messy party. The kids mixed water and corn starch. They mixed baby oil and flour. Painted my deck all different colors.
Played in the sand box which stuck to floury/oily bodies.
They hacked celery and added peanut butter and raisens then ate it. We called in ant salad....
Children were painted from head to toe. Shiney from the oil/flour combo.
I think the kiddos really had fun. After everyone left I hosed down, deck, child, self, etc. Very easy to clean up.

[hubris]

We need to be more messy.

Does anybody but me have issues with feeling like some messy activities are wasteful? Not accusing other mothers of waste, it's just that I have a hard time pouring out a whole bag of rice for a kid to play in, or using shaving cream that way, etc. I would love ideas that don't involve using tons of food/cosmetic products.

One of our favorite messy things is to work in the garden together!

[Sydnee]

We do flour and water messy play about once a month, granted, since I've had our 3rd child (she's 3 months) we haven't done it, but the kids loooove that!!

[momto l&a]

We live in the country, enough said.

They constantly try my ability to get their clothes clean and stain free.

[corhorvath]

What wonderful ideas!! A messy party--my daughter would be in Heaven!! My daughter is ALWAYS messy. Literally, I have to bathe her every night. She plays hard all day outside-but she with my parents while I work.:

I know outside she:

• does yardwork with my dad, but she thinks it's play
• does gardening
• has a sandbox on their deck.
• When she gets home with me, we pick berries (while they're in season)
• collect rocks

Inside we do a lot of:

• painting and glueing with feathers, sticks, and other things.
• she has a piggy bank and plays with her money. It's a different kind of messy-coins everywhere.
• beads to make jewelry.
• play-doh.

We have a "craft" room that we use to do most of our stuff in. She has a desk to work at but we generally do stuff on the floor with an old plastic tablecloth. I have sets of clothes that I don't mind if they get destroyed. We live in WA and don't have central heat so sometimes clothes are necessary, sometimes it's just her chonies.

We've never played with food but she generally makes a huge mess when she eats (ie, lays noodles across her face or like the other night instead of brushing her teeth, she toothbrushed her entire face) and I don't "correct" her, but it's her responsibility to clean it up when she's done or ask for help when the job's too big. I think we just generally have a messy-oriented home that gets picked up everyday/night.

[mamababamba]

I love this thread! For a while we kept tempera paint, brushes, a squeegee and a squirt bottle in the bath tub...and then anytime the "cook" gets in the kitchen it gets interesting....I let ds use stale anything, flour and spices in his cooking endeavors.