What's a little Playdoh mess if the kids can have lots of fun?

Honestly, I really do not like Playdoh, or any other type of dough. I find them very messy when the kids are done playing with them. There would be small bits and pieces all over the table and floor. The kids would step over it and it will be all over the house.

I tried asking the kids to clean it up but they created an even bigger mess which I still ended up cleaning myself. So I could only get them to put the toys back into the box while I clean up the mess.

Isabel loves playing with Playdoh. Ethan likes it too but not as much as Isabel. She kept asking me to buy Playdoh all the time. It not cheap and the dough comes in small quantity. The kids are still too young to know how to play properly and usually end up mixing all the colours that the dough looked something like poo!


So I told Isabel that I would make the dough myself. Since knowing that we could make the dough ourselves, she had been bugging me about it for a week. I tried to delay as long as possible as I really do not like the mess that the dough is sure going to leave me.


On the other hand, the dough would be able to keep them occupied for around 1 - 2 hours at a time. That would leave me some time to rest and maybe read a book. The thought of not having the kids keep bugging me certainly outweighs the thought of having to clean up afterwards. After all, how much time would it take to vacuum the bits and pieces of dough off the floor?

So I left work at 6pm sharp yesterday and went to buy the food colourings to make the dough. It was an extremely easy recipe from http://www.bestrecipes.com.au/recipe/no-cook-play-dough-L2119.html. All I needed was floor, oil, salt, water and food colouring. I already had everything at home except the food colouring.

Isabel and Ethan couldn't wait to get started on it when they knew I finally had all the ingredients. They rushed to complete their homework and begged me to start immediately. The process of making the dough was just as much fun as playing the dough afterward.

Here's a look at what we did:

And yes, the dough left lots of small bits on the floor.The texture was not as smooth as Playdoh or other store-bought dough but it was good enough for the kids. They definitely did have so much fun and I had to rush them to go to bed as they have school the next day.

Such little effort for such big fun.... definitely will do this for the kids again.