Sand Play Dough

Last week Ella and Zoe, Irene and Julia (the 2 1/2 year old twins I babysit), and Tom and I went to our neighborhood beach and built a sandcastle and a sand turtle.

*the turtle is on the left in front of Ella*

This week the girls and I made homemade SAND PLAY DOUGH and individual sandcastles, using a super easy recipe from Family Fun magazine:

1) Mix 1 cup of sand, 1/2 cup cornstarch, and 1 teaspoon alum to a saucepan and use a wooden spoon to combine them completely.

2) Add 3/4 cup water and stir the mixture until it is smooth and the cornstarch is dissolved.

3) Cook the clay over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally. The clay should start to thicken within a minute or two (this part got to be quite the arm work-out).

4) After about 3 minutes of cooking, the clay will have thickened to the consistency of play dough.

Then the girls went to town squishing, forming, building, sculpting and creating their own unique sandcastles.

The final touch was adding flowers (we didn't have any seashells on hand). I think they turned out really cute and the process itself was a lot of fun : )

*Zoe's Sandcastle*

*Ella's Sandcastle*