During the holidays, as many parents know, kids expect you to entertain them from morning till dawn.  Unless the day is action packed, it’s a “boring” day and “I don’t have anything to do” day.

On one of those days, we made a batch of homemade playdough (play dough).  In summer, we tend to spend more time outside and kids didn’t play with it for a while.  Not only  did the playdough keep them occupied for hours – to mum and dad’s delight, but also there is an educational element to it: development of fine motor skills, blending colours, exploring senses like touch and feel, to name a few.

Instructions on how to make homemade playdough:

This is a simple no cook playdough recipe which you can make within minutes.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup flour
• ½ cup salt
• 1 teaspoon cream of tartar
• 1 tablespoon oil
• 1 cup boiling water
• natural or food colouring (eg. beetroot, turmeric powder), optional

Note:  Increase the above amounts two or three times for more playdough which can be divided and coloured differently.

In a bowl mix all dry ingredients.

Add oil, liquid colouring and boiling water (warn kids if they are helping!) and stir until it all comes together.

This is a proper way. As you can see above, I usually put dry and wet ingredients all at once and then stir. Here I added a bit of beetroot juice, but, oops, forgot to add oil.  Still it came good.

Tip the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead it until it becomes smooth. If the playdough is still too hot to touch, leave to cool a bit.

Divide into several portions and add different colouring few drops at the time to each. Knead well into the playdough.

Store in an airtight container after play time.  It will dry out quickly otherwise.

Last step, but not the least, have fun and play with your kids (for a little while)! It’s very therapeutic for adults, too, as you can see in the picture below !

On the McKenzie’s Cream of tartar packet there is cooked playdough recipe if you prefer this method:

2 cups four

4 tablespoons cream of tartar

2 tablespoons cooking oil

1 cup salt

food colouring

2 cups of water

Mix the above ingredients in a saucepan, and stir over medium heat for 3-5 minutes, until the mixture congeals.

Few more tips:

• For a textured playdough, add some oats, dried lavender or herbs.
• Add a few drops of natural cooking essence like orange, peppermint or almond for a nice smell, but omit if that will tempt small kids into eating the playdough – it IS natural, but way too salty.
• If the kids manage to eat some, don’t be alarmed, it won’t hurt them, they’ll just be very thirsty!
• Be alarmed if they eat commercial playdough – it is full of chemicals, with a weird sweet smell.
• Once the playdough starts to smell rancid, dries out or gets very dirty, it’s time to make another batch.