All Things Playdough

All three kids are asleep and it’s 9pm. So naturally, I’m making playdough. What else would I be doing?

I haven’t always gotten this excited about playdough. It’s just playdough, right? You buy it in little plastic cans and the kids mix all the colors up and it dries out and then you have playdough crumbs all over your house and it’s all shades of brown and that’s that. Except then you have to buy new playdough, so you can do it all over again.

And then…! A couple of years ago I saw where some stay-at-home-mom posted about making her own playdough. Even though I was teaching preK pretty close to forty hours a week, I figured why not? I’m always cooking and baking things, and I am always attracted to more “natural” ways of living and parenting…honestly, I couldn’t articulate why I thought it was a thing I needed to do…call it a random whim, but I’m SO GLAD I DID IT.

I haven’t bought a can of playdough since! As it turns out, homemade playdough is so much softer, lasts so much longer, and is so cheap and easy to make. I do this at least once a season, and honestly it’s never because it’s gotten hard or dried out. I remake it because I get bored and want new colors or scents OR because I get grossed out by all the germs I imagine have taken up residence in or on my playdough. I have no research on that so far, because I’m afraid to search for the research for fear of what I may find…so it’s entirely possible I’ve imagined the whole thing and there are no germs on my playdough. The world may never know. Either way, we wash or sanitize after playdough. Just in case.

But I digress. My summer playdough saw some hard use and now included random bits of mud and bark and dead grass and was a murky shade of purple-brown, so I decided it was time for some FALL PLAYDOUGH. I made it orange and scented it with cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg. (I would have added vanilla but I was out.) As it was, I had to borrow some cream of tartar from a neighbor, who, fortunately, either understands the crucial nature of late-night, last-minute playdough-making, or humors me. Love her either way.

My kids (my personal kids, my school kids and other extra children I attract during the week) will spend long hours doing playdough.

Here are some of the ways in which I keep them engaged:

• I do not keep it out all the time. Over the summer I got it out one day a week. Now, I get it out roughly once a month and repeat it daily as long as it holds their interest, which is usually 3-4 days or so. Then several weeks later I get it out again and repeat daily for 3-4 days. Obviously if someone requests it, I’ll make it happen, but the very loose “schedule” on which I make it available works really well. The toddlers will often sit for at least 30-45 minutes, and the older kids will honest-to-goodness enjoy playdough for hours sometimes. For a two-year-old, even fifteen minutes is an awesome stretch. I even use it with my babies, but for those who want to put everything in their mouths, I place it in bags. That way, they can still enjoy the texture, but they can’t eat it! And obvi, I supervise them LIKE. A. HAWK.

• I switch up the colors and the scents! I usually make 2-3 colors at a time. I often make complementary colors (like pink/blue/purple or red/yellow/orange)...because it makes me twitch when they mix it and it looks like mud, but I don’t want to stress about them mixing it. If the colors complement one another, they can’t make brown when mixed. Voila! I can be the cool mom who doesn’t stress over mixed colors! You can use all kinds of things to scent your playdough - essential oils and cooking extracts work well. Spices are also great!

• I rotate cookie cutters. I have seasonal cookie cutters that I rotate out for playdough use. Today, I got out my pumpkins and leaves.

• I rotate different toys. They get playdough scissors or straws or forks or plastic knives or rolling pins…they get kitchen toys and they get cars and they get animals…but they don’t get all of those things every time. Keeps it more exciting.

• Sometimes we take our playdough outside. For whatever reason, this is more fun than inside. Also the cleanup is so much less stressful! This is true for soooo many things. I sometimes secretly take toys and activities outside because I hate to clean up my floor inside…and the benefits of nature for my kids are, shall we say, secondary to my joy that there’s less clean-up.

• Read to them while they tackle that playdough! This is a lovely way to pass a morning or an afternoon. The sensory experience is SO calming, and they are often able to tune into read alouds that are higher-level than their usual books. Break out those chapter books!

Here are some of the things we have done with playdough that you may enjoy repeating:

• Cupcake party: They got paper cupcake cups (silicone would work even better), candles, beads, and sprinkles and they went to town making cupcakes and singing happy birthday!

• Cookie baking: cookie sheets, beads for chocolate chips, spatulas.

• Playdough roads: I gave them a bunch of different vehicles with different wheels to make tracks.

• Intentional color mixing: great art lesson!

• For babies: put some in a ziploc bag and let them squish it and squeeze it! All of the sensory benefits, none of the eating.

• ADD GLITTER (If you’re reading this, Hubby, I’m really, sincerely sorry.)

That toddler conversation! And those chubby fingers working that playdough! And that Emily Arrow playing…!

How I make my playdough:

You will need:

1 cup all-purpose flour

½ cup salt

2 Tbsp cream of tartar (I don’t really know why this stuff is so important, but I use it in playdough and sugar cookies)

2 Tbsp vegetable oil or coconut oil

2 cups water

Optional: Food coloring/essential oils/cooking extracts…and glitter.

Whisk together your flour, salt, and cream of tartar. Do this right in the pot on the stove. Add your oil and water, mix it all up over medium heat. When it forms a ball and sticks together, it’s done! Take it off the heat and keep mixing/squishing as it cools so that it gets nice and smooth. You can add food coloring to the whole pot or, if you want more than one color, add it after. Same with any scent additives and with glitter.

Helpful notes:

• I absolutely always double/triple/quadruple this recipe. It doesn’t get wonky like some things do when you double them. It’s super easy and very hard to screw up.

• It’s an excellent arm workout. Sometimes I make Hubby do it for me. I mean, I wouldn’t want to overexert myself or make my arms look TOO great.

• It makes an excellent gift! Big Girl and I made this for her class for Valentine’s Day one year. Super cute, cheap, and not sugary!

If you try this, I’d love to hear about it. If you come up with any ideas for it that I have not shared here, spill, please! The rest of us would love to add another playdough idea to our repertoire.