Ooblek

Being a stay at home mom of a 14 month old daughter I've realized that she is getting a little too old to sit around and watch reality television all day.  Boy, she wants a lot of attention!  I can barely get through my coffee while watching Real Housewives before she wants me to play with her.  ;)

So, I've been trying to think of new things to do with her.  I've been wanting to finger paint with her, but where the heck do you find finger paints that are cheap? 

We are planning on going to a local farm as soon as the weather is a little nicer, but today we played with ooblek.  I saw this on facebook and thought why not.  Originally I had planned to have her play with it this while I made dinner as daddy was working late, but I made it a little bit earlier and off we went into the kitchen. 

If you don't know what ooblek is (I had to google it) apparently it is a liquid and a solid (which has a long fancy scientific word that I couldn't tell you if my life depended on it) and also was in Dr. Seuss.  You take 1 cup of water to 1 1/2-2 cups of corn starch.  I started with 1 1/2 cups of corn starch and then added a little more to thicken it up.  I'm not super big on measurements so I can't tell you how much extra I added. 

I will caution you against dumping it on your child's high chair tray which is what I did.  It's a little challenging to clean up because you aren't supposed to be it down your drain.  I had a hard time getting it off the tray and into the garbage while holding the tray and trying not to spill it.  The nice thing is that once it dries on things (like your grandmother's old, wood, one of a kind hutch) it is super easy to get up. 

Here is Em checking out her ooblek.  Oh, and I may have made a little much.  But it was so cool!  I'm not gonna lie...I sat and played with her. 

Poor girl was so tired tonight.  Her naps have been crazy.  She's napping at 8am for 45 minutes and then falling asleep at 11:45am for about an hour to hour and a half and then not wanting to sleep any more so by dinner she is exhausted.  Although considering she was on a napping strike earlier this week due to not feeling well I'm just glad she's napping.  I feel like I've spent the last 14 months of my life obsessing over her sleep schedule. 

So, now I've had my glass of wine, a bowl of popcorn (I've been obsessed with stove popped popcorn lately), and my husband is watching the NFL draft (yay!) and talking out loud to himself and yelling at the tv.  I, on the other more refined hand, need to get back to my book as all the ebooks I've requested from my library are suddenly available.  Yikes! 

Cheers to the almost weekend!