Fun Things We Add to the Mud Kitchen

I have been working my way through Dawn's YouTube channel, The Minimal Mom, while I declutter and organize my house, and watching the different videos helped me to realize one of the things that I was already doing well. And that's meal planning!

So I want to actually do a post about my weekly meal planning routine because I feel like I have something useful to share in that regard. But one thing that came to me a few days ago when I was looking through my fridge was I don't feel like hunting for recipes to use up ground flaxeed... and I just want to give it to Zac for his Mud Kitchen! Ground flaxeed + water makes great "mud" for plastic animals to play in too, if you have an indoor sensory bin and a super-rainy or super-cold day to get through.

Here's my list of fun things to add to the Mud Kitchen. What are yours?

water beads

biodegradable packing peanuts

ground flaxseed

spices

cornstarch

colored water

A lot of these ideas have come about by accident. "Spices" came from doing HelloFresh. Every time a spice came in a packet and I already had it in the cabinet, I just used mine and gave the packet to Zac for the Mud Kitchen. We actually had a special place on the kitchen windowsill for spices he could come get at any time!

We first did the water beads on June 1, 2018 when we did Wombat Stew for Picnic & Play. Zac was three at that time, and it was our first day of school.

Wombat Stew
by Marcia K. Vaughan

I first handed out biodegradable packing peanuts for kids to dissolve when Leah did Starch in the grade 8 Organic Chemistry: Food & Nutrition block. But now we use them all the time in the Trash Timeline lesson.

I gave Zac colored water for the Mud Kitchen completely on a whim one day last year when we were cleaning up from the Archimedes Screw (grade 7 Simple Machines). I was about to pour it out on the ground. But he loved it!

dyeing water so we can better see how it travels up the Archimedes Screw

we try holding the screw at different angles and use the two colors of water (green and purple) to easily compare how each goes up the tubing

the steepest angle works best, and green water goes flying out the top!

Zac happily gets the colored water at the end for his Mud Kitchen

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