Summer of Blazing Imagination #4 - Glow in the dark water

So this is actually from July...I'm just really, really behind on post...

Today's Summer of Blazing Imagination activity is super easy! Last year I picked up several packages of glow in the dark sticks/rings from the dollar store, planning to use them on the 4th of July when we went to see fireworks. Well due to the weather conditions, fireworks were banned & after using them for a fun glow in the dark bath last summer; I completely forgot about the glow sticks.

Well I found them again & timing is perfect for this 4th of July, however since I have plenty I decided to update the glowing bath activity from last year. We did do this in the evening, but who says bathtime has to be in the evening? This would be great fun in the middle of the day...which is actually when I wish I would have done it because B had a ton of energy after this. 

Here's all you need. Paper & crayons optional.

To change it up this time I added carnival balls (similar to ping pong)

& made the sticks into rings or hoops. The object is to see how many of each color ball you can get in a ring.

*The rings sink on an angle and move with the waves of the water, so it can be difficult to get the balls into the hoops.

To add a little learning to the game, we kept score by charting. After bathtime, we looked at the chart, counted and determined which had more/less points.

Simple.Easy.Learning!



Noodle Sculptures

The temperatures keep climbing; this weekend it was 112! Now I'm a Texas girl, but come on, can we get a little break. Do you know how hard it is to keep an almost 3 year old inside most of the day? Almost impossible, unless you want to go crazy by the mid afternoon. So with that in mind, I've been trying to find activities that keep us cool enough to be outside...even if only for 15 to 30 minutes. Today resulted in Noodle Sculptures. These are simple & so limitless. Great for indoors or out. Take a pool noodle cut it into sections, then add some toothpicks and let the creativity begin.

 Simple sculpture.

Placing the toothpicks in.

 The second B started this, I thought 'that looks like a birthday cake.'

Adding a few more toothpicks.

Look Momma, 'I made a cake with candles!' Yes, he thought this up on his own.

I just happened to see the same thing in the sculpture he was building. Like mother, like son. ;)

Tugboat pushing 'barges'.

He was trying to make a dinosaur, and got most of the way. I helped him finish with the mouth

& 'spikes' on it's back. B had fun making his floating dino chase boats in the pool.

*If you use the toothpicks in the water,

after 10 minutes or so they do start to splinter easily when pushing them through the noodles.

We tried to keep them out, but some how wound up with a floating pile in the water.

What do you do on a HOT day?

It's day 49 of 100+ temperatures here; and Thursday is suppose to be 108! So what do you do with a preschooler to beat the heat & make it educational? You go on a scavenger hunt for food...snack that is. I took a bowl and filled it with ice cubes, added raisins (or your choice of snack) & let the digging begin.

Once snack was over, the ice that didn't melt yet was transferred to our water table

where we learned about solids vs liquids.

                       As the rest of the ice chunk broke apart and fell into the water table,

                                 B had icebergs for the boats to maneuver around.