Do you ever remember playing in the kitchen while your mom or grandmother were baking?
The wonderful smells and the fun conversations not to mention the amazing treats that came out of the oven!
I know that technology and modern conveniences are great things but sometimes I really want to kids to experience life without all the bells and whistles. So I thought I would ‘re-create’ a day in Grandma’s Kitchen as part of our Discover & Explore December Activities linky.
This is the first post in our Vintage Play for Kids series where we’ll introduce some great throw-back ideas that are new to our kids!
Candy Cane Play Dough
The first thing we needed was something fun to cook!
And yes, we made some cookies but we also cooked up some Candy Cane Play Dough. We used The Imagination Tree’s recipe for the Best Ever No Cook Play Dough (I didn’t have glycerine so I just omitted that ingredient). This is really an amazing play dough recipe — it creates wonderfully soft and very stretchy dough that stores really well.
Our little addition was to put in some peppermint extract along with splitting the dough to make some white and use food coloring to color the other half red — smells and looks like Candy Canes!
Oh, and we also added red and white glitter for some holiday shimmer.
Now that we have ‘cooked’ up some fun (literally!), it’s on to playtime!
Playing Grandma’s Kitchen
I love the idea of playing of vintage play for kids! And kids really enjoy things like this because it’s new to them.
Most children haven’t seen some of the older, more vintage items that we enjoyed as kids.
There were no electric items when Grandma cooked, everything was done by hand. You mixed with a spoon and kneaded with your hands. For kids, using these vintage kitchen items is a wonderful way to practice large motor and fine motor skills and build finger and hand muscles.
Here’s a few of the wonderful kitchen tools you can use with the kids — I’m including affiliate links to items I was able to find online for your convenience and details about where else you might find some of these cool kitchen tools:
- a Child-size Wooden Rolling Pin
- a Classic Potato Masher
- metal or plastic cookie cutters
- a Hand-held Egg Beater
- a copper cheese shaker (these Glass Cheese Shakers
are also a great option!)
- a bowl of water (I used one of our vintage glass bowls)
- a cookie sheet or cutting board
- a Flour Sifter
(we don’t have one of these yet)
Now I know what you’re going to ask — where can you find these items?
This is the best part — call your Mom or Grandmother and ask them! I’m sure they’ll have some of them stored away (or maybe they still use a few of them too).
You can also find them at flea markets, in vintage shops, online and second-hand stores too. They are usually pretty inexpensive, sturdy and easy for the kids to handle. We found a 3/4 size rolling pin at a local vintage store and it’s just the perfect size for kids!
Here’s a fun invitation to play for the kids — set out the play dough along with items that you would use to make cookies and let them have some fun baking!
And even though we included glitter when we made the play dough, I also included additional glitter in the cheese shaker so the kids could decorate their cookies.
And this is why we call it Candy Cane Play Dough — we used a fun Candy Cane cookie cutter
Turn it into a Gift for the Kids
The holidays are a wonderful time to think outside of the box and give kids gifts that encourage some amazing play connections. And I also love to think about ways that family members can create personalized gifts.
This Vintage Kitchen Play Basket with some homemade play dough would make the perfect gift for any child!
Our co-hosts have some wonderful ideas for the holidays this week! And we’d love to see your posts too — please share any kid-friendly post that focuses on fun & play for the December Holidays!
Make sure to visit all our co-hosts for more fun ideas this week:
Fantastic Fun & Learning *** Buggy & Buddy
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- Share family-friendly posts related to the weekly topic — kids activities, crafts, recipes, nature outings, printables, etc.
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