Favorite Tot Activities of the Week

Homeschooling multiple kids can be a balancing act. Depending on the range of ages of the kids, it can be hard to find that good middle ground. Too much focus on the younger ones and the education of the older ones suffer. Too much attention on the older kids, and the younger ones demand attention…at least mine does. 😉

This week though, I feel like I was able to strike a pretty decent balance. I feel like I can conquer the world now! Or, at least take on next week. haha

Quick note. To help achieve this balance, the girls had taken it upon themselves to knock their math out first thing in the morning before breakfast. Thus taking the pressure off the rest of the day to make sure it got done and opening up more free-time later in the day to pursue whatever their interests are at the moment.

Here are the activities I found this week that kept my very active Little Man busy so that I could give the girls some attention. We were all in the same room, which always helps him feel like he is a part of whatever is going on.

Activity #1- Chocolate Scented Playdough {Homemade}

Quick No Cook Homemade Playdough — with a twist {and without cream of tartar}

Back when the girls were in preschool, the teachers had a sign-up sheet asking the parents to each take a month to make playdough for the class to play with. The colors would vary depending on what the theme for the month was. I definitely made my fair share of it. The school provided a recipe to make sure it was everything coming into the classrooms was allergy-safe. This particular recipe was for a cooked, unscented playdough. Once the girls were done with preschool, a part of me was glad not to have to make any more playdough. [Hey, that was 4 years of playdough making! Four years of large playdough batches that took a ton of flour, almost a whole container of salt and enough cream of tartar that would make me constantly need to make last minute trips to Kroger.]

After preschool, we had a TON of the store-bought Play-Doh in our home and a ton of the playsets. With our last move, we cut down on some of our containers and sets that just didn’t see much play time.

Enter my Little Man. I recently found a three-pack of Play-Doh hiding in my garage. (It may have been hiding…or I may have just forgotten to bring it in the house when unpacking…) He has enjoyed playing with the stuff and life was good.

Or so I thought.I was checking out some people on Instagram the other day and saw a mom sharing her genius idea {you can see it here}. Seriously, it’s such an awesome idea. Homemade SCENTED playdough! She tinted her dough orange and added orange zest. I know, amazing!