Playdough!!

The other day, I had a crazy desire to make some homemade playdough. But I didn't want plain boring colored playdough, I wanted it to smell like fruit and be colorful!! I decided to try to use coolaid as coloring. After church on Sunday, I asked Jeff to bring me by the grocery store. I picked out four different coolaid colors and then excitedly went home to make the dough. I made the dough and it turned out perfectly. Then I divided it into four balls. I took four bowls and poured some of each coolaid powder into the bowls. Then I added a few drops of water to create a runny paste. I made a ball with the dough and poked finger prints into it, and then poured one color into each ball. Then I kneaded them to mix the colors. (Might I add...my hands are thoroughly stained now...coolaid does stain.) The green ball turned out beautifully. The blue ball turned out beautifully. And so did the pink ball. But the purple ball...turned out to be red. I decided I didn't like it, as I had wanted a purple ball. (I guess my problem was: I didn't get a grape packet, I got some fruity mix packet, like mixed berries or something. I dunno, all I know is it was red.) So I decided to try to mix some of the blue into the red to make purple. (do those colors even create purple?)So anyways, I added some blue and kneaded and kneaded and kneaded some more....by the time I was done, I realized I wasn't going to be getting the bright beautiful purple color I had desired. Instead, I got a nasty purplish-greyish-greenish-brownish color. ...Kind of like the color of your dog's poop. (Sorry to be so graphic.) It's really nasty to look at, but it smells really good!! That evening, Jeff and I played hookie from church (Something I DON'T encourage any of my readers to do) and instead played with playdough with Poppet and Lolly. We have so many playdough toys, it's crazy. We have every color. So I brought the box from the garage in. It was a ton of fun. It was like reliving my childhood. After we were done playing, we left the little girls alone to play. (Talk about foolish) About an hour later, we came back into the kitchen to find a huge mess! Poppet had decided to get creative and mix EVERY SINGLE COLOR into one big pile. (We had over 50 colors.)So now, we have 50+ containers full of a mirkybrown color. She was so proud of herself. But anyways, back to the mess...there was playdough everywhere!! Itty bitty tiny pieces were absolutely everywhere. It took us an hour to clean it. But it was a ton of fun, I want to make more sometime soon.

Here are some pictures and the recipe...

...Playdough...
3 cups flour
3 cups water
1 1/2 cups salt
3 tbsp oil
6 tsp cream of tartar

*Food coloring*

Mix and cook over medium high heat until it forms a ball. Stir out lumps. Remove from heat. Let cool for several minutes then knead until smooth. Then...ejoy!