Last week on Capturing Parenthood was all about Summertime Bubble Fun! This week is all about staying cool during those hot summer days. And what better way to keep cool than with some Summertime Frozen Fun?!?
No…I’m not talking Frozen…as in Elsa, Anna, and Olaf. π I’m talking about some ice-cold activities! Four super chilly, yet totally fun and engaging activities, that your little ones won’t want to miss.
Summertime Frozen Fun
Frozen Water Beads
We love water beads! They are fantastic for sensory play, and we’ve utilized them in a variety of different ways. We’ve made Water Bead Stress-Ball Balloons, we’ve created a couple of gorgeous Rainbow Water Beads Sensory Bottles, we’ve watched them float around in a Water Beads Lava Lamp, and we’ve added them to our super fun Sensory Walk – Texture Exploration activity! But when the sun is blazing, it’s nice to have something cooler to play with…like Frozen Water Beads!
All you need is some colorful water beads (already hydrated), a freezer-safe dish or tray (we used a metal cake pan), and some water. Place the hydrated water beads into the dish, and cover them with water. Place the dish into the freezer overnight. When you’re ready to play, grab the dish out of the freezer and pop it into a shallow tub. Grab some cups or squeeze bottles of water (cold and hot), and let your little ones explore!
Have them run their hands over the top of the frozen water beads – it’s a wonderfully cool texture! Then they can try pouring water on top to see what will happen. Ask them which temperature of water makes the water beads melt faster or slower. Let them experiment and play. Once they start melting, the water beads will develop a weird, mushy texture – which is a brand new sensory experience! π On that note…the water beads will essentially disintegrate…so you won’t be able to use them for future play.
Magic Ice
Have you ever seen ice cubes bubble and fizz as they melt? No? Not possible? What if you use magic ice cubes? π
What’s the magic behind these bubbling ice cubes? It’s our favorite combination of baking soda and vinegar!
Fill an ice cube tray with distilled white vinegar. Feel free to add some food coloring to the ice cube tray…to make the ice cubes even more fun and magical. Pop them in the freezer overnight. When you’re ready…pour baking soda onto a cookie sheet or shallow tray – making sure that the baking soda covers the bottom of the entire tray. Take the tray of baking soda (along with your vinegar ice cubes) outside into the warm sun. Pop the vinegar ice cubes out of the tray and place them on top of the baking soda. Sit back and watch what happens when the ice cubes start to melt and interact with the baking soda.
If the reaction is not quite fast enough for your little one…go ahead and grab a cup of vinegar and a baster (or pipette). Let them squirt more vinegar on top of the ice cubes, in order to speed up the reaction. We loved watching all of the colorful bubbles slowly ooze together in the tray.
Frozen Ocean – Animal Rescue
Frozen play becomes a lot more engaging and fun when there is a rescue mission involved! And since we made a trip to the beach this summer, I decided to setup a little Frozen Ocean – Animal Rescue activity. Our little nugget loved freeing all of the sea creatures from their frozen fortresses. π
All you need for this simple activity is a muffin tin, some blue water beadsΒ (already hydrated), a handful of ocean creatures, water, squeeze bottles, and some salt. Add some hydrated water beads to each muffin tin cup, place one (or two) ocean creatures into each cup, and fill with water. Place the muffin tin into the freezer overnight. When you’re ready to start the rescue mission, remove the muffin tin from the freezer and take it outside, into the hot sun. Grab a shallow tub or tray (to contain everything), as well as some squeeze bottles of water (hot and cold), and a salt shaker. The heat of the day should warm the muffin tin enough to release the frozen ocean creatures and water beads. Flip the muffin tin over, and let the frozen ocean cups fall into the shallow tub.
Let your kiddos know that it is their mission to save all of the ocean creatures. In order to do so, they must melt the ice as fast as possible. Let them experiment with the salt and squeeze bottles of water…until their mission is complete!
Frozen Poms
Do you have an abundance of those little colorful pom pom balls lying around your house? π Let’s put them to good use for our final icy activity! Frozen Poms are similar to frozen water beads, except the poms never disintegrate. Which means that you can still play with them, and manipulate them, once they have melted. You can squeeze the cold water from them, pop them into bottles, place them back in the ice cube trays…and when all is said and done…you can set them out to dry, so that you can reuse them for future crafts and activities!
All you need is various sizes of colorful poms, a couple of ice cube trays (we loved using our mini ice cube tray for our teeny-tiny poms), water, a shallow tub or tray, and some cups/water bottles/containers/slotted spoons, etc. Place the poms into the ice cube trays and cover with water. Pop in the freezer overnight. When you’re ready to play, take the frozen poms outside, and pop them out of the ice cube trays and into the shallow tub. Let your kiddos explore and experiment as the poms start to melt. Feel free to provide some water to help the melting process go a bit faster. Sit back and watch your little ones get creative!
Our little nugget loved scooping up the poms with various spoons and cups. She liked stuffing them through the mouth of a water bottle. And she spent quite a bit of time placing all of the teeny-tiny poms back into our mini ice cube tray! Lots of fine motor practice there! I loved watching her creativity, as she developed various new ways to play with the poms…once they had broken free of their icy shells. π
Sometimes those summer days can be stifling…but these four simple ideas are sure to keep you and your kiddos nice and cool! And if you’re looking for more ice-cold summer activities, make sure to check out our Frozen Goop – Summer Sensory Exploration blog post…as well as our Watercolor Ice Painting blog post!
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