Made Fairy Mud This Morning

[Unregistered]

so-so

I had the kiddos make it today as part of a birthday celebration for one of the girls. I had brought out 4 rolls (the cheapo brand from Safeway) of toilet paper for 3 girls, and I had grated one bar of soap, then let them do the half bar. I have some mixed reviews on this...first off, I didn't think there was enough toilet paper to make a decent amount of fairy mud. We ended up using all 4 rolls, extra colored water, and I still wouldn't think it was enough for all 3 of them to really do anything substantial with it. We used two types of glitter and seashells. They loved putting it all together...and then this is where we had a larger issue...out of 3 girls, only 1 of them wanted to play with it for an extended period of time! They were afraid of getting dirty! I couldn't believe it. I grew up in the country with gardens, etc., and I would have been laughed out of town. It's not like it was dirty or ugly. It was rose-colored glittery play dough, basically.

But they kept saying how they didn't want to get dirty, made "ew!" noises the whole time, etc. Luckily, the oldest girl, age 6, really got into it. It compelled her younger sister, age 4, to come back and try it again. But the birthday girl, age 4, refused to come back and play with it. I know it is from parental influence. They don't want their kids to get dirty (have had parents tell me they like bringing their kids here because we do stuff they just don't like to do at home...i.e. sand, play dough, science experiments, cooking time, etc.)

I keep telling them the wonderful thing about skin is that it can always be washed off right back to the way it was before they played. Has anyone else had this problem?

[Sugaree]

Tip on the Ivory soap...don't grate it, microwave it. Put it on a microwave safe plate for 2 mins and let the kids watch. Do one at a time. It will expand huge but that is ok and the kids get a kick out of seeing it. Take it out and let it cool and then put it in a container and let them crumble it. It is SO much easier than grating and I think it dissolves easier in the water after too. I let my kids handle the soap first so they could see the changes in it.

I make my own laundry detergent and use this method for processing the soap for it. The first time I did it, it took weeks to get the smell of soap out of my microwave. It didn't affect the taste of anything I cooked, but the smell was definitely there. My husband made me buy a cheap, used microwave after that.

[bklsmum]

I make my own laundry detergent and use this method for processing the soap for it. The first time I did it, it took weeks to get the smell of soap out of my microwave. It didn't affect the taste of anything I cooked, but the smell was definitely there. My husband made me buy a cheap, used microwave after that.

I make my own too and do the same thing with the Fels Naptha but the smell goes away right away for me. Weird.

[Sugaree]

I make my own too and do the same thing with the Fels Naptha but the smell goes away right away for me. Weird.

It's probably my old microwave, but for weeks every time you used it you could smell Fels Naptha. Like the smell was coming out of the vents on the bottom. It never affected the food though. I didn't mind it, but it gave my husband headaches.