Oobleck

I have been wanting to make Oobleck for quite awhile, but I was always waiting until we could read the book, "Bartholomew and the Oobleck" by Dr. Seuss. I decided to go ahead and make some on Sunday because the kids were getting stir crazy. They have been doing so good the last few weeks considering most of their stuff is still in boxes and they don't really have a routine yet. Our future "classroom" still looks like this:

Quite frankly, it is driving me nuts! I am a very organized person by nature and I can't stand the fact that our lives really don't have any organization yet. Callie and Josh are now sharing a room, so Jamey's cousin gave us a bunk bed. We have to paint it white, so it is in the garage until we have time to refinish it. Until then, we don't have anywhere to put their toys, so everything remains packed up except for the boxes the kids have managed to unpack all over the floor. I am very glad that we have a designated space for a classroom though, and I have high hopes for the future of this room.

We do have a sandbox, which I'm not super crazy about (I hate how sand gets everywhere, in every crevice, and I don't want it in my house), but it has given the kids something to do:

Josh's latest fashion statement, even at Wal-Mart!

So today I pulled out the old cornstarch and water to make up this fun mixture to get the kids off my back! :) I am glad I did, because it kept them busy for almost 2 hours! For those that don't know what Oobleck is, it is made by mixing one part water with 2 parts cornstarch. The mixture is almost solid like if you just hit it or bounce your fingers on it, but then if you just place your finger on top, it will slowly sink in. You can pick it up and mold it, but as soon as you stop, it'll seep through your fingers. It is really quite cool. Here are a few pics of the kids playing with it:

Mixing it together

It started to get too hard to mix with the spoon, so in went the hands.

Watching it seep through her fingers

An hour or so later, this is what the porch looked like.

Josh wanted the "masher" and he picked a tomato from the garden and squished it up in his bowl.

Even though we are only renting our house, which is a new experience for us, we are blessed to have awesome landlords who don't mind if we paint and are also cool with our dogs. We have an awesome, though small, backyard with a great garden that we inherited. Here is Kona's happy place:

The weather has been so great here, and we often leave our back door open. I love the fact that the kids can go in and out in their bare feet and not track dirt in (unless they've been in the sandbox). In our old house, there was so much dust and mud that they often never played in the backyard. So overall, we are loving Colorado!