Comments (14)

By Mom Unplugged, September 21, 2008 8:57 pm

Last week for our sand Unplugged Project, I had an idea for making permanent sand castles which I had seen as a proofreading exercise in my daughter’s spelling workbook! (Spelling Workout, Level D, Modern Curriculum Press, p. 12)

Hey, you never know where you might find inspiration, right? My kids vetoed me last week for this particular sand project, and chose to do something else instead, but I figured we’d get to try it for this week’s theme of hard. Plus, since it was recently my sister’s birthday and she loves Hawaii, we made sand sculptures for her.

We followed the instructions in the spelling book. We needed sand, cornstarch, and water. The recipe called for 2 cups sand, and 1 cup each of cornstarch and water. We doubled it.

Sand was easy. We went out to our big sand pile and scooped up 4 cups of sand and put it in a big cooking pot. We then poured in 2 cups of cornstarch:

And 2 cups of water:

And stirred over low heat.

We stirred for a while. It was very runny, but looked yummy, like melted chocolate ice cream.

After about 10 minutes we got bored and left it alone for another 5 minutes or so. When we rechecked it, it had transformed into a solid, stiff lump! I had to trade in my plastic spoon for a sturdy metal one or it would have snapped in two! It was so stiff that in this photo, the spoon is standing up on its own:

I had prepared the kitchen table with our craft tablecloth as well as a plastic garbage bag for easier clean-up. We dumped the mixture out on the garbage bag to cool.

It cooled quickly and soon we were all playing with the warm, squishy, sand playdough. It felt really nice.

Eventually, it started to dry and get a bit crumbly so I put out a bowl of water to sprinkle on it. A spray bottle of water turned out to be even better, and more entertaining.

We shaped it and poked it with sharp pencils, toothpicks, even a funnel.

Afterwards we put our creations on plates to dry. Here are the results:

The next day, we unfortunately discovered that my 2 year-old’s hand print and the starfish were breaking apart. The two sand castles however, were fine. I would recommend this project only for larger, 3-D sculptures, but the thinner, flat ones were disappointing. But…in case you were wondering, the pot cleaned up fine!

PS: In reviewing last week’s projects, I saw that Meg had made something similar as part of her sand project, but used sand and glue instead of cornstarch. She used molds to make starfish and they turned out really well! Consider experimenting with molds for extra fun if you try this. Karen B. also made “sand clay” similar to our recipe and added salt to hers to slow spoiling.

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Did you join in this week’s Unplugged Project themed hard? If so, then please add a link to your project in Mr. Linky below. If you didn’t join us this week, then feel free to browse the links below and read about how to join in for next week!

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Next week’s Unplugged Project theme will be:

Fruit

Enjoy!

Comments (9)

By Mom Unplugged, January 13, 2008 10:31 pm

We did not do well with the Unplugged Project this week (theme: Sculpture).

With me being plugged in more than usual and a few ski trips plus homework that had to be done, I am afraid we didn’t get to do anything new for “sculpture.” That’s a shame, since the children were excited about it, and seemed to have some interesting ideas.

I did take a picture of an old project that the kids did one day, all of their own devising.

Are you all familiar with Sculpey Clay? Ever since making Sculpey Clay beads in art class one time, my children are quite enamored of it.

Sculpey Clay is a modeling clay that you mold and then bake in the oven. After being baked, it turns hard and can be drilled, painted…whatever.

This picture depicts some Sculpey Clay cookies made by my son (age 5). On the right, you can see a baby in a cradle, complete with pillow by my 7 year-old daughter.

Unfortunately I baked the baby and cradle too long and they turned from red (cradle) and beige (baby) to jet black! So although I recommend Sculpey Clay to those who have never tried it, be sure not to overcook unless you want everything to turn black!

So what sculptures did you and/or your kids create this week? If you made some sculpture, please put your link in Mr. Linky so that we can find each other.

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Next week’s theme: Toothpicks.

Why? I don’t know, but that’s what popped into my head. Sorry!
Heather wisely pointed out that pointy toothpicks and little boys might not be the best combination so she is going to change it a bit for next week. That is totally fine!

Since we all have children of a wide variety of ages, and there are even adults who do the project from time to time, remember you are always welcome to change and adapt a theme. How about popsicle sticks, or twigs, or anything you want!

The point is to have some TV-free fun with your children (or for yourself). If we can do it together and share our projects once a week, that makes it even more enjoyable. So do whatever you want that fits your child’s age and interests, but the one requirement is to have fun (oh, and be sure to stop by next Monday and tell me what you did, OK?).

Good luck!