Kindergarten: Holding Hands and Sticking Together: Holiday Playdough and Candycane Fun!

I just finished making my playdough for the next couple of weeks. Here is what I came up with:

My new favorite recipe for playdough is this one using Bisquick:

Bisquick Playdough
2 cups Bisquick
1 cup salt
2 cups water
1 Tbsp cream of tartar
1 Tbsp oil

Mix all ingredients in a microwave safe bowl. Microwave for 3 minutes. Scrape and stir the bowl. Microwave for another 3 minutes. If it is not quite ready, microwave for another minute.
(I made a double batch and put it back in my microwave for one more minute, which worked perfectly.)

I like this playdough because it really lasts well. A double batch actually made 6 of these sized balls- but I was experimenting with Christmas ideas and ruined one... I had these big, shiny confetti shapes like these that I thought would be fun:

NOT.

They didn't mix in and were too much. Lesson learned and only five playdough balls left.

So I decided to go with Snowball (white with colored glitter), Christmas Tree (green coloring with cut up red and green tinsel pieces and some little gold stars), Cocoa (all I did was add LOTS of cocoa powder, and it smells awesome!), Gingerbread (cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg ), and Candy Cane (red coloring and mint extract).

I was thinking I could make Peppermint Patty playdough and have the brown cocoa playdough and some white with mint extract. Yum.

I also looked for some pine scented essential oil in the store this morning, but they didn't have any. I was thinking that may work well in the Christmas Tree playdough. I COULD tell you that I put it in there, couldn't I? I forgot that you can't smell through the computer. Well, I am honest- and I didn't put it in. The ones that smell don't have any "extras." The ones that don't smell, have some bling in them. It will be fun for the kids!

Here are some cute Christmas Tree Playdough Mats from Jennifer Brown's TPT store. My kids would love rolling out the bulbs for the Christmas trees.

She also shared some wonderful Snowman Playdough Mats! Thank you, Jennifer!

Here are some other cute Winter Wonderland Mats from OkinawanGirl's TPT store.

FREEBIE! Winter Wonderland Playdough Mats

KidSparkz shared 20 Playdough Mats for September through December!

20 Playdough Mats for Themes September through December

Back to the topic of mint extract, I made some candy cane activities last week.

Jenny Spencer at Ignite Learning posted this idea on Pre-K and K Sharing. I loved it and tried it right away. It was so easy and a HUGE hit! I cut simple candy cane shapes from plain white paper, added mint extract to the red paint and popped in two marbles. The room smelled wonderful, and the kids had so much fun.

For this candy cane activity, I cut lots of large, medium, and small red and white circles. I had each size on its own table. The kids could make whichever sizes they wanted. This was a lot of fun for them because they made these all on their own and had choices. My camera battery had died at this point...so here are my samples. :( I didn't even make them write sight words or anything on them- nope! JUST for fun.

This simple little paper is fun for a whole class writing activity, or to send home for extra practice. Just click on the top picture if you would like a copy of this worksheet.