Play Doh!

Both of my kids are really into Play Doh lately, which I love because it's a great little activity to keep them busy while I fix dinner. Our supply of Play Doh, which at one time felt endless, has recently dwindled to a few hard brownish balls of formerly squishy dough. So we decided to make a batch ourselves the other day. I like the idea of knowing exactly what's in it (in case it makes it into someone's mouth) and being able to choose our colors. We bought some plastic containers to store the dough and with one batch were able to fill 8 containers, 4 for each kid. I decided to separate their play dough so each child could pick his/her colors and so that Sydney wouldn't ruin all of Pierce's dough by letting it all dry out! They loved making it and to be honest it is a lot softer and easier to use (especially for those little hands) than the store-bought stuff.

Here's the recipe:

2 cups flour

2 cups water

1 cup salt

4 tsp cream of tartar

2 T. cooking oil

food coloring

Mix dry ingredients in a large sauce pan. Add oil, water and food coloring (if you want to make just one color - otherwise you can add the coloring to the finished dough and knead it in with your hands). Cook on medium heat until the mixture pulls away from the pan. Knead slightly on wax paper. Keep in an airtight container.

The only ingredient you may not have on hand and that costs more than a few pennies is the cream of tartar, so check your spice rack before you get started! We forgot to check first and got everything in the pan and realized we were one teaspoon short on cream of tartar, so we had to hit the store.