This Is Not For The Faint Hearted: Gloop

Let me just warn you, read the following with “children doing the experimenting during balmy days in the back yard” in your head, because this kind of play- indoors- is not for the faint hearted… or those with any pride or joy in a clean kitchen.

I’m part of the Irish Parenting Bloggers group, and it is through them, I usually find some great ideas to bake, cook and make. Naomi at Dr. How’s Science Wows is normally my go-to for interesting and fun experiments (one of my favourite sites: I regularly attribute all sorts of wonderful ideas to Naomi for no other reason other than if its interesting and fun, it’s more than likely to be from there!) Recently, a new blogger has joined our group, Ciara from Our Little House In The Country. Ciara has a blog full of great activities to do with your children.  This “Gloop” recipe has been one I have been thinking of making for ages. I bought a bag of cornflour for this very purpose months and months ago, so when I spotted it on Ciara’s blog, I decided to make it, today, while it was dry and sunny and Grace and James could do it outside rather than on my recently-cleaned kitchen floor. But, just as we compiled our ingredients and I had them all fired up to play with this Gloop, the heavens opened and it poured, and poured and wouldn’t stop.blog gloop

So we set up on an old towel on my recently-cleaned kitchen floor, and I watched the destruction of my kitchen my children engage in, what is termed in these modern times as “sensory play”; known, in the olden days as: “making a mess”. Whichever way you want to label it, they had great fun: I filled bowls of things for them to mix through: rice, oats, mixed spice, sugar, salt, flower petals, cooking oil, effervescent viamin C tablets.

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Afterwards, when Fergal (kind man that he is) helped me tidy it up, there was quite a bit of adult-sensory-play: wow, that stuff is amazing. Soft and liquid when you run your fingers through it, hard as a brick when you hit or push it. The mixed spice made it smell delicious too (although I didn’t experiment with how it tasted. Unlike James. Bleuuugh)

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