Use a wheebarrow to create a mobile mud patch in your yard!

Today, I bring to you our mobile mud patch! Now, we’ve made a lot of mud pies in our day, and it’s always great fun.

Our recipe for mud:

I mix up a bucket of the black stuff using 2/3 potting soil, 1/3 sand, and a generous splash of water, and we usually just put down a plastic table cloth or large sheet of cardboard and get straight to work.

We use old kitchen utensils for scooping and mashing and splatting, and we decorate our pies with flowers, stones, pinecones, sticks etc.. A fun way to kick off the activity is to give each child a bag or bucket, and head out on a neighbourhood treasure hunt, collecting “ingredients” for decorating.

This year, we took mud play to a new level after I found Let the Children Play, and discovered all the different ways that Jenny and her readers had their children playing with mud. Their mud kitchens and mud pits had me green with envy, and got my wheels turning.

We filled our wheel-barrow up with a healthy helping of mud and added shovels, scoops trucks and diggers and made ourselves a mobile mud patch. A piece of wood for a ramp, and ta-da…we had a quarry. I placed a short plank across one end of the wheel-barrow, and put out utensils, dishes, sticks, flowers, stones etc. and that served as a counter for creating pies and cakes.

Add “running water” to the yard with a container and spigot that children can control:

I wanted the children to have access to water as they needed it, but a blast from the garden hose into the mud can be a little disastrous, so I brought out the water-jug that we take camping. The spigot was easy enough for even the littlest hands to turn off and on, and the Hooligans LOVED having complete control over “running water” in their play area.

Another great idea that I borrowed from a post I saw on Let the Children Play, was a “brick-laying” activity. We’ve had a stack of old bricks sitting behind our shed for years. I set a bunch of them out on a vinyl table cloth with trowels and spatulas and a big bowl of mud, and the kids had a blast slapping on the mud, and stacking the bricks.

Even my own great big Hooligans got in on some of the action.

Playing in the mud, and getting dirty are such an important and unforgettable part of childhood. There’s nothing quite like the feeling of squishing your toes in it, and squeezing it through your fingers, and for little ones, there’s always the thrill that comes with simply getting messy.

Drop us a line and let us know how your little ones play with mud. We’d love to hear how you have fun getting messy in your yard!

Creating a sensory bin for stimulating sensory, imaginative and fine motor play!

Sensory bins are easy to make, and can usually be put together with very little cost, using items that you have around the house.

Start with a container: a storage bin, cardboard box, foil pan or one of my favourites, a new, unused kitty litter box.

Pick a theme i.e. dinosaurs, jungle, food, holiday etc, and fill your container with a base material such as rice, sand, dry pasta, and add lots of small, interesting objects to engage your child. Adding an assortment of scoops, tongs and small jars and containers will take your bin to a new level as children pour, sort and sift the contents of the bin!