Ice Ice Baby!
As the weather is warming up again, (well, the forecast definitely looks good for The Cotswolds over the next week or so!) we’re all looking for fun things to do with the kids in the garden!
Inspired by lots of blog and Instagram posts, I thought I’d finally give some ice play a go. I knew the boys would love it, and the photographer in me knew it might give me some interesting photo opportunities as well!
This is what we did…and what I would do differently next time!
Preparation
Obviously you need to do this the night before but it was super quick! I took a muffin tray, filled it with small plastic toys like dinosaurs, animals and lego men, added water and put it in the freezer.
The hardest bit was finding room amongst the fish fingers and Auntie Bessie Yorkshire Puddings (how good are they by the way?!) but I solved that by tucking into a tub of ice cream - it’s for the kids after all!
The next day
I took the muffin tray outside on a plastic tray and lined up the tools! We had spoons, wooden hammers, toy screwdrivers, random kitchen implements and a bowl of salt. I tipped the balls of ice out of the muffin tray and told the boys they had to try and free the toys - they didn’t waste any time!
What I would have done differently!
Now, don’t get me wrong - the boys absolutely loved doing this and they’ve asked to do it again so I take that as a win!
But, there are a few things I would have done differently…
I stupidly put the salt out in a bowl…which our youngest found and within 2 seconds had tipped it out onto the grass! We did manage to salvage some and so could show the effect it had on the ice but I would definitely have put it in a different container next time!
The boys relished the chance to bash things with the hammer and they did it with such enthusiasm, they’d freed all the toys within about 10 minutes! So it didn’t last as long as I thought. Next time, I’ll stagger it and introduce different tools over time, making it more of a challenge to break the ice.
What I’d like to try!
I think there’s plenty of scope to try some different things with this so here’s a few thoughts:
Add themed toys, e.g. all dinosaurs or all lego characters which could encourage more play after they are freed
Get the children to pick flowers or leaves from the garden to put into the water for freezing the night before
We’ve got some small foam letters and numbers which we use in the bath - once freed from the ice, it could lead to some literacy or numeracy activities - I’m thinking some kind of treasure hunt which always goes down well!