Baked Cotton Balls

The more I read about the benefits of sensory play for toddlers the more I look for fun ideas for the little man and I to explore with. I stumbled across this really nice list and found something that would be easy enough to whip up and that I had all the ingredients on hand, Baked Cotton Balls! Sounded interesting and most definitely not something J and I had done before. So here we go!

All the ingrediance: 1 cup flour, 1 cup water, cotton balls, and (if you want some fun colors) food coloring!

Mix flour and water together. I did this in my measuring cup so I had less dirty dishes in the end. ;)

Now back to if you want fun colors, split mix up into separate bowls and add food coloring. I added 6 drops of each color, you could add more if you wanted more vibrant color. (You can skip this step all together)

Then you dip your cotton ball completely covering it in the colored mixture and place on a greased cookie sheet. I used PAM to grease my cookie sheet. (Please excuse the disgusting state of this cookie sheet, it is used for craft purposes only)

While I was putting all this together I let the J-man play with plan cotton balls. If he wasn't so crabby from teething and putting everything in his mouth I may have let him help with the messy part. But he was happy as a clam playing with the original cotton balls.

Once all your cotton balls are on your cookie sheet place in your oven for 45-60 mins at 300 degrees.

When they come out of the oven let them sit and cool.

Mine had a bunch of extra "stuff" hanging out on the cookie sheet, so I later broke all that off.

Once he woke up from his nap it was play time! Unfortunately they didn't break open as easy as I had hoped they would. So I snapped open a few for him to play with.

He really enjoyed stomping on them and roaring at me like a dinosaur.

But just as promised, hard colored shell with soft and fluffy center. Maybe if I cooked them longer or added more flour to my mixture to make it thicker would it crack easier. I may just try this again.