When Life Gives You Snow, Make Ice Cream

The Polar Vortex came through town last week and we had snow. Lots of snow (12 inches on top of the 10 on the ground already). We also had freezing temperatures (-16 and wind chills in the negative 40s!) Then we had extra days off school for it. As if we weren't going crazy from two weeks off of school for Christmas break already! So, I found myself with two kids with severe cabin fever and asking myself what do I do with them! Then a little piece of my childhood came back to me. How's the saying go: "When life gives you lemons, make lemonade"? Well, no lemons, but the spirit of that saying rang true with all this snow on the ground, we made snow ice cream.

Summertime, and the Living is Easy (unless you're a parent)

So, summer is here, and I like to kick things off right. And by right, I mean by sleeping in. With kids at 8 and 4 I can trust them to eat unsupervised, and so I left bowls of cereal with "nametags" out and cups of milk to add to them in the fridge before going to bed last night.

This process has worked before, and they get a kick out of finding out what their nametag will be.

Not this morning.

At 6:30 (half an hour before we get up for school), Godzilla climbed in bed with me and proceeded to talk to me for the next 45 minutes about how his sister's friend's mom wouldn't stop tickling him at their Girl Scout party the night before. Then at 7:15, Nat came in needing help with a bloody nose and announced she had been up playing a game for about half an hour herself. Once this was all taken care of, they were both up and ready to start their day.

I gave myself about an hour to try and get back to sleep, but when the kids weren't calling my name, Twitter was . So naturally, no sleep came.

When the kids got out of school yesterday, we gave them a gift to congratulate them on a great year and to keep them busy this summer. It was a book called "The Big Book of Things to Make" and had been sitting in reserve since Christmas, just waiting for summer. I've since seen some other really cool books since picking this one up like: "Dad's Book of Awesome Projects" by Mike Adamick of "Cry it Out" blog fame, or "Made By Dad", either of which I would love to have as well.

Anyway, both kids were excited by the book and set to turning pages to decide which project they wanted to do first. They both quickly agreed on making slime, though my princess at first said she didn't want to touch it. And once that decision was made, this dad knew all his years of watching, playing with and imitating the Ninja Turtles had finally paid off. We grabbed some cold pizza and our ingredients and then set to work.

A little corn starch and some water go a long way. The best thing about having the book as a guide was the science lesson it provided with the directions. The slime didn't turn out like the traditional Nickelodeon Gak (you need school glue for that) but turns out runny and sticky and solid depending on its state.

The corn starch doesn't dissolve in the water, letting you change the slime's state as you stir or handle it. the kids were amazed by how they could swish it around their bowls, but couldn't even break the plane with their spoons. Once we had it all mixed up, we went outside and had the real fun.

Don't worry, it all cleans up with warm water.