We LOVE play dough around here. More often than not, I make the tried and true salt dough (1 cup flour, 1 cup salt, water) for the kids to play with. It's a special day when I buy containers of Play Doh, but even more special when I try out a different play dough recipe. My test run (with this recipe) over the summer was met with much fanfare so I knew I had to have a repeat. After baking and decorating 204 cookies yesterday, I had 1 box of holiday cookie mix left, a container of applesauce in the snack drawer, and kids just dying for a sensory activity.
1 package of cookie mix (of your choice. Over the summer I used Betty Crocker sugar cookie mix and it worked great) .and 1/2 container of natural unsweetened applesauce. Only use 1/2 of the container or it will be much too sticky. I wasn't paying attention to what I was doing and talking to the kids as I opened the applesauce and poured. I poured the entire container in and had to add extra flour so it wouldn't be sticky. I also added flour to the pan so the kids could add in flour as needed. This worked out perfectly and the kids played all afternoon with the sugar cookie play dough! Definitely a hit!
The kids prefer cookie cutters and play dough knives and scissors to play, so that's what we have out. Every time.
After 3+ hours of playing and all of the extra flour added in, it was pretty dried out. This made for an easy clean up and none got caught in the carpet surround the play mat. Bonuses all around!
