Rice Bin

I'm the kind of crafter that sees ideas and copies them. Sure I have my fair share of things I think of on my own but with the huge wide world of blogging available now - most ideas I get from someone else - and I love it!!! So many fun things to see and try :)

After watching my girl's spend a good hour at my friend Julia's from Sweet Serendipity playing in her rice bin I knew this was something I must try in our own house. She changes hers for the holiday/seasons so I started with Easter and so far...so good.

Ingredients:

- Rice (I used about 8 cups)

- Rubbing Alcohol

- Food coloring

- Trinkets/Play things
(measuring cups, tongs, etc.)

-Storage Bin

-Cardboard/Newspaper

Directions:

1. Take 2 cups of rice and add 1 tsp of rubbing alcohol and 10 drops of food coloring.

2. Mix till the color is evenly on all of the rice.


3. Spread out on something to dry (about 1/2 hour).


4. Add it to the bin and play away!

* I added a cheap vinyl tablecloth underneath my bin to help 'catch' any rice that made it's way out (which was A LOT - I have a 2 yr. old...) But overall the mess that resulted from this activity was WELL worth the time they spent happily playing away.

The trick for me was to place the bin in a room we don't go in very often (and has hardwood floors). That way throughout the day it wasn't really in my way at all and I didn't really care about the mess. When we were through playing it got picked up, the lid placed on top, the bin put away unto a very high shelf, and the extra rice got swept away.

It's already made it's way out for us to play with several times in the past couple of weeks!

Have fun!