Fun and Free - Breaking Ice

I read this post on Monday and got excited, and busy.  Honestly, I should have been more excited ... this was an awesome, easy, free activity for the kids, and one we'll do often during the hot Florida summers.

I started by freezing layers of food-coloring colored water with magnetic letters in them.  The layers allowed the letters to be disbursed well throughout the ice and I hoped it would give the kids a chance to notice and talk about the various colors.


Once the concoction froze I flipped it over onto a sheet pan and tapped it out of the original pan.  It came out very, very easily.

I gathered all the toy hammers I could find and a good solid mallet and we headed out onto the sidewalk.


 The mallet was given to a 4 year old who loved, loved, loved doing the pounding.  The younger kids got the toy hammers, which worked quite well for removing the letters from the ice chips.



We discussed each letter as they were freed from the ice and talked about the colors. 


But let's be real ... the fun was in the pounding, which continued long after the letters were removed.




The food coloring had an interesting effect on the ice, which sparked the curiousity of the older kids, who will be doing a little research on that.


Do I need to say that we'll be doing this again soon?  The pan went back into the freezer, letters and all, as soon as went back into the house.

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