Make your own mud pies

Making mud pies is lots of fun for young kids!

Try this mud pie recipe and find out how to make your own mud pies from our friends at Mud Mates.

Making mud pies is a great learning activity and perfect for messy play in the garden.
 

Make your own mud pies

Ingredients for your mud pies recipe

 

• Small bucket or tub for mixing the dirt and water

 

• Water

 

• Smooth dirt (free of rocks, stones, sand, weeds etc)

 

• Old muffin tins, saucers, baking trays, plastic pots to hold the ‘pies’

 

• Stones, flowers, leaves, other outdoor bits & pieces to decorate the pies

 

• Extra water for experimenting (optional)

 

• Twigs and/or old spoons for stirring and moulding the mixture (optional)

 

How to make mud pies

1. In a small bucket add equal quantities of water and of dirt.

2. Using their hands, get your children to mix the water and dirt together until it feels a bit like bread dough.

3. If the mixture is too crumbly add some more water, or if it is too runny add more dirt until it becomes the right consistency.

4. Press, pull and knead the dirt mixture until it becomes firm enough to make a sausage shape and doesn’t break apart.

5. Your mixture is now ready to make mud pies!
 

What kids learn when they play in mud

In today’s environment our kids’ outside worlds are shrinking and many do not have the opportunity to explore outdoors as often as in the past.

The great news is though, it doesn’t require a large amount of space to play with mud and a box or bowl filled with dirt works well too.

When children play in mud they explore different textures with their hands and even tongues in some cases!

Playing with mud gives them the opportunity to develop their fine motor skills and to carry out science experiments as they observe how mud changes when you add water, sand or even when you freeze it.

Filling containers up to measure volume happens without kids even thinking about why they are doing it.

Playing with mud is a great unstructured play activity that helps kids to develop their imaginations and creativity.

But most of all, it’s so much fun!
 

Mud pie ideas to try

There's no end to the imagination when it come to making mud pies!
  

• Fill up your muffin tins, plastic pots etc with the mud mixture to make mud muffins, birthday cakes and pies and then decorate with the stones, flowers, leaves or other items you have to hand.

 

• You can also roll the mixture out flat onto old baking trays and use cookie cutters to cut out ‘mud biscuits’.

 

• Shape the mud pie mixture into balls and squish them flat or even shape them into ovals with your hands or feet.

 

• Add more water to the mixture to make it extra sloppy and stir it with twigs or an old spoon for some extra mess!

More kids messy play articles to enjoy:

• How to make magic mud
• Tapioca pearls sensory play activity
• How to make slime

Source: This article was written by Mud Mates - Taking care of messy kids with protective over-garments, perfect for dirty, messy play, indoors and out.