Boredom Buster: Halloween Sensory Play with Edible Gelatin Eyes

I made these gelatin eyes a few days ago and finally let Parker play with them over the weekend. He's been dying to get his hands on them since he saw me using Easter eggs to form them. I found this fun Halloween themed sensory play idea on the Fun at Home with Kids blog. Asia's blog is a great resource for sensory and imaginative play for toddlers and babies. She also has a book out! My photos are not as great as hers but it doesn't really matter because Parker had a BLAST squishing, throwing and stepping on these edible gelatin eyes. Ready to get started? Here is what you will need.

Edible Gelatin Eyes

Ingredients

1 packet of Knox unflavored gelatin

Food coloring 

Raisins

Cooking oil

Bottoms of plastic easter eggs or this eyeball chocolate mold

An old egg carton (not needed if you use the chocolate mold)

Instructions

1. Add 3/4 cup of boiling hot water and food coloring to one packet of Know gelatin. Stir until dissolved.

2. Oil the inside of your Easter eggs bottoms/mold.

3. Add one raisin for each. This is your pupil.

4. Refrigerate for 30-60 mins until gelatin has set. You can make these ahead and keep them in the refrigerator until you are ready to play with them. I left mine in the fridge for 4 days. The raisins started looking a little creepy but otherwise the eyes kept really well.

I started by cutting open a trash bag and taping it to the floor to minimize the mess. Then I let Parker go crazy with whatever he wanted to do with them. At first he was nervous to touch the eyes but after a little instruction he was happily grabbing them and squeezing them in his hands. 

Parker loved moving the eyes from the floor to the container and then dumping them back out again. He did that at least 4 times. It was fun to watch him run from one side of the plastic bag to the other moving the eyes around. He kept saying, "Eyeball!!" After 20 minutes or so, he accidentally stepped on an eyeball and felt it squish under his foot. He thought that was so funny and began stepping on all of the eyes and saying, "Whoa!" 

He insisted on sharing the eyeballs with me and tried to stack all of them in my hand at the same time. 

The aftermath of our sensory play was a lot of gelatin pieces all over the floor. Thank goodness I thought to lay the plastic bag down before we started playing. This was a fun sensory play activity! Now I regret getting rid of all my chocolate molds.

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