Thursday, February 25, 2010

Non-Gwyneth Goop

Ramona loves goop.

Not Gwyneth Paltrow's website, wherein we can learn how to drink room temperature lemon water for breakfast and find the best digs in Paris, but the kind of goop that is sometimes a liquid, sometimes a solid, and constantly fun when one is seven years old.

Betsy helps her mix it up, though I suspect Betsy is having as much fun with the mess as Ramona is.  It looks like this:
 
 

and like this: 


And then your table and floor look like this: 


But, do not fear, oh, ye of little-time-to-clean, because in seconds it will scoop up into this:


It's just cornstarch and water, which means it dries, it flakes, it sweeps up quickly.  Or you can just wipe it away with water.  It's nothing and it's magic.

And Ramona adores it.  So do I. You will, too, especially if you've been saying no to lots of messes lately because you really don't want to deal with a mess. This is a mess you can say yes to.  You can seem like a Cool Messy Mom, knowing all the while that clean-up will be a snap.  (One caveat: it does look really messy while they're playing with it.  You will possibly snarl at me under your breath and wonder what I was thinking. You will tell yourself that you'll never visit my blog or trust me again. But then ... yeah.  You'll see.)

4 comments:

Mary Ellen said...

I just added three boxes of cornstarch to my grocery order. Thanks!

H said...

Non-Newtonian fluids! A physicist friend of mine, for a university project, made a huge tub of the stuff and walked on it while wearing a lab coat and Hawaiian shorts!

Cathy LeBlanc said...

mine is not sweeping up off the floor!! did I make it wrong? what ratio of cornstarch to water did you use?

Karen Edmisten said...

Oh, no! I think we used 2:1 (cornstarch to water.) If it's very thin, and seems to be dried on, a damp cloth should dissolve the cornstarch and make it easy to clean up. Is it thin or thick?