These Baked Cotton Balls are probably the most fun the Bee and I (and Auntie B) have had with a craft.  Ever.  They combine Finger Painting, Baking, Smashing, and Mess Making, all in one easy to clean up activity!

 Ingredients

• 2 cups flour
• 2 cups water
• Food coloring
• Cotton Balls (I used one of the 100 ct. ones I’ve gotten from Target.  We could have done probably 200 cotton balls, instead of 100)
• Baking pan
• Cooking Spray or Baking Mat

Directions

1. Mix Flour and Water in bowl until smooth.  
2. Divide into as many bowls as you would like colors.  We found 7 worked out about perfectly.
3. Add food coloring and stir.
4. If your munchkin is old enough, you can give them the 3 primary colors and let them figure out what Mixing colors make (this is the Bee, figuring out that Green and Red make Brown)
5. Coat cotton balls in “paint”
   Because Mama likes to stay clean, I coated mine with the spoon we used to stir
   My sister and the Bee went to town mixing with their hands.
6. Seriously Fun!   Even Clean Freak me got into it!
   (Although I was behind the camera, not in front of it!)
7. Place Completely coated cotton balls on baking tray sprayed with Pam.
   I honestly wasn’t sure what the aftermath would be, so I purposely chose my oldest pan,
   and wasn’t willing to risk my Baking Mats (although the “paint” peeled right off the sprayed cookie sheet)
8. Bake Cotton Balls at 300 Degrees for 45 minutes to an hour. The colors will change slightly, but they still look cool!  
9. After done baking, smash with hammer.  

If your kids are old enough, let them do this, or give them a play hammer.
This was a VERY therapeutic part of the project.
Especially seeing how far I could get them to fly across the room!

Baked Cotton Balls broken open!

The Cotton Balls are hard and crunchy on the outside, and still soft and silky on the inside!