One activity that my young children enjoyed was growing indoor grass in a plastic cup. I saw the idea in lots of different places, including Family Fun Magazine. Even though we did this activity in the spring, it might be fun to grow the grass in the winter as a centerpiece for my dining room table, just to see some greenery at that time of year. If I grew it in a shallow container, I could make a scene, depending on what I added to the grass. Candles, plastic animals, army men… the list is endless as to the scenes you could create!
Older children could create scenes from different countries or habitats, or a battle from the Civil War. Or they could design a scene on the grass that would make someone feel like they were in a spa, with different levels of candles stabbed into the dirt.
If you want to make the fun grass heads in the picture above, start with some clear plastic cups. The children decorated these according to their personalities. I decided to hot glue their decorations onto the cup to make sure they didn’t fall off, but your kids could use white school glue. Each child shoveled soil into the cup, then sprinkled grass seed. They sprayed the seeds with a spray bottle of water. We placed the cups on a table next to a sunny window.
Grass grows fairly quickly, so we didn’t have to wait very long. Soon the grass was tall enough to decorate the “hair,” so to speak. We put hair clips into the grass heads, and they looked really silly. This is a perfect activity for young children.
