Learn with Play at Home: Peppermint Scented Candy Cane Playdough

For some quick and easy, holiday inspired play, I whipped up some peppermint scented Candy Cane Playdough. The whole activity took me about 10 minutes or less to set up (including making the playdough from scratch) and kept the kids busy for well over an hour. And, being playdough, they've been back using it every other day this week. (Although, it's more a pink coloured playdough now.)

Ages: 2+

Skills: Creativity, fine-motor, language, sensory, etc.

To make our Peppermint Scented Candy Cane Playdough I made a batch of our no-cook playdough. (Takes about 4 minutes to make)

I then divided the mix into two and coloured one half red (using red food gel colouring) and left the other half plain so that it would be white.

To the mixture I also added some Peppermint Extract to give it a candy-cane scent. Extract is meant for flavouring more than the smell so it's not super strong but safe if a small amount is consumed. For a stronger scent that will last longer I would recommend using Peppermint Oil. (I used the extract as that's what I already had in the pantry)

Candy Cane Playdough Invitation to Play

I set out a little Invitation to Play for the kids and the rest was up to them. I deliberately left the red and white playdough separate so that they could manipulate the colours together themselves and work with the contrasting colours. In addition to the playdough I included some basic playdough tools (rolling pins and cutting implements) as well as some Christmas themed cookie-cutters.

Mmmm, scented playdough is great for engaging the use of multiple senses in the one activity.

The kids were more interested in using all the tools and creating a huge variety of different shapes and designs than just making candy-canes, which was fabulous. It really is fun to twist the two colours together and see the lines of colour getting thinner and thinner the more you twist.

These were their favourite designs. Have you tried a scented playdough before? You might like to pair your Candycane Playdough with this free printable Christmas tree playmat.

For more Christmas inspired play and crafts, check out some of our other posts below: