To spark imagination and inspire safe fun indoors, the C.S. Mott Children's Hospital's Camp Little Victor's summer series provides families with step-by-step, kid-friendly activities to enjoy, ranging from arts and crafts, fitness and motor skills to math and science projects and delicious recipes. Check out more Camp Little Victors activities.  

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This week is all about food, more specifically, playing with it. Join Camp Little Victors in making cupcake liner flower gardens, experimenting with magical milk, eating delicious pizza biscuits and strengthening your child's fine motor skills by building a pasta straw forest. Your child will love the new activities, and you'll love being able to do them together.  

Arts & Crafts

Cupcake Liner Flower Garden

Summer gardens are beautiful, so why not create your own? Put to use extra cupcake liners in the house and let your child's creativity blossom making their perfect garden. Want an extra challenge? Give your child a specific type of flower to try and recreate. So easy, so simple, and so fun!

What you will need:

• Colored cupcake liners

• Scissors

• Pipe cleaners

• Small pom poms

• Glue

• Markers (optional)

Instructions:

Step 1: Cut out multiple cupcake liners into various shapes and sizes, then layer in order to create a flower.

Step 2: Decorate your cupcake liner with markers (if you want). 

Step 3: With the cupcake liners stacked together and working from the backside, use your pipe cleaner to punch a hole in the middle of the cupcake liners. Pull a ¼-inch of the pipe cleaner through the cupcake liners and loop it down to secure the flower.

Step 4: Glue pom poms into the middle of the flower to make the pollen. 

Step 5: Repeat steps 1-4 to create different types of flowers. 

Step 6: Glue your flower(s) to a piece of construction paper to create a beautiful cupcake liner flower garden! Use your markers to decorate the construction paper with grass, a sun, butterflies and more.

Inspired by What to Expect's 30 At-Home Activities to Do with Your Toddler.

Science & Math

Color Swirling Milk Experiment

Create beautiful color swirls in milk with just two ingredients: soap and food coloring. Your child will enjoy seeing the experiment come to life and being able to make the magic happen themselves.

What you'll need:

• Milk

• Dish soap

• Food coloring (use multiple colors!)

• Cotton swab (such as a Q-tip)

• Dish or bowl for milk (make sure sides are over an inch tall)  

Instructions:

Step 1: Pour one inch of milk into dish or bowl.

Step 2: Drop food coloring into milk, making sure to spread the drops out and vary colors. 

Step 3: Dip cotton swab into dish soap. 

Step 4: Run cotton swab along the top of the milk and food coloring, swirling it around the dish. Because dish soap and milk don't mix, the dish soap glides along the top of the milk, mixing the food coloring in a psychedelic way – just like magic!  

Inspired by Crafty Morning's Magic Milk Science Experiment. 

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Food & Recipes

Pizza Biscuits

This kid favorite is always exciting, but pizza biscuits make for even more fun at home. This activity allows kids to customize their own pizzas and try different flavors. Your kids will be excited to help cook dinner and they'll love seeing their creation come out of the oven – almost as much as they'll love eating it!

What you'll need:

Ingredients: (one batch makes 16 mini pizzas)

• 16 oz container of 8 ready-to-bake biscuits

• 8 oz pizza sauce

• 1 cup mozzarella cheese, shredded

• 1/3 cup parmesan cheese, grated (optional)

• Pizza toppings of choice

Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

2. Spray muffin tray with olive oil cooking spray (or a different oil spray).

3. Pull each biscuit dough piece in half horizontally, creating two pizza doughs. Place in a greased muffin tray, pressing dough up the sides of the tray.

4. Fill each biscuit cup with a spoonful of pizza sauce.

5. Top each biscuit cup with 1-2 tbsp of mozzarella cheese.

6. Add your pizza toppings, if using.

7. Bake for 16-19 minutes. Broil the last minute until the cheese starts to brown for a well done pizza top (optional).

8. Top the pizza biscuits with grated parmesan cheese (optional).

9. Let cool for 5 minutes and enjoy!

Inspired by Living Well Spending Less'Kid Friendly Pizza Muffins.

Fitness & Motor Skills

Pasta Trees

Help improve your child's fine motor skills by creating a forest of pasta trees! Use toys from around the house to create a scene your child will be excited about. Placing the pasta on the straws will help stimulate your child's fine motor skills while simultaneously peaking their creativity in designing their own forest.

What you need:

• Rigatoni pasta

• Plastic straws

• Playdough

• Construction paper

• Action figures, plastic animals (optional)

• Markers (optional)

Instructions:

1. Using your playdough, create a few "soil" mounds on a piece of construction paper, making sure to have the playdough thick enough to support your pasta straw trees.

2. Place three to five straws into the playdough, spaced apart from one another.

3. Have your child feed the rigatoni pasta pieces through the straws.

4. Add action figures or plastic animals to complete your forest scene!

5. Your child may also want to expand their creativity by coloring water or rocks on the construction paper.

Inspired by Raising Dragons' Straws, Pasta and Playdough Activity.