"Peanut Butter and Jellyfishes" Preschool Book Extension

Peanut Butter and Jelly Fishes: Noodle Necklaces 

We checked out a really fun ABC book at the library last week, Peanut Butter and Jellyfishes: A Very Silly Alphabet Book by Brian P. Cleary. My kids absolutely loved it. Each page has fun illustrations with a hidden letter. Dancing Girl had a blast looking for the hidden letters on each page.  You can also take it a step further and have your kids identify all the things on the page that start with each letter.

When I started thinking about an activity to do with this book, there were so many different possibilities. I thought about making a spotted D-dalmation or a paper plate jellyfish, but in the end we decided on doing a noodle necklace like the newt wears in the book.

I looked up how to dye noodles. The instructions I found used white vinegar and food coloring, but comments said that it would still stain your hands.  But, I added one extra step, and our hands are still clean (aside from the food dye that Messy Boy poured directly onto his hands).

Of course Messy Boy wanted to assist with the messy part.

So, to make your colored noodles, put one to two teaspoons of vinegar (the link specified white but I used apple cider vinegar), 4 or 5 drops of food coloring, and noodles into a plastic baggie.  Have your kids shake away to distribute the color evenly, then you're supposed to put them on a tray to dry.  This is where I went a step further. I popped my pasta into the oven on a low 200 degrees for about 10 minutes.  It was perfect! When I pulled it out, the pasta was dry and didn't rub off at all while Dancing Girl and Messy Boy made their necklaces.

Baking the noodles worked liked magic!

Once the noodles were done, I prepped the strings for them by tying a bead (Thanks to Messy Boy I have a jar full of beads from broken necklaces and bracelets.) to one end to keep the noodles from sliding off and wrapped tape around the other end to make it easier for the kids to manipulate.

I mixed some of the noodles together and had the kids do a little color sorting, and then they started stringing.  Messy Boy made one necklace and was done. Dancing Girl kept working until we ran out of noodles. I tried to talk her into making some patterns with the noodles, but she was insistent on keeping her necklaces all one color. In the end, this was an easy and fun activity to do together!

Now to figure out what to do with these necklaces...

Have you ever done noodle projects with your kids? Or made any yourself back in the day? Macaroni picture frames, anyone?