What the kid wants, the kids gets

 "Mom, can we make a pinata?", asked Anjali on Sunday morning.

I have had rather bad experiences with Anjali and paper mache - i used to make multiple paper mache crafts early this year, so much so that you couldnt walk across the house without getting your feet on a puddle of paper pulp. Earlier this year, I made a couple of paper mache bookshelves and a lightbulb lab. I tried to get the kids interested in paper mache, but they werent. We had a huge (I put so much effort into facilitating crafts and you girls do it for five minutes!) showdown about making and macheing a volcano which left Anjali in tears and I put paper mache aside since March and didnt touch it (mostly).

"You do realize that you have to paper mache the balloon", I asked her.

"I have a good idea", she said. "We paper mache it and then poke a hold and burst the balloon and take out the balloon and then we can fill the paper mache with candy, close it and make a pinata. We can take the pinata to the playground and get all the kids to hit it"

Honestly, I have no idea how she got to know this process. We have never gone far enough in our paper mache crafting and we nave never actually made a whole pinata. So after I had closed my mouth, we set out to do it, me still with some skepticism.

I got the newspaper and Anjali got the balloon. Then i mixed up some paper mache paste with flour and hot water.

"Mom", Anjali called from the living room. "I'll cut the paper and you mache it"

I should have known.

Anyway, I brought the paste to the living room and Anjali cut the paper accordingly. Sophia sat on the beanbag chair and watched. After I pasted a couple of papers, Anjali put one paper in the bowl of paste.

"It so warm!", she exclaimed.

Sophia tentatively put a finger in. "Its hot!"

And then it was all goo and newspaper and before you knew it, the balloon was covered and set to dry.
It was dry this morning and we poked it before I left for work. The girls were painting it orange. At first, they wanted to make a princess pinata, complete with yarn. Then they changed their minds and decided to make a pumpkin one, it being halloween and everything.

The next morning, I looked at my craft cupboard and there was no orange paint. Not a single drop. But there was some sample milk powder. And my trusted orange food coloring. So it became a shiny milk powder painted half way to a pumpkin pinata. 

I have a weird camera that loses photos for no reason. Anyway, the pumpkin pinata went to the playground yesterday with humongous success. First the children pulled the strings and then I let it rain candy on them, and then they ate the candy and then they played foot ball with the pinata. After that, we played flush the toilet, which, fortunately. doesn't have anything to do with a toilet but is a version of ice and freeze that I read in the exceedingly amazing 15 minutes outside

It is currently Anjali's favorite game, and evidently, i have to be the catcher. Sophia, who doesnt generally like getting caught feels that this is a different situation, and is quite happy for me to catch her and wait for one of her friends to come and flush her.