kinetic sand

After having the opportunity to play around with it at work, I bought the girls some kinetic sand. It has been a huge hit, especially with Claire. She played with it for an hour straight. 

As far as the messiness factor it isn't too bad. On a scale of 1-10 with 1 being supervised crayon usage and 10 being unsupervised painting, I would say it is a 4. Really no worse than wayward playdoh crumbs.

I bought the sands alive version, but prefer the brand that we have at work (waba). The sands alive has a bit of a flour like texture, while the kind we use at work is more like a brown sugar/actual sand. If it continues to keep the girls' interest, I think I will spring for the waba brand this winter.