play heats up in the outdoor kitchen

Things have really been heating up in the outdoor kitchen at preschool.  Since we created a permanent space for this wonderful sensory, social, imaginative and creative play it has become a hive of activity.

One of the bonuses of the outdoor kitchen has been that boys, who wouldn't be seen dead in the home corner inside, are cooking up a storm outside.  

There are a wealth of sensory play materials you can add to the outdoor kitchen - all of them inexpensive and readily available.  We have been cooking with wet sand:



We have been cooking with pebbles:

We pop out baskets of natural materials - leaves, seeds, twigs:

Just perfect to use to decorate cakes:



And last week we began cooking with sawdust:

Here are some other ideas for outdoor play kitchens that have been popping up around the blogosphere of late:

A Mud Pie Kitchen           ::: Child Central Station

Mud Pie Kitchen               ::: Children at Play

Mud Pie Kitchen Love      ::: Chasing the Seasons

Outdoor Mud Pie Kitchen ::: Simple Whimsy

And from the Let the Children Play archives:

A Mud Pie Kitchen for our Dirt Patch Part 1  Chronicles the making of our mud pie kitchen

A Mud Pie Kitchen for our Dirt Patch Part 2  Chronicles the making of our mud pie kitchen

Making Mud Pies                                           Ideas and resources for outdoor kitchen play

More Mud Pie Kitchen Madness                    Inspiration from other bloggers

Mud Pie Kitchens Revisited                            More inspiration from other bloggers

What have your children been cooking in their outdoor kitchen?