I’ve tried to avoid the slime craze at home, but eventually, I gave in. I’m generally okay with messy projects since we homeschool, but I’m not quite comfortable with the ingredients usually used for making slime, like glue and borax. It’s even more of a concern if you have little kids around.
One day, I decided to earn some major Mom points and came home with a bunch of natural ingredients, announcing to the kids that it was slime time. Making slime turned out to be a lot more enjoyable than I thought, and the mess was manageable. I even think we could do it again!
In case you’re not familiar, slime is a fun, gooey substance that you can mold, pour, squish, and stretch. The sounds it makes are part of the fun too! It’s a great sensory activity for young kids needing that kind of play, and some even use it for educational STEM activities.
Most slime recipes use “non-toxic” ingredients, which many assume means safe. However, non-toxic doesn’t mean completely harmless. The original slime recipes contained borax, which, while useful in some of my natural cleaners, does pose risks. It’s not great for skin contact and can be very dangerous if ingested.
When reports of skin irritations and even hospital visits surfaced, people started looking for borax-free slime recipes. The issue, though, is that the alternatives aren’t really safer, since they often contain borax too.
So, I decided not just to eliminate borax, but also ingredients like eye drops, liquid starch, laundry detergent, and glue—basically anything I wouldn’t let my kids handle. The goal was to make slime so safe you could eat it, so we hit the pantry!
After seven attempts, we finally got a recipe that worked. This slime is fun and slimy but not too messy. It’s gluten-free, all-natural, and can be made on the stove, which is great if you don’t have a microwave.
Making slime is a great activity to do with kids. It’s a fun learning project that can spark creativity. Our kitchen ended up looking like a mad scientist’s lab with slime experiments all over, and we learned a lot along the way.
Do you love or hate slime? Got any other ideas on making a natural version?
