DIY mud kitchen

Dirt shakes, stone soup, mud pies, oh my!

Outdoor play kitchens are awesome for encouraging hours of open-ended play. There are a lot of great tutorials available for making your own and many of them can be built by rounding up supplies you probably already have on hand. Now that’s my kind of project!

Here are a few that have caught my eye:

Mud Kitchen build plans by Ana White

Mud kitchen ideas and fun outdoor play spaces

A gorgeous setup using mostly reclaimed pallets and wood scraps

Or modify a FLISAT table into the perfect sensory area

To build ours, I modified this tutorial a bit based on what wood scraps we already had on hand. It took me a few hours to build over a weekend, and then another half day to stain and let dry.

I made the cutout fit an Ikea TROFAST bin (since we use TROFAST bins for everything!) and didn’t worry about adding ‘hot plates’ or ‘button knobs.’ I like not having them so the tabletop is more versatile, but they’re so darling, they’d be fun to add if you’re going to give this a try!

Just gather some old pots, pans, muffin tins and utensils and you’re well on your way. If you want to add in a bit of playful learning fun, check out our SOIL unit!

Did you have an outdoor mud kitchen growing up?