Kids will love eating this summer snack that looks like a sandcastle, but tastes like a yummy ice cream novelty. This sandcastle activity for kids is a quick and easy summer snack for kids! You will used a clean sandcastle mold, ice cream, vanilla wafers, and assorted candy to decorate. This is an EPIC beach activity your kids will be talking about for years to come. So add this fun idea to your bucket list to make (and eat) this summer activity for kids!

Summer Activity for Kids

I made this super simple summer snack for my kids. It was a HUGE hit! With how cool this looks you won’t believe how simple it is to make! All you need to make this summer snack for preschoolers is a sancastle mold, ice cream, vaniall or graham crackers, and assorted candy to decorate your creation.  This is one of those summer activities my kids still talk about! You’ve got to put this on your summer bucket list for kids and add this idea to your beach theme or summer theme with your toddlers, preschoolers, kindergartners, grade 1, grade 2, grade 3, grade 4, grade 5,and grade 6 kiddos.

Summer Snack

All you need are a few simple ingredients to make this really fun summer dessert!

• vanilla ice cream – slightly softened
• 1 box of vanilla wafers – any brand
• non-stick spray (like Pam)
• clean sandcastle mold
• candy for decorations
• shovel – optional, for eating

Sandcastle Activity for Kids

Start out with a CLEAN sand castle mold. You can wash one you own with soap and water or get a new one from the Traget dollar ($5) section and wash it out as well. Any size or shape will work.

Set out your ice cream to allow it to soften slightly while you prepare the sandcastle mold.

Now spray the inside of the DRY container with non-stick PAM cooking spray. Make sure to get all sized and the bottom.

Beach Activity

Now crush a box of vanilla wafers – any brand. I like to put them in in my food processor to get them nice and finely crushed within seconds, but you can also put them in a sealed ziplock bag and carefully crush them with a rolling pin if you prefer.

Dump a handful in your prepared sand castle mold.

Summer Activity for Kids

Now rotate your ice crem mold around and back and forth to completly coer the bottom, sides, and ridgest inside the sandcastle.

Summer Snack for Preschoolers

Scoop in the ice cream. Do not stir or move back and forth as it would disrupt the sand vanill wafers. Simply keep plopping more ice cream in.

Beach Theme

Press down and smooth on the top to remove any empty pockets and add ice cream as needed to have a nice full sand castle container. Now freeze completely. We made ours the day before, but you could make it in the morning and have it ready for an afternoon snack no problem.

Ice Cream Activities

Turn the sandcastle upside down on a plate and pop out the the molded ice cream covered in vanilla wafer sand. 

HINT: Tug on the edgest to help it slide out smoothly. Having trouble, allow it to sit a couple minutes. Still having issues, you could dip the outside (not ice cream top) in a sink of warm water to loosen the edges.  We never needed any help but to pop it right out by loosening the edges. SUPER EASY!

Feel free to add extra handfulls of vanilla wafer cookie sand around the castle or to add more to your delicious sandcastle creation.

Summer Bucket List for Kids

Now it’s time to decorate your sandcastle. You will want to have all your candy decorations ready to go as this is an ice cream dessert so you don’t have an indefinete amount of time to decorate. LOL! WE used kit kat pieces, M&M, etc.

Summer Desserts for Kids

Now it’s time to dive in to this super cute and FUN summer snack or summer dessert for kids!

Ice Cream Dessert

For as cute as it is, you wouldn’t expect it would taste so yummy. But it is delicious! Such a fun,  outrageously cute, and memorable summer activity for kids! This is a must add to your summer bucket list ideas!

Summer Fun

Depening on the size of the mold, this will be a family beach snack or a sandcastle snack to share with friends or a large family gathering! This is so fun and MEMORABLE!

Beach Theme

• Disolving Seashell Activities – a Summer Science Experiment
• Free Beach Worksheets for Preschoolers, kindergartners, and grade 1
• FREE Ocean Coloring Pages
• Super Simple Sand Slime
• Fun to play with Ocean Slime
• Huge Ocean Unit (250+ pages)
• Ocean Color by Number Worksheets
• Crack the Code Worksheets with ocean themed pages
• Under the Sea Lego Challenge Printables
• more ocean activities for kids
• Sandcastle Subtraction Craft
• Fun Sandcastle Letter Matching – Summer Activities for Kindergarten
• Hands-on Sandcastle Colour Matching Activities
• Sandcastle Letter tracing Activity
• Summer Sandcastle Count and Trace Numbers 1-10 Printable Activity
• Sandcastle Number Playdough Mats to count and trace
• Summer STEAM – Sandcastle engineering with tp rolls
• Ice Cream Sandcastle Summer Snack Idea
• Sand Bucket & Shovel Letter Matching – Summer Activities for Kindergarten
• Sand Volcano – EASY Summer Science Experiment for Kids
• Beach Summer Experiment with a Density Tower