Kids in the Kitchen - Playdough to Make at Home

It's Thursday - Kids in the Kitchen Day!

Let's make Play dough!

I taught preschool for years, and I was always surprised to hear how many parents do not allow their children to paint or sift flour or do other important learning activities in their own homes.

Allowing your children to make messes and play with play dough is so important for your child's development. Fine motor skills are mastered and creativity grows. Concepts including texture and size and the five senses are explored without a word being said. In addition, creating shapes with play dough can become an academic AND fine motor lesson - teaching about circles and squares? Form one from play dough! Teaching your child how to spell their name? Help them to create letters using it.

You will need to make this for your child before he or she can play with it.

Here is the recipe:

3 cups of Flour

1 1/2 cups of salt

3 tablespoons of oil

2 tablespoons of cream of tartar

3 cups of water

Food coloring or packets of unflavored Kool-aid in various flavors

Mix and cook this over very low heat until not sticky to touch. It is easier if you add the food coloring to the mixture prior to cooking.

If you choose to add the coloring after cooking, you will have to knead it into the dough when the dough is somewhat cool.

Okay, now go PLAY with the kids!! The mess will wait, the kids will not!

Just a note: Be aware that the Kool-aid will make the dough smell good, even if it won't taste good.
Keep an eye on little ones who enjoy munching on things!

Milkshakes & Smoothies

Last night we were away on a one day trip. I made a happy mistake a few weeks ago and booked a night at the Hyatt in Arlington, VA through Priceline (love that Name Your Own Price). At first my hubby couldn’t get the night off so I wasn’t sure whether I was going to just take the kids myself or maybe give the stay to someone else. Happily he was able to take off work after all so we were all in our cozy hotel room.

We have four kids, ages 22, 20, 16, and 13. It is the oldest's 22nd birthday today!! It is so nice to see the kids laughing and talking and getting along so nicely. I pray that they continue to get along when they are grown. While on our overnight trip, we walked to a McDonald’s and ate and acted silly. All of us. And I have the pictures with which to blackmail them!

So today I was jonesing for the lovely cappuccino I have been making, but I wasn’t home for much of the day before we left on our trip. So now I’ve made sure I know where the nearest coffee-bars are near the hotel! Its not the caffeine I’m looking for, because I order decaf most of the time, but I love the comfort from the sweet sugar and coffee smell. I know, sounds crazy.

Anyway, I was thinking about what else I have made with the Magic Bullet. Yesterday we made smoothies, milkshakes, and I used it to blend the cream cheese for the frosting for my carrot cake.

For the smoothies we used some fruit I had in the fridge: cherries and blueberries. I also had bananas. Into the bullet cup I threw one banana and a handful of the frozen blueberries. Then I added 2 handfuls of ice (which looked to be about one cup). Then I added about 4 tablespoons of orange mango juice (all I had in the house). I blended them and voila! My first smoothy.

Next I used the cherries instead of blueberries and then instead of the orange mango I used cranberry juice (I was out of the orange mango) and while it sounds crazy – it was awesome! The texture was perfect, you could drink it or even use a spoon. Delicious.

For the milkshakes we still used ice, but used milk and sherbet. Basically I guess you can add anything you want to the blender and enjoy it. Hopefully. There are some things I can imagine my kids might throw together that I wouldn’t want to touch.