Happy Birthday Matthew!

Today Matthew turns 11!  Where does the time go?  This year we celebrated Matt’s birthday with a Fishing Lunch Party. Of course Matt is still extremely interested in his Military things but this year he has also started to grow fond of fishing. He has had several opportunities this year fishing in his grandparents lake and also now his Aunt and Uncle now have a fishing cabin to use.

Table setting / Decoration / Crafts:
The weekend before Matthews’s birthday the kids created paper mache fish and spent a couple days decorating them with paint and some with glitter and even beads. These fish were displayed in our windows as part of the party decorations. We used brown grocery bags and traced a fish we drew as a template. We then painted them in blue, green and orange with water colors. These were placed at each place setting and all around the table. The tablecloth consisted of a aqua green plastic cloth and fish netting layered over top. We found clear fish plates at the Christmas Tree Shop that we used at each place setting. We also cut out rectangular placemats from a dollar store world map. For the kids party favors we found tiny plastic cases and created mini tackle boxes that we filled with gummy fish, lobsters, octopus’s, sharks, sea horses etc. These were a great hit! The beautiful cake consisted of 4 layers with blue icing. Using marzipan we formed fish and seaweed to place all around the cake – wow it looked so cute!

Food:
We bought 3 different flavors (colors) of Goldfish Crackers and served them in mini fishbowls. The party drink turned out to be completely adorable. We served Swamp Juice to the kids. To make this drink you boil tapioca pearls and then soaked half of them in green food coloring and the other half in blue food coloring. Place these in the bottom of a clear glass. Then you take Lemonade and add either a little bit of blue food coloring or some kind of blue juice. The idea is make the lemonade look a little dirty. We then added a few gummy fish and a blue straw with a worm stuck to it. With fishing worms on the brain we came up with the idea to serve them Shrimp and Beef Lo Mein for the main course. The kids loved every minute of it!

Summer Wrap Up – Garden Party with Kids

Our Garden turned out to be such a fabulous spring and summer activity. . We loved to see how fast everything grows and boy was it a fun day when we realized we actually had our own vegetables. We decided to create our very own “Garden Party Lunch with Kids”.

Using a rolling pin and clay we traced and cut out vegetables and then placed a metal stake into them. When the clay hardened we painted them sprayed them with protective spray and placed them into our garden to serve as our “garden markers”. The kids had fun with this project.

We served fresh salad using our very own organic vegetables. Although we were on the right track for a healthy lunch we kind of ruined that because we just had to make these adorable garden cupcakes!

We even decorated the tablescape with vegetables. We strung small garden shovels, garden rakes and carrots from our chandelier. The kids thought it was fun so we went with it!

We created our uniquely designed stepping stones, using cement, pea pebbles and glass stones from the dollar store and plastic plant saucers. When they dried we placed them in and around our garden for a creative path.

The lessons we learned this year from having our garden have been phenomenal and made a huge impact on the kids. We reviewed the food pyramid with kids, explaining the proper intake of food and appropriate eating habits. During the season, the kids measured the growth and charted the progress of our garden. The kids are looking forward to the garden next year, and they will definately be more involved in the planning and creativity!

Oh and our Sunflowers were gigantic and gorgeous, and the vegetables were the best we have ever had!

Our Summer Wrap Up

Its a wrap!  Sadly, the summer has almost come to an end. We are going to post a few of the highlights of things we did during our summer vacation. Wendy and I had a great trip together and the kids had some fabulous day trips, vacations and fun craft days we will be sharing with you. But as with every end, there is a new beginning and we are anxiously awaiting our Fall crafts, trips, activities and fun. We will definitely keep you appraised of many of our activities and hope you can share some of your Fall fun with us too.

National S'mores Day with Kids!

The Event:
Today is National S'mores Day and the kids love these delicious treats!  We are in the middle of yet another heat wave making us look for new ways of making smores.  We posted a few unique smore recipes down below.  We are going to have our traditional smore making around the camp fire this Friday night!

The History:
The name of the treat comes from the two words "some more," clearly combined because people often wanted to have at least a second serving after having one s'more. The treat was developed by campers in the early part of the 20th century, making use of the fairly new mass-produced marshmallows. Marshmallows were easy to transport, as were candy bars and graham crackers, and the marshmallows could be warmed easily over a fire to make a delicious dessert in a situation where other types of sweets would have been difficult to come by.

The true origin of the snack is unknown, as camping recipes tended to be passed from person to person and family to family - often over the campfire itself. The first recipe for s'mores was published in 1927 in the Girl Scout Handbook and the event marked the official introduction of the s'more into popular culture.

The publication of the s'more recipe was not the first pairing of chocolate, marshmallow and cookies. In 1913, the Mallomar cookie was introduced to market. The Mallomar has a graham cracker-like and is topped with marshmallow and a layer of chocolate.
 

S'more Recipes:

Yummie...S'mores Stuffed Brownies by Picky Palate - click HERE for the recipe and also lots of other incredible recipes!

 

Oven Baked S'more Dessert by Joy of Baking - click HERE for the recipe and click HERE for a Homemade Marshmallow Recipe!

 

S'more Cupcakes - click HERE for recipe

 

Friendship Day

" Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art... It has no survival
value; rather is one of those things that give value to survival. "

- C. S. Lewis

In 1935, the United States Congress proclaimed that the first Sudnay of August would be National Friendship Day. My next natural question to myself is what is friendship? It did not take much thinking on my part to come up with my own complete definition of Friendship. To me, Friendship is an intimacy between people, a deep relationship that combines communication, loyalty and understanding, an act and feeling between people who share an empathetic nature with each other and offers a quiet definite support. True friendship is relaxation, a comfortable silence, the feeling of something being right and well with the world. A true friend can walk into a room and you can get a sense of being home just by being in their company.

Here are some ideas for Friendship Day:

Make Amish Friendship Bread Starter kits. You can find the recipe HERE at Allrecipes.com. We love the idea of passing this around in cute decorated glass jars, but plastic freezer bags will still do the trick too! It is important not to use metal when passing along the friendship bread starter. We made this yesterday with the kids and we are excited to hand them out today and also to have taste of the bread when its time to make our batch.

Here is a good site that shares individual stories on what friendship means to them:

http://www.whatisfriendship.com/

First Man on the Moon Landing

 “The Eagle has landed” (Neil Armstrong) July 20, 1969 at 4:18 p.m. EDT, The Lunar Module (Eagle) touched down on the moon at the Sea of tranquility.

“That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind” (Neil Armstrong)

The Apollo 11 mission was to land men on the surface of the moon and then to return to Earth. The crew on Apollo 11 consisted of Neil A. Armstrong (commander), Michael Collins (command module pilot), Edwin (Buzz) E. Aldrin Jr. (lunar module pilot). These are perhaps the most famous men to have ever been in space. This was absolutely a great time in history. A lunar module camera provided live television coverage of this monumental event. Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon at 10:56 p.m. EDT. Aldrin, being the second man to ever step foot on the moon set foot on the moons surface at 11:16 pl. EDT.


The purpose of the Apollo 11 mission was to land men on the lunar surface and to return them safely to Earth. The mission was successfully accomplished.

To see pictures and more info on this initial lunar landing mission look HERE at the site below.

To see NASA’s partially restored video clips from this monumental mission click HERE

 

 

 

National Ice Cream Day with kids!

All the way back in 1984, then President Ronald Reagan dubbed July National Ice Cream month -- and the third Sunday of the month National Ice Cream Day...and who are we to argue?

So this Sunday, eat your heart! Grab a milkshake, sundae or the always-satisfying ice cream cone.

National Gummi Worm Day!

Today is National Gummi Worm Day!  Jelly Belly is giving a 25% off some of their Gummi Worms today so hurry and click HERE for link.

".....,I think I'll go eat worms! Big fat juicy ones, Eensie weensy squeensy ones, See how they wiggle and squirm!"  Remember that song?  Click HERE to get all the lyrics and you can also listen to it from BusSongs.com.

GUMMI HISTORY:
The 1980s also gave birth to a new gummi character. In 1981, Trolli came out with the gummi worm. The original concept of the gummi worm was to create a candy for children that their parents might find mildly shocking. Since then, the gummi worm has become less shocking and one of the most popular gummi characters. Many characters followed the gummi worm and gummi candies now are available in all shapes and sizes.

GUMMI CRAFT:

Homemade Gummi Worms are much simpler to make than you would think.  Here is one way of making them:

You need:

12 tbsp sugar

1 1/3 cup orange juice

8 tbsp corn syrup

8 tbsp unflavored gelatin

Food coloring, optional

Superfine Sugar for coating

Preparation:

1. Prepare an 8x8 inch pan by wetting it lightly with water.

2. Place gelatin in 1/2 cup cold water to soften for about 5 minutes.

3. Place the juice, sugar (regular not the superfine) and corn syrup in a medium saucepan over medium heat and stir until sugar dissolves.

4. Stir in the gelatin and continue stirring until gelatin dissolves.

5. At this point add food coloring if desired.

6. Pour into prepared pan and leave until completely set, 4-6 hours at room temperature or 1 to 2 hours in the refrigerator.

7. When set, turn out of pan and cut with a sharp knife into long, thin strips to resemble worms.

8. Roll your worms in the superfine sugar.
Click HERE to get another recipe that makes dual Orange and Raspberry Gummi Worms.  There are many other variations out there!

FUNNY GUMMI FACTS:

• Gummi bears are one of the only, if not the only, type of candy to be turned into a television show
• Gummi bears were originally called ‘dancing bears’
• Today, gummi candy is available in a variety of shapes - spiders, watches, hamburgers, pizza, bugs, feet and more. However, bears and worms are the most popular.
• Red is the most popular color of gummi candy

GUMMI WORM HUNT:

1. Give each child a plate with three gummy worms covered in whipped cream.
2. Give each child a and cup.
3. RULES: The first child to find the gummy worms using their mouths NOT their Hands and get them into their cup is the winner!
4. Remember No Hands allowed!!!

I couldn't find a National Gummi BEAR Day date so if anyone know of such thing, please let us know.  

Blueberry Picking with Kids!

July is the national Blueberry month and we are definitely going to celebrate this fruit. There are approximately 35 states that blueberries grow in so if you are close to one of them, enjoy and have fun with this fruit.

Blueberries are really delicious. There are so many ways to eat them. Appetizers, Breads, Rolls & Muffins, Coffee Cakes, Dessert Cakes, Cookies, Bars & Squares, Doughnuts, Desserts & Puddings, Jams & Jellies, Pancakes & Waffles, One-Crust Pies, Two-Crust Pies, Salads, Punch & Wines, Relishes, Entrees, or just plain blueberries, its endless!

These extremely healthy and delicious berries also offer a fun and creative way to spend a day. Since we live in the north east region of the US we are going to spend a day picking fresh blueberry. There are so many places to go to pick your own fruits and vegetables around our area. Just recently, Wendy and I spent some time traveling to Maine and Canada. During this trip we learned that not only does Hammonton, NJ call itself the Blueberry Capitol of the World, Cherryville, ME shares the same slogan. Maine is well known for its Wild Blueberries.

Since we agree that Blueberries are one of our favorite we have decided to make this another one of our “Fun Day’s”. This is going to be fun. We will find fun and creative ways to serve up these delicious fruits while having a great time.

FOOD:

We made a delicious Blueberry dessert called "Blueberry Crumb Bars".  They surprisingly came out not too bitter and not too sweet, actually perfect!

You can find the recipe HERE and along with the great pictures on how to prepare it. 

CRAFTS:

Why not try blueberry painting, we are going to. You can boil blueberries on the stove top for about five minutes and then have the kids go to town smashing them. Give them paintbrushes or sponges cut in fun shapes and let them go to town. Of course during this activity you should mention some key facts such as the blueberry has a ton of health benefits and is said to prevent cancer and heart disease.

You can always cook up blueberries on the stove with sugar and a small bit of orange or lemon juice then freeze them to made delicious freeze pops. You can do this without the sugar too and it is still delicious.


Martha Stewart has a great idea for fabric painting blueberries, click HERE to see.

TABLESCAPE:

We used a white plastic lace tablecloth with blue round placemats.  White dishes.  We punched out round circles in 2 different color blue and scattered them around the table like blueberry confetti.  We had mini-blueberry pies, Blueberry muffins, a Blueberry Pie, Blueberry Crumb Bars and Blueberry Lemonade.  We found these adorable blue plastic pails and used white stickers to place their names on each of their own bucket.  The bucket was used to carry their hand picked blueberries.  We also used a real blueberry plant on the table.

FESTIVALS:
Click HERE to find a list of blueberry festivals for a few states


FUN FACTS:
For fun facts about blueberries check out this website HERE


HEALTH FACTS:
With just 80 delicious calories per cup and virtually no fat, blueberries offer us many important nutrition and health benefits. For health benefits and information on Blueberries check out these sites below.

http://www.blueberrycouncil.org/nutrition.php

http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=foodspice&dbid=8

http://www.state.nj.us/agriculture/news/press/2010/approved/press100617.html

http://sfp.ucdavis.edu/pubs/brochures/blueberries.html

http://www.attra.org/attra-pub/blueberry.html

FREEBIES:

Click HERE to download these adorable Fruit Fonts we found at Font Space, preview below:

It's National French Fry day!

Ok, who doesn’t like French fries, chips, pommes frites, freedom fries, French-fried potatoes… no matter what you call them or how you cook ‘em (deep fried, oven baked, pan fried)? No one we know that’s for sure. The history of the French fry varies depending on who you ask. My favorite explanation is that the Belgians invented them. They date them back to the 1600’s. During the winter, when the river was frozen they could not fish so they cut up potatoes and ate those fried in oil instead. During World War I soldiers tasted the fried potatoes and called them French because at that time it was the official language of the Belgian Army.

Here are two good sites to read about the history of a French fry HERE at Official French Fries and HERE

So in the tradition of Fun and Facts with Kids, can you guess what we are going to do? You guess it, we are making our own French Fries. Of course the kids are going to have a blast not only eating them but making them too!

You can always:

If you have a favorite French Fries stop that you have been avoiding, now is the day to stop by and indulge in a large! Where are your favorite fry places? Wendy's? McDonald's? Red Robin? Feel free to comment on where your favorite places to get fries are!

Make your own Deep Fried Fries. Buy a large (or a couple) baking potatoe(s) and slice up into strips, depending on the thickness you like. Dry on paper towels while heating up some oil in your deep fryer to 350 and fry for 4-5 minutes or until desired crispiness. Drain on paper towels and season with salt.

Make your own oven baked fries. Use a baking potato or whatever your favorite kind of potato. Slice up into wedges or strips and toss in a bowl with olive oil. Spread out onto a baking sheet and sprinkle on some salt (or some johnny's). and bake at 450 degrees F for 15-20 minutes, stirring fries once when they star getting crisp.

Or to make it really simple, use a bag of store bought french fries, your favorite cut, and deep fry them or spread them on a baking sheet and drizzle with some olive oil and bake until desired crispiness.


THE FOOD:
French Fries of course!  Below is the recipe we will be trying this year. We like the idea of baking these treats instead of deep frying them.  We always love it when we can make it healthier for the kids!

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/emeril-lagasse/oven-crispy-fries-recipe/index.html

THE CRAFT:

We will place our French fries in paper fry holders. We found the DIY paper template online. We printed it out on Red and White Striped Scrapbook paper and then cut and folded it to shape.  You can find step by step and the template for two mini’s HERE and a large size to print out HERE

FREEBIES:

We found adorable Culinary Art Fonts. You can download from HERE  Below is an example of some of the fonts: (the end one is pizza that I cut off by accident)