Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Toddler Tuesday: Cooking with Sam


Chocolate Covered Rice Krispie Eggs

Cooking can be a wonderful activity to do with your child.  There are so many learning lessons that can be incorporated and I will try to list those with each recipe that we try.   


This week's learning lessons:
              Go over color of the eggs and the ingredients
              Learning to say all the ingredients.  
              Differentiation of  the different textures of the ingredients
              Practice pouring objects from one place to another
              Start to understand how we measure 
              A talk about *hot*
       


6 cups of Kellogg's Rice Krispies cereal
3 tablespoons butter
4 cups of miniature marshmallows

chocolate (I will confess, we used up all the random Valentine chocolate laying around)
Sprinkles
plastic easter eggs


1. Show toddler how to pour cereal into a large measuring cup. 


2. Have toddler pour cereal from measuring cup into an extra large bowl. 


3. Have toddler measure out the 4 cups of marshmallows and 3 tablespoons of butter and put into a pot.  This would be a great time to have a discussion about HOT!  We even sang a little made up song about the hot stove.  Adult: stir until completely melted and then pour into extra large bowl.

4. Help toddler to mix it all together.  Then a taste test of course!  Ok, it takes great onto the eggs.


                             




5. *Note - this step goes much easier if you spray all the eggs with PAM.  Show your toddler how to stuff the eggs with the rice krispies mixture.  Let sit for 5-10 minutes.  


                    










6. Another taste test.  Still good.








7. Make a small double boiler.  Fill a pot half way with water and bring to a boil.  Then find a bowl just big enough to lay in the pot above the boiling water.  Place chocolate in bowl and allow to melt.   (don't know why I don't have a picture of this sorry).


8.  When the chocolate is melted remove from heat and allow toddler to dip the egg in the chocolate.  Then a little double dip for the egg into some sprinkles!




9.  Allow to dry.  We even put them in the freezer for hardening.


10.  Final taste test!


*disclaimer -  you know your child best.  If you feel your child is not quite ready for some of the steps seen above then modify to do what is most appropriate for your child *




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Next week: Chocolate-banana pancakes

Sunday, April 22, 2012

DIY: How to make a superhero cape tutorial



This is my first Pinterest project.  I decided to make a superhero cape for my 2 year old son.  Since he is really into cats I decided to make it a cat theme.  Just a note I still consider myself a beginner sewer but bear with me!

Supplies: 
1 yard of solid color fabric
1 yard of print fabric
optional - fat quarter
black thread
white thread
pins
scissors




Iron out both pieces of fabric and then fold in half.




The neckline: 
Then take the edge opposite the fold and fold it  until there are about 5 inches on the top






Cut  off the folded edge as seen below.  You can do this free handed.
Why am I using a piece of plywood to cut my fabric?  A certain someone (who shall not be named) thought I would ruin the cutting mat  by getting little pieces of fabric stuck in the mat while I cut the fabric.  The plywood got the job done.






I needed a round edge for the neckline so I grabbed my extra large mixing bowl from Ikea which worked perfectly. This allowed me to draw and cut a slight curve line from the cut edge to the folded piece.






Cape ties
  Take the triangular scraps that you cut off in the first step and make a total of 4 straps that are 16 inches long by about 2 1/2 inches wide.  Take one of the printed pieces and one of the solid pieces and put together inside out.  Pin.








Sew along both long sides and one of the short sides.  I cut the extra fabric along the corners so it was easier to turn inside out. When finished turn both ties right side out.






Assembly:
  Now place the right side of each piece of fabric toward each other.  Sandwich the cape tie between these two pieces leaving about a half an inch hanging out.  




Now the fun part!  Sew the cape together.  I started with a basic straight stitch but I didn't think it was going to be strong enough so I went through and did a zig zag stitch.  I left about 5 inches along the top open so I could put the cape right side out. Don't forget to trim the edges!




Cape decor: 
I didn't include this in the instructions because I would do it differently the next time I make one. But for this one I wanted an S emblem so I printed out a very large S in Arial font about size 500.  I very carefully traced the S onto a piece of fabric and cut.  It didn't have to be perfect since I was going to attach the S with a zig zag stitch.    For the cat I searched for a cat silhouette via the web and enlarged it.  For the circles I got out my trusty Ikea bowls and traced.


If I were to do it again I would definitely skip the sewing and do some sort of iron on.  





Special thanks to these blogs for inspiration and helping to get me started
http://thepleatedpoppy.com/2008/01/cape-tutorial/
http://www.georgialeigh.com/?p=57
http://www.allfortheboys.com/home/2012/1/2/diy-cape-christie-at-storehouse-crafts.html/
http://www.comeonilene.com/2011/06/20/reversible-superhero-cape/

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