crafTuesday - baking Neopolitan cookies

My sister and her hubby came down from Seattle last weekend for my grandmother's surprise 80th birthday party, and while she was here, I took advantage of the extra baking bod and put her to work in the kitchen with my kiddos, baking Christmas vittles.

I let the girls go through the cook books and cookie magazines, and Payton's choice were these Neopolitan cookies.  They wouldn't normally have been something I would have gravitated towards, but since I happened to have the ingredients on hand we went for it, and it turned out to be a great cookie and a lot of fun to make.

The recipe:

Neopolitan cookies (from a Taste of Home cookie book)

1 cup butter, softened
1-1/2 cups sugar
1 egg
1teaspoon vanilla extract
2-1/2 cups flour
1-1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon almond extract
4 drops red food coloring
1/2 cup flaked coconut
4-1/2 teaspoons chocolate syrup
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1-1/2 teaspoon shortening

The process:

1.  Line a 9x5 inch loaf pan with waxed paper; set aside.  In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Beat in egg and vanilla.  Combine the flour, baking powder and salt; gradually add to the creamed mixture and mix well.

2.  Divide dough into thirds.  Add almond extract and red food coloring to one portion; spread evenly into prepared pan.  Add coconut to second portion; spread evenly over first layer.  Add chocolate syrup to third portion; spread over second layer.  Cover with foil;  freeze for 4 hours or overnight.

3.  Unwrap loaf and cut in half lengthwise.  cut each portion widthwise into 1/4inch slices.  Place 2 inches apart on ungreased baking sheets.  Bake at 350 for 12-14 minutes or until edges are lightly browned.  Remove to wire racks to cool.

4.  In a microwave, melt chocolate chips and shortening; stir until smooth.  Dip one end of each cookie into chocolate; allow exce4ss to drip off.  Place on waxed paper; let stand until set.

Yield:  5-1/2 dozen



I loved that this was a two day process.  We did steps one and two with the kids before bed on Friday, and Saturday morning after breakfast finished things up.  They turned out delightful, much better than expected.  I highly recommend this one as a great cookie to bake with kids.  Payton in particular really had a lot of fun with it, as did Alyca.

Have a great day!  Davinie

crafTuesday- Countdown to Christmas, Advent ideas

So it's going to be a blog posting blitz for me this week.  There are a few things that got away from me, and a couple of things I want to post before December.

Aren't you lucky?  :)


Advent #1 - Santa's Beard

Counting down to Christmas is something fun in our family.  As I was yarding out the Christmas decor, I noticed we actually have several different ideas for counting down the days, and I wanted to share a few with you in the event you were looking for ideas.

This first one came from Pinterest.  I didn't see any reason to stray from the original.

Of course, I had to make two little santas, for my two little elves.  I made them last night while watching the finale of the Sing-Off (dont' worry, I want spoil it for you if tonight is your night to DVR).

I used some old MM sticker numbers from my stash.  Ran out of two's so utilized the Z's a bit.  But it turned out great!  This is going to be a fun little project for my girls.  They are both artists, so don't need the help, but this would be a great preschool craft to teach scissor skills.  Maybe someday with a snowman.  hmmm.

#2 - Starbucks advent tree

A couple years ago I got this Starbucks tree full of chocolate, and had to keep it to reuse.  I think this is the 3rd or 4th year for this one.  When you turn the box around you reveal bits of a scene, and it's Christmas when the full scene is revealed.  Payton saved me a few bucks this year.  I was going to use some little candies or tiny little gifts, but when she heard the word "advent" the girl went to town on said scissor skills, and it's full of tiny bits of paper in tiny shapes, and who knows what else.  I'm actually really looking forward to checking out what she came up with, especially for number 11.  Number 11 is important because it's her favorite number, she "likes the way it looks, and the way it sounds".  I'm sure she put something good in that one.....




#3 - Christmas books Advent

My absolute favorite advent idea is the countdown to Christmas book idea.  I heard about this a few years ago and think it's just genius.  I've always been baffled at the idea of Christmas books.  What do you do with them the rest of the year?  Are they just stacked amongst the other books?  I love the idea of wrapping them all up, to be opened during the holidays.  Starting 12/1, each night the girls will take turns choosing a wrapped book, and then we'll read it before bed.  We usually read a couple each night, so they will get to choose a wrapped book, and then we can choose one of the favorites that were already opened.  On the 24th, we read Twas the Night Before Christmas, so I don't wrap that one.  This particular one has the fold out pages where the paper jumps out at you as you turn the pages.  Love this version.  We got it several years ago from my Aunt.

The smartest idea I had was to purchase wrapping paper after Christmas last year, and then wrap the books before packing them away.  This helped with the let down post-holiday, and also saved me a ton of time this year.  It also keeps all the books a surprise from even me.  What fun!

These books are kept in a big basket with other holiday fodder, things like reindeer headbands, a snowman jack-in-the-box, a stuffed ornament that plays jingle bells when you squeeze it, light up reindeer noses.  Fun things to entertain the kiddos.

Tomorrow night, the 30th, is when we are going to introduce our little elf to the kiddos.  I wonder what they'll name her?  I'm actually excited about the antics she'll come up with.  I think it'll be fun for the hubby and I to take turns wreaking havoc.

Have a great night!  Davinie

StoryArt on crafTuesday - Elmer the patchwork elephant

Earlier this spring I participated in a fun ATC swap for kids and my girls just loved it.

While blog hopping for this event I stumbled upon this great treasure of a book, which I immediately snagged at Amazon.com and have decided to turn into a summer series to share on my blog (and to play with my kiddos).

I'm passionate about a few things:  Art.  Art with kids.  And teaching.  So the idea of doing art AND educating the kiddos, making those little brains grow, just makes me happy.

Enter Story Art.

On crafTuesday for the next few months, I'm going to be doing craft projects with my girls (and any friends I can wrangle) based on illustrations in a children's book.  We are going to mimic the process used to create famous illustrations, and get some summer reading time in while we are at it.  S

For this first "Art class", we decided to go with a classic in our household, Elmer.




We love these books.  They are well written, entertaining, and Elmer has many storybook adventures, so it gives something for the girls to look forward to when we head to the library for a new story to bring home.

In Elmer's world, except for relatives, all the elephants are the typical gray except for him, so one day he covers himself in berries to match everyone else, which makes him blend in with everyone else.  His sparkling personality is hidden amongst the crowd and everyone misses him.  When his identity is revealed it becomes a big joke, and the elephants  decide to have a special parade each year where he "dresses up" like typical elephants, and they dress up like Elmer.

That's the premise for this art project.

I printed out elephants for the girls to trim out, and then we grabbed poster paint (I learned from my lesson with our last project..... one of my fingernails was red from that acrylic paint for a week!), and some household items to create fun effects while we painted our elephants in different patterns and colors for our own parade (on butcher paper).

Supplies consisted of:
poster paint
plastic fork
unsharpened pencils
dish sponges
foam brush
pastry blender
toilet paper rolls
decorative roller
etc.

I just wanted to use household type products that might create a fun effect with paint.

Then it was just a matter of decorating the elephants.

To make it easier I put one color per object, fearing that all Elmers would be brown if they got to take their supply to a different color.  This worked out well.

(I got those nifty Aprons at the Dollar Tree).

Payton really liked the project and her favorite supplies were the fork, the pencil, and the dish sponge.

Morgan liked doing her own thing with the foam brush, but also liked the toilet paper roll (I liked the toilet paper roll too).

We had our furboy Cooper watching the action so had to get a photo of him too.  :)

Then it was a matter of lining the Elmers in a row for a parade on paper.

For some reason, at one point in her presentation of the parade Payton broke out into chicken dance.  I don't know why.  But it's my job to document it all.  ;)

I was going to use google eyes but couldn't find the huge bag I got at Michael's, so used two circle punches with white and black cardstock.  That worked well.

We read the book first, and then focused on the artwork before starting our project.  That night, I read another book or two about Elmer, so that we could continue thinking about him and look at the art in a different story.  

My girls just loved it so I will be doing this again!  I'm already excited about the possibilities of this type of project in a future classroom someday.  I'd love to see a whole classroom wall lined with Elmer's in a parade.

I'll be back with another StoryArt project next week.  Have a great Tuesday!  Davinie

P.S.  Download a .pdf to make your own Elmer here.

crafTuesday - Patriotic rockets, or lanterns, as the case may be.

Summer is here which means Mom is on full entertainment alert.  That means craft time. 
With the 4th of July coming in a few short weeks, I was on the hunt for a patriotic, summer craft to do with the girls, and when I came across this, I knew I had my answer:

Pin- Factory Direct Crafts

I don't know about you, but we hoard our toilet paper rolls for craft purposes, so after going on a hunt around the house, it was easy to come up with the supplies to do this craft at home.



Crepe paper, ribbon, a star craft punch, red, white, and blue jewels, glitter...... and paint. You'll notice I used acrylic paint here, but post craft I gotta tell you, GO BUY SOME POSTER PAINT. Small children and acrylic paint don't mix, lol.

I went with paint because kids love paint.  I went with glitter because my girls are obsessed with glitter.  I went with jewels, because, for pete's sake....  they are obsessed.  And it all started easily enough:

They got three rolls each and started by painting and embellishing all of the rolls before putting it together.  Everything was fine until Morgan started doing this:

And it seemed like there was more glitter than paint.

And then this one got her hands on the giant glitter shaker, and some Elmer's glue:

And she ended up looking like this:

Oh my.  Glitter.

Did you know that the glitter in the jumbo glitter shaker from Walmart has a static quality to it?  And that the flakes are huge?  I do believe I shall be carrying glitter on my person for at least the next month and a half.

This project?  We were at this project for about an hour and a half, so even though I'm going to be carrying glitter on my person for the next month and a half, it was well worth it, because my girls had a great time, and even though our rockets more look more like patriotic lanterns, we had a lot of fun with the process.  The girls did anyway.  I'm still sweeping.  ;)

Give it a try, at your own peril.  Ha!  Davinie

crafTuesday - Paper Bracelets

crafting with the kiddo is back!  I've taken a break from routine craft projects with my girls, not that it's stopped them from doing it on their own and covering the house in paper bits.

I wanted to share what Payton recently came up with on her own.  This would make a GREAT party craft, it's inexpensive, and it's a great way to use your crafting stash and get some work out of those punches.

Payton came to me, wanting to make a bracelet.  Morgan had received this rock 'n roll leather bracelet kit for Christmas that is a similar idea, but what a smart cookie, to think of doing it with paper.

Paper bracelets.  Making them is easy.

I trimmed 1.5 inch strips from 12x12 pieces of patterned paper.  I cut one pink strip, and one purple strip.  Payton then proceeded to cut the purple strip into little squares.

After that it was a matter of adhering squares to the pink strip with a glue stick, and adding punched and hand cut shapes and a little bling.

We left a couple of inches blank, and attached it with a glue dot or two.

What a fun craft for kids at a theme party, a girl scouts meeting, or a no school / indoor / snow day?!  It was very easy to put together AND to clean up.

Before I go I wanted to share this little game my girls got for Christmas.  We are obsessed with this game, and it's been a lot of fun.  Payton enjoys it, and even I enjoy it.  It's a challenge for everyone.  The best part for me is it's tiny size.  It doesn't take a lot of room on our game shelf.  It's called Spot It.














Each person is dealt one of these circle cards, and then one circle is placed in the middle.  It's a matter of looking at your card and the center card, and finding the image that both cards have on them.  Seems easy, but there are several images on each card, and they are different sizes, so it's actually quite a challenge.  Whomever points out their matching shape first wins the card in the middle, and the winner is the person with the most cards once the stack is empty.  We've been playing this game daily and it's a fun time filler, it stretches your brain a little, and I'm a fan (obviously, lol).  Check it out!

Have a great day!  Davinie

crafTuesday - Holiday book share, and a reindeer face

In the past I never bought Christmas books.  I've always felt they were a bit silly in our bookcases during the rest of the year, and it took away from their meaning.  We have a Barney Halloween book that my kids had me read all the time and it got old reading about halloween candy and costumes in July.

A couple of years ago my friend Nic shared a FUN idea involving Christmas books and I jumped on that wagon so hard I think I went to Goodwill the next day to forage through their stacks in order to get 24 books.

It's an advent of sort.  Wrap 24 different Christmas books and put them in a basket.  Each night, my girls take turns and one of them chooses a package, unwraps it, and we read a Christmas book every night.  It takes the edge off the urge to open gifts under the tree, and is a fun alternative to something candy related in a calendar (although we have one of those too).  I just loved the idea.

Some favorites that we've added to the stack are:

Merry Christmas, Splat (Splat the Cat) - Have you ever read the Splat books?  The artwork is fun, the message is heartworming, and they are funny books too. 

The Poky Little Puppy's First Christmas (Little Golden Book) - Who doesn't love the Poky Little Puppy?


How the Grinch Stole Christmas! - Of course. 

My aunt bought the girls The Night Before Christmas Pop-up when Morgan was a baby and that's a fun one to set aside for Christmas Eve, outside the gift book box, simply because of it's fragility. 

The Polar Express - Of course

Mooseltoe - A moose with a big mustache.  Of course there's pandemonium around the holidays. 


Russell's Christmas Magic - I'm a huge fan of the artwork in this one.  Russell has other books and they are all fun.

A Pirate's Night Before Christmas - this one is a TON of fun to read. 

Walt Disney's Mickey's Christmas Carol (Big Golden Book) - reading the Christmas Carol in some form is always a must because of the message it gives.


The last one I wanted to share was Fancy Nancy: Splendiferous Christmas.  We are huge Nancy fans at this house and have all her other books.


Doing this project every year has certainly changed the way I feel about holiday themed books.  I look for new books to update the stack all the time, with the intention of keeping the 24 best that are appropriate at the time (for example, we are done with touch and feel and those pop up style books).

After the holidays, the books are tucked away with the Christmas decorations, that way they are fresh again the following year.  So far, my girls have loved the tradition.

I didn't want to end this post without a fun holiday craft project to share.  This particular project was made with a an almost 2 year old Payton's foot and handprint. 

The first time I was inspired to make this I was watching TV and I saw a little reindeer on the fridge in the background during a commercial.  It goes to show you can find inspiration everywhere.

Simple trace each hand on a piece of brown cardstock.  Trim them out.
Trace a foot on a piece of light brown cardstock.
Put them together with a red circle and some google eyes, and voila:

I love my reindeer.  I bring him out each year for Christmas decor.  Something like this would be really use to do for Grandparents, and what a precious keepsake.  Kid feet certainly grow fast!

Have a great night!  Back in just a minute with my Project 12 for October and my December Daily, of sorts.