Kidstir: Yummy Yogurt Bark

Today we had a fun and full day of swimming at a friend's house. When we got home, I figured we needed to make another Kidstir recipe before the ingredients went bad. Mr A helped me since Mr Z was zonked out on the couch.

This was a great recipe... because it was so easy! Mr A immediately started telling me the numbers (measurements) that he saw on the ingredients list because he remembered from our first recipe.

Here Mr A is 'reading' the measurements of the ingredients.

Mr A liked spreading the yogurt in our pan. When he moved on to the second pan, he wanted me to take a video of him singing a song he made up. (It was really cute, but I need to figure out how to get it off of my phone.)

The special ingredient we received from Kidstir in the kit were organic StoneGround Crisps made by Back to the Roots. We sprinkled them crisps on after taste testing a few. They didn't really have a taste to me. But Mr A put the crisps on his yogurt and did the other pan.

This is so fun. These things look like ornaments. Mr A said as he pressed the crisps into the yogurt.

Mr A tossed in the blueberries... and set them in carefully so they were in just the right spot.

I cut up the strawberries because he didn't want to help with that part. He tossed it on.

Since we had some leftovers of the ingredients, we went back and added the rest of the crisps and blueberries. Mr A made sure his pan had lots of blueberries since blue is his favorite color.

Now we are waiting for them to freeze in the freezer. Mr A was very anxious to try them out. While he was watching a movie he probably asked about 5 times if they were ready and actually checked on them in the freezer maybe 3 times.
Finally, they were solid enough to try.
He was not impressed with the frozen fruit. They were too cold and hard. He basically sucked off all of the yogurt from the berries.

I enjoyed my little piece though. I have a feeling I will be eating most of it =)

See our other Kidstir adventures Here and Here!
Happy Cooking!

Kidstir: Animal Crackers

We did finally get to the store for the ingredients we needed for our Kidstir recipes. Mr A was in charge of the recipe card and held it the entire time in the store. But, I had to keep checking it because there were no pictures for him to tell what the ingredients were, since he can't read yet. But we got everything and Mr A was eager to get a recipe done today: Animal Crackers.

I set out all the ingredients on the counter after Mr A helped clear a clean space. I told him a little bit about how to read a recipe, but I just had him match the quantity of the ingredient with the number on the measuring cups and spoons. He found most of them on his own. example: 1/2 teaspoon, he matched the numbers and words from the ingredients list to that on the measuring spoon/cup.

Mr A added the dry ingredients carefully. As he was leveling one of the flours, he felt it saying It is so soft. When they were all added, the boys had a great time whisking everything together. Sometimes a little too vigorously.

Mr Z helped add the wet ingredients.

While I mixed the wet ingredients a little bit better, Mr A slowly added the dry until he decided they just needed to be dumped together. I mixed and mixed until it was time to roll out the dough.

Mr A helped roll out the dough. We had to do it a few times as he would press too hard and make it uneven. I helped him with the technique, although I'm not that good at it either. But, we switched directions while rolling to get it as even as we could.

Then the boys started stamping. Mr Z was so excited to use the cookie cutters provided by Kidstir. He pounded the animals in, not making a clear cookie.

We rolled out the extra dough a few times to make more cookies after the boys had stamped all they could. Mr A got better at cutting out the dough to get whole cookies. It was a trick to get the dough out without breaking the animal.
I would say using the cookie cutters was the boys' favorite part of this recipe.

Mr Z played with the leftover dough we didn't make animals out of.

Here's our baked Animal Crackers. They were really delicious to eat warm... straight from the oven.

Mr Z played with the extra dough for quite awhile... while our cookies baked. It was like play-doh and he burried Lightning McQueen a few times and squished the dough around on the table. Even with food you can get an awesome sensory experience.

I absolutely love this picture of Mr Z enjoying his animal crackers. He could not get them in fast enough and thoroughly almost the entire plate.

Mr A liked to dunk his in some milk. Mr A also invited his best friend over to have a cookie and milk snack with him. =)

I would say our first Kidstir recipe, Animal Crackers, was a success. Both boys loved helping in the kitchen and then eating what they had created. ... Now to get them to help clean up. Lol.

Kidstir kits are geared toward a 4-10 year age group... although all ages can enjoy it. My 2.5 year liked getting his little hands involved too (with supervision of course). The kit is delivered right to your door and that's one of my favorite parts. I love subscription kits... it makes everything so much easier. I'm all for ease. With your subscription you also have access to digital videos, more recipes and downloadables on the Kidstir site.

Check out what was included in this month's subscription box and my post #1 (here).
Join Kidstir (Here).
Happy Cooking!

update: visit our adventure with recipe #2: Yummy Yogurt Bark (here).

Kidstir: Opening the Box

Several days ago, we received a Kidstir Cooking Box to try out and review here at home.

Mr A absolutely loves getting packages and mail. So, he was thrilled to open the box. Its always so exciting to see what is inside... a surprise that cannot be prolonged.

I liked how neatly everything was packaged, wrapped in green tissue and a label on the top of the box with an index of what is included in your box.

Mr A began tearing everything out. His facial expressions are so fun. Letting out gasps of excitement as he pulled out the different sheets. I think there's going to be something incredible under here  Mr A said as he came to the last page of paper. He lifted out the paper and found some more cool things.

Also included in the box, was either a utensil or ingredient for each recipe. Cookie cutters, veggie bags and stoneground crisps were given for the specific recipes.

That was all amazing! Mr A said as he finished unpacking the Kidstir box. Mr Z joined in when we were almost finished exploring the box. They played with the cookie cutters for a little while, but I had to put them away before they got lost or broken.

Stoneground Crisps for the recipe Yummy Yogurt Bark.

 Baking bags for recipe Power Munchies (Kale chips)

 Cookie cutters for recipe Animal Crackers.

Of course Mr A chose to make the Animal Crackers recipe first. But, we needed to go shopping! We took our recipe card to the store and gathered everything we needed for our Kidstir recipes.

In one month subscription you get wonderful things for a great cooking experience with your kids.

We received a great collection of things to get started:

*a pre-printed shopping list

*3 recipes with step-by-step illustrated instructions, ingredients list, tools list, fun facts and an activity to go along with the recipe. all of the recipes and pages are hole punched to build your own Kidstir Cookbook. (a Kidstir binder should be included in your first box too, however we did not receive one)

*set of 4 spring cookie cutters

* veggie bags for drying/baking veggies

* Stoneground crisps ingredient

For all that is included, I would say that it is worth the price for the subscription. Subscriptions are $19.95 usd/month. You can also gift subscriptions in 3, 6 or 12 month packages. You can also purchase a single kit for $24.95 usd. They would make a great gift for birthdays or holidays.

Join Kidstir Here and get a discount on your first subscription box.

Be on the lookout for our first experience with the Kidstir recipes. #1 will be Animal Crackers =) Happy Cooking! We are excited to get started... ...

(I received this kit free from Kidstir in exchange for our honest opinion and experience of the kit.)

update: look at our Animal Crackers experience (here).
look at our Yummy Yogurt Bark adventure (here).

Stone Soup

We learned how sharing can be magical with the folktale Stone Soup.

A stranger passes through a town and bring the community together by providing a pot and a simple stone. The members of the village provided everything necessary to make a pot of soup to serve everyone.

Again, the boys made the soup as I read, with the storytelling pieces. 

The other day we went out to breakfast. I figured a good table activity would be our Mother Goose Time workbooks. It did help quite a bit to bring them along. They boys did a few pages and it kept them occupied for almost half of the time we were there. This is a great way to catch up on our More Math and Literacy since we always get behind. Daddy even helped Mr Z trace the letters in his journal.

Taking MGT with us when we have places to wait, is a great way to stay busy and learn at the same time. I definitely need to remember to take our workbooks with us more often.

Acting Out Stories w/ MGT

The African Folktale of The Black Snake and the Eggs is about a chicken that leaves her nest to go eat. Every time she comes back, one or more of her eggs are missing from her nest. She tell Rooster what is happening and they decide to trick the snake since they suspect it was him. When one egg was left in the nest, Chicken leaves. Snake gulps down the egg, but it was hard and got stuck, killing the snake.

While I read, the boys used props to act out the story. This has been his favorite part of each day and the lesson. I leave the pre-printed storytelling pieces or props on our Mother Goose Time shelf and he makes sure this is the first thing we do.

Mr Z liked to play the part of the snake and Mr A was the chicken and rooster. I helped with the eggs a little bit.

We finished the story and talked a little bit about what stealing is and why it is not a good thing to do.

Each month in the curriculum there are math cards. They range in difficulty and have easy math problems to difficult. Mr A is usually pretty good at them. We used the plastic eggs to work out the problems.

Mr Z likes to take over activities like this. Mostly to annoy his older brother, so Mr A was getting upset. It was tricky to get Mr A out of his mood, since Mr Z kept ruining what he was working on.

He made an egg castle and was quite proud of it.

Mr A was working on stringing noodles onto a string. He made a long noodle snake. Mr Z strung 3 noodles on his and pulled it around the house for awhile.