Smashed Potatoes - Tutorial

I love making these smashed potatoes for special occasions, or just because.  They're easy, fun and super tasty!  Try them yourself.

Ingredients/Tools:

Red potatoes (about 2-3 per person)

Olive oil

salt

pepper

food scraper

baking sheet

plastic Zip-lock bags

Step 1:

Wash your potatoes and cook until soft.  I put 2-3 in a quart bag and microwave for 4-5 minutes.  You want them to be soft enough to squash easily.  You could also boil or bake them but keep in mind that will take longer.   While your potatoes cook grease or line your baking sheet with foil and preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Step 2:

After allowing your potatoes to cool a bit, set them on a flat surface.  I use a cutting board.  With your food scraper flatten the potatoes to about a half inch.  Try to flatten all to about the same width.   Brush the flattened potatoes with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste.

Step 3:

Bake for approximately 8-10 minutes.

There are lots of opportunities for your kids to get involved in this side dish.  Let them wash the potatoes.  Allow them to place them in the plastic bag or drop them into the pot for boiling (before it starts to boil, of course.)  If they can safely reach the microwave, tell them which numbers to punch in and press start.  If the potatoes are cool enough let them try to smash them.  My kids favorite thing to do is to sprinkle the kosher salt and twist the pepper mill.  Serve as a side dish or with a dipping sauce as a tasty snack.  

A Lesson in House cleaning

Today after we completed our morning school time I decided that we would do some house cleaning time. My daughter was so excited!  My son (the 2 year old) was not so excited choosing instead to go to his room and play.  Although he did help out when the spray bottle came out, squirting water, what's not to love about that?!?

A few things to keep in mind

The age and coordination of your child should dictate what you do and do not let them help you with.  Use your best judgment based on your own child's abilities, but also don't be afraid to challenge them a little, under your close supervision, of course.  You may be surprised at what they can do!

Dusting

My 4 year old loves dusting.  I love to watch her carefully move photo frames and other knick knacks out of the way so she can dust under them.  Don't know where she got that from; I just dust around them :)  

Wiping

Anything that involves spraying and wiping both of my kids love to do.  In the middle picture my daughter was cleaning their kiddie chairs by spraying with a mild cleaner and then wiping.  Of course, a few times she over-sprayed and completely soaked the chair.  I would remind her to only spray once or twice when I noticed.  She's learning so really it's not a big deal to me.  Plus, if you notice I put the chairs in the kitchen where wiping up the excess cleaner would be a snap.  Some of the pictures also show the kids cleaning the mirrors in their rooms.  The loved that!  Especially trying to catch the cleaner before it trickled down to the bottom; I think that part was their favorite.

Bathroom

First, let me start off by saying even though they're our own bathrooms they still gross me out.  I resisted letting the kids help me for a long time, even when they specifically asked to.  Finally I decided that teaching them early to clean their own bathroom would probably, in the long run, be a good thing (I hope at least.)  For my 2 year old I just let him swish the brush around in the toilet bowl.  My 4 year old gets more direction and she does a pretty decent job.  As soon as we're done with the toilet they both get a very, very thorough hand washing.  Before we start I also remind them not to touch their faces, especially their mouths or eyes while we're cleaning. 

My final word on the subject of cleaning

I believe encouraging your child/children in the habit of cleaning, especially their own spaces, can only be a good thing.  I can't guarantee they'll continue to do it as they get older and keep absolutely immaculate bathrooms (heck, I don't even do that); however, I'm pretty sure not having them do it at all would lead to very messy/dirty spaces as they get older.  So let your little one help, even if it makes a little more work for you.  You're building character, confidence and cleanliness!

Painter's Tape Letters

At dinner my daughter announced, out of no where, that she wanted to "play school," right now.  Ok, momma time to pull something out of the back pocket and luckily, I had something quick we could do.  This idea came from Pinterest, but I didn't pin it so I'm not sure of the original source.  The original idea was using painters tape to paint an Easter egg but I changed it up a bit and did letters.  Here's what we did:

What you need:

Painters tape

Paint

Paint brushes

Paper (good idea to have the paper to paint on - cardstock is nice and sturdy for paint, another larger sheet to put under to keep your surface tidy - we used easel paper)

Choosing your letter:

I chose the letters of each of my children's first names.  If you're doing a letter of the week you could choose that and work this activity into your weekly lesson.  Using painters tape I simply created the letter on a sheet of cardstock.  Before applying the tape to the paper I put it on my pants and pulled it off a couple of times so it wouldn't be so sticky.  You want it to peel off somewhat easily and not rip your paper.

Painting:

The only direction I gave my daughter was to paint close to the tape or even over the tape.  She chose her colors and had a great time doing it.  When I pulled the tape away to reveal her letter she was so excited.  I would have liked for her to have left it just white but she wanted to paint over it.  It's important to remember that there is no right way for kids to be creative (a lesson I struggle with a lot) so I just let her do her own thing and she was so proud of the result!

This is what it looked like when I pulled the tape away:

The final masterpieces:

I Like Book - Review & Recommendation

Ok, we have only had the kids' I Like Books for about 4 days but I already LOVE them!!  Here's a quick low down on the book:

What it is

The I Like Book is a sort of diary where you are given a short line to write in each day something that you like about your chiild.  There are spots for two parents/caregivers to write their own thoughts.

There are also spots to insert pictures and areas for the child to answer questions about their own feelings and thoughts.

Why I love it

We read from the books to the kids every night, as a part of our reading time.  I love to see the smile on their faces when I read what we liked about them.  They immediately loved their books and carried them around the next day asking for me to read from them.

I also love that years from now the kids will have something we wrote with our own hands and not just typed onto a screen.  I don't know why, but I  think there's value in that.

Lastly, the book is small enough to keep around the house easily and remember to write in versus trying to put together a big bulky scrapbook.  

My final word

You won't regret this purchase!  I bought ours at 50% through AP Deals and I've heard other deal sites offer it from time to time.  If you spot it make sure to pick up a few.  The book is written in a 12 month format so if you keep it up you'll need a new one each year.  The book comes in various colors.  We got a read and purple one.  Oh and don't forget about gifts.  Next time I find it on sale I'm picking a couple up for friends and family.

What to teach, what to teach?!

There's no shortage of blogs, websites and news articles all trying to dictate what it is that you should and shouldn't be teaching your kids.  It's enough to overwhelm even the most intelligent of moms out there.  As you'll soon discover I take criss crossing routes on our learning path and sometimes stop all together like a deer in headlights because I just don't know which way to turn.  I was feeling this way last week when I sat at the kitchen table with my two little sponges ready to soak up what I had to offer and I had nothing.  Just I was about to give up and turn on a movie I saw my bible sitting near me, beckoning me to open it up.  I did and landed on Psalm 18.  I read the first 10 or so verses to them and when I stopped my 4 year old said, "read more mommy," so of course, I did.  I realized there were lots of words the kids were not used to hearing on a daily basis so I picked out 3 and made them the words of the day (one for Monday, one Wednesday and one Friday.)  I then made and/or picked out online activities to reinforce our words.  I also created a photo frame where we could use dry erase markers and write our words each week, thereby reminding me and daddy to use those words more frequently.  Through divine intervention I came up with a whole week's worth of activities....thanks to God....which was a great lesson for me as well.

DIY - Words of the Week Frame

I purchased this frame, as a set of 2 from Hobby Lobby for about $8.  Using Microsoft Power Point I created a slide with the heading "Words of the Week," 3 lines because I'm only doing 3 per week, and some flower clipart.  My frame was larger than the regular letter size paper so I took 2 coordinating color sheets and taped those down first then added the slide I created on top, giving it a matted look.  I'm planning on printing a new one with different clip art at the start of each season.

Bunny Pasta Books

Make your own Bunny Pasta Book

Easter is almost here so bunnies seem to be everywhere!  I picked up a couple of boxes of Annies HomeGrown Bunny Pasta with the intentions of eating the cheesy morsels, not playing with them, but you never know when inspiration will strike.

What you need:

Annie's Homegrown Bunny Pasta

Plastic sandwich bags

Food coloring

Vinegar

Paper (white and/or colored)

Pencils, markers, crayons

Dyeing the pasta

We used four colors (purple, pink, yellow and blue) so we divided one box of pasta into 4 plastic baggies.  I added about 1/2 teaspoon of vinegar to the bag and a drop or two of food coloring.  The kids loved shaking the bag around to get the dye onto all the little bunnies.  After you've done this with all the pasta set it out to dry on paper towels.  After it dried I sorted each color into 4 separate bowls.

Writing our book

I took three 8.5 by 11in sheets of white cardstock and cut them in half.  I gave my four year old a little inspiration by starting the story, "once upon a time there were 4 bunnies..."  I wrote in the numbers 1-4 so she could glue the bunnies down next to them.  Then we just continued on with the story.  She added some, I added some.  We kept it pretty simple.  This part is truly limitless.  You could make a longer story, add other fun shaped pasta or add some printed clip art or draw your own pictures in.  I was thinking you could even print pictures of your family members and include them in the story too.   Lastly, if you have a word of the day, like we do you could incorporate that into your story.  Our word of the day was devour.

Finishing the book

I finished off the book by drawing some clouds, flowers, and trees so that the kids could color them in.  If your child is older they could do this themselves of course.  To bind the book I simply punched a hole in the upper left hand corner so the pages could be rotated upward, thus eliminating the turning action so no bunny would come unglued.

What this teaches

Creativity, first and foremost!  Not only are you using something in an unconventional way (the bunny pasta) but you are also encouraging their imaginations by coming up with their own story.  I had a little bit of math in our story, but you could definitely add more.  If you use different colors like we did you could also incorporate patterns.  If you are teaching your child another language try doing the same book in the 2nd language.  There's lots to learn, if only you look, that's what I'm learning anyway :)