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With temperatures blazing into the 100 and teens here in Phoenix, it is always a challenge to find things to do INDOORS with the kids besides TV, electronics and videos. One of the things I have always enjoyed with my own children and now grandchildren is crafting together. It is a great thing to teach kids skills that they can use throughout life, give them a chance to express themselves creatively and there is a strong link to cognitive function as they take things from their minds and express them through their hands. They develop their fine motor skills and can also exercise problem solving as they create.
One summer I let each of my kids pick out fabric and they made decorative pillows for their beds and learned to use my sewing machine in the process. Those pillows stayed in our house for years! When they were little and wanted to paint when I was painting, I gave them water, a paint brush and a block of wood and let them go to town mess free. You probably have things around your house that will work for kids to use to imagine and create all kinds of wonderful things:
If you are still short on supplies, this is a good time of year to:
Here are some more great kids crafting kits available right now for reasonable prices. You could give your kids some options and let them choose something that they will really get into. There is something to be said about getting a kit and learning to follow directions while also adding some extra flair of their own!
At Dollar Tree: (They have a ton of options, these are just a few!)
Hobby Lobby: (again, there are a ton of options! And, many of their art kits are 40% off right now!)
Magic Paint posters! You only need water
and your dino lover can paint away!
This kit even comes with the rocks!
Michaels: (lots of clearance going on here!)
*In stores only pipe cleaners, felt, pom poms and wooden paintable door hangers are on sale for 47 cents!
It won't be long now until school starts back up! Take these last few weeks to make some memories, build some confidence in your kids, do some STEM activities without them knowing it and just have some fun away from the screen! Use this craft time to initiate conversation and relax together. You and your kids will love it! Have a Fun Friday!
If your children love doing crafts, you may want to consider this:
Green Kids Crafts- Monthly STEAM projects using only green materials. Use coupon code SCREENFREE for $10 off!
Last year, we put on a Christmas in July Party and we shared lots of kid friendly crafts!
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Well, I've been having so much fun on this Fun Friday that the blog is going up a little late, but hey, you can still have fun all weekend long!
Yesterday I posted about the fresh pesto that I made without pine nuts out of the basil in my garden and I promised you a recipe to use it in. So, today I am showing you a variety of recipes that you can make for a family pizza night, one of which is a Pesto-Goat Cheese Chicken Pizza! That is the great thing about DIY pizza, you can put whatever toppings on them that you want and personalize them to fit your taste. We like to use our favorite pizza dough recipe that I shared on this post long ago. Or, if you are worried about gluten or anything like that, you can make or purchase a cauliflower crust. Lindsey shared a recipe on this post.
Pizza Pans and Stones:
We have a few choices at our house.
Lots of Topping Choices:
I know that some people just hate the idea of pineapple on pizza, but I love a good Canadian Bacon pizza with pineapple on it. Here are some other topping ideas, apart from the normal pepperoni and cheese!
First, I prepared my dough and let it rest and rise while I cooked the chicken and prepared my toppings.
I used my grill pan to prepare the chicken. I used olive oil, salt, pepper, dried oregano, dried basil and garlic to season it. I used chicken tenders that cooked quickly. When they were all cooked, I chopped the chicken into bite-sized pieces.
As toppings, I prepared cheese, shredded carrots, broccoli, chopped tomatoes...You get the idea, you can use as many toppings as you would like. For the Chicken-Pesto-Goat Cheese PIzza, I did the following:
I also made Maddy a vegan personal pizza.
If you want to use a traditional red tomato pizza sauce, you can use themarinara recipe I posted here. You can use an immersion blender to make it smooth if you like.
Cooking is more fun for me when I am making things that I grew or created myself. We made the dough from scratch, I made the pesto, I grew the basil and the tomatoes! It all tastes so good! Next, I am going to try making my own mozzarella! What are your favorite pizza toppings? Do you like pineapple on your pizza? I'd love to hear!
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I keep thinking of 2 ways to begin this Fun Friday post. First, it is swimming season. Can you have enough towels? My kids used to drag them through the dirt while they were wet, so they needed to be washed daily. Second, since it is that swimming time of year, I thought I would personalize some beach towels for my grandchildren, but my first idea didn't go so well. The idea that I am going to blog about today came about as I tried to fix my first mistake. I came up with this fun project that your kids can help you with! For Fun Friday, decorate some beach towels with fabric markers.
Recently I have been finding new ideas for using my heat gun. One idea I saw was to to embossing on fabric. One person said that she had personalized beach towels. When I tried it, it wasn't as successful as I would have hoped. The embossing powder blew around on the fabric and that caused a mess around the letters on the towel. Since that happened, I have been racking my brain for a way to rescue the towel. I got these towels for just $6.99 at Target, but I still didn't want to waste them! Then, I saw my fabric markers and decided to try to outline the letters with a fabric marker. What a difference!
Now I want to do towels for all of my grandchildren! I had two more towels ready to go on hand, so I did them for my other 2 grandchildren who live in town. I didn't do any glittery embossing powder, but I just used the fabric markers to decorate them. You can use stencils or free hand them. Make pictures or other decorations with the colorful markers. If your kids are old enough, they can decorate their own towel.
I used Tulip brand fabric markers. They come in a variety of tips and vibrant colors. They also dried quickly so there was no wait time. Emily was able to use hers at swimming lessons the same day.
This post contains affiliate links. I will be compensated for purchases made through those links at no additional cost to you. All views expressed are my own. Thank you for your support! Are you old enough to remember the Kool Aid Man commercials? Oh Yeah! I've done a lot with Kool Aid over the years besides drink it the regular way. I've made slushies for my kids with it. I have made play dough with it. I've seen people dye their hair with it, though I haven't done that. But, today for Fun Friday I am going to share a couple of "new to me" ideas using this versatile powdered beverage, plus I am throwing in a free printable, too! Kool Aid Candy Dots When I was a kid growing up, getting those little wax paper sheets of colorful candy dots was a fun treat for us. When I recently began to see recipes for them on Pinterest, I was intrigued. The recipes I saw all called for egg whites or meringue powder. I wanted to make my dots vegan, so I used corn syrup instead. You can make your Candy Dots any flavor you would like and they only take 4 ingredients! Here is how I made them: Kool Aid Candy Dots 1 c. powdered sugar 1/2 package kool aid unsweetened mix, any flavor 2 T. corn syrup 1 T. almond milk Mix the ingredients together until a stiff yet flowing dough forms. Put into a piping bag and using a small round tip, pipe onto waxed paper strips. (Just make small dots, the dots will spread.) I made two batches, one of orange and one lime. This recipe made LOADS of dots! Allow the dots to dry over night. My candy dots stayed a little soft inside, not totally crunchy. The Kool Aid really gives them a burst of flavor and bright color! After they dried, I cut my waxed paper strips between the dots into 4x6 inch rectangles and slipped them into plastic cookie bags. I think these would make a sweet, fun party favor! To print, use the Avery 8160 labels. Do not check "fit to page." I used lime and orange flavors, but the possibilities are only limited by the flavors of Kool Aid available. I love how bright and sunny these colors are and I think they would be great at a swimming party, (along with some Kool Aid Slushes!) Kool Aid Sherbet or Ice Cream Believe it or not, I think this sherbet was even easier than the candy dots and of course, much cooler! Since it only took 1/2 a package of Kool Aid to make the Candy Dots, I used the same flavors to make this ice cream, or sherbet, whichever you want to call it, and it only took 3 ingredients! Not only that, I made one of the flavors vegan for Maddy's sake and it is so good! I will give you the recipe for both the vegan and the non-vegan versions. "Put the Lime in the Coconut" Vegan Kool Aid Sherbet 1-15 oz can coconut cream or coconut milk 3/4 c. granulated sugar 1/2 package lime Kool Aid "Put the lime in the coconut and mix it all together!" (I couldn't resist!) Mix all of the ingredients together very well. Pour them into a regular sized loaf pan. Put in the freezer for about 2 hours. After 2 hours, the sherbet should be partially set. Use the hand held electric beaters and beat the mixture to create a more creamy texture and smooth back into shape in the loaf pan. Place back in the freezer. I left it in the freezer until the next day and then scooped it out to serve! It is really delicious! Creamy Orange Kool Aid Ice Cream 1 and 1/2 c. heavy cream 1/2 package orange Kool Aid 3/4 c. granulated sugar Mix all the ingredients together and prepare just like the lime recipe. It is so yummy! Hope you have some good summer fun this weekend and maybe give one or both of these recipes a try! Let me know what you think and if you have any other off the wall Kool Aid ideas!
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Creators of Hot Cocoa Bombs! (copyrighted)
Author
Helen Reynolds: Mother of six children , grandmother to eleven! I love to cook, craft and create things and I especially love doing that with my family, So, when my lawyer daughter, Lindsey, my artist daughter, Madalynn, and I came up with the idea of Hot Cocoa Bombs, this blog was born. Then, one more daughter, with her technical and science skills, plus creativity has joined in to round us out! Read more about us here! Archives
June 2024
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