Cinnamon Pretzels

We had a snow day today...plenty of the white stuff! With school cancelled, we had the kiddos home, and they were looking for something fun to do. They pulled out their Rainy Day Play book (which we renamed the Snowy Day Play book just for the day). They found a fun idea for making soft pretzels. I remembered that I had a ball of frozen pizza dough from Grandin Bakery in our freezer. I put it in the fridge to thaw this morning and it was ready to go later in the afternoon.

I had brown pizza dough on hand, but we also make white dough at the bakery if you prefer. The kids made long "snakes" out of the dough and shaped them into letters, pretzels and other shapes (including Santa's sleigh, can you spot it in the last picture?) We put the shapes onto a parchment-lined baking sheet. My parchment is oven-safe to 425°F. If you don't have any that is safe at that temperature, just use a greased baking sheet. We then brushed the pretzels with melted (salted) butter, and sprinkled them with cinnamon and a generous amount of brown sugar.

The pretzels went into the oven, preheated to 425°F, for about 12 minutes. How long you bake them will depend on how thick they are. Ours were about as thick as my thumb.

When the pretzels came out of the oven, we let them cool on the pan for a couple minutes and then moved them to a wire rack to rest until they were cool enough to eat. The kids dipped them in maple syrup...mmm...just right!

Glad I had the dough in the freezer. Made this project quick and easy. One snow day down, how many to go?

Princess Birthday Party

Do you have a little girl with a birthday coming up? Here's her chance to be a princess for a day! Princess parties are great for girls around 5-8 years old.

When you send out invitations, let the guests know they can come dressed up as princesses. It is also nice to have a few extra dress-up pieces at the party for anyone who forgets or doesn't have a costume.

There are so many great ideas for party activities:

1. Decorate crowns with feathers and gems.
2. Make necklaces and bracelets with beads and cord.
3. Paint wooden jewelry boxes and jazz them up using glitter glue.
4. Pick up a few princess puzzles and see who can finish making theirs the fastest. The kids can take home their puzzles after the party.
5. Have a princess race. Each girl puts a book on her head and they all walk (run!) to the finish line.
6. Play a princess memory game. Put a bunch of princess items on a tray. If you're like us, you'll have plenty of princess toys around the house. Look for things like princess figurines, tiny hair combs, glass slippers, and rings. The older the children are, the more items you can place on the tray. To play the game, give the girls a minute to look at all the items on the tray. Have the girls turn around and then remove one item from the tray. Let them look at the tray again and try to figure out which item is missing. Replace the toy and play again.
7. Have a dance party. Put on some fun music and let the girls dance in their fancy dresses.

Ready for snack time? Grandin Bakery has lots of fun ideas for party treats. We can do cakes with tiaras, castles and pretty princesses. We also have a set of cutters that make the loveliest cookies. Just let us know how you'd like them decorated!

Instead of goodie bags, you might want to give one special item to each girl, like a wand or a princess story book. And if you have a printer at home, you can take a group picture of the princesses, print out copies, and send each girl home with a photo to remember the special day. Happy party planning!

Teddy Bear Birthday Party

Here is a great theme for a little girl's birthday party: Teddy Bears! This party would be great for younger kids between the ages of 4-6.

Invite each guest to bring along her favorite teddy bear. The teddies can join in all the birthday fun, from snack time to present opening.

• Set up extra chairs at the table so that each girl can sit next to her bear at a tea party.

• Make hats for the teddy bears using paper cups, crayons, and stickers. Use some stretchy string to put chin straps on the hats so that they stay snugly on the bears. 

• Let the kids decorate teddy bear shaped cookies. Grandin Bakery can make uniced sugar cookies that are ready to be decorated. We can also put together containers of icing in any color you like. Just pick up some candies or other toppings at the grocery store and you're set! Here is a picture of the teddy bear cutter we use at the bakery:

• Be sure to play games with the teddies. One idea is to have a teddy bear race. Split the kids up into pairs and give each pair a tea towel to place their teddies on. Each person holds two corners of the tea towel and together they carry their bears to the finish line. Whichever pair gets there first wins. If the bears fall out of the tea towel, back to the starting line!

• When it's time to open gifts, first have each guest hide her teddy bear for the birthday girl to find. Each time a girl's bear is found, her present is opened. This is a fun way to get everyone involved in the gift opening.

• Having kids over for lunch? Make teddy bear shaped sandwiches. Simply cut bread into bear shapes using cookie cutters and then add cheese or jam. Here are some cute grilled cheese sandwiches that are beary fun!

Dinosaur Birthday Party

I love planning birthday parties for my kids. And it always helps to have a little inspiration, so I thought I'd share some of my ideas with you here. Today's theme is dinosaurs!

 1.     

1.       Set the Scene:

•  Let the birthday boy or girl help you draw dinosaur foot prints and hang them around the house. 

• Make a mini dino world to put on the party table. Fill a container with dirt, scatter rocks over top, tuck in a few small branches for trees, and add some plastic dinosaurs.

 Plan Fun Activities:

• Have a dinosaur dig! Buy a bag or two of plastic, toy dinosaurs (you can usually find these at a dollar store) and bury them in a bucket of Lego. Divide the kids into two teams and line them up a few feet away from the bucket. Let the teams race to dig up the dinosaurs. The first person on each team runs to the Lego and starts searching. Once he finds a dinosaur, he runs back to his team and the next person runs over to start searching. The team that finds their half of the hidden dinosaurs first is the winner. In the summer, if the weather is nice, you can play this game in the sandbox instead of with Lego. 

•  Play T-Rex hide & seek: Whoever’s turn it is to seek has to roar and stomp like a Tyrannosaurus Rex while he looks for the other kids.

• Make paper plate Stegosauruses: Buy two sizes of paper plates and cut them into halves. Give each child a small half plate for the head and a large half plate for the body. Using double-sided tape, help them attach the head to one end of the body (the dino will be in profile view). You could always have assembled dino bodies ready for the kids to decorate, if that’s easier. Let the kids use foam stickers to make legs, spikes, eyes and ears. They can also color their dinosaurs with markers or crayons.

 
 Have Super Dino Snacks:

• What's on the menu? How about dinosaur eggs (grapes or jellybeans), dinosaur bones (popcorn twists) and swamp water (juice).

•  Set out some fun dinosaur-shaped cookies. Grandin Bakery makes sugar cookies decorated in any colors you like.

 Happy party planning!

Hmmm...how to keep the kids busy at the family Christmas party?

Here are a few of our favorite ideas:

• Set up a craft station to make ornaments. Stock up on popsicle sticks, pompoms, pipe cleaners, beads and glue. Let the kids create!
  

• Have some "Minute to Win It" type games ready to go. Have the kids race each other to stack six metal nuts (from the hardware store) on top of each other using only a pencil (no hands!). Last year, at our family Christmas, one of the challenges was to put cookies on our foreheads and get them into our mouths by simply scrunching up our faces -- lots of laughs with that one! Check out the Minute to Win It website for more game ideas.

• Have a white elephant gift exchange: all the gifts have to be something from home that you don't need (want!) anymore. Each person can open a new gift or "steal" someone else's when it's their turn.

• Give the kids gingerbread men or sugar cookies to decorate with icing and candies. Put the icing into Ziploc bags and snip off the corners so that kids can squeeze out the icing.

• Set out a stocking and a bucket full of a bunch of household items. Let the kids take turns putting an item into the stocking and turns guessing what's inside just by feeling it.

Hope you have fun at your holiday get-togethers this year. We're sure looking forward to ours!