Helpful Mom

As you may know my kids love to quiz me on what color does it make if you combine x and y.  Over and over all different combinations, they ask day after day.  And we do different types of activities to reinforce what we’ve taught them about the basic colors and what combinations make their favorites, like blue and red make purple.  Our most common way to do this is by coloring our pancakes different colors.  But today’s activity was simple and easy.  All you need is a few plastic containers, water, food coloring, and eye droppers(I used our medicine syringes).  We filled three containers about halfway with water and added a few drops of food coloring to each of them in the primary colors.  Red, yellow, and blue can be combined to make all the colors of the rainbow, and if you combine all three you make brown.  Give your kids empty containers and the eyedroppers so they can combine the colors and experiment to their hearts delight.  We pulled up chairs to our kitchen counter and they were enthralled for at least a half an hour just mixing colors!  And after nap time they asked to do it again.  This time we moved it to the tub and they spent nearly an hour playing with their colors.

Sorry it’s been so long.  Last week was a crazy whirlwind, 3 book sales, the Ronald McDonald house garage sale, and catering dinner for 60, all along with all the normal day to day things with the girls.  Thank goodness for a supportive husband, naptime, and preschool mornings.

So today I was making easy pretzels which the girls absolutely loved making and they were very easy.

The recipe goes as follows from:                                                                   

1 package of yeast and 1 1/2 cups of warm water mixed together until the yeast fully dissolves.  Add 1 tsp. salt, 1 Tbs sugar, and 4 cups of flour.  Mix and knead the dough until it is smooth.  Roll and twist the dough into letters, numbers, or other shapes.  Lay the pretzels on a greased sheet, brush with a beaten egg and sprinkle with salt.  Bake at 425 for 12-15 minutes.

The girls really got into it.  They love to help me bake anyways but this had lots of fun steps for them to get involved.  As we added the flour I told Katrina that we needed 4 cups of flour and I had put 1 in how many more do I need?  3!  And so on, she thought it was great and I knew I’d snuck in a little basic math.  They loved helping to knead the dough and of course creating all kinds of letters and shapes.

They come out pretty white not brown like pretzels, so if you wanted to color them it would be another fun opportunity to teach about mixing colors.  Funny the girls now ask me all the time what different color combinations would make, and we buy those Trix yogurts by Yoplait that come with two colors in the package and they want me to mix them together to see what colors it makes.