Activity for Kids: Cheap, Easy, Fun!

My two year old is SO hard to entertain. She just really isn't into anything, accept making a mess. But this little activity did the trick! It actually held her attention! She wanted to do it again and again! This really is so much fun! best thing about it is that you most likely already have everything you need to do it in your kitchen!

 I found it on Pinterest, but it doesn't have a link, so if you know where it came from let me know so that I can give proper credit! This is what you need:

*Vinegar *Food Coloring* Baking Soda* Medicine Dropper

 Cover the floor of a casserole dish with baking soda. In a separate bowl mix vinegar and food coloring. You don't have to measure. It will all work out just fine. Fill your medicine dropper with the vinegar and food coloring mixture and drop it on the baking soda. It fizzles up really big and then settles into little colored polka dots.

This is Raia with her baby sitter Kaci who has been helping us since I have been injured. Even Kaci and I were entertained!

Make sure you have plenty of baking soda because if your kidsa re anything like mine, they will want to do it again and again. My nine year saw these pictures while I was posting and she wants to do it now too.

 It may be perfect for all ages!

I hope you try it and let me know how it turned out for you! I'd love to have you become a follower as well. It would make my day!

Thanks!

Have a great day!

XOXO,

 Amy

RIP- Halloween Cupcakes

How cute are these to satisfy your Halloween craving?

While I was waiting in a doctor's office (something I do a lot since I have four kids) I saw this cute little recipe for a chocolate cake with "RIP" Headstones made out of cookies. I loved the idea and wanted to make it, but I thought cupcakes would be easier. No cutting and serving and plates and forks to worry about that way:)

So I guess I cheated a little bit because I didn't make the cake or frosting from scratch, but I did add an extra egg and a teaspoon and a half of vanilla to a white cake mix. And besides, My friend who is an expert at making cupcakes and frosting from scratch says she likes store bought chocolate frosting better than homemade anyway:)

So you will need:

Cake mix- whatever flavor is your favorite Prepare as directed adding extra egg and teaspoon and a half vanilla extract

Cup cake liners

2 cans Chocolate frosting

Milano Cookies from Pepperage Farm (Vanilla wafers would also work)

Basically you make your cupcakes according to the directions on the box. Let cool completely (put in freezer for a half hour if needed)

Fill a zip lock bag with chocolate frosting and cut a very tiny slit in one corner to pipe "RIP" onto cookie.

Frost cup cakes, cut a slit in the top of the cup cake with a knife for the cookie to be inserted into the cupcakes.

note: if you use a chocolate cake recipe you can crumble a little of the cake in front of the headstone to look like freshly turned dirt. I didn't do this because I used a vanilla cake.

So Yummy and so fun!

Happy Crafting!

xoxo, Amy

P.S. - Do me a favor and go here and click on my link (#512- at the bottom) so that I can be one of the most viewed links and e featured . . . please?

Rainbow Rapunzel Cake

Hello! I am super excited to be a part of this blog.
I am Amy's sister-in-law, Shannon.
I married her brother, Sean, who has been telling me for 2 years that I need to have a blog; but, lets face it ~ it's kind of intimidating! So, here I am facing my fears, thanks to Amy ;)

For my first post I thought I would share the cake I made for my daughter's 9th birthday.
Since she was born on St. Patrick's Day we talked about different elements that make that day special. When we talked about Leprechauns and how they have gold at the end of rainbows, she wanted a rainbow cake. So, that I what I made.

STEP 1: COLLECT SUPPLIES

The first things I did were preheat the oven and gather everything I needed
to make a mess in my kitchen.

1 BOX WHITE CAKE MIX
{we like Pillsbury since it has pudding in the mix YUM!}
+ INGREDIENTS FOR CAKE
{I think you need eggs or egg replacer, oil and water}

CAKE PAN(S)
{I used 1 large rectangle, but rounds would too}

6 BOWLS
{1 large siz and 5 small/medium size}

2/3 C MEASURING CUP

RUBBER SPATULA

PAM SPRAY

FLOUR

2 HOT PADS

TIMER

SPATULA
{I used my large surface one that we use for flipping pancakes}

1-2 TUBE WHITE FROSTING

FOOD COLORING

FOIL-LINED COOKIE SHEET

AN AFTERNOON AND A WILLING CHILD ;)

I did not decorate the cake. My husband's Aunt Lisa did.
I will ask her where to find a tutorial on how to do it, then I will add it.




STEP 2: MIX THE CAKE

Next, I mixed the cake the cake according to the instructions on the box. Then I separated the mix into the 5 smaller bowls, and left some in the large bowl. I had 2/3 C mix in each bowl.
So it should look like this sans the food coloring I added prior to taking the picture.


Next, I added a whole lot of food coloring to each bowl. I just used the kind you can pick up at the grocery store ~ like the kind you dye eggs with. If you have the cake food coloring then by all means use that because the color might be richer. I don't make more than 2-3 cakes a year, so I didn't want to invest in those ones.

For red, yellow and blue, I put about 1/3 teaspoon of coloring in each bowl. For orange I mixed red and yellow, but more red than yellow. For green I mixed almost equal parts of blue and yellow, I think I put just a little more blue. For purple I mixed equal parts red and blue, but it almost looked black so I tried to fix it by adding a whole lot more red. It came out looking decent so what can I say? When I was putting the food coloring back in the box I noticed a nifty little chart that says exactly how many drops of each color to mix to get the desired color. . . But thanks to passing kindergarten I knew how to mix the primary colors!

This is how much blue dye I used. It wasn't vibrant enough for me, so I ended up doubling it.

Lexi, little chef in the making.

It looks like candy

I let her do all the mixing of the colors

STEP 3: BAKE THE CAKE

This is the tedious part ~ I only had 1 large rectangle pan, so I had to repeat this step 6 times!

First, take your clean pan and spray it with PAM on the bottom and along the edges really well. You don't want any trouble taking the cake out since it's going to be really thin.

Next, add a small amount {I think it was about 1-1 1/2 Tbs} of flour and dust
around the inside of pan. I was told that this helps the cake to come out easier. I'm not sure if it why this is, but it works pretty good. Make sure that you get the flour all along the bottom and the sides. Dump the excess flour in the trash.

I started with the purple layer and worked my way backwards through the rainbow, so that red would be on top just like in a real rainbow. Pour 1 color of the mix in the pan, then use your rubber spatula to spread it through out the pan as evenly as possible.
I set the timer for 10 min and it cooked it perfectly. Remember I used a large rectangle pan,
so it you are using round or any other shape, you may have to give or take a little on the timing.

I used the large spatula to gently separate the cake from the pan; then I quickly turned the pan upside down on the foil-lined cookie sheet. I washed the pan then repeated for each color of the rainbow.

While the first layer was cooking, Lexi said she wanted purple frosting with Funfetti sprinkles in between each layer. So, we mixed our red and blue again and got purple frosting. We still didn't use that chart. ;) Because each layer was so thin, it cool pretty rapidly. So, so while we cooked the blue layer, we frosted and sprinkled the purple layer. We did this for each color. If you are going to just frost the cake with normal frosting, then make sure that you have both tubs of frosting. We used 1 whole tub for the filling.

The last thing to do before the enjoying the cake it to frost or decorate the outside.
Sean's Auntie called that morning and offered to make Lexi a Tangled cake, since:

a) Lexi LOVES that movie {understatement of the year}
b)Lisa is uber talented and make awesome cakes {another understatement}
c)Lexi thinks Lisa is like the Cake Boss

So, I dropped my cake off at her house to let her work some magic. You can do what every tickles your fancy. For those interested in how she frosted it, I will ask her where to find a tutorial.
* She said to use something called pastry puff?? I guess it comes in a box, just follow directions to mix it. She said she painted the inside of a pastry bag with food coloring to get the strip look in the hair. I'm not sure where to get this stuff, but I'm sure a google search might bring it up.

I don't even like cake, I am really more of a cookie person ~ chocolate chip cookie person to be exact ~ and I usually skip out on cake. There was something tempting about the bright colors of this cake though, so even I had some, and it was yummy!

VARIATION:
Instead of cooking each layer individually, you could layer them all in the same pan. Put the purple in first, spread it out, then the blue and so on. You could bake it like that or run a knife through it to give it a marble effect. Another idea is to drop spoonfuls of each color randomly in the pan until you have used it all up. Then cook according to time on the box. If you try any one of these variations, please link to this page so I can see what you've done with your crafty self!

All you have left to do is enjoy :)