Hot Chocolate Spoons

Friday Treat Time

I have been wanting to try this out for a while, and I decided I would do it for the boys as a treat for after school.

I melted some chocolate and then let it set enough to get a full spoonful. Then I put some chococolate drops, fudge pieces and marshmallows on top before putting them in the fridge to set.

After about 30 mins they were ready to be served:

The milk was warm enough to melt the chocolate but not hot enough that you couldn't drink it!

It did actually turn to hot chocolate eventually , as long as you didn't eat too much of the chocolate first!

It was a tad sickly but good fun - I think they would have liked the spoons on their own!

Thank You!

Salty Spellings

This is very short and sweet (well salty!).

I am always trying to find new ways of "conning" the boys into doing their spelling, the best so far is "drawing" them on the iPad! However this new method has been good fun this week.

First we covered the base of a tray with salt:

Then the words were written into the salt (I am sorry I can't seem to get the photo up the right way, but you get the idea!):

The boys loved this, especially shaking the tray to make the words disappear!

If we do this enough it might stop thumb sucking as the salt stayed on their hands for a while!

Thank you as always!

Stress ball people "Squidgies"

I really though this was going to be an easy/quick activity, but let me tell you it was not nearly as easy as I had thought it was!

You need a balloon, salt (although we used flour first, we discovered it is MUCH easier with salt!) and funnel and then glue and bits to decorate...

Fill the balloon with the salt/flour, this was much messier than it needed to be! We literally redecorated the kitchen in flour!

Then tie a knot in the balloon...

Then you can let your imagination run wild with decorating your squidgy man!, I like the wobbly eye, Olly does not! As it turns out the wobbly eye does actually fall off once you start playing! Our Squidgies were not as firm as they should be I think I managed to get too much air in the balloon. They should keep their shape once you stretch them.

After a hard day of being played with at school they look warn out!

Thank you as alawys for getting to the bottom!

P.S I'd love a comment.....

Sugar cube houses

Competition Time

I would like to say we are not a competitive family, but I would be telling a lie!  We are all VERY competitive so whenever the word competition comes up everyone is definitely well and truely up for it!  

I have just undertaken the massive task of decluttering out kitchen, it took the best part of 4 whole days! In the midst of this decluttering I came across a box of sugar lumps and came up with a plan.

The boys and I decided to have a competition to see who could build the largest sugar cube tower in 1 minute....

This was Olly's - 7 lines (even including the top one which shouldn't really be included as the second to top is not a compete like!)

This was mine, 6 very beautiful lines!- 

 And Thomas was the winner with 8 complete lines!

We then decided to collaborate and see if we could build a complete pyramid wall with all the cubes....

Then an igloo was in order as they were like blocks of snow!

The boys then decided that they had to build a "snow house" for Yoda (of course!)

And everyone needs s ski slope.....

This was so much fun and a great start to the new year of activities!

For those who are concerned about wastage - there was none Robin has been working his way through the used cubes!

Thanks as always - please feel free to leave comments....

Upside down tea

I had seen this idea on the internet somewhere and I thought it would be fun, so one morning I announced we were having an upside down tea!

To start with we had shepherds pie cupcakes...

I always have a fuss when I make something like shepherds pie, but this time there wasn't a peep from either boy, they just ate them in record time!

Then they helped me make the pudding which was chocolate pizzas!

We just melted some chocolate and spread it into circles then decorated with sprinkles and sweets...

We left them in the fridge whilst we ate the cupcakes then they were ready to eat!

This was one of the most stress free tea times I can remember so I am wondering if I should make the upside down tea a weekly event!

Frozen Hands

A bit of preparation is needed for this activity, but it is loved by the boys!

You need to fill up some rubble gloves with water and put in the freezer, we then forget about them for a few weeks or months!

Our activity bowl has been out of action for a while and actually still is, but the other night Olly asked if we could get the hands out of the freezer!

We play with these things at bath time as the boys love watching them melt, they have a competition to see whose "hand" lasts the longest!

They do melt very quickly in the bath, but its so much fun watching the fingers fall off one by one!

You could also add colouring to the water before freezing.....

My next post is going to be all about an upside down tea we had....

New Year Edible Sparklers

HAPPY 2014

2014 is going to be a year full of crafts and activities and I can't wait!

On New Years Eve we had some friends round and we had a bit of fun before the kids went to bed. We had some fireworks (indoor and outdoor!) and then we watched the countdown from 2012 (!) and all sang auld lang syne before the children went to bed not too late (they would still be up at 6 anyway!)For tea we made edible sparklers, They are so easy and the children loved them!

For tea we made some edible sparklers -

We basically dipped either breadsticks or marshmallows in chocolate and then dipped them in sparkly sprinkles!

After eating pretend fireworks we watched some real ones...

Thank you so much for reading still, I am really looking forward to some of things we have planned for this year!

Second Half of Advent

A Quick Snap Shot!

I know that everyone has moved on from Christmas (except me who in just discovering Pinterest is frantically "pinning" ideas for next year!) but in the name of completion I feel I need to post a few of the activities we did in the second half of advent! So here you go:

Cloud Dough

This was something I had wanted to try out for a while and it was good fun, although not as fun as I had hoped! You basically mix flour with oil a drop at a time until you get a bread crummy texture that moulds into shapes but also crumbles easily - like moon sand. We also added glitter:

Christmas Play dough 

I really love making play dough, I really do - there are loads of recipes on the Internet, but I use 3 cups of flour, 1.5 cups of salt, 6 tsp cream of tartar, 3 tbsp oil, 3 cups water, some glitter and some food colouring. You put all the ingredients in a saucepan and heat gently whilst string, its so satisfactory when it suddenly comes together then you can kneed it until it looks and feels like play dough.

Cinnamon Stars

This was from The Truth in the Tinsel you basically mix a cup of cinnamon and a cup of apple sauce, we then added some flour until it was a dough like consistency and made stars. We baked them on a low heat for about an hour. They smell really nice and make good tree decorations.

Decorating gingerbread stars 

I don't think this needs much explanation! The boys  love squirting on icing and sticking sprinkles and sweets on them and then they eat them as quickly as possible!

We did so many more activities but none that I seem to have photographed! It was a really busy lead up to Christmas but a great one! We had so much fun with this Adventivity and will definitely be doing the same next year - I have already started looking for ideas!

I hope you all had a lovely time and Happy New Year!