Category Archives: Fun with Kids

A Week on Our Own: Days 4-5

A Week On Our Own: Day 3

Today was the BIG day for Dave; the day of the defense. For Little Man and I, it was a day of trials and errors… many trials… many errors. Numerous errands that were achieved, but just barely, and I think we were both relieved to have survived until nap time when we both got some time apart from the other.

It was during nap time that I got the much awaited call from Dave to say that he’d passed!!! I wasn’t surprised since he’s pretty fantastic, but it’s always good to get confirmation. The presentation went well, the public discussion went well, the private committee discussion went well, and it was all wrapped up with a couple of bottles of bubbly to toast the soon-to-be doctorate. Now there are just the edits to get through, and then the formatting hurdles for the graduate school. There’s always something that goes sideways with the formatting, and things are normally sent back to you at least once. I can’t imagine what this must have been like before word processing computers. Oy!

To celebrate the successful completion of his dissertation defense Dave was going to go out to dinner with some friends and committee members, and it only seemed fitting that Little Man and I went out as well.

We went to one of Little Man’s favorite restaurants, Sun’s Noodle Bar, specifically for their Chicken Fried Rice. Normally we call in an order and get take out for home, but this was a special day so Little Man and I ate in the restaurant. Often when Dave and I take Little Man to a restaurant we bring the ipad with it’s movies and games to keep Little Man entertained while we get to enjoy a meal outside of the house and some adult conversation. This night, I didn’t even need it. Little Man sat and ate his food like a pro… albeit a very hungry pro… and didn’t ask for the ipad until the very end when I was paying the bill. We sat, we talked, we ate, it was a blast and totally made up for our mutual frustrations earlier in the day. Now we just had to make it to the weekend…

A few more jewels for Daddy’s sign, and a bit of glitter glue.

Operation Daddy Sign: Day 3

Today was a day for a few more jewels and some glitter glue for Daddy’s special sign. Little Man first selected the “tiny, tiny, tiny” jewel that he wanted to claim for his own (today was turquoise), and then chose a few more for Daddy’s sign. The glitter glue was a bit more anticlimactic since you had to squeeze pretty firmly on the tube to apply it, so it involved a bit more Mommy help than the other tasks had. But we added some sparkle to the sign, and another jewel was added to the treasure chest, so all in all a successful art project.

Glitter glue accents.

A Week On Our Own: Day 2

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Fairy Doors

Today we woke to a gorgeously sunny morning, something we haven’t seen in awhile. It’s still a cool Spring, but the sunshine makes all the difference. We also had a play date set up with one of Little Man’s friends (and mine too) to visit Neck Point. No errands today, just fun.

Our main goal for today was for Little Man and his friend to visit the Fairy Doors. The last time I wrote about Neck Point was for the first time we visited the park with Dave for a Surprise Day. We’ve been back many times, often with friends for sunny day play dates and a few times with family as well. It’s one of our favorite places to visit, and each time we are there we explore new paths and find new treasures.

Little Man’s favorite thing to do (other than throwing pebbles into the ocean) is to visit the Fairy Doors. Up until this point we’d only ever visited the main door where treasures can be found. I’m still learning the story of who made these doors, but from the parking lot if you take the path behind the washroom and head up and to the right you will find the first Fairy Door.

“Give a Little, Take a Little”

A small sign above the door states “Give a Little, Take a Little.” I’d been told about this door in advance, so I knew to bring a little treasure to leave behind and that Little Man could then choose a little treasure of his own from the fairy stash. Today I also brought a little extra treasure along for Little Man’s friend since this was their first visit to the doors. We generally pass on the dodgy candy, but each visit has a new selection of treasures to choose from. Little Man’s favorite so far is the penny, which is my personal favorite too since they aren’t even printed anymore. A real treasure if I’ve ever seen one.

If you continue straight on this path (no veering to right or left, no matter how tempting those paths are, at least for us today) you will come across a small grove of other fairy doors. I think we’ve counted nine in total, and there very well could be more scattered across other paths. We’re going to have to keep exploring to see if there are others. My friend said that she’d seen a picture of another, more ornate door… That should keep us searching up and down the paths for awhile.

Door 2

Door 3

Door 4

Door 5

Some of the doors are higher in the trees for those fast flying fairies.

Door 6

Door 7

Door 8

For today Little Man and his friend had a blast going up to every door they could find and knocking to see if any fairy were home. The only door that actually opens is on the treasure house door, so we explained that the other fairies must be out and about (or ooot and abooot). The kiddos sighed, and then rushed off to the next door they found.

Knock, knock… Any fairies home?

Lastly we came to another one of the pebble beaches and climbed around on the logs a bit. This beach, however, got a full blast of the cold ocean wind, so pretty quickly we went back to the paths and back tracked to our favorite pebble-throwing-in-the-ocean beach that is around the bend and protected from the wind. By this time the little legs were exhausted and it was getting close to lunch time. That means that the whining level went up considerably, and the tired toddlers were herded back to the cars and their respective homes for lunches and nap times. More exploring would have to wait for another day.

The adventurers…

Day 2 of Operation Daddy Sign

Even better than paint splatting, Little Man LOVES stickers. Now, the problem can be that he wants the stickers to be toys rather than letting them stay on the paper. For Operation Daddy Sign, Little Man chose some sparkly start stickers and special gem stickers, both of which were left over from supplies for birthday crowns that we never got around to making.

Little Man putting star stickers on Daddy’s sign.

A close up of a star sticker constellation. Say “star sticker” five times fast…

Little Man got to put the stars and 4 gems on one by one, choosing the spots himself. He likes to group and line things up, so he made some nice constellations in a couple of spots.

The jewels…

The “little, little, little” purple jewel for Little Man’s treasure.

His favorite part of this was that at the end of putting on all the stickers, he got to choose one gem for his own to play with. He chose a “little, little, little” purple one, and has been playing with it ever since. He puts it on his golden plastic pirate coins, puts it on his real coins, carries it around to the dinner table and to brush his teeth before bed. He even “put it to sleep” on his changing table before story time. It will be interesting to see how long it takes for the jewel to become lost in or under the couch. Any over/unders? Day 2 accomplished…

Operation Daddy Sign: Day 2 (Stickers accomplished)

A Week On Our Own

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It was only after we’d dropped Dave off at the ferry to start his week-long adventure to New York to defend his dissertation that I realized I was going to be alone with Little Man for the first time in a foreign land. Canada doesn’t feel “foreign” very much any more, but for that moment driving the curvy, forested road back to our house on the farm it did.

This was going to be one of those weeks where the main goal was to make lemonade out of lemons… as fast as absolutely possible. A dissertation defense, for those who haven’t had to face this particular lion’s den, is a public presentation of your dissertation followed by a series of question and answer periods the first one open to the public and the second one only with your committee. This is where you “defend” your dissertation, the work you’ve done, what your work adds to the larger field of anthropology (no stress there), and basically why your committee should set you free. It’s a huge milestone towards the completion of your doctorate, and we weren’t going to be able to be there for Dave. Argh!

My goal for the week was to try to keep Little Man entertained and help him as he’d miss his daddy, as well as keeping myself sane as the sole caretaker of our energetic three year old. Towards that goal I hoped that writing about our adventures for the blog would both encourage me to find interesting things to do, as well as having a place to actually stop and put my thoughts together in the evenings after Little Man was asleep. This week will be a bit different for this blog since I’ll have entries for each day. So strap on in, here we go…

Day 1: A Sign for Daddy
The day was rainy, like both of our moods. We moved through our routine of breakfast and getting ready, running a few errands, but Little Man was not at his best and neither was I. After his afternoon nap things got noticeably better, partly thanks to a craft idea from my brain twin on the east coast. Jen is my doppleganger in spirit and it’s likely better for the world in general that we don’t live near each other anymore, but it’s hard to be split from someone who you share a brain with. Jen is also the mother to two adorable little girls, and she is a wealth of fun kiddo activities. When her husband was recently away for a week of training Jen helped her oldest make a sign to welcome Daddy home and each day they did something else to the sign. That’s what Little Man and I started today.

The best thing ever is splatting the brush onto the paper.

Our first day on Operation Daddy Sign consisted primarily of painting, me using my fingers and Little Man using a foam brush. His favorite part was to fly the brush-plane over the paper and drop it with a splatting noise and splatting paint on the paper. My job was to try to keep the brush splatting on the paper and not the floor or the cats, as well as keeping the cats from contributing their own paw art by running across the art work. All in all a good time was had by all, though I think the kitties would have liked a bit more artistic expression.

I kept rotating the paper so more splatting to cover more of the paper.

I kept rotating the paper so more splatting could cover more of the paper.

I also took the opportunity to make a batch of Whole Wheat Oatmeal bread, and the entire house smells of warm baking. I think that after putting Little Man down to bed my treat will be a slice of that bread with a little butter and some TV or maybe a good book. In the meantime, I have a little boy who is protesting that he isn’t tired and doesn’t want to go to bed yet, while at the same time rubbing his eyes and sighing tiredly. Time to wrap things up for Day 1.

Using Frozen Pizza Dough

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It came to my attention that while I have briefly talked about how to use frozen pizza dough for flat bread, I’ve never actually given the process it’s own center stage. Frozen pizza dough is like gold in your freezer, and it is incredibly easy to thaw quickly in the microwave. There is no need to wait for a solid hour or more for it to thaw out on the counter top. So I wanted to share that information here in it’s own post and it’s own recipe. Hopefully this will help make it more accessible and also take a bit of the fear factor out of using the dough from frozen.

This all started with a blog post about stocking your pantry with easy to make foods, that can be made cheaply, made in bulk, and frozen for storage and easy retrieval later on. For me, the most versatile thing that I make in my kitchen is Whole Wheat Pizza Dough, and unless something terrible happens (like our freezer being such a mess that we can’t possibly see a frozen ball of delicious dough… which has happened…) I always have it in my freezer.

What I do not always have is the hour or more that it can take to allow the dough to leisurely thaw out and come up to room temperature while lounging (the dough, not me) on the kitchen counter. This is especially true in the cold weather months. Instead, we have been graced with the microwave. If, like some of my dear friends, you have no use for the microwave then please by all means use this same recipe to make and freeze the dough. You need to be more organized than I am in order to remember when to pull the dough out to thaw, but judging on the organizational skills of my friends who choose to not use the microwave that isn’t a problem.

But back to our task at hand… Using frozen pizza dough. This is going to be important, since the next post I do will have an amazing Turkish inspired baked tomato and egg dish. You are going to want to make that dish, and you are going to want this easy flat bread to go with it. Trust me. 🙂

Using Frozen From Scratch Pizza Dough

Ingredients:
One portion of premade frozen Whole Wheat Pizza Dough (white dough works well for this too!)

Directions:
If you have lots of time…

Remove the frozen portion of pizza dough from your freezer and place it on the counter or someplace warm to sit for about an hour to thaw. Once the dough feels slightly chilled, but no longer frozen, use it as described below.
Frozen pizza dough lounging on the counter

If you don’t have an hour to thaw your dough…

Remove the frozen portion of pizza dough from your freezer and remove any plastic or other coverings you had it protected in.
Frozen dough ready to be defrosted.
Place the frozen dough on a small, microwave safe plate and “heat” the dough on regular power for 30 seconds.
Pizza dough that has been defrosted in the microwave and rested.
Let the dough rest in the microwave undisturbed for about 5 minutes. After the dough has rested give it a gentle poke with your finger in the center to see if it has thawed all the way through. If it still has a large frozen portion in the middle, then heat it again for 30 seconds and let it rest for 5 minutes. Continue doing this until the dough is completely thawed. Be careful since if you heat the dough too much in the microwave the edges will start to cook all the way through. You can still use your dough if this happens, but just know that those edges may get extra firm when you bake the dough.

To Bake Your Dough:

Roll or stretch your dough to the desired shape and thinness for whatever purpose you desire.
Ready to roll…

Hand stretched dough seasoned with a little olive oil, salt, and dried thyme.
If you want to be sure that you don’t get too many bubbles forming in the middle of your dough, dock it at this point with a rolling docker or simply poke it all over with the tines of a fork.
If you want the dough to be used as a flat bread or similar preparation, season the dough with a little olive oil, salt and your favorite dried herb blend and then bake it in a preheated 425 degree oven, checking it after about 10 minutes to ensure that it isn’t browning too quickly. To give it a nice burnishing on the top, switch your oven to broil for the last minute, but watch it like a hawk so that it doesn’t char.
If you want to use the dough for pizza, simply follow the pizza recipe you have at hand, or check out some of the options here at thesheepareout.com.
Enjoy!

Click here for a printable version of the Whole Wheat Pizza Dough recipe.

Click here for a printable version of the Using Frozen Pizza Dough recipe.

More Thoughts on Hummus

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Like I mentioned in my last post, hummus is one of those versatile recipes that can be used a dozen different ways. When I made the batch for the Request for Hummus post, I wanted to use the hummus for more than just a meze (a Turkish or Greek… why does it make me nervous to type both of those names back to back… dip or snack food), but as a part of a larger meal. What came to mind was a sandwich that I’d fiddled with before, but hadn’t yet perfected. What it needed was a silky layer of hummus to really pull all the flavors together, and voila, the Mediterranean Tuna and Hummus Sandwich was created. You’re really going to like this one.

The sandwich has three main components, the flat bread, the hummus and a Mediterranean-style Tuna Salad. The flat bread could be bought from your local store, or substituted out for a nice crusty roll, OR you could use some of the fantastic Whole Wheat Pizza Dough that I wrote about for stocking your pantry. As I’ll describe below (or click here for a “how to” recipe for Using Frozen Pizza Dough), you simply roll out the dough, season it with whatever dried herb mixture you prefer, and bake it until crispy. It’s delicious! The hummus, while you could buy it from the store, is so easy to make at home that once you get this recipe (Marie’s Hummus) down you’ll never look at the pasty stuff from the grocery store in the same way again. The last part, the Mediterranean-style Tuna Salad, is included here. If you’re not a big fan of the traditional mayonnaise-based tuna salad, this one is for you.

While I actually am a fan of a good, rich, mayonnaise-based tuna salad sandwich (in fact I think that’s what we’re having for dinner tonight) there are times when I want something a bit different, and that’s when I use this Mediterranean-style Tuna Salad recipe. It has a nice, briney bite from kalamata olives, a little feta cheese gives it a creamy-richness, and there’s plenty of crunch from vegetables like onion and celery. In fact, you’ll be surprised by how much salad one little can of tuna can create since it is well supported by a crunchy cast of characters. The salad is a cinch to toss together, the flavors get better if they have a chance to hang out for a bit, and it’s great to serve over lettuce for a large salad, or you can serve it with crackers for a snack or appetizer, OR even better you can serve it as a part of a great, layered open face sandwich like the one shown here.

Mediterranean-Style Tuna Salad

Ingredients:
3 eggs, hard boiled and separated
1 can tuna in water, drained
2 sticks of celery, finely diced
¼ cup feta, crumbled
¼ cup kalamata olives, pitted and diced
1 cup English or hot house cucumber, diced
½ small onion, diced
¼ cup olive oil
1 tbsp. lemon juice
1 tsp. herbs de Provence, or other dry herb blend
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

Separate the egg whites from the yolk, and discard two yolks. That is where most of the fat and cholesterol reside. Use them if you want, the salad will be even more delicious. I discard them here to lighten the salad. Finely dice the remaining yolk and whites. Add them to a large bowl.
Add the tuna, celery, feta, olives, cucumber and onions to the bowl and toss to combine.
The salad ingredients.

Tossed to combine
Whisk the olive oil, lemon juice, herbs, salt and pepper in a small bowl to combine.
Toss the salad with the dressing and enjoy!

Click here for a printable Mediterranean Tuna Salad recipe.

Mediterranean-Style Tuna and Hummus Sandwich

Ingredients:

One portion Whole Wheat Pizza Dough
1 cup Marie’s Hummus
1 batch Mediterranean Tuna Salad
1 tsp. Herbs de Provence blend
1 cup salad greens or arugula
Olive oil to taste

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350º.
Roll out the dough into a wide oval, about ¼ inch thick. With a fork (or docking tool) poke holes all over the surface of the dough. This will keep it from bubbling up and distorting. Brush the dough lightly with about 1 tsp. of olive oil. Sprinkle a pinch of salt and the Herbs de Provence over the dough. Either slide the dough directly onto a pizza stone in your hot oven, or place it on a parchment paper lined baking sheet and then into the hot oven. Bake for 10-15 minutes, or until just browned in spots. Remove the crust to your work area.
The prepared dough for flat bread.

Note that the shape of the dough changed significantly. 🙂 This is what makes it “rustic”… When things don’t go as planned just call them “rustic” and they’ll still taste as good.
Spread the hummus in a thin layer over most of your crust, leaving a 1 inch border around the edges.
Leave a thin border around the edges for a good place to hold onto your open faced sandwich.
Mound the Mediterranean Tuna Salad on top of the hummus, leaving a narrow border around the edges so that the hummus is visible.
Each added “layer” should leave a little of the previous layer visible so you can see a bit of everything.
Mound your salad greens or arugula on top of the tuna salad and drizzle it lightly with olive oil.
I used hearts of romaine here for the last layer, but my favorite is arugula. Water cress would be great too!
Cut into “slices” and serve. Enjoy!

Click here for a printable Mediterranean Style Tuna and Hummus Sandwich recipe.

If you want to find an easy “recipe” for using your frozen from scratch pizza dough, click here: Using Frozen Pizza Dough.

One delicious open face sandwich. You can make smaller sized ones for individual portions if you want to be fancy, or make one large one like this and cut it into quarters or long slices to serve family style.

A Request for Hummus

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One of the best parts of this blog has been reading and replying to comments from readers; and most recently receiving requests for recipes from friends. Cooking is a way that I connect with people. It’s something that I can do as a gift, or as a way to build a friendship, or to show love to friends and family. Often when I am cooking for someone, I am also thinking about that person while I’m chopping the onions and garlic, stirring the veg in the pan, or tasting for final seasoning. It makes cooking more than just putting ingredients together for a meal, but it gives me time to also think about the person or people that I’m cooking for. Its’ an act of love, not just of eating. So when friends request recipes from me I take it as the highest compliment.

It is therefore a great joy that in a couple of upcoming posts I will be sharing a couple of recipes requested from friends who are distant in geography but close in my thoughts. The first recipe I’ll be sharing is for hummus. Hummus is one of those foods that is super simple to make, irks me to buy premade, and is incredibly personal in how you prepare it. The two greatest influences for me in my hummus was the first time I was taught to make it in Beirut, as well as from my experiences in Turkey. In Beirut, the friend who taught me to make it created an amazingly herbaceous version, speckled throughout with finely chopped parsley. In Turkey I was most influenced by our amazing excavation chef, Necmi, who guarded his culinary secrets dearly, but whose hummus was incredibly silky and redolent with garlic and tahini.

Then there was Iowa… Not a statement that normally follows a genealogy of hummus. But it was in Iowa that I was able to expand my initial anthropology of food course into a series of courses, spanning food production and politics; to the cultural expressions of food and identity. It didn’t make sense to me to teach a course on food and not get to taste or prepare food to share in class. So for those classes, especially, I tried to make sure that I brought food to share with my students, and in a couple of cases (some more successful than others) to make food with the class on campus.

One of the most successful cases of this was with my Food Politics class when we spent one class meeting in the college kitchens making ricotta cheese and pizza dough for our own white pizzas. This isn’t just a “fluff” exercise, but it takes the intellectual side of talking about a subject and makes it real by actually touching, preparing, sharing and eating food together.

For this particular class it happened that I had a couple of students who were lactose intolerant and I didn’t want to leave them out. So I started thinking of the bare pizza dough, fired in the oven, what would go well with it? Hummus… Make the pizza dough into a spiced flat bread, serve it with the freshly prepared hummus and you’ve got a rock star food to share. So that’s what we did; made pizza bianca with the homemade dough and ricotta, as well as a meze of hummus and flat bread. I was greatly impacted by many of the students from that class, and it’s been great to keep in touch with them as they graduated (or will soon!) from college and we’ve moved up north. This recipe was requested by one of those students, but she and her friend were inseparable and therefore I can’t bring myself to dedicate this hummus to one without the “other” (anthro humor there… sorry…). Chelsea and Becca, this is for you ladies.

As you will see with this recipe, basic hummus is a great blank canvas for a myriad of flavors. I’ve added smoked paprika for a little Spanish flare, spinach for some extra greenery in a form that my son will eat (sometimes), or roasted red bell pepper for a different savory taste. The sky (and your imagination) are the limit here, so feel free to whip up a batch and personalize it to your tastes.

I like to serve hummus in a shallow bowl, with a depression at the top to hold a little golden olive oil, and a sprinkling of paprika over top.

Hummus

Ingredients:

2 garlic clove (or more to taste)
2 (15 oz) cans of chickpeas, rinsed and drained
3-4 Tbsp. tahini (sesame seed) paste
3-4 tsp. lemon juice
2 tsp. ground cumin
2 tsp. ground coriander
2 tsp. salt
Approximately ½ cup olive oil

Directions:

Drop the garlic one clove at a time into a running food processor through the feed tube. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as necessary.
Dropping garlic into the feed tube.

Scrape down the sides of the bowl so you don’t lose any of that garlicky goodness.
Add the rest of the ingredients except for the olive oil and pulse until the ingredients are mixed but still a bit rough.
A rough mix of ingredients.
Then turn the processor on and through the tube slowly pour in the olive oil in a thin, steady stream until you get the desired creamy consistency.
A smooth, creamy hummus.
Taste and adjust for seasoning. Blend the hummus again. Taste. Blend. Enjoy!

Click here for a printable version of Marie’s Hummus recipe.

A perfect dish for sliced flatbread, fresh veges, or even as a “sauce” for sandwiches.

Leprechaun Games – Day 3

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We reached the end of our Leprechaun Games adventures on Monday, the official date for St. Patrick’s Day. Little Man had successfully found six coins through the Leprechaun Cloud and Magic Treasure Stones activities. Now on this last day of the treasure hunt, he awoke to find that the leprechauns had returned over night to hide the final installment of three coins. This time they had hidden three coins under three rainbows in the living room. Just between you and me, the original plan of the leprechauns was to hide the coins and rainbows outside but St. Patrick’s Day ended up being a bone-chilling cold and rainy day. Therefore the leprechauns took pity on us and left the booty in the nice, warm, dry house.

One leprechaun showing where the coin was going to be hidden in the rainbow of cups.

The first rainbow was found on the living room table crafted out of Little Man’s rainbow cups. He found this one quickly since the leprechauns used their favorite color green cup as the hiding place.

Little Man found the hidden coin quickly.

The rainbow and coin hidden inside the castle tent.

The second rainbow was hidden inside Little Man’s castle/tent. He was relieved that the resident dragon (aka really fluffy cat) hadn’t snuck into the castle to play with the treasure.

Little Man with rainbow in hand and recovered coin by his foot. Teddies at the ready to protect from the dragon-cat.

The third and last rainbow was one drawn by the leprechauns on Little Man’s art easel. The plan was to give us an art project for later on in the day, and a chance to talk about rainbows, their colors and the mixing of primary colors.

The final rainbow drawn by the leprechauns on Little Man’s easel for coloring later.

Once the last three coins were recovered, they were set aside in a fittingly green dish to wait until nap time. (Now you will notice that at this point in the post there are near to no pictures. That is because I seem to have lost my camera. Wah! More pictures will be forthcoming, but those of the final part of this adventure are gone. You’ll just have to use your imagination.)

On the way to his bedroom for nap time, Little Man set up the letter and the coins for the leprechauns. We retrieved his leprechaun letter and rolled the coins back up, leaving it all on his little stool. When Little Man awoke, his first request was for his toy samurai and the second was to go and see what his leprechaun reward was. I’m not sure if he thought he needed samurai protection from the leprechauns? When he got to the stool Little Man found that the letter was unrolled, and on top of it rested a small, wooden treasure chest. The chest was filled with leprechaun gold, and the letter thanked him for playing with the leprechauns and that they’d be back again next year. They also welcomed him to look for them at the end of a rainbow whenever he wanted.

The treasure chest was a huge hit, and Little Man was quite impressed that he got so many “golden” coins. Last night the treasure chest “slept” in the castle/tent so that it would be safe from dragons. The bottom of the chest was decorated by the leprechauns with his name, a rainbow and the date. Now I think he’s just plotting what to do the next time he sees a rainbow, and on the island he might not have to wait too long for.

The dragon lurks outside of the castle dreaming of treasure… or at least a quiet, dark place for a nap.

Leprechaun Games – Day 2

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On Day 2 of our Leprechaun Games (inspired by Fun at Home with Kids), Little Man awoke to find that the leprechauns had returned to continue the search for gold game (Read about Day 1 here). This time he was met with a tray of “Magic Treasure Stones.” We took the Treasure Stones to the table (with copious towels and clean water again) for him to “excavate.”

The basis of the Treasure Stones is the awesome fizzy reaction that happens when you combine baking soda with vinegar. It can make science fair volcanoes explode, and Magic Treasure Stones erode away to reveal hidden treasure. For our purposes we repurposed an empty mustard container that I had set aside for future water table activities, and filled it full of plain, white vinegar. This activity takes a good amount of vinegar, so you may need to stock up… I did.

Spraying the Treasure Stones with “magic water” aka white vinegar.

Little Man squirted the Magic Treasure Stones with the vinegar (aka “cloud water”) and watched as they fizzed and foamed, slowly revealing their treasure. Three of the stones contained “golden” coins, and two contained “sea gems” (aka glass blobs). He had a great time smashing the partially eroded stones and rinsing the coins off in the water. In fact, I think he would have been happy simply with the coins and the dish of water. I’ll have to keep that in mind for future water table activities as the weather gets warmer…

Over the course of the rest of the day, he played with his “treasure” and we talked about leprechauns, rainbows and golden coins. He went to bed after rereading his letter from the leprechauns, excited about the search for the last three coins, and what the leprechauns would give him when he completed their game.

Now we two leprechauns need to plot our last installment of the Leprechaun Games, as well as a delicious St. Patrick’s Day dinner. After all, a good game needs a good dinner to pull it all together.

Here’s how I made the Magic Treasure Stones:

Equipment:
1 large glass baking dish, or clear plastic tub (like for sensory play)
1 box baking soda
Green glitter and shamrock confetti
Green Finger Paint (Color Safe)
3 “Golden” Coins
Assorted sensory fun like glass beads
2 tbsp. water, plus extra
2 cups white vinegar
Squeeze bottle

Directions:

In a large bowl mix together the baking soda, green glitter and confetti, and a good squeeze of your color safe green finger paint.
All the equipment needed.

The “dry” ingredients.

A good squirt of color safe finger paint.
Drizzle the 2 tbsp. of water over the mixture and give it a good stir to evenly distribute the water. Then add one more good squirt of the finger paint and stir again. The mixture should look pretty dry. This reminded me of making a pie crust or scone dough. You don’t think it will hold together, but it will. Test your mixture by grabbing a handful and forming it into a rough ball. If it won’t hold its shape, then drizzle in a little more water until they just hold their shapes.
The mixture will look very dry, like it won’t hold together. Just have faith.

A last dose of paint for a little more color.

The mixture will just hold together when formed into “magic balls.”
Finish your first “stone” by inserting one of the golden coins into the stone and forming it again. Carefully set this stone aside in the glass baking dish.
A Magic Treasure Ball.
Divide the rest of the mixture into four portions in the bowl, and continue forming treasure stones and inserting the treasure until all five balls are completed.
Set them aside into the same tray you will use to “excavate” them.
Set the stones aside some place safe and allow them to dry overnight. You want the balls to be nice and dry for the best reaction with the vinegar.
When you are ready to go, please the stones somewhere that your little one can find them. I recommend leaving these in the baking dish rather than scattering them around. They are fragile.
We posed the Treasure Stones for Aiden on his little stool and with a rainbow that he’d made with his music teacher.
When you are ready to excavate, fill your squeeze bottle with the vinegar and show your little one how to spray the treasure stones. The stones will fizz and slowly erode to reveal the treasure within. Your kids will likely enjoy smashing the opened, softened stones, so be sure to have towels and clean water handy.
Spraying the Treasure Stones with “magic water” aka white vinegar.

Squashing eroded Treasure Stones.

Retrieving the treasure.

Treasure in the sludge.
Rinse off your treasure and the three additional golden coins. Have fun!

Click here for a printable version of the Magic Treasure Stones “recipe.”

Rinsing off the treasure was more fun than finding it in the first place.

Leprechaun Games

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There is something about St. Patrick’s Day that a lot of us want to celebrate, but we somehow feel slightly embarrassed to do so. I’ve read post after post of people apologizing for getting into the spirit, and now I’m adding myself to the list. St. Patrick’s Day doesn’t have the same gravitas as Easter, it certainly isn’t as mainstream as Christmas or birthdays, but it has its own quirky fun and falls at a time when many of us are starving for springtime and a bit of color (or at least some Guinness).

In upstate New York we lived just down the street from a little Irish pub, and every year for St. Patrick’s Day we would walk down the street with friends for some corned beef and cabbage… and Guinness. This usually meant trudging through a couple of feet of snow to get down the avenue, but it was worth it for the food, Guinness and companionship that this holiday meant. One year this also included me wearing an entire tray of Guinness pints spilled by a frazzled server. The walk home that year was a cold one, but we laughed for most of it as the fumes of freezing Guinness wafted off of my jeans as we snow plowed home. I looked forward to this tradition (not the wearing Guinness part) every year, and it is still at this time of year especially that I think of those friends in NY now with their own small family too.

This year, I wanted to find a way to make St. Patrick’s Day fun for Little Man. I know that by the time I post these ideas the holiday will be here, so it makes it hard to plan any of these activities in advance. If you want to try any of these, just think of it as stretching the holiday over the course of the week (or beyond). I don’t know about you all, but I’m in the mood for a party.

In my quest for Little Man-geared St. Patrick’s Day activities, I came across an idea from Fun at Home with Kids. In her post, Asia shared a great idea for a series of activities for kids building off a letter from a leprechaun inviting her daughter to search for leprechaun gold. This was just the sort of thing I was looking for, and I’ve followed a couple of Asia’s ideas here and added a few of my own. Please check out her excellent post for more details and other ideas too.

We started our adventure today, two days before St. Patrick’s Day to get into the mood. To start, when Little Man came to the breakfast table today he was greeted by a rolled up letter from leprechauns (Dave didn’t want to be left out) inviting him to join in a game of searching for gold. Click here for a “recipe” for this letter and to start the Leprechaun Games. The leprechauns write that for three days they will hide three gold coins for Little Man to find. At the end of the three days (we’ll see how this part goes…) Little Man is to wrap all nine coins up in the leprechauns’ letter and leave it for them while he naps (they won’t come if you are looking for them). When he wakes up, the leprechauns will have left him a special surprise. You’ll have to keep following these leprechaun posts to see what this is… 🙂

Start the letter with “Dear (Name):” and proceed with the idea below, or use your own flare.

Then after breakfast Little Man found a tray of Leprechaun Clouds on his stool ready for him to explore. We brought the tray of clouds back to the dining room table (well protected now with towels..,. lots of towels…) and the adventure began.

LOTS of towels and water…

At first Little Man wasn’t sure about this crazy Leprechaun Cloud. He isn’t the kind of kid who loves messy things with his hands, and it took a bit of coaxing from Dave to get him to dive in to search for treasure. Once Little Man got used to the squishy foam, he had a blast and even after the activity was done and cleaned up, kept coming back to the table and asking for more clouds. He ended up calling the little bowl of water for washing his treasure “cloud water.” This was definitely a success.

You can hide any sort of object in the Leprechaun Cloud as you like. I wanted to keep this as a fun, but inexpensive activity so I only bought a few things from my local arts and craft store. Little Man searched for and found 3 “gold” coins, two plastic “crystal” butterflies, and a handful of little glass blobs. Other options that you could use include pretty much anything from sensory play ideas, like pom poms, plastic flowers, beads, and the list goes on. The little glass “blobs” and plastic butterflies that we used here were from the mega sale bins and were a total hit. While he likes the butterflies, the glass blobs became “sea gems” and “pearls,” and he ran around all day and evening with his “treasure.” He hid them from himself in the couch, in his plastic food bins, and in his teddy bears. I love it when the cheapest things become the most fun.

The “treasure” as it emerges from the cloud and gets washed off.

Now Little Man is completely excited about what adventure the leprechauns will have for him tomorrow when he gets to search for three more coins. As you’ll see in the next post (and as Asia examples on her blog) the next adventure will be in “excavating” through homemade Treasure Stones. I made the stones once he went to bed so that they’ll have time to set up overnight and he’ll get them in the morning. We’re looking forward to more leprechaun fun… and LOTS more towels.

Here is how I made the Leprechaun Clouds…

Leprechaun Clouds
Equipment
1 large glass baking dish, or clear plastic tub (like for sensory play)
1 can shaving cream
Green Finger Paint (Color Safe)
3 “Golden” Coins
Assorted sensory fun, such as glass beads, pom poms, etc.
Green embellishments like glitter and shamrock confetti

Directions

Place your “Golden Coins” and other sensory items in the bottom of your baking pan or plastic tub.
This is supposed to be a fun, but inexpensive activity so don’t break the bank buying fancy swag for your cloud. These glass beads and plastic butterflies were in the mega sale bin at our local craft store.
Spray the shaving cream over your buried treasure in two layers. Save the rest of the can for other activities… or for shaving.
Drizzle the green finger paint over the shaving cream and swirl it together lightly with your finger.
Embellish the Leprechaun Cloud with green glitter and shamrock confetti.
Place this somewhere for your little one to find.
Make sure to have towels to clean and dry little (and big) hands, as well as clear bowls of water to wash off the treasure.
LOTS of towels and water…

Click here for a printable version of the Leprechaun Games or Leprechaun Clouds activities.

Eureka!

The Sheep Are Out…

I'm a mom, an anthropologist, and a food lover finding her way on a small farm on Vancouver Island

Category Archives: Fun with Kids

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Leprechaun Games – Day 2

Leprechaun Games

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