homemade fruit fun-fetti cakes

Why oh why do fun-fetti cakes taste sooo much better than plain old vanilla? I'm not even a fan of sprinkles or crunchy bits in my cupcakes but there is something so magical about little bits of rainbow in a happy cake of sweet. Follow us to the end of the rainbow for a scrumdilly-delicious recipe.

You will need:
1/4 pound of butter
2/3 cups sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs
1/3 cup of milk
2 tablespoons plain or vanilla yogurt
1 1/2 cup of flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 cup fruit loopy cereal
large bowl for mixing
wooden spoon or handmixer
small sandwich bag
heavy plastic cup or rolling pin
muffin pan
cupcake liners or oil to grease the pan

scrumdilly-do it:
Set your oven to 350 degrees to preheat and gather your ingredients.Grease a 12 cup muffin tin or dig out your prettiest cupcake liners and place one in each cup.Dump your fruit loopy cereal into the sandwich bag, seal and smash it up with the rolling pin. You do not need to roll the pin, just smash up the cereal. Pour into small bowl and set aside.Beat butter, sugar and vanilla then add your eggs. Mix well and add your yogurt. Next up one cup of flour plus baking powder then milk, then the remaining flour. Scrape the sides and get it all mixed together.Dump your small bowl of loopiness into the batter and mix with a large wooden spoon.Dollop the batter into your twelve muffin cups. You can fill these to the top as they do not rise too much and should not spill over. Place in preheated oven for thirty minutes and remove to cool.Once cool you can enjoy them as they are or whip up a batch of whipped cream "frosting" then top with more cereal. Whatever you choose, it's all quite tasty! These cakes cook to a nice crunchy top with a slightly sweetened cake inside, while the cereal adds a chewy texture. If your tots are not fans, omit the cereal for next time or try some other mix in. Using whipped cream for the frosting adds a bit of pretty and texture without breaking the sugar bank....as long as you only ad a small teaspoon of the sweet stuff. Enjoy!

another three part project

Just for fun!
I have no name for this project but it can take a while to complete so may be good to bust out when the "I'm bored" chant begins. It also makes for a fun collaborative project if your tots are all levels of ages and developments.

You will need:
One color of dark paint (tempera or acrylic)
White paint (tempera or acrylic)
Paintbrushes
Large sheet of heavy white paper
Paint friendly area
Markers (make sure yer kidlet is ready for these)

scrumdilly-do it!
Grab your sheet of paper and your dark color of paint and have your kidlet cover the entire sheet. You can use a couple of shades here and let yer kidlet mix them up but the idea is to create a solid background. Set aside to dry.Set out the white paint and have your kidlet paint an outline of a picture or shape or design on top of the painted background. Use a fat brush here, you will want the outline to be at least and inch thick. Set aside to dry.Bust out the happy markers and have your wee one doodle, design and draw all along the white paint. Use one color family or mix it up. Try using just black. The idea is to have fun, practice patience and let yer imagination loose. Try it with outlines of large shapes or maybe a silly face. Let your wee one come up with the next step. It's all about the process here.*crayola or kid friendly markers will work on the white paint but their colors will be muted. If your tots are older or you're totally chill about the permanent kind, go ahead and bust those out as they add more pop to the project.

four projects for st. patrick's day!

from the wayback machine...

Rainbow Rice Salad
Hearts to Shamrocks
Shaving Cream Fun
Savory Potato Muffins

A Little Leftover Love for Lunch

Zaza loved, loved, loved making those sticky-sweet, pinky-pink Sugar Buns.

Both with jessica, and later with three other little girls.

That last time we got a bit carried away making the sweet, pink, cream cheese -- it looked so pretty in the bowl, and was so much fun to stirrrrrrrrr -- and ended up with a surplus.

I popped the leftover sweetened cream cheese into an airtight container, and finally thought to use it this morning when I was running late with lunch-prep and low on sandwich supplies.

Note: the dark bits in the photos of the cream cheese are heart-shaped candy sprinkles (mixed in by Zaza during the bun-making session).

Scrumdilly-do it!

Pop two (multigrain, blueberry, gluten-free -- if you're pretending to be healthy with this) toaster waffles into the toaster. Remove from toaster, and let cool.

Spread cream cheese on one waffle.

Spread fruit preserves on other waffle...bananas would work too.

Let kidlets lick the spoon and spreader.

Place cream cheese waffle on top of jam waffle, cheese-to-jam, sandwich-style.

Wrap in silver foil or a cloth napkin, and place in lunch box.

No toaster waffles? Try Frozen french toast. (Or home-made French toast!) Or cinnamon-raisin bread. Or even plain old wheat toast.*

*Plain-old-toast must be cut into heart shapes to make up for plain-ness of bread choice.

100 Days of School!

I know we're on the cusp if not day of for those who celebrate it but check out this awesome project that my good friend, the A-boy did. It was so cool that we had to do another one with Miss Za. As you can see, Miss Za did a most awesome job herself! 100 squares of color! The A-boy did his on a large piece of matte board while Miss Za did hers on the backside of holiday craft-paper gift wrap. Looks awesome either way and I think I need to do this one myself! Thank you to the A-boy and his parents for letting me "steal" this project.

No instructions save for the pictures. Happy 100 Days of School (and did ya know, it's my birthday today! I'm not yet quite 100 years old)! For a list of nifty school, teacher and 100 Days books, click here!

love bots on parade

Why stick to paper for your Valentine lurve? Why not make something a little extra...

valentine fun: stuck on you

With Valentine's Day fast approaching, why not have your kidlets make a valentine that is quirky, fun AND useful? Simply "repackage" your everyday gluestick with a bit of happy colorful paper.

junk mail garland

gotta love your value pack...i'm not sure how regional this is but here in l.a. we get a blue envie full of coupons every month. i have never ever used these coupons and it has been impossible to get my name off the delivery list. this time around, rather than toss them into the recycle bin, i turned them into a nifty garland that you and your kidlets can easily duplicate. just paint, punch, decorate and attach to a ribbon. i stitched mine up but a glue stick will work just as well. have fun!

confession, lurve & smiley smiles {cuz i really do love you all}

have i told you all how much i love this darn blog? love it. absolutely love it. working with children in all things creative makes my heart sing louder and higher than a duet with ethel merman and annette funicello. the sad part is that i spent so much time finishing up my degree, i fell out of the working public and stopped working with kids. boy did i miss it. BIG TIME.

i have finally finished (and with a specialization in PLAY [for reals!])! whoo-hoo! but before i go off and reenter the real working world again, mr. a-go-go and i are taking a great and grand road trip across the good old united states of america. we'll be traveling for at least two months and along the way we hope we'll figure out where it is in this big country we are supposed to be. where, what and when, it's all about the adventure and discovering. but don't worry, before we head out you'll still have two months or so of crafty ideas, book recommendations and recipes. i can't stop. i simply can't. there are too many ideas in my head. in fact, just recently one of my friends reprimanded me for "giving away" all my ideas and the thing is, she may be right but this is just who i am. and here is where i get to my confession. while i love this blog and adore my crazy posting and ideas, i often wonder if there is any point to it all. does anyone really enjoy it, learn from it, create from it? am i helping you see how awesome your tots are? am i enabling you to bond over gluesticks and homemade clay? sometimes i wonder and i worry and then i feel like the uncool kid in class, the one who wears mismatched socks and talks to her imaginery ostrich (though in my opinion, that would be THE coolest kid) and i think maybe i should just stop and of course, when that happens, i inevitably end up receiving an awesome email or letter from one of my readers who sends me happy thoughts and stuff like this...
this is mielye and she has an unwavering lurve for a wee boy named jacky. she lurves him so much that she decided to make him three whopping valentine'd day presents and one of them came from this little blog. this is the reason why i do this and this is what makes my heart sing. read more about mielye's lurve story at The City Peach. and now here is where i beg, plead and grovel...if you ever dilly-do anything, i would love to post about here...seriously, it warms my anxious-ostrich-loving-mismatched-sock-wearing-heart.