When I found this resource from Red Robin, I knew I had to share is with you!  It is really good!  Included are of course some really fun burger recipes (developed by kids) along with cooking with kids tips, and even stranger safety information and activities to share with your children.  This is a free resource you don’t want to miss!  

50 Gourmet Burger Creations From Kids Across the Country

Enjoy!

Christine

It’s a common complaint of many families these days. Everyone is involved in so many activities that it’s hard to come together and enjoy time as a family. Consider some of these ideas on how to enjoy a fun family night in instead of everyone going their separate ways.

Scientifically it has been proven that families who eat meals together are more emotionally connected and more stable. And since everyone has to eat, why not start your fun family night in by cooking a meal together?

Family meals don’t have to be elaborate or tedious to prepare. They can be as simple as cooking hamburgers, having chips, and drinks. Of course, you may want to prepare something that will get everyone involved in the cooking process. Someone can cut up vegetables, someone else be in charge of cooking the dessert, and another person in charge of the main meal. Have everyone pitch in and the work will be completed quicker. You can also use the time to reconnect and talk about what’s happened in each person’s life since your last family fun night.

Once the meal is complete, take time to set a nice table and eat there rather than in front of the television. You can make clean-up a breeze by using disposable plates and napkins if you like, but you can also make the dinner seem more special by using nice place settings which are normally reserved for holidays.

After you’ve eaten dinner and cleaned up the dishes, continue your family night by playing board games. Have everyone choose one of their favorite games and then decide together which one you’ll play first. Games are meant to be fun and relaxing, so try to avoid becoming too competitive if that’s your personality. Depending upon the game you’ve chosen, you may be able to play more than one game; and don’t forget to play games even the little children of the family can enjoy.

If games aren’t your favorite things, you can also plan a movie night. Find a movie everyone will like, or at least tolerate, and pop some popcorn. Comedies are usually a good choice even though people have different senses of humor. Unless the humor is extremely dry, everyone in the family should at least get a chuckle out of the movie.

Pull out the family albums and take a stroll down memory lane. Remember the way the children were when they were young. Everyone loves to look at pictures of or hear stories about themselves even if they can be slightly embarrassing. Talk about some of the things your children did as babies or toddlers that you found so endearing.

No matter how busy your family may get, it’s vital to take time to reconnect as a family. You can use some of these ideas on how to enjoy a fun family night in or you can come up with some of your own. The important thing is to do something everyone, no matter what their age, will be able to enjoy and look forward to.

My good friend Susanne Myers, “The Hillbilly Housewife”, comes up with the best things!  She just published a fun e-book “The ABC’s of Christmas” and after a bit of coaxing, I convinced her to let me share it with you!  You see, she runs a really fun club, called the Hillbilly Housewife Club, (that I am a member of) and in the club the past few weeks, we’ve been talking a lot about homemade and frugal gift ideas.  To really get our creative juices flowing, one of the members started a post in the forum called the ABCs of Christmas Gift Giving.  This e-book is a compilation of the best ideas from those forum posts.  So for every letter of the alphabet there are several gift ideas.  These are really fun and creative – a lot of things I hadn’t thought about!  For example B:  Baking Lessons and I:  Ice Candles  (I had never heard of those!)

Before I tell you how to grab your copy of the e-book, I also wanted to let you know that Susanne has decided to extend her Thanksgiving special offer, to you, for a Hillbilly Housewife Club Membership.  This is such a great deal!  (I honestly can’t believe she is offering memberships this cheap, but SHHHH don’t tell her I said that – I don’t want her to change her mind.)  It is normally $15 per month to be a member of the club (see
here:  http://www.hillbillyhousewife.com/christine )  But until Wednesday – Dec. 9th, she is offering a year membership for $50 or a 6 month membership for $30!  That is like paying for a little over 3 months to get a YEAR worth of access, or paying for 2 months and getting 4 months free!  That is a total no-brainer to me!  At any rate, obviously she can’t extend this offer much longer (it took work to convince her to leave it up for you guys until Wednesday) so hurry over and grab your membership while you still can!  http://www.dinewithoutwhine.com/hbhwsale

And no, I didn’t forget.  Here is your ABC’s of Christmas Ebook http://www.dinewithoutwhine.com/abcgifts-christine.pdf Enjoy it, I know I did!

C-

I thought it would be fun to share a video today of two of my boys and myself making a Fairytale Christmas Cake.  ENJOY!

Christine

I don’t know about you, but I loved scratch and sniff things when I was a kid. It was just exciting to see what smell would come off the paper. Now I’ve taken it a step further and started to make scratch and sniff paintings with my kids. They absolutely love it and I’m sure yours will as well.

It really couldn’t be simpler. All you do is grab a few packs of Kool-Aid, a cup of water and some brushes. Use the Kool-Aid like water colors and let the kids paint away. When their master pieces are done, set them aside and let them dry completely. After that they are ready. Just let the kids scratch and sniff.

Can you guess what each smell is? Don’t even think about walking over to the box of kool-aid packs to peek… that would be cheating

While you are discussing the different smells with your kids, talk about the various fruits and how they could be prepared. If you have a few of the fruits available, cut them up and serve them as a snack. Of course you could also compare how the painting smells compared to the real thing.

GET CREATIVE WITH YOUR FOOD AND WIN!

Here’s a great way to get your kids to eat more fruit and veggies. Let them get creative with their sandwiches by making sandwich faces. I always start with a slice of honey wheat bread for this. Then the kids spread it with either peanut butter for a sweet sandwich, or anything from hummus to cream cheese or even a little mayo if there’s nothing else in the house for a savory one.

Next I go through the pantry and fridge and come up with all of the healthy toppings I can find.

For peanut butter sandwiches this usually includes banana and apple slices, raisins and various dried fruits.

For the savory sandwiches I pull out lettuce, tomatoes and all leftover veggies as well as some sprouts (they make great hair).

Then it’s time for the kids to get creative. Their goal is to come up with the most creative and funny face they can with the ingredients supplied. If the result is impressive, I get out the digital camera and take a snapshot before they eat the sandwich. The picture then becomes my computer background for a while. The kids love the challenge and try to outdo each other which of course results in more fruits or veggies being used for their creations.

I also noticed that they tend to snack on the good foods while they are making their face sandwich, which gives them an extra serving of fruit and veggies that day.

Let’s see YOUR Creative Funny Face Sandwiches!

We’re holding a contest and want to give you prizes for sharing your funny face sandwiches with us.

Here’s how to enter:

Photo Contest:

1. Make a silly sandwich with your child or children.
2. Take a picture.
3. Send both the picture and the recipe to us at nicole@menuplanningcentral.com
4. Check back here to vote after we post the finalists, and watch your inbox for prize notifications.

Recipe Contest:

1. Send your funny-face sandwich recipe to us at nicole@menuplanningcentral.com
2. Check back here to vote after we post the finalists, and watch your inbox for prize notifications.

What can you Win?

Great question! For starters, everyone who enters either just a recipe OR a recipe and photo will receive a printable coloring book via email as a “thank you” from us to you.

All entries will be eligible to win the following prizes, as well:

1. Membership to MenuPlanningCentral.com (1 winner)
2. Copy of Work at Home ebook www.FullTimeWAHM.com (2 winners)
3. Copy of Party by Mom ebook from www.PartybyMom.com (2 winners)
4. Pack of recipes from www.YummyPLR.com
5. $25 Gift Certificate to Amazon.com
6. More prizes coming…

Here are some tips to get your creative juices flowing with these…

• Banana slices topped with raisins, or cucumber slices topped with a dot of ketchup make great eyes.
• Pepper and apple or peach slices are great for mouths.
• For ears try mushroom slices or strawberries cut in half.
• Sprouts and little broccoli flowerets are perfect for various hair does.

Rules:

Here’s the legal stuff. The recipes and photos will become the propery of MenuPlanningCentral.com Please submit only recipes and photos for which you are the owner. (Don’t send us pictures unless you personally took them.) We reserve the right to judge the contest and choose the winners based upon our preference. Contest will end after we’ve had sufficient time to promote it and gets lots of entries.

Thank you to these contest sites for mentioning our contest.

Playing with playdough is a lot of fun and I have yet to meet a kids who doesn’t like to help making it either. Last week we took it up another notch by making an edible playdough that actually tastes pretty decent. So we’re combining making something, playing with something and having a sugary treat all at the same time… now that’s hard to beat

Here’s the recipe we used:

Peanutbutter Playdough

Ingredients:
1 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup honey
2 cups powdered sugar

Directions: Mix all ingredients in a bowl, using your hands. Dough should feel soft and pliable. Form shapes and be creative!! Storage: When not using, MUST be stored in an airtight container.

Here’s another great way to have fun with food – Make your own mini green house and grow a fruit tree or plant in it. Kids enjoy watching something they planted grow and they are learning along the way.

Here’s how you do it…

Mini Greenhouse

•    2 clear plastic cups
•    Tape
•    Fruit seeds
•    Water
•    Paper towels
•    Marker

Write the name of the type of seeds on a piece of tape and also the child’s name to place on a set of cups. Let the child wet the paper towel in the water, fold it and place it in the bottom of one cup. Place the seeds on top of the wet paper towel. Put the second cup over the first and tape in place on one side.  Place the “greenhouses” on a sunny windowsill.  If too much moisture accumulates inside the cup, lift the top cup for a while. When the seeds have sprouted the children can replant in a pot with dirt.

Welcome to Day Two of Summer Fun In The Kitchen.

When was the last time you baked something with your kids? Christmas cookies for Santa?

Now is a great time to get them involved in some baking. They need some afternoon snacks anyway and I’m sure your family would also appreciate some pie for dessert. Last night I made this Oatmeal Pie with my kids and it was a big hit. I used a frozen pie crust I had in the freezer and everything else needed for this simple pie was in my fridge and pantry. I’m sure you have most of it around the house too.

We did use about 1/2 cup of coconut flakes in it and it turned out great. Didn’t even need any ice cream or whipped cream to top it (even though I’m sure that would have been delicious too).

Now it’s your turn… what are you going to bake with your kids? Feel free to share your favorite recipes as a comment below.

We are participating in Lynette Chandler’s Blog Egg Hunt that’s going on all week. Today’s Easter Egg Prize is A 3 month subscription to Menu Planning Central sponsored by us.

Here’s how to win.

1. Copy the URL of this post, then
2. Click me ==> .

3. Enter your comment and don’t forget to paste our URL too.
Take a look at www.techbasedmarketing.com all week long for some other fun easter hunts.

Good luck!