The Fondant Experiment

Little man's birthday party is coming up in less than a month already. We are having it early since the twins will be here around his actual birthday. Since I am going to be making his birthday cake, I decided to try something new and use fondant this time. I've never worked with it before, so today I'm making a trial cake to see how it turns out.

I found the recipe over at snappee turtle. I only made half a batch of each color and that was plenty to cover the 9 inch double layer cake I made with some left over.

One thing to remember is that the fondant has to sit overnight in the fridge so make sure to mix it up the day before you want to decorate your cake.


Marshmallow Fondant Recipe

To make one batch of fondant you will need:

• 16 ounce bag of mini marshmallows
• 2-5 Tablespoons of water
• 2 pound bag of confectioner's powdered sugar
• Food coloring
• Crisco shortening (this is used to grease the counter and your hands to smooth the fondant)

1. Pour all the mini marshmallows into a large glass bowl. I only used about half the bag since I was only making half a batch. Add 2-5 Tablespoons of water. (I put 2 Tablespoons). Microwave in 30 second increments for about 2 minutes or until the marshmallow is creamy with no lumps.

2. Add food coloring to the marshmallow and wait for it to cool off.

3. Add the powdered sugar 1 cup at a time to the marshmallow, kneading it with your hands. Make sure to use shortening on your hands quite often, it is very sticky.

4. Wrap the fondant in plastic wrap and place in zip lock bags. Refrigerate until you are ready to use. It should be allowed to settle overnight.

Make your cake as normal and frost it with regular frosting. This makes the fondant stick to the cake better. Take your fondant out of the refrigerator and get ready to roll it out. You can get a fondant rolling mat with circle measurements on it to show you how big it should be to cover your cake, but I just rolled it out on wax paper.

I had a 9 inch cake and I made sure the circle I rolled out was at least 12 inches across. It ended up a little bigger than that and as you can see I had plenty to cover the cake. Carefully peel the fondant and place over the cake. This was tricky for me, it kept wanting to stretch too much. Use a pizza cutter to cut the excess fondant off the edges.

 I rolled out the second color and used cookie cutters to cut out shapes. I think it turned out fairly well and I learned a few tips for next time when I make the actual birthday cake. Now we have a yummy strawberry cake to eat this week!


(linking up here, here, here and here)

mother's day canvas how-to

For Mother's Day this year we decided to make all the grandmas a homemade gift from little man. He is too young to get much out of it, but I had fun making them. I have seen lots of handprint and footprint crafts lately, so we decided to make one of our own.


Mother's Day Canvas

What you will need:
a small canvas - I used 8x10 inches
acrylic paint in the colors you want to use - I had purple, blue, pink and green
1/2 inch wide ribbon for edge of canvas
ribbon to use for hanger on back
hot glue gun with glue sticks
small paintbrush
foam paintbrush
sharpie marker




How to make it:
1. Use the paint to make the footprints and handprints with your child. We took off all little man's clothes and put on a paint shirt for this step since I knew it would get a little messy. Let it dry.

2. Use the small paintbrush and other paint colors to draw in the body of the butterfly and the leaves of the flower along with anything else you might want to add. Use the marker to write the child's name and date on the bottom of the canvas.

3. Once that is all dry, use the hot glue gun to glue the 1/2 inch ribbon around the entire edge of the canvas. Glue a small loop of ribbon to the back to use as a hanger. And that's it! A nice, simple craft for your child to make for grandma. Little man didn't understand the concept of making a handprint, so they looked a little odd, but he had fun playing with the paint. 

Should Children Have a Television in their Bedroom?

There has been some discussion recently about whether or not little man should have a TV in his room eventually. I was very much against it because I would rather have him spend time reading or playing than glued to the television. Even if it was just on in the background, I think it's unnecessary. I don't have anything against him watching TV occasionally, but he can do that out in the family room. My dear husband was of the opinion that he should have one to watch when he goes to bed at night. So I decided to do some research about the subject, because who can argue against actual facts, right? Now mind you, I don't do this with every argument, that would be a little crazy (and besides I'd end up finding out I was wrong half the time). I just felt very strongly about this one.

             As technology invades our lives more and more, it is becoming very common for children to grow up with a television in their bedroom. The average American child between the ages of 8 and 18 watches about 4.5 hours of TV a day. Seventy percent of children have a TV in the bedroom and about one-third of every preschooler does as well. Is this simply a harmless entertainment option with no affect on our children or are there damaging side effects to this seemingly innocent device we are placing into their bedrooms? 

            An article in the New York Times states that  “a growing body of research shows strong associations between TV in the bedroom and numerous health and educational problems” Research shows that children with bedroom TV’s score lower on school tests, have more sleep problems, as well as having a much higher risk for obesity, smoking and the health problems related to obesity. It is recommended by the AmericanAcademy of Pediatrics that children under the age of two do not watch TV at all and that older children limit their screen time to two hours a day or less. This not only includes the television but also other electronic devices that most of us have around the house as well. 

            The most obvious problem when children have their own television in their bedroom is that parents simply can not monitor the amount of time that is spent watching TV as well as they can when the TV is in a central, family location. The TV causes distractions with homework and less time is spent reading. An article in the LA Times explains that kids with a bedroom TV not only spend more time watching television altogether, but compared to television watched in a family room, “the screen time a kid logs in his or her bedroom is linked hour-for-hour, to more belly fat, higher triglycerides and overall greater risk for developing heart disease and diabetes".

            While some parents have come to rely on the TV to babysit their young children when they need to get something done or as a way to get them to bed easier, watching TV right before bedtime has actually been shown to disrupt the child’s sleep. According to a recent study in Pediatrics, children with a bedroom TV were more likely to have daytime tiredness. Children also had more trouble falling asleep, more nightmares, and more awakenings if they watched TV at all in the one hour prior to going to bed.

Here are the main areas that a bedroom television is shown to negatively affect children:

• weight
• sleep disturbance
• lower test scores
• increased tendency for smoking
• poor diet choices

            Of course, not all television is bad, and children can learn many things from educational programs. The key, though, is to limit time spent in front of the TV and to carefully monitor what our children are watching, as well as making sure they are getting plenty of physical activity. Having a television in their room makes this difficult to do and research has shown that it does negatively affect the children who are allowed to have a bedroom TV. 

I haven't shown this research to my husband yet, so I have no idea if it will change his mind on the subject or not. What about you, do you allow your children to have a TV in their bedroom?


photo credit: GregRob via photopin cc

what to feed a hungry 10 month old?

My little man has recently started throwing his food on the floor occasionally and playing around with it more. He used to have a voracious appetite so I think that was why he just gobbled everything up so fast. Now he seems to have slowed down a little. He is not as hungry and has more time to have fun with his food. He is also becoming more picky it seems. He will be eleven months old next week and I am always looking for more ideas for snacks and meals for him. So I thought I would do some research and see what other moms are feeding their babies and make a list of some of the things that my little guy likes to eat.


Foods that little man loves:

• toast with butter on it (for some reason he prefers his bread toasted rather than plain)
• pancakes (you can make these ahead of time and freeze or refrigerate them for the week)
• black beans (his favorite snack)
• pasta
• rice
• cooked vegetables: broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, green beans, corn, spinach
• baked beans
• re-fried beans (he eats a lot of beans...)
• stuffing
• mashed potatoes
• fruit: bananas, cantaloupe, kiwis, tomatoes (watch for reactions to acidity when introducing tomatoes)
• yogurt (made with whole milk)
• cheerios
• puffs (I think every baby loves these)
• small crackers or saltines broken into pieces
• cottage cheese
• cheese (cut into very small pieces)
• pieces of chicken 
• oatmeal
• grits
• applesauce

He still eats some pureed baby food. He has fruit mixed with baby cereal in the mornings for breakfast and has some vegetables with his dinner in the evening, if we aren't eating a vegetable that he can share. He also still drinks formula of course, we are trying to get him used to drinking from a sippy cup. He has a hard time tipping it up far enough on his own but is getting better.

He can pretty much share most of what we are eating now. As long as its cut up into small pieces and is not too sticky, crunchy, spicy or chewy.

Foods to avoid at this age:

• marshmallows
• peanut butter
• hot dogs
• grapes 
• honey
• nuts
• citrus (you can introduce citrus around 10 months but watch for reactions to acidity)
• regular milk (most babies can start to switch to whole milk around 12 months)