During the holiday seasons kitchens are overflowing with abundance. Holiday baking with kids recipe cards is a memory that etches into the minds of children. The smells, the colors, the mess! It's all a delight to them. Even now, I can remember holiday baking as a child.
If your kitchen is anything like mine, there are already plenty of healthy and healing cookies, bars, fudge, --and a few not so healthy and healing just to balance everything out--that are ready to be consumed by my growing family.
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Explaining the Process of Baking to your Kids
Have you ever stopped to explain the baking process to your little one? Baking is a wonderful learning opportunity! It benefits literacy, step processing, listening skills, fine-motor skills, and comprehension skills.
Over the years, I have cooked with young ones many times. It's a sacrifice to be sure. The mess alone can leave any momma frustrated and stressed. Trust me, some of my most peaceful baking memories are alone listening to Bing Crosby. There is no mama shame in getting your alone time in your kitchen.
However, some of my most precious baking memories are baking with children and letting them be kids! Letting them crack the eggs, letting the flour poof into a cloud and seeing their wonderment, showing them how to measure the sugar! Letting them be little.
One of the most treasured baking memories I have is my nanny girl accidentally smearing green and red frosting all over her face. I was already frustrated with the mess we had created {that I knew would take half a lifetime to clean up}. But the cute expression on her face melted me and in sudden clarity I realized I was missing a memory. I could choose to make the memory life-giving, or I could choose to let the momentary mess derail the joy.
I chose to bring life to that baking experience. We face painted with frosting. I'm not kidding you. And it was everywhere. But at 4 years old she laughed so hard we both ended up on the floor as the dog ran around the kitchen island trying to figure out what was so hilarious. We took a picture before washing up, and to this day it is one of my most treasured pictures.
Those kinds of memories don't come often.
Creating Kids Recipe Cards
However, this activity doesn't require any baking! All it requires is a little patience and a little coaxing. Sit down with your child and a cookbook and talk about recipes. Talk about the ingredients, about measuring cups and spoons, the step-by-step process, and the temperature of the oven.
If you have a child cooking story, take a moment to read one. Here are four of my favorites:
The part that will really take some coaxing is the direction part. Preschoolers rarely have the developmental ability to list step-by-step processes.
However sometimes you will find a child that likes to tell a story, and coincidentally it coincides with the process of cooking/baking! There is no rule that applies to all children, so you may find that your kids need no coaxing, and you may find that they need a little help to get there.
You may have noticed that in the end this project looks polished. As a pre-k teacher that is my WORST NIGHTMARE and biggest pet-peeve! I want any kid activity to look like a kid did it and NOT Pinterest perfect.
When I do this project, I always let the child print their name {even if they take up the entire page doing so} and I let them draw their recipe on a blank piece of paper. It’s nice to have an organized kid's project, but completely pointless if it is organized and structured like an adult did it. Let them be kids!
The result is that you will have a delightful recipe to treasure!
You can grab the JPEG files by holding down on the photo or right clicking on the photo and saving. Or you can access my Home & Family vault where the PDF and JPEG files are located. The holiday recipe cards are from The Ultimate Christmas planner, which is my best seller at my Etsy Shop!
Enjoy those special baking times with your kids! I would love to see what your kid came up with. Connect with me over on Instagram for more family tips and encouragement.
I love this!! I love working in the kitchen with kids and this adds a whole new dimension to it!!
It's a lot of fun to have children write recipes. Their perspective is quite unusual and adorable!