The Elephant in the Room

I have been waiting to try this recipe, so today I told the boys I would be making Elephant Bread during their "quiet time" for our afternoon snack. Jacob was so excited. He remembered when I made Monkey Bread and looked forward to this new treat all day. The boys asked why it was called Elephant Bread... I said it was because the pieces look like elephant ears. This is a sticky, gooey, caramelly, pull-apart bread. Enjoy.

"Elephant Bread"

Put this stuff in your mixer bowl:

2 cup all purpose flour
3 tbsp honey
2 1/4 tsp active dry year
1/2 tsp salt

Set aside.

In small saucepan melt:

1/4 cup butter
1/3 cup milk

Remove from heat.
Add 1/4 cup water and 1 tsp vanilla.
Let cool briefly. Add to flour mixture.

Start mixer. Add 2 beaten eggs and 3/4 cup flour

Cover and let rise 1 hour.

Roll dough out nice and flat (like a pizza)
Brush 1/4 melted butter mixed with 1 tsp vanilla on top.
In small bowl mix 1 cup white sugar and 2 tsp cinnamon. Sprinkle the majority over the buttered dough. Completely cover dough with topping.

Using pizza cutter slice into approximately 2" squares.
Stack these squares unevenly into 3 piles.
Carefully place in buttered loaf pan.
Sprinkle any remaining sugar/cinnamon on top.
Cover and let rise 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 350. Bake 35-40 minutes until top is golden.

Try not to eat the whole thing.
Jacob, Daniel, and I ate half of it. It was delicious.

Frederick

Hurray! Another storybook craft! These are my favourite. I just love reading a book and then creating the character in the book with the boys. Jacob and I read the book "Frederick" by Leo Lioni together and then he asked to make Frederick. And I think they turned out so cute. In the story four mice are storing up food for the winter, but the fifth mouse, Frederick, isn't helping. Instead he gathers sunlight and colour and words. The other mice don't understand him but when the winter runs long and the food runs out, Frederick warms them with memories of their beautiful meadow, and ends the book with a poem. Daniel wanted his Frederick to one carrying corn (there is a picture of the mice storing up corn in the book) and Jacob wanted his Fredrick to be eating a chocolate chip cookie (this comes from a picture where Frederick is eating a nut with black spots).

"ROAR"igami

So my brother in Japan sent us another Japanese craft to do. This time it was origami. It was way easier than the last craft!
"Firetruck" & "Digger"

We Love Experiments

The boys started asking to do "Volcanoes" this morning, which is basically a pie pan full of baking soda and then I make four small bowls of different coloured vinegar. They use tiny measuring spoons to make mini colourful volcanoes. Today I said "Why don't we make a really big volcano?" 

So we did. I put 3/4 cup of baking soda in a bottle and shook it up with some red food colouring. Then we added 3/4 cup of vinegar. Their reaction was awesome. 

"Bubbles!" That is what the boys kept yelling. I felt smart putting the bottle inside a dish... Good thing too!

We added vinegar three times before the baking soda ran out. Measuring spoons joined the fun.

Next we added some canola oil to see how it didn't mix. This was not smart, since I did not foresee oil stains on their shirts.

Next we added blue food colouring because I had no more ideas. We needed about four more cups of water to make it a fun adventure. They made Pepsi Pudding... Which to me sound delicious.

They played with this for about 1 hour and it was awesome.

Oh yeah... There was also glitter glue involved... When squeezed in it didn't mix and made glitter snakes, which was really cool.