Heavenly Homemakers

Encouraging women in homemaking, healthy eating and parenting

Junior Chef Club – JOIN US!! (This Makes a Great Gift!)

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Our brand new Junior Chef Club is a perfect way to help your kids have fun learning in the kitchen! We can’t wait to include all of your kids in this!

What is the Junior Chef Club?

The Junior Chef Club is a weekly cooking subscription just for kids! (Bonus: Parents get to enjoy all the recipes and food too, and maybe even a night off!) Here’s how it works:

Each week, we’ll send a brand new Recipe Printable Packet to your inbox. You can print this packet and turn it over to your Junior Chef! It will share simple prep instructions for a brand new recipe plus a Grocery List, a Kitchen Supply List, and a bonus page with Serving and Sharing Ideas.

We suggest that you print the pages each week and let your Junior Chef add them to a 3-ring binder as they build their Junior Chef Cookbook!

Here’s a sample of what your Junior Chef Club Member will receive each week:

Cost for the Junior Chef Club?

Your Junior Chef will receive an email packet of recipes and printables every single week! What a super fun gift that keeps on giving!

To make it easy, we have options to make it work for your budget! What works best for you?

    • $2.00/week ($104/year) or
    • $5.00/month ($60/year) or
    • $36.00/year (BEST VALUE!)

—> And check out the additional huge Christmas Coupon below that we’re giving you! <—-

Yep, there’s more…. :)

Yearly Subscribers receive a Big Bonus for joining!

We want to encourage you to save money with our yearly subscription fee, plus we want to set your Junior Chef up for success!

If you choose to jump in for an entire year, you’ll save lots of money AND receive the following printables right away so that you can get your kids set up with a fantastic 3-ring binder and begin to Build a Cookbook. Check this out!

These bonuses add $15 to the value of the subscription. And guess what else?

We’ve got a Christmas Coupon for you!

YES. That means that if you hurry, you can sign up for just $26 for the entire year!!! AND, the $10 coupon will be re-applied year after year, so your subscription will always be $26 instead of the regular $36. Woooo!!!! What a fantastic gift for your kids!! Are you as excited as I am?!

COUPON CODE: LASTCHANCE10

This offer is only good through Friday, December 3. After that, registration will not open again until next November. GET IN WHILE YOU CAN!

Let’s review!

  1. Subscribe to our Junior Chef Club – hurry to use the coupon (LASTCHANCE10) to get a super great discount on the entire year’s subscription!
  2. Yearly subscribers receive a big packet of bonus materials to help their Junior Chef get started with an amazing cookbook binder.
  3. Every week, we’ll send you a packet of Recipe and Serving Ideas Printables to print and give to your Junior Chef. They can add it to the 3-ring binder Junior Chef Cookbook they are building and they can have a blast trying new recipes!
  4. This offer officially ends Friday, December 3, and will not be available again until November 2022.

Questions?

Let’s see if we can answer them for you!

When will I receive the free Bonus Pages? If you choose to become a yearly subscriber, we’ll email you the Cooking and Baking Basics eBook, the Cookbook Cover pages packet, and the Cookbook Divider page printables just as soon as you sign up. We’ll also email you a certificate that you can print and include with your gift which helps explain all the fun to your Junior Chef!

When will my Junior Chef start to receive new recipes? We figure a lot of you will plan to give this subscription as a gift to your Junior Chef at Christmastime! Therefore, we will begin emailing the Recipe Packets starting Wednesday, December 22. 

So the printables to get started will hit your inbox immediately after purchase, as described above. But the year’s worth of recipes won’t start coming in until right before Christmas. When your Junior Chef opens the Cookbook Binder on Christmas morning, you can explain what they’re getting, and you’ll have a starter pack of recipes waiting for them in your inbox to get them going!

What if I have more than one Junior Chef in my family? Awesome! We allow the printables to be used for more than one person IN YOUR IMMEDIATE FAMILY.

If I only want to pay per week or per month, will I still get the freebies? No, those are only free for yearly subscribers. But you can purchase that packet here for just $15 if you’d like!

Let us know if you have more questions!

 

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Calling all Kids!! Join us for a Kids Cooking Camp this Summer!

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This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

We excitedly invite your kids to join our Kids Cooking Camp!

Don’t worry one bit about this whole camp thing being educational. The kids don’t have to know about that part. They’ll just think they get to make and enjoy treats like ice cream and mudballs and fruit dip. So what that they’ll learn some valuable cooking skills? Who cares that they’ll learn about family teamwork? Whatever that they’ll get to help with meal planning and meal prep? They won’t even realize they are learning because they will simply be having fun and doing something special just for them!

Aha! But it isn’t just for them. It’s for parents too! Because when the kids learn great cooking skills, the parents win big time!!!

This entire Kids Cooking Camp package is worth $99 because of its loaded content and lifetime access.

What is Kids Cooking Camp?

It’s an online “camp-in-the-kitchen” experience. Your kids can have fun with you, with their siblings, and/or with their friends and neighbors while enjoying the Kids Cooking Camp activities and recipes! Here’s what you and your kids will find when you first access this awesome online resource:

Heya Kids! Welcome to the Kids Cooking Camp!

We hope you’re ready to have some fun. Maybe you’ll learn a thing or two while you’re here?!? But mostly we want you to find some new favorite recipes and figure out some ways to have a blast in the kitchen!

  • To make this happen, we created a great list of Challenges and Activities for you to choose from.
  • Then we created an entire stack of printables for you to use as you work your way through the Challenges and Activities.
  • Of course, we put together huge lists of recipes that you can pick from and enjoy.
  • And we topped it all off with a Campfire. Because you can’t have camp without a campfire!

You’ll find a Parent Letter to give you more of the information you need. The huge list of delicious recipes is kid-friendly, easy, and fun. There’s even a brand new eBook full of Non-Food recipes (for things like slime and moon sand!!) to give your kids an extra fun recipe-reading-and-following experience.

Well, you just need to get signed up and dig in with your kids. That’s all there is to it. Then you can see for yourself how fantastic this is!!

Who is this Kids Cooking Camp for?

Really, it’s for kids of all ages.

Little ones can have fun doing activities and creating recipes with a grown-up. Older ones can take the entire package and run with it! And adults? Well, have I mentioned that we all get to eat the tasty treats our kids will be making?

Everything is great about this Kids Cooking Camp! Everyone wins!!

It’s so easy! We look forward to enjoying this with you and your family! Ready to dive in?

Enjoy our Kids Cooking Camp – awesome for everyone in your family – HERE —>

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Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Simple Recipes We’re Using to Help Our 5-Year Old Learn Kitchen Skills

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This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

We’re starting over at our house! Just like we did with our “first set of kids” we are teaching our new 5-year old Bonus Boy how to cook. Here are the favorite simple recipes we are using to help him learn kitchen skills!

Hopefully, you won’t get too tired of hearing me encourage you to teach your kids to cook. :) Obviously, it’s more important that you teach them to love the Lord and love people. Focus on that first.

But also, eating is something we must all do every day of our lives. Your kids need to know how to prepare simple foods (or complicated foods, if you are my 19-year old). It’s a much-needed skill, and guess what?

After putting in hours of effort, making lots of messes, and having a blessed mixture of frustration and fun with my oldest four kids – they can all cook. It is fantastic. The work involved was entirely worth it. And when all is said and done, we made a lot of awesome memories (and Monkey Bread).

Sometimes now, they feed me. Often they feed themselves. They will someday feed their wives and children. This is beautiful!

Now, we’re starting all over again. This little one moved in with us when he was four. He has become the 5th Coppinger Boy! If I have the audacity to make food without him, he can’t possibly understand why. “But I wanted to help you!” Well, who am I to argue with that?

He cracks eggs, makes messes, helps measure ingredients, makes messes, stirs carefully, makes messes – well, he’s also learning how to use a broom and dustpan. ;)

Teaching Kids to Cook is MessyYum

So what? I like a clean kitchen, but now that I have teen and adult kids who can cook, I realize more than ever that the messes from when they were little are just part of the teaching process. If I expect a mess from the little one in training, then I’m less frustrated when a mess inevitably happens. If we happen to crack, pour, and stir correctly so as to avoid a mess, well, that’s a bonus.

Ready for some kid-friendly recipes?

Simple Recipes to Help Kids Learn Kitchen Skills

Here are some of our favorite simple recipes we are using right now to help teach our 5-year old basic kitchen skills. He helps measure, pour, and stir. As we work, I talk through everything we are doing so that he learns the vocabulary of cooking and the reasons we do what we do.

In addition, he helps:

  • Crack eggs for Scrambled Cheese Eggs (he cracks it, then hands it to me to open it into a bowl).
  • Put frozen fruit and mixed greens into the blender for Smoothies.
  • Do whatever he can with whatever I’m making because he really wants to be a part of all of it! So if possible, I always try to find him a job while I’m cooking or baking.

Looking for more help and recipes as you pull your kids into the kitchen with you?

If you really want to go all in and teach your kids to cook this summer, I encourage you to invest in Katie Kimball’s Kids Cook Real Food eCourse. I used this course with Malachi and plan to use it with Bonus Boy too. It is FANTASTIC!!! Get the details here. And pick up her awesome FREEBIE —>

What are your favorite foods to make with your kids?

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Summer Activities for Kids: Make Ice Cream in 10 Minutes!

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This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Looking for some fun activities to do with your kids this summer? I’ve enjoyed 22 summers with kids (and counting!), so I certainly have a few ideas to share! Stay tuned during the next few weeks as we provide all kinds of suggestions for making your summer with your kids meaningful. (Subscribe here so you won’t miss out!) Today’s idea: Make Ice Cream in 10 Minutes!

Yum

As I was remembering this fun summer activity idea, I decided it would be much more fun to do if we invited friends over to join us! So we sent out the invitation, got our supplies ready, and had a little Ice Cream Making Party!

By the way, we are SO CLOSE to final adoption day for Bonus Boy that I almost waited to post this so that I could show you his precious face. Soon and very soon he will officially be a Coppinger and then all stickers come off!

This “make ice cream in a bag” idea is one of those we always WANT to do, but never seem to get around to ACTUALLY doing. Somehow inviting friends to do it with us made it much more doable, you know? Afterward, the kids played and the moms visited. Bliss! And also, there was ice cream to eat, so double win!

Make Ice Cream in 10 Minutes!

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Summer Activities for Kids: Make Ice Cream in 10 Minutes!
 
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Author:
Serves: 2 servings
Ingredients
  • 1 cup heavy whipping cream
  • 3 droppers full of liquid stevia, or 3-4 Tablespoons real maple syrup, or 3-4 Tablespoons sugar
  • ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
  • ½ cup rock salt or coarse sea salt
  • Ice
  • quart and gallon sized freezer bags
Instructions
  1. Measure cream, sweetener, and vanilla into a quart-sized freezer bag and seal.
  2. Fill a gallon-sized freezer bag half-full of ice.
  3. Add ½ cup rock salt to the ice.
  4. Place the sealed quart-sized bag filled with ice cream ingredients into the bag of ice and salt. Seal.
  5. Toss the bag back and forth, shaking and tossing for 5 minutes or until the mixture thickens to ice cream.
  6. Remove the quart-sized bag and rinse the salt off.
  7. Open the bag, scoop out the ice cream, and enjoy!

We moms found that the ice cream shakers needed a little bit of help to get the mixture shaken vigorously enough to turn into ice cream! Also: be sure to do this activity outside!! The bags tend to get drippy. :)

Here are some of our other Simple Ice Cream Recipes.

Use any of these with the above Freezer Bag Toss idea!

Here’s to a great summer of fun with our kids! Here are other ideas we’ve shared so far:

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

No-Bake Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Bites – (Gluten and Dairy Free)

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You might notice that this No-Bake Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Bites recipe looks identical to our No-Bake Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Bars recipe. This one is a fun one to make with your kids!

Yep. You figured it out. Same recipe. One shaped into bars. One shaped into balls. We are so creative, are we not?

Speaking of creative, we’ve got three other simple varieties of this recipe here. Just a few ingredient variations will give you one of these!


Grab the No-Bake Cookie Dough Bite recipes here:

Need Coconut Flour?

I found a great price here!

Need Almond Butter?

It’s hard to find a good price on this! Aldi has been my best option, if and when I can make it there to shop. (I live an hour away from the closest Aldi, boo!) Try to find one without added sugar. Or better yet, if you can find a good price on almonds, make Homemade Almond Butter!

Need Honey?

I much prefer and recommend buying local honey! Otherwise, I recommend buying a big jug from Azure Standard if that is an option for you.

Need Chocolate Chips?

My very favorite chips are these Enjoy Life Mini Chocolate Chips! They are usually more expensive in the summer as they don’t ship well in the heat. So watch for them to go down in price in the fall and winter months, then stock up!

Need Vanilla Extract?

Oh how I love making it myself! Unfortunately, the price of vanilla beans has gone up over the years. Boo. Still, I think it’s best to make it ourselves if we can! Learn how here!

And now, grab your kids and let them help you make these awesome little treats!

No-Bake Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough BitesYum

No-Bake Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Bites - 5 Ingredients
 
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Author:
Serves: 12-15
Ingredients
  • 1 cup natural creamy almond butter
  • ¼ cup honey
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • ½ cup coconut flour
  • ¼ cup mini chocolate chips
Instructions
  1. Mix the ingredients together in a bowl until well combined.
  2. Roll the mixture into teaspoon-sized (or whatever sized) balls.
  3. Refrigerate for about 30 minutes before serving.

We like using a cookie scoop like this one to make these Cookie Dough Bites.

Looking for more help as you pull your kids into the kitchen with you?

If you really want to go all in and teach your kids to cook this summer, I encourage you to invest in Katie Kimball’s Kids Cook Real Food eCourse. I used this course with Malachi and plan to use it with Bonus Boy too. It is FANTASTIC!!! Get the details here. And pick up her awesome FREEBIE —>

 

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

The Easiest Frozen Yogurt Cups

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This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

When I say that these are the Easiest Frozen Yogurt Cups, I truly do mean that they are the easiest!

The “recipe” I’m about to share with you is going to entirely amaze you. Where has this been all of our lives? Why have we never thought of this before? We should have been making these for years!!

This is the time where you gently interrupt and say, “Laura, I figured this one out a long time ago. You are the only one who didn’t know. Bless your heart.”

Heh.

Well, either way, let’s all talk about making these Frozen Yogurt Cups right now. It’s the easiest thing in the world. And the result is super fun and refreshing on a hot day!

The job of making these Frozen Yogurt Cups has been turned over to our 5-year old. He’s thrilled to be our biggest kitchen helper, and we love that he is starting to learn basic cooking skills!

Of course, in the case of these Frozen Yogurt Cups, there is no cooking involved. This is perfect for a 5-year old!

I do need to interrupt myself now and say that I have actually made a variety of these Frozen Yogurt Cups before. But now I’ve discovered a cheater way to make them, which is why the 5-year old has found himself a kitchen job, and why I am left wondering why I never thought of this before now.

What’s the cheater way to make these Frozen Yogurt Cups?

Well, as you know, I’ve started buying a few cheater foods at the grocery store. Why? Well, now that our family is doing foster care and have started over raising Littles, all while keeping up with the Bigs, and navigating all the meetings and such involved with foster care – my time in the kitchen is more limited than before. And that’s saying something.

So yeah. Sometimes I buy ready-to-serve yogurt. It’s sweeter than what I could or would make myself if I always made or bought it plain and added our own good ingredients. But I’m pretty happy with the pre-made Whole Milk Yogurts I’ve found. So for now, we settle for this yogurt compromise.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

——> Need some re-assurance that compromising on perfect foods is just fine and dandy? Read my post called Beyond the Free Range Chicken. Be encouraged! Be free! Buy the yogurt. (Or not. Because we’re all in a different place and God will lead us each in how to feed our families.) <——-

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Meanwhile, in the land of store-bought yogurt and 5-year old chefs, may we now present to you the lovely idea you are going to thoroughly enjoy this summer!

First, if you don’t already have them, I highly recommend that you invest in these lovely silicone muffin cups. With these jewels, you can make this Frozen Yogurt Cup “recipe” and many more. I love them and don’t know how I got by without them!

Other Recipes to use with your Silicone Cups:

Simple No-Bake Cookie Cups

Simple Strawberry Cheesecake Cups

Honey Sweetened Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups

Healthy Peppermint Patties

The BEST Chocolate Chip Cookie Cups


There you go. Just in case you didn’t believe me when I told you that I use my Silicone Cups very frequently!

Now, where were we? Ah yes…

The Easiest Frozen Yogurt CupsYum

While this is hardly a recipe, I’ll write it in recipe form, just for fun and ease. Hand this one to your kids and let them enjoy making this awesome treat!

The Easiest Frozen Yogurt Cups!
 
Save Print
Author:
Ingredients
  • Your favorite yogurt
  • Muffin Cups or Silicone Muffin Cups
Instructions
  1. Spoon 3-4 Tablespoons of yogurt into muffin cups.
  2. Freeze for about 2 hours or until frozen solid.
  3. Store in a freezer bag or freezer-safe container.

P.S. Want to help your kids learn to cook? Great!

Need some resources to help you know where to start?

We have this great eCookbook package that is a huge help!

[wp_eStore_fancy1 id=33]

Better yet,  I highly recommend this incredible Kids Cook Real Food eCourse! We used it with Malachi and it was a lifesaver!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Summer Activities With the Kids: Go Berry, Apple, or Peach Picking!

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This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Looking for some fun activities to do with your kids this summer? I’ve enjoyed 22 summers with kids (and counting!), so I certainly have a few ideas to share! Stay tuned during the next few weeks as we provide all kinds of suggestions for making your summer with your kids meaningful. (Subscribe here so you won’t miss out!) Today’s idea: Go Berry, Apple, or Peach Picking!

I have the BEST memories of heading to orchards, farms, and friend’s houses in the summertime with my kids so that we could pick berries, apples, or peaches.

We live in small-town Nebraska, so we are blessed to have many neighbors and friends who have berry patches, gardens, and orchards. (Yes, we have a garden in our yard too. But we don’t have the space for planting in huge bulk like many of our country neighbors.)

For years and years when our kids were little, we’d take advantage of every invitation to “come pick!” that we were able to enjoy.

Allow me to take a walk down memory lane…

We had a friend with a huge strawberry patch, where we would all load our buckets! We got to do this for FREE. What a blessing! (They’ve since sold their farm and moved out of state. Happy for them, sad for us!)

We also have friends with a gorgeous apple orchard! In the late summer, we’d head out and get as many apples as we could, all for a tiny price per grocery bag. It seemed too good to be true!

One year, my friend Anne and I borrowed the orchard owner’s cider press. After picking apples at the orchard, we spent the afternoon with all of our kids experiencing the work and joy of making homemade apple cider!

Oh my babies!

One year, we headed to Michigan for a wedding, at the perfect time for fruit picking! As we drove, we noticed sign after sign advertising “You Pick!” farms. Matt and I decided to stop at several locations on the way and enjoy time as a family picking fruit and enjoying the experience. We all still talk about that trip as one of our favorite traveling memories!

Blueberries don’t grow well in Nebraska, so picking them during that trip to Michigan was a very special treat! (Also, as we ate berry after berry while we continued to travel, somehow I ended up sitting on some and staining/ruining my pants. Hahaha! The boys still remember that too! “Mom, remember how you sat in blueberries and ruined your pants?!” Good times.)

Mmmmm, peaches! While peaches do grow well in Nebraska, we still stopped at a Peach Farm during our Michigan trip to enjoy a wagon ride to pick peaches. Of course, we took advantage of their offer to “eat whatever you like!”

Why Go Berry, Apple, or Peach Picking

Truly, the fun and joy that come with picking fruit on a farm with your family is priceless.

Yes, there are bugs. Yes, it is hard work. Yes, it may be hot. So prepare yourselves, give the kids a pep talk, take water bottles, go before the hottest part of the day, and know that while you’d love the experience to be perfect, someone may still have a melt-down.

Through the years and beyond all the less-than-fun parts, our family found these fruit picking experiences to be wonderful because:

  • The kids got to learn more about where our food comes from.
  • The kids got to learn about the hard work it takes to put food on the table.
  • We got to take home loads of delicious, nutritious fruit to eat in a variety of fun ways. (Details below!)
  • It saved all kinds of money as we either had to pay very small prices per pound of fruit, or we were encouraged to take all we wanted for free!

Beyond Berry, Apple, or Peach Picking

Once the fruit is picked, then what? Well, the fun just keeps on keeping on!

Yes, the fun comes in the form or hard work. :)

After working hard to pick the fruit, of course, we eat as much fresh fruit as we can hold. NOTHING is more delicious than sweet fruit that comes directly off the tree or bush!

But next comes the fun and work of preserving what we can’t eat fresh. The hard work pays off for months as we enjoy homemade applesauce, frozen berries in smoothies, and peach cobblers in the middle of winter. We all work together to wash, cut, and process the fruit.

Here are some ways we preserve our fruit to enjoy all winter long:

What to make with Berries, Apples, and Peaches

You’re sure to come up with wonderful ways to use your freshly picked or beautifully preserved berries, apples, and peaches! Here are some of our favorite ways to enjoy the “fruit” of our labor. (Laura is punny.)

Ready to go pick fruit?

Now that our “first batch of kids” is older, if they are able to join us, we can really pick a lot of fruit since they are able to work like adults. And here we are again, starting the process with new babes God has put in our lives. We are excited to take our Bonus Boy on fruit-picking adventures as we know he’ll love it!!

Here’s to a great summer of fun with our kids! Here are other ideas we’ve shared so far:

Stay tuned for more fun Summer Kid Activity ideas!

 

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Summer Activities for Kids: Make Smoothies, Milkshakes, and Popsicles!

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This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Looking for some fun activities to do with your kids this summer? I’ve enjoyed 22 summers with kids (and counting!), so I certainly have a few ideas to share! Stay tuned during the next few weeks as we provide all kinds of suggestions for making your summer with your kids meaningful. (Subscribe here so you won’t miss out!) Today’s idea: Make Smoothies, Milkshakes, and Popsicles!

There are many glorious reasons to make smoothies, milkshakes, and popsicles with your kids. What are these reasons, you ask? Oh, I am more than happy to share:

  1. Smoothies, milkshakes, and popsicles are obviously perfect to enjoy on a hot day because they are so refreshing and cool.
  2. When you make food WITH your kids, they are much more likely to want to eat it.
  3. You can sneak all kinds of nourishing foods into smoothies, milkshakes, and popsicles – so basically, you are making treats that are very healthy!
  4. Making smoothies, milkshakes, and popsicles are a super simple way to get all your kids – from tiny to big – into the kitchen to learn some kitchen skills!

When our 5-year old Bonus Boy first moved in with us, one of the first fun activities we did together was to make “milkshakes.” (They are really considered smoothies, but he “doesn’t like smoothies – he only likes milkshakes.” Call them whatever you want! We load them with fresh greens, frozen strawberries and bananas, farm fresh whole milk, and sometimes even an avocado. He drinks these “milkshakes” right up! And he loves to help us make them, so we aren’t sneaking the healthy stuff in. He puts it all into the blender himself!

Below are 13 of our favorite smoothie, milkshake, and popsicle recipes. Take note that you can make a smoothie and then freeze it into a popsicle – a double good treat! Or look there at #13 – make homemade wholesome pudding, then freeze it into Pudding Pops! Creamsicles anyone? Yep! There’s a recipe for those too!

Make Smoothies, Milkshakes, and Popsicles!

  1. Pineapple Mango Smoothies
  2. Pineapple-Orange Slushies
  3. Creamy Orange Cooler
  4. Strawberry Peach Slushies
  5. Icy Cold Milkshake Treats
  6. Green Machine Milkshakes
  7. Easy Peppermint Milkshakes
  8. Fresh Peach Milkshakes
  9. Strawberry Milkshakes
  10. Strawberry Creamsicles
  11. Mock Frozen Yogurt
  12. Orange Creamsicles
  13. Homemade Pudding Pops

Sky’s the limit on the variety of milkshakes you can make with different fruits and fun combinations. The same is true for smoothies! Use whatever you have in your freezer or fridge. Use up odds and ends of leftover fruit that is starting to go bad. Use milk, cream, kefir, yogurt – whatever you have. There’s hardly a way to go wrong with these ideas!

HINT!

Do you think your kids would enjoy the taste of these milkshakes and smoothies? But they are turned off by the color of these goodies when you add greens to your blender? Yep, I hear ya. We’ve learned to pour the mixture into a solid cup so that it isn’t see-through. We top it with a lid and let the kids choose a fun straw. Ta-da! Problem solved. The kids can’t see the funny-looking mixture – they just know the contents inside their cups are delish!

Looking for the perfect blender?

Any ol’ blender will do. But nothing is amazing as a Blendtec or Vitamix if you want a perfectly smooth smoothie. Your family is much more likely to guzzle down their smoothies and shakes if they are seedless and chunk-less. :) Here are more details on why I love my Blendtec.

Looking for great homemade popsicle makers?

I just invested in the double-set of these. They are fantastic! Why the double-set? Well, because 6 popsicles just isn’t enough. Making 12 popsicles at once is much better, don’t you think!?

By the way, while the above 13 recipes are beyond great and extra full of nourishment, it is worth a mention that I often pour 100% juice into our popsicle molds to make simple fruit juice popsicles. Incredibly easy and a super money saver!

Looking for more help as you pull your kids into the kitchen with you?

And if you really want to go all in and teach your kids to cook this summer, I encourage you to invest in Katie Kimball’s Kids Cook Real Food eCourse. I used this course with Malachi and plan to use it with Brayden too. It is FANTASTIC!!! Get the details here.

Psst! Did you see our other Summer Kid Activity ideas so far?

Stay tuned for more fun Summer Kid Activity ideas!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Summer Activities with the Kids: Make Donuts!

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Looking for some fun activities to do with your kids this summer? I’ve enjoyed 22 summers with kids (and counting!), so I certainly have a few ideas to share! Stay tuned during the next few weeks as we provide all kinds of suggestions for making your summer with your kids meaningful. (Subscribe here so you won’t miss out!) Today’s idea: Make Donuts. Who can say no to that?

Here’s what’s great about making donuts with your kids (besides the fact that everyone gets to eat donuts!):

This activity gives you a chance to help your kids learn more about reading a recipe, measuring ingredients, rolling, cutting, and kitchen safety. Our favorite recipes are listed below!

Looking for more help as you pull your kids into the kitchen with you?

And if you really want to go all in and teach your kids to cook this summer, I encourage you to invest in Katie Kimball’s Kids Cook Real Food eCourse. I used this course with Malachi and plan to use it with Bonus Boy too. It is FANTASTIC!!! Get the details here.

Make Donuts ~ Read a Book

Summer is an awesome time to spend more time reading fun books with your kids!

Have you read Homer Price? It’s a great read-aloud for your family! There’s a great chapter in the book about Homer making donuts with his uncle’s donut machine – SUCH a fun chapter! The donuts got out of control!! After you read that chapter, you’ll have no choice but to get into the kitchen and make donuts with your kids!

Here are a couple pictures of my four oldest boys enjoying the donuts we made after reading Homer Price many years ago. Aw, they were so little! (And Malachi was apparently playing dress-up too!)

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He’s 14 now. But he still loves donuts.

Ready for some Donut Recipes? Here’s a classic favorite of ours!

Summer Activity with the Kids: Make Donuts

Whole Grain Cake Donuts
 
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Author:
Serves: 15-20
Ingredients
  • 3 ¼ cup whole grain flour
  • 2 teaspoon baking powder
  • ½ teaspoon cinnamon
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
  • ⅔ cup sucanat or brown sugar
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • ⅔ cup milk
  • ¼ cup melted butter
  • Oil for frying (I use palm shortening or coconut oil)
Instructions
  1. Mix dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl.
  2. Stir in eggs, vanilla, milk and melted butter.
  3. On a floured surface, roll dough to ½ inch thickness.
  4. Cut with donut cutter, biscuit cutter, or cookie cutters.
  5. Heat oil in skillet or electric skillet (enough oil to cover the bottom of the skillet about ¼ inch).
  6. Place donuts into the hot oil to fry for 2-3 minutes on each side.
  7. Remove from skillet and place on a paper towel lined plate.
  8. Sprinkle a mixture of sugar and cinnamon, or powdered sugar over the hot donuts.

 

Want to make your donuts even healthier? How about adding a veggie – without anyone noticing? Whole Grain Pumpkin Donuts for the win! Truly, when you add pumpkin puree to donuts it not only adds nourishment but adds moisture and delicious flavor too! Find the recipe here:

Whole Grain Pumpkin Donuts

Need a little frosting for your donuts?

Here’s a high-sugar chocolate recipe. I will provide this recipe for you, but I will not be held responsible for giving your kids a sugar high. ;)

Simple Fudge Frosting

2 1/2 cups powdered sugar
¼ cup cocoa
¼ cup butter
¼ cup water
½ t. vanilla

Stir powdered sugar and cocoa together in a bowl. In a small saucepan, melt butter. Add water and bring to a boil. Pour boiling water and butter into powdered sugar and cocoa. Add vanilla. Beat with hand mixer until frosting is combined.

How about a donut glaze that is much lower in sugar!

Orange Honey Glaze

2 teaspoons orange juice concentrate
1/4 cup heavy cream
2 Tablespoons honey

Whisk ingredients together on the stove until smooth. Drizzle over warm donuts!

Get out the Cookie Cutters!

Regular circle donuts and donut holes are fine. But we can make donuts even more fun when we use cookie cutters to make them into fun shapes! Any cookie cutters will do. Make stars during the Fourth of July. Make animal shapes after a visit to the zoo. Make hearts and deliver them to someone you love. Oh the fun you can have!

You might also consider baking your donuts in a cool silicone donut making mold.

Share with Others

Did you see the sentence above about using a heart-shaped cookie cutter to make heart-shaped donuts to share with someone you love?

One of the best ways to spend time with your kids this summer is to SERVE others with them. Perhaps one way you can serve together is to make donuts and deliver them to someone who could use the blessing of friendship and fellowship!

Ready to have some summer fun with your kids? Head into the kitchen and make donuts! Take pictures and let us know how it goes!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

When You Adopt a Five Year Old and Start Teaching Him to Cook…

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I taught all of his brothers. It was well worth the effort as now our 14, 17, 19, and 21-year-old sons are quite proficient in the kitchen. It only makes sense then that we would take our 5-year old Bonus Boy into the kitchen and start teaching him to cook.

About the time I started counting down to the empty nest years, as I joyfully started to say “that’s the last time I’ll ever need to XYZ for one of my kids,” while I was beginning to eagerly look into the very near future of life with no more intense parenting requirements, God showed me that He clearly had other, better plans. He provided for us a Bonus Boy. This one with chocolate brown eyes and a giggle that fills our entire house with laughter.

I’m learning to balance the needs of my adult and teen children with the needs of a little one. I find myself juggling two seasons at once, paying college bills with one hand while wiping a nose with the other. Somewhere in there, I’m squeezing in Government and History lessons with my high school and middle school aged sons.

Once again, I have found myself pulling up the stool in the kitchen for the little guy, showing him how to crack eggs without getting it all over the…oops. Too late. Let’s clean it up and try again. Meanwhile, my high schooler is scrambling his own eggs over at the stove. He used to be the one smashing eggs onto the countertop. Now he is capable and resourceful – and if I need him to, he’ll make an entire meal for the family.

Aww, it’s our little Malachi. The same Malachi who now shaves and is taller than me. Here he is now —>

I know this will be the outcome for our newest one too. So I patiently clean up the egg slime with Bonus Boy and we practice again cracking an egg without making a mess. I show him (again) how to stir the muffin batter without flinging the…oops. Let’s clean up the flour mess on the countertop and try again.

The messes? They are worth it. The effort and time and energy it takes to teach a child how to cook? My adult and teen sons prove that it absolutely is all worth it.

Here’s our Bonus Boy, getting in on the Homemade Applesauce action last fall!

I never thought I’d again be teaching a little one to cook, but well, never say never. God’s plans are much bigger, much wiser, and much better than ours. My chocolate-eyed boy proves this to me daily, filling me with wonder at what else God has in the works.

I’ve said it many times but I’ll say it again: Teach your kids to cook.

Even if it’s just the basics, give them the know-how they need to be comfortable in the kitchen. It’s good for them, but it’s even BETTER FOR YOU!!! With all the major changes in our lives (fostering and adopting kids!), if my big kids didn’t know how to cook, there would be days we would be scrambling to eat because my time is so limited right now.

Need some resources to help you know where to start?

We have this great eCookbook package that is a huge help!

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Better yet,  I highly recommend this incredible Kids Cook Real Food eCourse! We used it with Malachi and it was a lifesaver!

Our foster and adoption journey

As soon as I’m able, I’ll share more details about how God has brought us to this surprising and beautiful time in our lives. My writing time is extremely limited now, and for some very sweet and tiny reasons. Whatever you do, don’t make plans. God makes plans. We simply get to learn to trust and obey Him as we walk our daily journey with Him!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!