Young Chefs – April 2012

One day I noticed the groupon was for a Young Chef’s class and thought about buying it for Nadia since she loved it so much last time. But then I forgot about it and went on with the day. Later I got a text from my friend Tricia asking if I saw it and if I wanted to get one too so that her son Elliott and Nadia could go together. Sure thing! So we worked it out for them to go in April and here are some of the photos.

Young Chef April 2012

Amelie had a lot more fun this time since her friend Jude was there to play. I didn’t have all the “My turn cook?” questions because she was distracted.

Young Chef April 2012

There were several more kids this time and the chefs did well with all the chaos.

Young Chef April 2012

Nadia was the first one to “hide the lime” while waiting on the Angel Food Croutons to bake.

Young Chef April 2012

Tasting the food. Neither Nadia or Elliott liked the lime fruit salad, but they did like the angel food cake croutons.

Young Chef April 2012

Jude, Elliott, Nadia, Amelie  (they were moving targets so this was the best one)

Young Chef April 2012

On the way out Elliott said, “Look it’s Nadia cooking!” I cracked up and had to get a photo – Nadia thought is was great! (oh how I wished I had put in her usual 2 ponies!)

Young Chef April 2012

And when we got home the girls found these from Aunt Sharon. SO COOL!

Young Chefs

Young Chef

Young Chef

Young Chef

We had a gift certificate for Young Chefs from a fundraiser earlier in the year and in November we had a chance for Nadia to redeem it. It would be an understatement to say that she loved it. They made pumpkin whoopie pies (with filling) and Mulled Cider. She practically begged me to sign up for the weekly program they sell for a class each week. I told her that she already did other stuff, but she could help me with the cooking more and more. Needless to say she has been inspired and helped me make a ton of our Christmas goodies. For Christmas she made her Grandpa Brian a set of 3 BBQ rubs. She went with me to buy the spices, measured everything out and then put them in the jars.

Young Chef

This is Amelie on the other side of the glass wondering when it will be her turn. One of the chefs came out and brought her a small chair and kitchen toys to play with which I thought was sweet.

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Her Papa and Grandma Brooke sent her a set of kitchen tools that are child sized and 3 very cool kids cookbooks for Christmas. She has already baked “Yummy Hunny Cookies” and looks forward to doing more in the New Year. I am really happy that the gift certificate has made her even more interested in cooking.

Autumn Treasures Unit Study

Autumn Unit
Click on the photo to see album

We got the Autumn Treasures unit study of Amanda Bennett’s site, unitstudy.com, and it took us much longer than usual due to our busy month, but it was great. I started by getting about 15 books from the library and printing some extra activities from Homeschool Creations. We learned a lot in this study just like our past ones on seashells and robots. We started with Do a Dot pages to get warmed up and start our discussion about fall (even though it was still pushing 100 in these parts)

Autumn Unit

Just like the other units there were a lot of fun videos to watch including how candy corn is made and how an apple press works. We learned about Johnny Appleseed and his travels – Nadia enjoyed all his crazy hats, especially the cooking pot. I have already done blog posts on the monarch butterflies and apple pie bites that we made, but here is a little view of the rest of our unit.

Autumn Unit
Nadia is working on her fall tree in this photo.

Autumn Unit
A puzzle for the back of her lapbook.

Autumn Unit
Learning the life cycle of a pumpkin – here she is with the pumpkin she picked out at homeschool day at Mainstay Farms.

Autumn Unit
Families are encouraged to go on a nature walk each day and collect items. Then enter the highlights into your unit study work book. Here are some of the things Nadia found along the way.

Autumn Unit
Leaf rubbings from our nature walks.

Autumn Unit
“Fairy” Amelie and Nadia on a nature walk.

Autumn Unit

Autumn Unit
Amelie was saying, “art art art art” over and over while I was working with Nadia so I went to see what she wanted. Then I realized that she was drawing “hearts.” Pretty cute!

We got the idea for one of our other cooking projects from the Mama Jenn site.  These were messy and fun to make and tasted yummy!

Autumn Unit Autumn Unit

Autumn Unit

Autumn Unit

Last of all, here is her completed lapbook.

Autumn_17

Autumn_18

Bite Size Apple Pie

When my new Taste of Home magazine came I saw this recipe and knew it would be perfect for Nadia to do during our Autumn unit. The only part I did was to read her the recipe, then cut the apples and pie pastry.

Bite Size Apple Pie

Ingredients.

Bite Size Apple Pie

Brushing the pie pastry with butter. Then she sprinkled sugar mixed with cinnamon.

Bite Size Apple Pie

Apple wedges wrapped with pastry, brushed with more butter and sprinkled with more sugar mix.

Bite Size Apple Pie

The first batch out of the oven.

These were SO GREAT! Not too sweet and so easy for Nadia to do. She was so proud and we shared them with friends and they loved them too.