It's Been a Long Weekend

We have finally got our shopping done and our chicken is now baking away in the oven. So I thought it is time to begin planning for next week. This past weekend we have been getting our craft supplies organized for Valentine's Day. I will post some of the things we are planning on doing as we go.

First this is one of the things the kids have all agreed on making:

Strawberry Sandwiches

Ingredients

1 quart strawberry frozen yogurt, softened

18 chocolate wafer cookies

Pink icing color

Royal Icing:
2 cups confectioners' sugar
1 tablespoon powdered egg whites
3 tablespoons water

Directions

1. Evenly spread yogurt into a 9" square baking pan lined with plastic warp. Freeze 45 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, prepare Royal Icing: In a bowl, with mixer on low, combine confectioners' sugar, powdered egg whites, and water. Increase speed to high, and beat until stiff peaks form. Tint half with pink icing color. Place icings in plastic resealable bags. Snip off one small corner of each bag, and pipe valentine decorations onto 9 wafer cookies. Let dry.

3. Using a 2-1/2" round cookie cutter, cut out 9 circles from the yogurt. Place each circle onto an undecorated wafer cookie, and top with a decorated wafer. Place sandwiches in freezer until ready to serve

And this one:

Heart Shaped Sugar Cookies

1 cup butter, unsalted

1 cup white sugar

2 eggs, lightly beaten

1 teaspoon vanilla

3 cups flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

In a bowl, cream the butter and sugar. Beat in the eggs and vanilla. In a second bowl, combine and mix well the flour, baking powder, and salt. Stir flour into butter mixture 1 cup at a time. Chill dough for 3 to 4 hours. Roll out dough and cut into shapes with cookie cutters or a knife. Brush with milk and sprinkle with colored sugar. Bake on a sheet pan or a parchment lined sheet pan in a preheated 350 degree F oven for 10 to 15 minutes depending on the size of the cookie. Remove cookies to a rack to cool completely.

Now a few of the crafts we are planning is:

To cut a lot of our craft costs we go to Oriental Trading and look through their craft stuff. Usually by the pictures we can figure out what we need. We always have an endless supply of foam and felt at home so that is what we look for. That is in thanks to going to the kids club held every Saturday at our local Michael's Craft Store. They always have some sort of good sales going on and I always stock up. I ended up with over $100.00 worth of Halloween craft kits for under $10.00. And again this happened for Christmas- so we are more than set for next year.

I have created some stuff for our upcoming Valentine's Day Unit- I will post those later tonight, after I get our menu plan and weekly plans finished.