Making Chocolates

 We had a great time making raw chocolates this morning and can't wait to taste them a little later on when they've set. We even made our own instructional video to share for Lychee to earn a DIY skill for her 'Chef' badge.  You can watch the video below:

Valentines Activity

 Looking for a fun activity for valentines day? How about learning to make genuinely healthy, organic and fairly traded chocolate? That's what we are going to be doing. I'm told it's easy enough for the kids to join in with too.

You could also do a study on fair trade, it's a little early (fair trade fortnight starts on the 23rd of February) but personally I think they've missed a trick because everyone will be marketed nasty commercial not fairly traded chocolate for valentines day without giving it a second though just nine days earlier.

The fair trade website has tonnes of free resources aimed at all age groups which look great and I will definitely be looking at these both with the teenagers I work with and my own two.

And if you are looking for links to buy the ingredients you need, you can find them at the bottom of yesterday's post on my other blog. :-)

'Cooking' with toddlers

My son has suddenly developed an interest in baking - how helpful seeing as we have just started the  GAPS diet and we can't eat conventional cookies/brownies/cupcakes anymore. :0(

All is not lost though! It turns out GAPS 'cooking' with a dehydrator is not only easy, but toddler safe as there is no oven used! Even a four year old is capable of turning a dial to the correct temperature and placing the front on this mildly warm 'oven' without burning themselves.

We picked up a really good deal on some peppers at the local market, so today we are making 'no cheese crackers' but here are some other great toddler (and GAPS) friendly recipes you could try making together.

• Banananut Cookies 
• Lemon Cookies
• Foccacia 'bread' 
• Fruit Leathers (remove the agave nectar to keep it GAPS friendly -  it still tastes great)
• Onion 'bread'  
• Cheezit's 
• Banana Bread Walnuts
• Brownies (I make these without the cocoa nibs and they still taste great)
• Chivy Cheese Chips

Domestication

Today, recognising that it was a tuesday, Cosmo pointed out to me that we needed to tidy up for our cleaner. Unfortunately she is ill this week, so I told him that she wouldn't be coming today.

'But who will clean our house for us?'
'We will.'
'I don't think you know how...'

Ouch.

Epic parenting fail.

When he was younger Cosmo did all the chores with me, but since we've employed a cleaner to help keep on top of things, I've relegated all the chores I still do to early mornings, nap times and bed times, or to when he is quietly working on something else, so that when we are together I can be doing something 'constructive' or 'academic' or just having plain old fun.

The reality is, that unless my children see me doing these chores on a regular basis they assume that they are done magically and that I have nothing to do with it.

With that in mind I started some domestication with Cosmo today. He helped me take apart the dishwasher and clean it with vinegar and bicarbonate of soda. He was impressed with the smell, and didn't want to touch any of it (in his defense I was wearing rubber gloves) but he did watch me do it and knows that we have to do it to keep our dishwasher in good working order.

Similarly I've made him help me with sorting laundry.

We invested in a cleaner because we thought I would be able to dedicate more time to schooling, but the reality is that I've lost the importance of why we are home schooling. I want my children to see real life and understand how it works. I shouldn't be shielding them from the day to day stuff in order to teach them how volcanoes work or what vaccinations are. Those things are important, but not more so than how to run a house. The reality is they will definitely run a house, but the chances of becoming a geologist or a medical research assistant are much slimmer.