Cold Day

The first week back from winter break was a short week for me-3 days off due to the cold, 2 days off for N2 due to the cold.  The first day we had off was a really fun day for us.  We did a lot of things we had never done before.  I'm pretty sure we stayed in our pjs all day (which is actually not a new thing for us but at some point I generally make them get dressed and this day I didn't).

We started out by playing video games.  We have a wii and they have started taking interest in playing it as they have seen Brian playing Zelda.  They have played some wii fit stuff like bowling, tennis and baseball but they are terrible at that and it frustrates them.  We had gone to the library the day before and I figured we may not have school so I picked up 3 kids wii games.  I had no idea what to look for so I found familiar character games.  The one that was the most successful for them was the Dora game I picked up.  They took turns playing.  There were times that Noah needed Natalie to do something because he couldn't make it work so he would ask for her help.  They tried the Penguins of Madagascar but it was too complicated for them since they were inexperienced video game players.  I played the whole game and it was my level of video game!  We also checked out a Cars game and they could play that 2 players but some of the tasks were harder than others.  When they went back to school on Friday, they told their teacher they played video games all day.  Sigh.  I always hated hearing that as a teacher and I really want to explain to her that they did NOT play all day and this was a special treat for them.

Before lunch we made soft pretzels.  I used a Tastefully Simple mix and I did not care for it at all.  It had a slightly fruity flavor.  N2 seemed to really like it though.  I let them make shapes but they had no clue what to do until I started making a shape.  Noah made a banana and something else of that shape but when cooked they resembled slugs so we called them slugs.  He was mostly uninterested in making shapes.but Natalie had a great time.  She made a horse, a family of peas and more that I can't remember.  When baked it was hard to distinguish one shape from another but it was fun!

(I made the elephant, bunny and mouse in the above picture).  You can see Noah's slugs.  Tow of Natalie's peas are in the bottom right corner.

Natalie got an Easy Bake Oven for Christmas and we hadn't had a chance to use it so I figured this would be the perfect opportunity!  The oven was actually a funny gift for my bridal shower so the mixes with the oven were bad so I had to find something else to make and luckily there are plenty of recipes out there.  We made a confetti cake with frosting.  I think the mix was a little too much but only for a tablespoon or so.  We had a really hard time getting the first cake out and it almost fell in the depths of the oven.  I think it was hard to get out because it was too tall and I didn't think the top wasn't done.  So the second pan we baked a little longer and the very top had a scrap mark when we got it out so now I know, fill the pans a little less!  Natalie was thrilled to make her own cakes!