Grandma Camp Cooking

LThree years old is the PERFECT AGE to start kiddos cooking. Something. Pouring things from cups into bowls gives them a big sense of accomplishment...and they are more likely to want to EAT something they helped COOK.

Lilly loves being in charge of Warren...and she has some MAD COOKING skills. (Warren thinks all new food tastes like broccoli)

Lilly no longer needs the cooking stool -- and Warren was THRILLED to be invited up to the cooking island!! (he just realized it was chocolate cake, not broccoli)

Our mission today is to figure out our new contraption -- Babycakes. A cake pop MAker. (a gift from my thoughtful friend, Linda P.)

The biggest challenge was figuring out how to get the batter into the hot pan. The answer is to put the cake batter into a ziplock bag, cut a corner off, and let it flow out...moving quickly from one ball hole to another...

Warren's job was to knock off all the little cake connector pieces (okay, he mostly did that with his mouth...)

The Cake Ball Maker even came with it's own little cooling rack...

Each batch took about 5 minutes to cook. Lilly and Warren were TOTALLY IN IT when we mixed up the cake, and delighted when I filled the cake ball pan...eager to see how they turned out...happy to eat off all the little connector pieces...only Lilly stayed for the filling of the second batch...by the time I was on Pan #4 -- neither child was anywhere within shouting distance...

On a very hot, hot day -- they needed to take a hose break.  Remember playing with the hose when you were a kid??

The final step in the cake balls project was to roll them in frosting, then sprinkles. What could be more fun??

I zapped some canned frosting in the microwave to make it thin...then we put the sticks into the cake balls. The frosting was still too thick to coat them...maybe melted chocolate would have been better. At the end of a VERY LONG DAY -- we had six frosted cake balls.

I am quite sure this activity will be one of those things that will remember better than it lived...and that's okay with me.

P.S.  In case you are wondering...one cake mix makes 99 f *&%&*ing cake balls...