Half Term Fun: Growing Beans with Children

Growing Beans – First Few Days

Early this week, I shared an Easy Sweet Recipe for Children – nice and easy, perfect to keep the kids entertained during half term.

While I was growing up in Brazil, I used to grow beans all the time. It was one of my favourite activities. My mum is a biologist, so she got me into nature.

As I did it so many times when she was a little girl, I wanted little man to try and grow some beans too. It is really simple to do, you only need beans, cotton wool and a little container to keep them.

You can use butter beans, found in the dried beans/ pulses section in supermarkets, straight out of the packet.

Growing Beans – After One Week

First you need to place a few beans on top of a cotton wool, then water a little every day to ensure that the cotton wool is moist at all times.

Little man added 3 beans to each plastic container. They should be kept indoors and away from direct sunlight.

Little man had a lot of fun watching the beans grow. As beans grow really quickly, you can see each morning how much it had grown from one day to the other. It is like magic!

Growing Beans – After Two Weeks

If you start growing them now, you will see a big difference by the time the schools go back next week.

As soon as the beans reach a couple of inches tall, you need to move them from the container to the soil so they can have more space to grow. You can just plant them with the cotton wool, so the roots don’t get damaged in the process.

Once the beans are moved to the soil, you need to carry on watering daily and they will become little plants in no time.

Little man loved watching the beans grow!

Half Term Fun: Easy Sweet Recipe for Children

Docinho de Leite Ninho

Happy Half Term!

Half term is great fun – parents get to stay in bed a bit longer and children love getting busy at home.

I like entertained little man at home by crafting, drawing and baking. Basically anything that makes him happy while we spend quality time together.

I have previously blogged about a Brazilian Recipe: Pineapple and Champagne Biscuit Layered Dessert.

Docinho de Leite Ninho

While we were on our summer holiday in Brazil, we decided to make a traditional party sweet called “Docinho de leite ninho”.

It’s a powdered milk sweet, found in every birthday party you attend in Brazil.

They are an easy to make sweet and it requires minimal adult supervision as you don’t need to use the oven or cooker.

Docinho de Leite Ninho

Ingredients:

• 2 cups of powdered milk (dry milk)
• 1 cup of sugar
• 1 cup of desiccated coconut
• 1 cup of coconut milk

Docinho de Leite Ninho

Method:

First you should mix the dry ingredients, then add the coconut milk until you get a dough like mixture.

Little man had a lot of fun mixing all the ingredients and making little balls.

I helped him a little by giving him the right amount of dough, so he could roll it until it was nice and round.

Afterwards little man rolled the balls on a plate with desiccated coconut and it is ready to be enjoyed!

It is best served chilled, however it is very yummy as soon as you make it. Enjoy!

They are so easy to make, that we actually make them twice (you probably noticed by the different t-shirts).

Please feel free to comment with your easy recipes for children!

Little Man’s Hero: Peppa Pig!

Peppa Pig Craft

Little man will be 4 sooon. At the moment, he loves Peppa and George, he watches 2 episodes of Peppa Pig every night before going to bed.

Peppa Pig is part of his little life. He learned from Peppa Pig that (in his own words) “mummy Pig works in the computer and does important work ”, that “George can’t talk because he is a baby”, that “Mummy Rabbit had two babies in her tummy, one was a girl and one was a boy”.

Making the Sky: Sun and Cloud

So far, Peppa Pig is in some ways teaching him some important lessons in life, that babies come from mummy’s belly, that babies can’t talk and that mummies need the computer to do “some important work”.

When I asked him about his hero, he immediately replied: “Peppa Pig”. I wasn’t surprised as he is a big Peppa Pig fan, he was over the moon when we went to watch Peppa Pig Live Show at the theatre in December.

Decorating Peppa and Grass

If you would like to reproduce the picture, you will need coloured pencils, crayons, coloured paper, scissors, glitter, glue and pipe cleaner.

First Peppa Pig was drawn in pink paper, then carefully cut around Peppa. Then little man coloured her dress with pink crayon. Green and gray papers were used to create the grass and sky in the background, by glueing them together.

Peppa Pig was then glued to the background. Yellow crayon was used to draw the sun and blue pencil to draw the cloud in the sky. Yellow pipe cleaner was glue to the sun and blue pipe cleaner to the cloud.

Glue was added to Peppa’s dress so red glitter could stick to it. Green pen was used to draw the grass, then glue to stick green glitter to the grass and green pipe cleaner.

The final result is little man’s hero: Peppa Pig walking in the grass wearing a pretty red dress in a sunny day.

This post is an entry into the Tots100 MoneySupermarket That’s My Hero competition

Little Man’s Hero: Peppa Pig!

Get out of Your Hobbit Hole!

Half term will be here soon so I thought I would share some ideas for family fun this Winter!

No doubt you and your kids have already seen “The Hobbit.” This winter, use this film to inspire you to get out into the world and start exploring. While the winter cold can be a huge drag, you can still have lots of fun days out with the kids. Here are some excellent opportunities for family adventures.

Vertical Chill Ice Wall, Covent Garden, London

Learn how to climb an ice wall on the facility’s 8m high wall with plenty of tracks for beginners as well as experienced climbers. The internal temperature is kept between –5 and –7 degrees C. This option might be a better bet for older children, as there is a lower age limit of 13. Nevertheless, pretend you’re scaling a mountain and get your altitude fix by trying this extreme winter sport.

Reigate Caves, Reigate, Surrey

Beneath Reigate Castle is Baron’s Cave, which dates back to medieval times. Nearby, you’ll also find the Tunnel Road Caves, which was used in World War I. Both caves are open and would make great places to explore.

Banham Zoo, Banham, Norfolk

Rated as one of the top three zoos in the UK by WHICH?, the Banham Zoo is a must-see. It has nearly 1000 animals in residence, as well as an exhibit dedicated to birds of prey and a free Safari roadtrain. You can also stop by the Tarzan Towers play area for a little playtime.

Christs College Ski Club, Guildford, Surrey

Spend the day here learning how to ski. You can sign up for lessons or ski on your own. It’s a great place to practice for if you ever want to take a family ski holiday to the Alps.

Make it happen

To ensure a successful day out, it will help if you remember the right gear. For starters, since it’s winter, you’ll want to dress appropriately and remind your kids to do the same, so that nobody ends up feeling cold. You’ll also want to allow for enough time for meals and even bring a few snacks for the trip so nobody is hungry.

It will also help if you have the right phone. If you are going somewhere you’ve never been before, a smartphone with the right apps which will give you local information, such as maps and recommendations on where to stay or stop and have a drink. However, you’ll want to make sure you have the right phone. For example, sell your Samsung galaxy s and upgrade to the sIII. Or, trade in your old Blackberry for an iPhone. Either way, you’ll want a good phone that will let you have all the information at your fingertips.

Either way, don’t let the winter weather keep you inside all day. Instead, get out there are start exploring.

This is a sponsored post.