The more activities we share with our children the richer, fuller lives they will enjoy and the happier they will be overall. One such activity that can be shared with our children is the joy of baking and making cupcakes! They are a great cooking activity to share with children because the endeavor consists of many choices. Choices help give children the opportunity to really feel confident about their likes, dislikes and areas that they can feel free to express their creative juices. One can purchase the boxed mixes or one can easily make them from scratch following a favorite recipe or experimenting with new recipes each time a new batch is made. If you decide to choose a new recipe with each new batch, this can be the first fun choice for your child to make! He or she can choose which new recipe sounds best to their liking.
Do they want to make Sally's Extra Fluffy cakes or Carla's Famous Swirls? This choice alone will change the outcome of one of their favorite dessert treats. Then on to the decorating! What do they want to ornament their mini cakes with: frosting, fudge, sprinkles, and shavings? One, a combination, or how about all of the above? This gives children many choices. In addition, when baking cupcakes the majority of people tend to bake more than one at a time giving children typically eight blank dessert pallets to become the creative artist they are in their mind. The first masterpiece may be slathered with chocolate frosting and carefully placed chocolate chips arranged in a smiley face! The next a vanilla lover's paradise with multi-colored sprinkles enticing the onlooker to take a bit.
And, if one's child is hesitant or reluctant to get started, then the parent can help by starting a few themselves! Even cleaning up is a great part of the fun! There are mixing dishes to clean up, but if you tell your children as they help what a wonderful help they are to you, how you appreciate their help so much, and how much you enjoy doing things with them, they will for sure love helping! They will feel good about helping, feel proud about it, and even end up volunteering to find other things that they can do, non-related to the project to help out. Children want to feel good, if they know what pleases their parent they will continue to find things to do so. Making these great little deserts with children can be more than a simple baking experience.
It can be an opportunity for children to feel free exploring their creativity without any restrictions. It can be a way for them to feel as though what they have created will be accepted and enjoyed by others; an essential lesson to learn. It can also be a way for children to feel appreciated. Feel as though their help, their efforts are things to be valued, and things that can help to improve their sense of self. It can also help them realize what they like to do, what they don't like to do and so many other great possibilities! So why not make some cupcakes tonight!.
Mika Hamilton runs a website about cupcake recipes, visit: http://www.cupcake-recipes.com