Bread and Butter

It's Tell Us Tuesday with Much Ado About Something! Today I am showing how to make homemade butter with kids!




Two of my kiddos came home from school last week after doing Thanksgiving rotations. In both cases they were able to make Butter using little baby Jars and spread it on some crackers to enjoy. They both came home so excited and told me that "we must make some together!!!" So yesterday as I was getting up I packed up my Mason Jars and lids and then remembered my bread machine that sits in the laundry room and grabbed that as well.

When I got to the house S was home sick, which makes the 5th week with a kid home sick. I am sure she could have gone to school the way she was attempting to bounce around the house, but I told her she had to lay on the couch and rest so she could go for the rest of the week.

About 3 hours before the kids got home I prepared the bread in the bread machine. This appliance is probably still one of my favorites, so easy to use and it makes some amazing bread.

I also sat the Heavy Whipping cream in the mason jars to sit out at room temperature for a few hours. This helps to make the butter quicker and easier, which is just what is needed for those little hands shaking.

You start out by filling the mason jar about half way full.


Then start a shaking and keep shaking, it will get thicker and eventually coat the entire jar.

  The kids have fun with the shaking!  

  And of course they had to get a picture of me.    
It will seem like you can't shake anymore but just keep shaking you are not done yet. Eventually you will see it come off the sides cleans and you will hear a solid shaking around in some liquid. That would be the butter in the buttermilk.


Then pour it into a colander and you can save the buttermilk to bake with or just toss it.

  Then rinse it with some cold water to help it keep longer in the fridge.  
Then I put it in a bowl and start pressing it with a spoon to get all of the extra moisture out and eventually it will all ball together.


We added some salt to taste in a couple batches and then some cinnamon and sugar to a couple other batches. 


Then we transferred them to some containers and of course everyone had to have their own.







Can we talk about that school and couch laying hair?!?! Haha next time I am going to make sure to comb that out!

By that time the bread was done and cooling a bit on the cutting board.

  I used a serrated knife and cut some slices and put them on a plate and covered half with the regular butter and the other half with the cinnamon butter. They loved every bit of it and each had a second piece.  

It was really easy and the kids had a good bit of fun. We even have butter leftover sitting in the fridge ready to be used for breakfast and the butter sandwiches they eat for lunch. We go through a lot of butter every day.

Jenny

 

When the Kids come out to Play

My kiddos were out of school for two days for Columbus Day and a teacher work day. It has been a couple months since the kids have started school and I have had the opportunity to hang out with them. I forgot how much I love them as well as how exhausted I get when I spend 10 hours a day with them.

The week before the days off we discussed what we wanted to do so that we weren't spending hours in the morning fighting over what we were going to do. I love fall. That's no surprise at all. I thought it would be fun to take them up to the apple orchards and pick apples since it was something they have never been before. The kids were really excited and I knew it would be a good day.

On Monday I got to work and the kids were excited and ready to go apple picking. Their mom mentioned that we could go and get some pumpkins too. We ended up going to a pumpkin farm first which was about an hour away. Burt's Pumpkin Patch is a really cute place that is in the North Georgia Mountains. They have pumpkins set up everywhere and hay rides and anything you can possibly imagine. The kids loved it and we picked out sooo many pumpkins.

Luckily from there the Apple Orchard was only 15 minutes away. We went to BJ Reece's Apple Orchard which is in Ellijay, Georgia. It is a beautiful orchard that sits on some really nice hills so the views are breathtaking. The line to get in the orchard was forever long and I am amazed my kids were pretty patient while waiting. We got inside and the orchard was pretty empty as you could tell most people had already gone through the front and middle sections. Eventually we made our way to the very back and found some apples to pick. The kids had a great time!

 

 

It was a fun filled day and at the end of it I thought I was going to pass out from being so exhausted but I forgot how much I love hanging out with these goobers. I also realized how big they are continuing to get. Their mom and I really noticed it in these pictures and its crazy for sure.

 

The next day, Tuesday, we spent the majority of our day at Toys R Us and the mall spending allowance money that has just been racking up. So a good bit of money later we ended up with a number of new toys. Then we came home to carve pumpkins.

This took about 2 hours but it was worth every moment because it was the kids first time ever carving pumpkins and they loved being able to do most of it themselves. W is a little funny about stuff being on his hands so he just used a spoon and got about 4 seeds out, but luckily with two sisters and a Jenny we had his back.

 

 

 

Fun days out of school with my kids, and it reminds how much I love my job!

 

Jenny