Valentine's Party

What a great time we all had (at least I think we ALL had) at our little Valentine's Party. The kids were really having a great time decorating cookies. Many of the cookies were so...what's the word...DECORATED! I loved their creativity.

Of course you gotta sample the goods while making your creation.

Again, more sampling!

And of course, leave it to Miss Mindy to pick an activity that either #1 didn't interest the kids too much or #2 was a little over some of their lacing skills. Thanks moms for jumping in to help string their candy necklaces.

I know I say this often (at least I HOPE I say it often), but we truly have the best kids here at preschool, and the best Moms to go along with them. Thanks for all you do to make our preschool so successful!

Strawberry Pie Recipe

STRAWBERRY PIE

PREP TIME: 30 Min
READY IN: 2 Hrs 30 Min
Original recipe yield 1 - 9 inch pie

INGREDIENTS
1 (3 ounce) package strawberry flavored gelatin
2/3 cup boiling water
3 cubes ice
1 (8 ounce) container frozen whipped topping, thawed
1 cup strawberries, hulled and sliced
1 (9 inch) prepared graham cracker crust

DIRECTIONS
In a medium bowl, combine gelatin and boiling water. Stir 3 minutes, or until gelatin is dissolved. Add ice and stir until gelatin thickens and cools. Fold in the whipped topping and strawberries. Chill until mixture will mound (chill in the fridge for about 5 minutes or so), then spoon into crust. Top pie with several sliced strawberries. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours before serving.

The above directions were from the original recipe. I changed it a bit when we made it for school. I added about an extra 2/3 cup of blended strawberries to the mixture. We also made our crust from chocolate graham crackers and then melted some semi sweet chocolate chips and coated the bottom of the crust. I thought it was a good addition. It tasted like chocolate covered strawberries to me. Mmmmmmm!

COCONUT CREAM PIE

8 oz cream cheese (room Temp or microwave for 5 sec)
1/2 cup sugar
Cream together

In a separate bowl mix:
1 small pkg vanilla pudding with directions from back
1 tsp vanilla
Let it sit in fridge for 5 minutes

Fold Pudding mixture into Cream Cheese mixture.

Whip 1/2 pint whipping cream. Then fold into mixture.
Add as much shredded coconut as you like (I used about 2-3 cups worth).
Divide among 2 pie crusts (I use either graham cracker, chocolate graham cracker or Oreo)

Let chill 1-2 hours in the fridge.

Beach Creations

We had a really great time learning about coconuts and the beach last month (January). The children really loved talking about where coconuts were found and we enjoyed talking about how we might climb a tree one day (when visiting somewhere exotic) and pick a coconut. Below I have posted some pictures of the kids while "CREATING" their own beaches. They had so much fun. I told them they could do whatever they wanted (I just gave suggestions!) The children started their scenes out by painting the whole piece of paper blue. I told them that the blue would represent the ocean and the sky. Some had a hard time not using any other colors other than blue.

We had quite the mess on the table with paper, stickers, crayons, glue and scissors. The sky was the limit. The only directions were to use your imagination and whatever else you needed.

Every one's pictures turned out so beautifully. We truly have some very talented little artists in our class.