I'm still in charge of activity days two Wednesday afternoons a month. Here are a few of our recent activities.
Right before school started, we did a back-to-school pizza & priorities party. We made homemade pizza, which got dubbed as "Miss Annie's pizza" when we were in Oklahoma. I don't remember where the recipe came from originally, but we really like it. (I have modified it slightly.) We also talked about priorities and tried to make daily schedules. That didn't work as well as I thought, since the girls didn't even have a set time to get up or bedtime - at least they didn't know what time that was. Also, the girls weren't in any after-school activities, so they didn't have much to schedule. But that led nicely into making choices about what to do with their free time. I made a little bookmark for them with a picture of a sliced pizza. It said, "Think of your day like a pizza. A pizza wouldn't be right without bread and sauce and cheese, just as there are some things that are essential for your day. You have to eat, sleep, work, and go to school. You divide your pizza into slices just as your time gets divided. The toppings on a pizza, like pepperoni or olives, are extras. They make the pizza taste yummy. Just as you choose your toppings, you have time in your day to choose extra things to do. Choose wisely to make the best day! And don't forget to make prayer and scriptures a part of your day. They're so important that if left out, it's like forgetting to put the pizza in the oven!"
Homemade Pizza
Dough: 3 ¾ tsp yeast * (about 1 ½ pkgs. yeast, if using the pkgs), 1 ½ cup water, 3 TBSP oil, 1 ½ tsp.
sugar, 1 ½ tsp. salt, 3 ¾ cups flour
Sauce: 1/4 tsp. salt, 1/4 tsp. garlic powder, 1/8 tsp. pepper, 1/4 cup finely chopped onions, 1 cup tomato
sauce (8 oz) – this makes a thin layer of sauce, so you may want to prepare extra if you like more sauce.
Divide sauce in half.
Topping: 1/4 cup parmesan cheese, 3 cups mozzarella cheese, 2 tsp. oregano (divide topping in half),
other desired toppings (like pepperoni, olives, etc.)
Heat oven to 425. Dissolve yeast in warm water. Stir in remaining dough ingredients. Beat vigorously
until blended. Allow dough to rest about 5 minutes. Lightly grease 2 pizza pans (can also be sprinkled with corn meal).
Divide dough in half. On a pastry mat or clean surface, knead dough just until smooth. Add flour as
needed if it’s sticky. Make sure you have plenty of flour on the surface underneath the dough. Roll out
thin and gently transfer (pull up with fingers) flattened dough to 2 baking sheets. Continue to pat and
spread dough to the edges of the pan (10-12 inch pan) with floured fingers. Pre-bake crust about 10
minutes. While the crust is baking, mix sauce ingredients.
Spread sauce on and sprinkle with parmesan cheese and oregano. Add desired toppings and mozzarella. Bake 15 minutes.
* I use Fleischmann's Instant Dry Yeast from Sam's Club- you can buy 2 lbs of it for about $4.50. They seem to last well in the fridge after the package has been opened. I haven't checked out Costco's yet since I still have a bunch from Sam's, but I imagine it might be a good deal as well.
Another activity we did was hair accessories. There are tons of websites out there for making these. I chose one that looked really simple from this site. They didn't turn out as cute as I would have liked. I forgot that 10-11 year old girls like lots of sparkly things. They didn't want to put just one gem in the center of the flower - they wanted them all over. The loopy flower turned out to be too hard for them (I thought they were really easy). I couldn't find the site I used, but here's a similar tutorial here. And again, it wasn't my idea to put a little rose in the center of those, but the girls made them how they wanted to. In conjunction with the hair clips, we had flower birthday cupcakes for one of the girls. If they didn't enjoy making the hair clips, I KNOW they loved the cupcakes!
Our most recent activity was making family trees. The girls sponge painted the leaves and sky. Then we glued on the tree and pasted the apples on the branches. The names (up to their great grandparents) were written on the apples. I might have to send the one I did to Mom and Dad. The five apples on the bottom are my siblings and me. We also briefly shared something about one of our ancestors. The girls liked the picture of my great grandmother's wedding dress. Lulu's dress is over 100 years old. This was also my grammy Evelyn's wedding dress. (My sister Ashley is holding the dress.)
