Cookie Baking Night 10/19/15

Tonight was Cookie Baking Night. In attendance this evening: Emily, Ethan, Carissa, Alli, and Rylar. Tonight we tried a "Pioneer Woman" recipe called Spreads. It's basically a butter cookie recipe that you spread into a pan, bake, and then spread melted chocolate on it. We made a variation where we spread chocolate chips on one-half and sprinkled mini M&Ms on them and spread butterscotch chips on the other half and sprinkled mini Reese's Pieces on them.

Rylar cracked his first egg (at Cookie Baking Night, anyway) a few weeks ago, and now he's a little pro and offers his services at every opportunity.

While our treats were cooling, we read from Leading Little Ones to God by Marian Schoolland. Tonight we read chapter 15 titled "God Made All Things Good", and we read from Genesis 1:20-25 about how God created the world. In this society of prefabricated, premade, pre-assembled items where the children think their food comes from a grocery store and not the earth that God provided for us, it's good to keep the knowledge in front of us that we have a Creator who is also our Sustainer, and He is Good!

The finished product.

The birds have become a popular item now at Cookie Baking Night. Here Ethan is feeding Peanuts a piece of bread (which she was not so subtly hoping for all through supper). 

You might have noticed Emily was absent from the pictures above where we made our treats. Tonight she was here in name mostly. She arrived with a headache and spent the whole evening in bed, opting out of supper and asking "could we please not walk to the gas station tonight" (which all the kids have been begging me to do one last time before the cold weather sets in). When Carissa heard this piece of information, she said, "Whoa! This is serious." 

So, another Cookie Baking Night has come and gone, each one different in it's own right.

As usual, a fun time was had by all (well, maybe all but one)!

Cookie Baking Night 10/05/15

Tonight was Cookie Baking Night. In attendance this evening: Emily, Ethan, Carissa, Alli, and Rylar. It's that time of year again. We made our fall classic treat Pumpkin Patch Brownies.

Best part: Putting on the pumpkins and the vines.

Everyone has their own style

While the brownies were cooling, we read from Leading Little Ones to God by Marian Schoolland. Tonight we read chapter 14 titled "God Has Many Names". We talked about the importance of a name. In our lesson, we only scratched the surface of the many names ascribed to God in the Bible with Mighty One, Father, Lord. We read from Exodus 3 in the Bible, where God calls himself the great I AM. We learned that with this one name He is telling us that "He has no beginning", "He has always existed" "He does not change" "He will always be the same" We also talked about His name JESUS , which the Bible tells us is above all names. The Bible also tells us that someday every knee will bow at that name. This name also tells us that He is our Savior.

I love to study the names of God and to teach them to my nieces and nephews because they tell us so much about the character and nature of the faithful God we serve. 

We rounded out the evening with a few lively games of Zingo and Pass the Pigs. As usual, a fun time was had by all. 

P.S.
One other highlight of the evening was visiting the two newest members of our household, Rusty and Peanuts, two little cockatiels that moved in with us shortly after my parents did. The children love to watch them. Near as I can tell, it's better than T.V.