We made these super easy gelatin treats for Halloween, but they would work just as well for a fall-themed event.  You can easily buy pre-made gelatin already in a cup formation (which I did to save time, but also to get a variety of colors) and use any leftover Halloween candy for the body parts of the spider or monster that your child is creating.  I also invested in a small tube of black frosting that Monkey could easily grab and use to create the eyeballs, etc.  I know it seems like a lot of sugar all at once, but I was there to regulate her intake, and it turned out that she didn’t care for the gelatin one bit.  She mainly enjoyed making her “jiggly critter.”  We were inspired to make this dessert by one of my mom’s magazines (she’s been in town visiting), but I can’t find it on their site. Here’s a picture of the page that we used to guide us:

We’ve been reading the fantastic book Zen Ties by John J. Muth a lot recently.  Since it’s fall, it’s a happy coincidence that this book features apples.  I decided to have a little apple tea party with Monkey by having her help me make an apple galette, and serving apple tea.  We shared a wonderful afternoon, first admiring and selecting apples in the store and then preparing this freeform pie.  We purchased the tea, which was too spicy for us.  The pie turned out beautifully.  Here’s the recipe:

Apple Pie

Crust Ingredients:

• 1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 tablespoon granulated sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup shortening
• 1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
• 1/2 cup very cold water (+ more if needed)

Apple Filling Ingredients

• 2 mediums-sized baking apples such as Granny Smith, peeled, cored and sliced very thin
• 2 tablespoons light brown sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
• 6 teaspoons apricot preserves
• Vegetable oil spray

Instructions

1. Combine the flours, sugar and salt with a whisk in a large mixing bowl.  Add in the shortening in small chunks, cutting them into the flour mixture with each addition until the dough reaches a crumbly stage.
2. Mix the vinegar with the cold water together and then, using a fork, add it to the flour mixture in a couple of batches.  If needed add up more cold water until the dough holds sticks together uniformly.
3. Knead the dough on a floured surface a couple of times, then shape it into a ball and flatten into a disc as if making pizza dough.  Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
4. Preheat the oven to 425.
5. Mix together the brown sugar and cinnamon.
6. Lightly grease a baking sheet.
7. Roll out the dough on a lightly floured surface.  You may roll out the dough into one large galette.  The dough should be not be any thicker than 1/4″.
8. Place the dough on the baking sheet, and spread the apricot preserves on the crust.  Then arrange the apple slices in overlapping circles, working from the outside in, leaving a 3/4″ border around the edge.  Sprinkle the apples with the sugar and cinnamon mixture.
9. Fold the extra dough around the edges up and around the apples, overlapping the dough to create a rustic event.
10. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes until the edges of the crust are golden.

Make sure you let the galette cool down before eating.  Serve with your choice of ice cream.

Since we’ve been talking about tea and playhouses in the last month, I wanted to post a pic of what real ingenuity (and time on your hands thanks to retirement) can do. This is a playhouse built by my father-in-law for his five grand daugthers. It is fantastic. An adult can almost stand completely in it, there are shelves and a play stove inside – along with all kinds of kitchen accoutrements – and outside there is a picnic table, windsock, windows, doorbell, and wind chimes. He used only scrap material he had around his place or that he found at garage sales.
As I’ve always maintained, sometimes getting kids to eat is all about the place. Location, location, location! Monkey spent hours playing and eating in this playhouse.

This little tea party was put together by my father-in-law, and believe me it was a huge hit with Monk.  She couldn’t get enough of pouring, and then drinking, the water.  We were all drafted, I mean invited, to attend the tea party.  Eventually we moved into snacks which included Pepperidge Farm Goldfish instead of the traditional toast and jam. It didn’t matter to monk: she’s had toast and jam before, but now goldfish are her newfound love.

Monk loves to put her shoes on her self.  Who am I kidding?  These days, everything is “No Mommy.  I want to do it myself!”  In order to help her determine left from right, because inevitably the shoe would end up the wrong foot, we invested in these little doo-hickeys (at some places they are called jibbitz, or any other name) and since then there has been no confusion.  The stars go on the right foot!

A departure here … an activity to do on a hot day. We use an old tissue box to hold crayons and then we the crayons become stubs I throw them into a separate little bag. We’ve had some scorching hot days recently so I had Monk put the stubby crayons between a couple sheets of wax paper and then set it outside in the heat. Within 30 minutes, we had this gorgeous “stained glass”.