Ho Ho Ho! 3 Yummy Holiday Goodies You Can Make With a Toddler

Goodness gracious, these past few week have seemed like a whirlwind! We've had Christmas get togethers, nights of present wrapping, and finishing up with last minute shopping. Also, add full time jobs and keeping 2 tiny humans entertained and alive into the mix, and it's as if the past week is just POOF! gone.

One of the things that Dan and I really want to make sure we do as a family is to start family traditions, and the holidays are a great time to do that. As an adult, what are some of the family traditions you remember from your childhood? I bet holiday baking comes to mind for a lot of you. I have great memories of decorating lots of different cookies, making goodies, and baking with my parents, so I knew this was something that I wanted to do with my kids. Also, Annie is SUPER interested (as you might gather from previous posts) in helping Mommy in the kitchen, whether it's making dinner, washing dishes, or just stirring something, so I knew this was a tradition that we could easily start right now and have her fully engaged despite the fact that she's not yet 2 years old.

Our daycare is pretty awesome, so I decided that for our holiday goodie-making this year, we would make a variety of treats to take to the teachers. This way, while we were making them, I could tell Annie that it was for them. I know she's pretty young, but she understands things more and more each day, so while she might not have fully understood that we were making the treats for someone else, I figured it didn't hurt to talk to her about it.

One of the most important things that I kept in mind when deciding what treats to make was the fact that a TODDLER would be helping me. So it wasn't going to be anything super elaborate, but it had to be something that a toddler could "help" make and yet delicious enough to gift. I settled on 3 different goodies: Puppy Chow, Festive Rolo Bites and cookies.

In the craziness of the season, I forgot to snap photos of the process of making these delectable, so finished product photos will have to suffice! These are all Christmas-themed goodies, but you can technically make them year round, or for other holidays as well. If you're looking for (or need) some last minute ideas for quick and easy goodies, check out the recipes below! I made all of these in one evening, with help from Chef Annie.

Puppy Chow

You can find a whole slew of typical Puppy Chow recipes on the internet, or even on the back of a box of Chex. I however, follow them VERY loosely. I actually don't even follow one any more, because I feel like I've got a good handle on it with a few tweaks I've made along the way. I don't want to toot my own horn (ok, maybe I do just a little), but I've been told by lots of people that they LOVE my Puppy Chow.

Prep Time: 15-20 minutes

8 cups of Crispix (some people use Chex, but I find everything sticks better with Crispix)

1 overflowing cup of semisweet chocolate chips

2/3 cup creamy peanut butter

1/3 c butter (you can use margarine, but I personally prefer butter) 2 teaspoons vanilla extract Powdered sugar to taste

In a large, measure out the cereal and set aside. This is one of Annie's favorite things do do when making puppy chow. Once we have it all measured out, I have her stir it while I'm doing the rest on the stove. In a small pan, melt chocolate chips, peanut butter and butter over medium heat on the stove. You can do the same in the microwave, but I always do it on the stove-top. Stir occasionally until the mixture is smooth. Stir in vanilla.

Once everything is well mixed, pour about 1/2 of the chocolate mixture over cereal, stirring until it's relatively evenly coated. Then pour the remaining mixture over the cereal and stir again until evenly coated. I do it this way, as I find the chocolate is less likely to clump if you do it 2 stages rather than one.

Lastly, pour powdered sugar over the mixture and stir or shake (with lid on) until evenly coated. Start with about 1 cup of powdered sugar and add more if desired. We usually have more sugar on our Puppy Chow, but everyone likes different levels of powdered sugar on theirs, so I don't want to give a hard and fast measurement for this. I just eyeball it anyways.

Enjoy!

Holiday Rolo Bites

I have no idea if this is the technical term for this sweet treat, but it's what I call them, so we'll go with that! This is probably the easiest one to make with a toddler and still have them be a pretty big participant. I've actually had to make them twice already - once for daycare and once for us because we just love them!

Prep Time: 3-5 minutes Cook Time: 4 minutes Cooling time: a while

(This one does take time to cool, so if you're looking for a recipe that you can make and take, this is probably not it. Puppy Chow would be a good alternative though!)

1 bag of Pretzels - You can use any shape but I used the circle ones. Just make sure they are not thick pretzels. Or flavored.

1 bag of Rolo candies

1 bag of M&Ms - this time of year you can find a bag that has only red and green, which is exactly what I did. I wanted them to be festive, but don't have the time or patience to pick out ONLY the red and green candies

Preheat the oven to 350 F.

Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Lay out the pretzels on the parchment paper and top with Rolo candies. This is where Annie helped the most! I unwrapped the Rolos and had her put one on each pretzel. I thought she might want to sneak one in her mouth, but she was actually MOST interested in building a tower with them instead! Of course, before I put them in the oven, I straightened all the candies out for optimal melting, but she had a ball helping me assemble them!

Bake 3-5 minutes until Rolos are soft, but not completely melted. This will vary depending on your oven and baking sheet, but I found that 4 minutes worked perfectly for us. Remove the baking sheet from the oven and gently press an M&M into the top of each Rolo. (This I did NOT have Annie help with!)

Chill until chocolate has set.

Enjoy!

Holiday-Themed Decorated Cookies

I'm not going to lie - I didn't make these myself. BUT they are a great (AND EASY) way to involve a toddler. When we made them, all I had Annie do was lay the cookies on the baking sheet (Dan and I decorated them after the girls went to bed), but you could easily make an activity of decorating with your toddler as well. I opted not to, simply because we had already done some decorating a week ago, and it was a weeknight so I didn't feel like dealing with the sugar high before bedtime!

Prep Time: 2 minutes

Bake Time: per package directions

Pre-Cut holiday shaped cookies (we used Pillsbury)

Store bought frosting (although you can make your own with confectioners sugar and milk)

Various Sprinkles

Bake cookies as directed on package.

Wait for cookies to cool and decorate as desired. Like I said, you can either make your own cookies, make your own frosting, or both! If you want to spice it up, you can even add food coloring to the frosting. That was not in the cards for us at the moment, but maybe when the girls are older we'll do something more like that.

Lastly, as usual...Enjoy!

Please feel free to comment on what your favorite holiday traditions or recipes are!

#Holidays #traditions #Food