Muffin Tin Monday~ Spring Break Fun

This week is Spring Break for my niece LaneyBug. So last night she had a sleep over with us! Today we decided to go to a local water spray park and then have a Muffin Tin Picnic.

The kids all had a fantastic time playing in the water.

And out of the water.

At lunch time we walked over to this beautiful lake to have our picnic.

Muffin Tin make a GREAT picnic item. All the food was ready for the kids and I didn't have to fuss with plates and baggies, we just took the foil off and ate!

We ate leftovers from Easter: kielbasa, rye bread, angel eggs, strawberries, cucumbers and carrots in dip, and a connect 3 smarties game.

Aunt SherryBerry had fun playing the game with Aidman.

Aidman could hardly keep his eyes off of the water. He loved watching the birds and ducks in the water!

Laneybug LOVES strawberries!

Lyssy is so cute!

Go check out more Muffin Tin Mondays.

Green MTM

Once again I told the kids that they had to find green things that they wanted to eat to put in their Muffin Tin Monday. They got cucumbers, pickles, olives, celery, and broccoli. I told them that I could make green dip (cream cheese, mayo, dill, s &p, garlic, and onion powder) for one of their tins. Then Aidman said "hey, we need more than just veggies". I wish I would have thought ahead and bought some green spinach wraps, but I didn't so instead I made turkey and cheese rolls that were held together with green picks. They LOVED their green lunch!

Yesterday I saw a GREAT color mixing art project on laughpaintcreate that I knew would be great to do today!

First we mixed blue and yellow with a paintbrush.

Then we used sponge brushes to add green paint.

And feathers to add white paint.

And finally we stuck on gold stars!

They LOVED all the different steps and items used to paint with!

MTM- Dice Game

A LONG time ago a MTM participator shared this awesome dice game. I have been wanting to do this dice game with my kiddos ever since and FINALLY did it today since there was no theme for Muffin Tin Monday.

This is how you play the game. The green dice tells which number tin to eat out of and the blue dice tells how many items to eat. Roll the dice and enjoy! (PS, I wrote on my tins with an expo marker and it came right off.)

1 raisins
2 honey roasted peanuts
3 oyster crackers
4 marshmallows
5 honeycomb cereal
6 chocolate chips

This was a very fun way to do math and eat snack at the same time.

Aidman LOVED this game!

It was a little difficult for my 4 year old to keep track of which dice told what to do, she did much better with just one dice and just picked which tin she wanted to eat out of and counted out however many the dice told her to.

Orange MTM

Can you believe that just over a year ago I started blogging, mainly to participate in Muffin Tin Monday (along with a few other reasons). When I first joined Muffin Tin Monday, the theme was the color series. Since my kiddos are old pros at this stuff now, I plan on making them make their own muffin tin meals during this years color series.

So when they came to me this morning saying that they wanted their muffin tin for breakfast, I told them that they needed to go find (in our kitchen) orange breakfast foods to put in the tin. They listed LOTS of orange foods, but then decided that many wouldn't be good for breakfast. They did pretty well on the first five items (cheese, dried apricots, orange, orange juice, cantaloupe), and had to get creative on the sixth item (graham cracker with cream cheese and orange sprinkles).

MTM with our cousin!

On Monday my sister Sherryberry and my niece Laneybug came over to help me make more aprons. Good thing too because I have been fighting with my sewing machine and needed some help, as it turned out, I fought with her sewing machine too. So, I'm starting to wonder if it's just me... hmmm, no it's gotta be the machines! hahaha.

Anyway, Laneybug kept my kiddos GREAT company while the grown ups were busy. They even got to have a yummy Muffin Tin Monday floor picnic together while watching a movie.

They ate ham, cheese, roll, pears, coleslaw, and airheads that Laneybug bought with her own money to share with her cousins. Isn't she sweet?

Thank GOODNESS, we got ALL 20 aprons completed! Lyssy is wearing her very special Birthday Girl apron, it is the only one that got pockets and is glittery!

Each of the other aprons have doubles or triples that look like them. Laneybug decided that she wanted this one with hearts all over it.

I think AB has a BEAUTIFUL smile!

This is one of my favorite fabrics! I think I just love the brightness of it because we bought the same design in blue and pink and I didn't like it at all.

Laneybug has to pose for EVERY single picture! I think this fabric is super cute on, but it feels super thin.

Of course, we will have a few boys in attendance so we had to make a few boy aprons. Aidman insisted that I make a Yankees apron for him, he is OBSESSED!

This fabric would make a cute shirt!

Such a handsome guy!

Muffin Tin Monday ~ Learning

Today's Muffin Tin Monday theme is Back to School or Learning!


My kiddos LOVE LOVE LOVE circle time. The funny thing is that we do not do an extensive circle time, but they love it any way. Every day after quiet/nap time (about 3 pm ish) we sit down and do our calendar, and talk about the theme, shape, color, letter, and number of the week. We also read books and poems to go along with the theme, play educational games, do some type of large motor skill, and go on a hunt of something in the house that goes along with the letter, shape, or color of the week. Aferwards, we normally do an art, math, or science project. I like doing this stuff in the afternoons because it leaves are mornings free for playdates, park trips, and I work 3 mornings a week but am home by the end of quiet time.


Today our muffin tin went along with our circle time. We had Square cracker with White cheese on it, 7 peanuts, Square shaped mango, and beets, broccoli cheese soup, and bread for the letter Bb.

Happy faces all around! It was yummy!

Muffin Tin Monday

There is no theme for Muffin Tin Monday so I went the easy route and just filled the cups with what was in the fridge. Of course, we used some of our Christmas MTM loot and that made it even more fun! We had beets (can you believe that these kiddos LOVE them?!) pineapple, crackers, and peanut butter.

Lyssy is always afraid of getting beet juice on her clothes (because it stains so badly) so she put a hand towel in her shirt like a bib.

WOOHOO! It's Muffin Tin Monday

Today I pulled out the Muffin Tin Monday loot that my sister got the kiddos for Christmas. Now they opened it on Christmas, but let's face it... this is NOT a toy so it quickly got set aside. BUT, today when I got it all out there were many hoots, hollers, giggles, jumps, and even alittle song of "chicka chicka wow wow". I wish Sherryberry and Laneybug could have been here to see it!

So for our New Years theme... we decided to use items that you will be seeing ALOT of in 2010!
For breakfast we had homemade granola bar and yogurt.

Look how happy they are!

Quicky Muffin Tin Monday

WHOOT WHOOT!! We FINALLY got back to Muffin Tin Monday!! This was NOT my best ever MTM, but after several weeks off from it, it was nice to get back to this fun Monday ritual.

I was planning to do a nice lunch for the kiddos in their Christmas muffin tins, but then planned a last minute trip to the library followed by a lake front picnic after preschool today. So, MTM was left for snack time. The kiddos shared a tin of yogurt, small pieces of candy cane, and dried papaya spears. It was a yummy snack and they were THRILLED that it was Muffin Tin Monday again!!

Fall Harvest MTM

Today's Muffin Tin Monday is Fall Harvest/Halloween theme. I LOVE Fall flavors so we went with a Fall Harvest Tin. We had Pumpkin Muffins, Baked Apples, and Apple Cider.


Just for fun I let the kiddos eat outside using the hay as their table. They LOVED it!

I have been looking for a low sugar pumpkin bread/muffin recipe because it seems like every recipe out there is loaded with sugar. I tried this one out today and it was pretty good, it needed alittle something so I topped it with cream cheese and sprinkles for the kiddos and brown sugar and almonds on mine.

Pumpkin bread

4 eggs
1 cup honey
2 cups mashed cooked pumpkin
1 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 cup yogurt or buttermilk
3 3/4 cup whole wheat flour or all purpose
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

Preheat oven to 325. Butter 2 9x5 inch loaf pans
In a large bowl beat eggs and honey together. Add pumpkin and oil.
Dissolve baking soda in yogurt or buttermilk.
Sift flour (I don't) with spices (I just mix well) and add pumpkin mixture alternately with soda mixture, blending after each addition. Pour into prepared pans.
Bake for 1 hour 15 minutes (for bread) or 30 minutes (for muffins). Remove from pans. Cool on wire rack. Makes 2 loafs. Not sure when a baby can have honey but I think it is definately a better option than refined sugar.

MTM- All About Me

Today's Muffin Tin Monday is All About Me, so we decided to eat out favorites for lunch. Since I didn't want to make them each their very own meal, I put out several things I had on hand and let them choose their favorite things to eat. The choices were: bread, saltines, or butter crackers; peanut butter or turkey; cottage cheese, yogurt, or cheese; cucumber, tomato, or broccoli; grapes, orange, or apple; pretzels, chips, or goldfish.

Lyssy choose butter crackers, peanut butter, apples, cucumbers, yogurt, and pretzels.

AB choose cucumbers, saltines, turkey, pretzels, yogurt, and apple.

Aidman choose apple, yogurt, tomato, bread, turkey, and chips.

They enjoyed having their favorites for lunch!