Kids in the Kitchen and a Mess on the Floor

It sounds so magical and looks so wonderful on the television commercials you see. What a great way to spend time with your kids, get them in the kitchen to help. Children can be so creative and messy all at the same time. I usually choose very simple things for them to do. I have learned from experience that being in the kitchen together does not necessarily count as quality time with the kids.

I have a 5 year old boy and I decided to make some very simple peanut butter cookies. It is called the one cupa recipe. One cup of peanut butter, one cup of sugar, and one egg. Simple, I thought, we can do this with minimal mess. He has helped before in the kitchen so I thought this one would be a no brainer. I should have known things were heading south when I tried to use my rubber spatula and it broke!

We got the bowl out, the egg, and the peanut butter. I measured the peanut butter and he helped scoop it into the bowl. Then I cracked the egg, and shell went into the mixture. Very frustrating, but we can over come it. So then here goes the easiest part of all. I asked him to dump in the one cup of sugar that I had premeasured for him. How could this go wrong? It is a simple matter of dump. Well, when he turned over the measuring cup he didn't wait long enough. He pulled his hand back and poured sugar all over the counter and the floor! I carefully instructed him that he needed to not do that. He needed to wait until all the sugar was poured out before he moved his hand. I re-measured what didn't make it into the bowl and we tried again. Don't you know that there was now even more sugar on the floor and counter. This was followed by a raising of my voice and his beautiful little eyes looking at me. I quickly had to apologize and then we dumped cookies out on the tray and put them in the oven. I have only one piece of advice when it comes to cooking with the kids. Make sure you feel well enough to clean up their mess, because they will make one.