Cooking Mag Mommy

There will not be a single mention of food or cooking in this entire post...wait, that was a mention!  Oh well... With Halloween right around the corner, I wanted to put in my votes for great Halloween read-alouds for preschoolers.  These are my current favorites to read to Eyrleigh and Rylynn and I'm planning on bringing them along to E's preschool class party on Monday.   Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson has all the qualities of a great preschool read-aloud.  It has a wonderful rhyming cadence and a repetative story that is easy for young children to follow.  There is even a "group participation" posibility if you want the kids to pipe up as the broom "whoosh"es away.  Last year I bought The Spooky Wheels on the Bus by J. Elizabeth Mills from the Scholastic Book Fair.  Sung to the tune of the more traditional "Wheels on the Bus", this story is a great one for preschoolers and a reader who can sing.  Usi...

I've blogged since 2008 but in the last few months, I've finally started following other blogs.  I've discovered something about myself.  I am hopelessly into themes.  Maybe it's the teacher in me but everything is more fun in themes...themed parties, themed food, themed lessons.  I know there is a large and vocal group of people that find themes cheesy but I  (and may I add, Martha Stewart) am not one of them.   I love things all tied together around one central idea. That's why I've had so much fun with Eyrleigh's parties and what I've become really addicted to looking at on blogs that show parties all centered around everything from apples to zebras. My last blog post was a seriously tardy review of our Halloween party and this post will continue that.  Here is a quick summary of our Christmas party LAST year complete with allergy friendly food ideas, a game, a craft, and some fun Christmas stories. The photo above is our table setu...

 I'm sure you've heard of Christmas in July...but Halloween in August?  And what cooking magazine is doing that theme?  Well no, Halloween in August is not a new trend, and no cooking magazine is doing a spread on it.  I've loved doing the cooking magazine reviews each month in the past but for a number of reasons, I've decided to change it up a bit on my blog.  Sure, I'll still review recipes from cooking magazine, though I won't necessarily use a current issue or even a magazine recipe.  For example, tonight I made Sweet Potato and Zucchini Bread  ( link here ) from a November 1992 issue of Bon Appetit.  I do save old cooking magazine but not that old.  I found this recipe on Epicurious, my favorite recipe site. ( link here )  I had zucchini and sweet potatoes and simply put both words in their search box.   This recipe is for bread but you can see I made muffins and had great results too.  This was actually the second...