Het Zand in Alphen

We often go for a walk around the lake at Het Zand in Alphen.  It is probably about 2km so not too long for kids.  What I love the most is the change in the seasons.  Here are some photos of a misty freezing walk where the ice was thick on the lake - children had lots of fun throwing stickes and stones on the ice.

In Spring it is beautiful with wild flowers.

Wildflowers were collected...

 Some sort of hideous "tea" was made with the flowers

A few tadpoles were collected...

Of course in summer it is great for swimming and playing in the sand.  If it is a hot day it is completely packed - not ideal in my book.  A few weeks ago it was 20 degrees, but the sun was shining and so we went with friends for a cake picnic and swimming - the water was quite fresh and full of tadpoles.  A super afternoon was had by all.

Vanilla Cake for kids parties

Vanilla Cake Recipe

I have used this Vanilla Cake Recipe for YEARS and don't need to ever look for a better recipe...it is fabulous and so easy to make.

Ingredients:

2 cups of sugar
4 eggs
2 and 1/2 cups flour
1 cup milk
3/4 cup vegetable oil
2 and 1/4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla essence

Heat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius.  Beat the sugar and eggs together until thick and creamy...about two minutes if not longer.  Add the rest of the ingredients and mix thoroughly.

Bake for 30 - 40 mins in two baking tins or in one large tin for longer.  Times will change per overn. Just keep checking until your knife comes out clean.

If I use this recipe for cupcakes then I put the tray in for about 22 minutes.

I am not one to make elaborate kids' party cakes...my favourite modus operandi is to get a edible frosted picture and once iced with butter cream icing, I just place the picture on top.  Parties have never been easier and the kids are always delighted.

Here are photos of the last batch of cupcakes I did.

Campfire Bread

Campfire Bread

We normally roast marshmallows if we make a fire, so I thought for a change we could try to cook some bread on the fire.  Saw ideas for this on pinterest on the site equiptosurvive.blogspot.com.

I halved the recipe as the recipe said it made 16 breadsticks.   I made four breadsticks with half the ingredients...so they must have made 16 really tiny ones.  Seeing as though there were 4 of us, half the dough was perfect for us.

This is  the recipe for four breadsticks:

1 cup all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
21/2 Tb sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/8 cup olive oil
3/8 cup warm water

Knead together with your hands and divide into four balls.  Each ball gets rolled out into a lond worm like shape and wound around a stick or skewer.  Roast over the fire until golden brown.  They cooked really well and were sweet so no need to put jam on or anything, but you could if you wanted to.

Old fashioned Pancakes

I think I am mostly using this blog to save excellent recipes and its useful to have one place to find them all.  I often make these old fashioned pancakes - more like flapjacks.

Old Fashioned Pancakes

11/2 cups flour
31/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 Tbsp sugar
11/4 cups milk
1 egg
2 Tbsp butter melted

mix together and make pancakes!

Enjoy!