My Summer Vacation

Once school is out for summer, my job changes from music to cooking. I am fortunate to work for a school that offers so many wonderful things to the children. For six weeks, we try some new foods and learn some cooking technique by being as hands on as possible. It is a tremendous amount of work and quite tiring, but I really enjoy it.

Snickerdoodle cookies are a tradition in cooking dating back about 10 years, way before I started. I couldn't find one child who objected to a repeat of this one.

In an effort to find things I could cook without an oven (see the explanation a little farther down the post), we tried French Toast. It was a huge hit and is requested for next year already. These cute little kids seemed to have bottomless tummies.

I love this picture because of her smile. Really, that's why I do this job.

It certainly made Grandma's day to have Rebekah and Jonah come for a visit. RL made a
"Firecracker Cookie" with the Kindergarten class and then played with them at recess. She had a blast. Can you tell that it was a scorcher of a day by the rosy cheeks???
This little cutie in Kindergarten has the most beautiful eyes, she is a sweetie and wanted to show off her "Firecracker Cookie" that she made for the 4th of July. This project became more "how many sprinkles can I fit on a cooke" rather than "make my cookie look like fireworks". It's all good.... if they're happy, I'm happy.

This was "Donut Day". Every student got to pick a donut, frost it, and decorate it. There were also all you could eat scrambled eggs. It was a huge hit. But really, donuts, frosting and sprinkles??? How could it not be a hit?

When you serve 300 donuts and let the kids decorate them, you have to be organized. We got the entire school through in around an hour. A big part of the success is due to my assistant this year. Asa is in the striped shirt in the middle directing traffic. He has been so much fun to work with and he is a pretty good cook too! He is heading off to college, but hopefully will return next year...???? I hope so.

I work with wonderful people. This is Patrick and Diane, two PE Coaches, who walked into Donut Day and took over scrambled eggs for me and did a magnificent job. All the staff worked to make the event a great one. Note the cabinets behind them...this is a science room. Dead, stuffed animals and bugs. Yuck. I drew the line however, at the live Scorpian... he was relocated.

This little guy wanted to show me his pizza bagel, but had a hard time looking away from the movies we watched in cooking. Watching movies kept them inside, cool and calm while the food cooked. We did not have an oven in our room and so cooking things was a major production.

Seriously...I have the best job in the world!