Making cheese at home

Avril (who will turn 4 later this year) has been recently very interested in cheese.  At home she tried different kinds of cheese.  Some of them she liked (Brie, Camembert, mozarella) and some she didn't (blue cheese, Swiss cheese) but she was definitely interested in it. And at school the kids have been recently playing the "cheese shop". All this led me to trying to make cheese at home. Avril loved the idea.
As expected there is a lot of online advice on making cheese. Most simple recipes have the same basic idea: heat up milk and add either lemon juice or vinegar and the only special equipment needed is cheese cloth.  Easy enough.  We settled down on the recipe from the Food Wishes blog because I liked the idea of adding buttermilk and seeing both the ingredients list written down and a how-to video was useful.
We bought the cheese cloth at a nearby Bed, Bath and Beyond but you can buy them easily online. This one got good reviews on Amazon.
We bought the three ingredients: whole milk, buttermilk and lemons in a grocery store and we were all set.  Making cheese turned out to be as easy as it sounded and the cheese was very tasty! A few days later, we made cheese following the same recipe at Avril's school.  The children took turns at various parts of the process and then they had cheese for lunch. Teachers and parents tried the cheese too.  I can recommend this as a great activity for children who are 3 and older.
Here's a picture of Avril scooping curds into the cheese cloth:

Amazing Family Game Board Book

The Amazing Family Game Board Book is one of the best purchases we made. This box full of games was inexpensive, it doesn't take much space and we already played with Avril many games: checkers, backgammon, Chinese checkers, nine men's morris, A-to-Z eye spy, trick track, reversi, mancala, war, go fish, crazy 8s and dominoes. And there are still many games left.
Some of the rules are too hard for a 3 year-old, so I had to simplify them a little and it is very hard at this age to lose but otherwise the games are a lot of fun both for my daughter and for me.

books we read this month

I decide to keep a journal of the books I read to Avril.

Tonight on the way home from daycare, we stopped by the library picking up some books. After dinner, we finished reading the following books. Avril and I enjoyed all of them.


I will give a rating 3.5 out of 5

What Happens on Wednesdays is a good book for preschool kids, we can really relate to the daily routines in the book, as we were reading this line" mommy read me a book, we were laughing to see Michal was unloading the dishwasher.

It might be a little too long for 3-year-old Avril? I will read to her a few more times. I personally like the drawing texture.There are lots of details,Avril and I spend time on each page looking at the shops,dogs on the street ..




5 star !!!

Dog and Bear: Two's Company is consist of 3 short stories. I liked it immediately. It is really appropriate for 2-3 year old. Avril can quickly recognize words she knows. I plan to read this book a few more times this week.
I requested a few more books by the same author.



rating 3

The Chicken of the Family
A cute stories about siblings.The younger one was teased by the old sisters.It is a little complicated for a 3-year-old, maybe when Avril is 4 or 5 year old, we can read it again?





The Day the Babies Crawled Away
4 star
This distinctive feature is its silhouette illustration with a lot of detail.Avril and I enjoyed it.I am not sure how much she really appreciate the drawing.Maybe as she gets older,she will appreciate the artistic aspect of this book.



We read this book twice tonight. once by me, once by Avril with my help. After this book,she remembered 4 to 5 Chinese characters.I shall remember to have her read the same book for the rest of week a few more times.