I’ve always loved baking – likely stemming from the fact that I love any and all sweets, especially if they are right out of the oven. I love that the girls are getting old enough to enjoy this hobby with me, and have for sure learned what ‘made with love’ REALLY means. Lacey especially loves baking; I swear she can enunciate “COOKIE” better than any other word in her two-year-old vocabulary.

I’ve learned a few things in the past few months about baking with toddlers; stay safe, keep those hands busy, and choose simple recipes!

Stay Safe! Pick a good spot in your kitchen that those little hands can’t get on anything sharp or hot. I love our ‘helping tower’ – it allows me to pull the girls up to the island in our kitchen and keep them away from everything dangerous.

Keep those hands busy! I am doing the parts of baking that they can’t quite help with yet, I try to find something else for them to do with those eager hands. Right now, giving them a mixing bowl with some ingredients to play with is doing the trick!  

Choose simple recipes. We do our best right now with recipes that are simple – and hard to ruin. For Christmas and Valentine’s day, our go-to has been sugar cookies. The girls love decorating cookies and maybe snacking on a sprinkle or two along the way.

This year we tried Martha Stewart’s Basic Sugar-Cookie Dough and they were a hit! I found these awesome heart shaped cookie cutters at Target for only $4!

What are your favorite Valentines day treats? What else should we try? Let me know in the comments!