November Family Literacy- The Gingerbread Boy

For G week one of the books by our author, Paul Galdone, was The Gingerbread Boy.  It was definitely one of Katie's favorites.  As she told the story back to me a few times.  She was particularly humored by the ending (spoiler!) where the foxy fox settles in for a nap after his snack. 

 As a activity to go with the story we decided to try to make our own Gingerbread boys.  It was tricky as I had to borrow the cookie cutter from the neighbor, guess I should put that on our list. After that, we suited up for the task. Everyone was game for helping in the baking!

Aren't their aprons the cutest?!?

Katie took over the camera for a few of the pictures. She had to get a shot of my apron.

 As I didn't have a recipe in mind I ended up using this one from Allrecipes.  I liked it because it didn't call for any eggs and I new that I'd have some dough eaters in the kitchen.  I did have to adjust it a bit as the initial recipe (as mentioned in the comments) was too dry to roll out.  It may have been because I ran out of white flour and had to substitute with wheat.  Regardless,  a bit more water in the mix seemed to do the trick.  I also ended up taking the cookies out earlier than 10 minutes (it was more like 6-7 min) so that they were soft.  I didn't know with the current bout of HFM if hard cookies would be right for us. 

 I must say the recipe was delicious both cooked and uncooked.  I honestly thought about balling up the dough and serving it as is though the final product is delicious, too.  I will probably make them again at Christmastime.  I had one cookie stealer in the kitchen...at least twice I caught her with cookie in hand and on the run!  Rascal!!!

"You can't catch me with the gingerbread man!"

Katie thought the dough was mighty tasty, too!

Much to my delight, Katie did wonder to herself as we put the first batch in the oven if one was going to jump off the pan...and if it did, we'd definitely catch it for a snack (and if I had my way, a nap like that foxy fox!)!   We all enjoyed catching the gingerbread boys- especially Daddy. 

What have you done as a family to encourage literacy lately?  Head on over to Work, Play, Read and link up to November's Family Literacy Challenge.