Baking Day Party

Some of the fondest Christmas memories are made in the kitchen, making holiday treats with the people we love. Baking days are like little holidays between the holidays and an excellent excuse to share moments with the ones you love.

...true gifts of the season - Love, Comfort, & Joy.

Baking days provide extra warmth to your home and comfort to friends and family. It's fellowship and fun…with yummy treats! The anticipation of tasting oven-fresh cookies can create traditions and memorable experiences, which are the true gifts of the season - Love, Comfort, & Joy.

Children remember experiences more than anything they get under the tree.

Research shows families who prepare food together tend to have closer, stronger, healthier relationships. Children remember moments, family traditions, and experiences more than anything they get under the tree.

Christmas spirit and holiday cheer...

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Plan a baking party to spark Christmas spirit and holiday cheer this year. My favorite times are before trimming the tree, preparing for guests or events, or having fun with the kids on a snow day.

Decorations, lights, music, and holiday-scented candles help set a festive mood. Make a group chat and share the ingredient list so everyone can volunteer to bring something. Have everyone bring a cookie jar or container to take their cookies home. For easy cleanup, use a non-stainable, easily wiped tablecloth and have plenty of parchment paper, foil, and wax paper on hand.

Tips for a great Baking Day Party for Kids

Remind yourself to relax and enjoy the experience. Let the messes and mistakes happen while you make the most of every moment. After all, they're only small once.
Kids should help with the fun and easy stuff, prep, clean up, and other age-appropriate tasks. This is their time for learning and growing. Take your time, and let them do some things by themselves.
Make sure there are plenty of grown-up hands to help. Not only in the kitchen doing things like oven duty, prep, and keeping up with dishes, but also keeping the kids busy in between things by starting the next batch, washing hands, or having an activity or snack break planned. If there's a plan for all the little waits, you get to keep the peace and joy flowing…busy hands are happy hands, and idle hands find mischief!
Remind everyone to bring aprons or dress their kids in clothes that are okay to stain and have their hair pulled back.
Plan fun, hands-on recipes. Spritz, Roll-out cookie-cutter sugar cookies, and Snickerdoodles are all good ones, and there are many more. Be sure to share classic family recipes to keep your traditions strong.
Pre-make any dough that has to be chilled for a while before handling it to have it ready for the fun parts.
Let kids experience Baking Day their way. Let them enjoy being a kid.

Seven-year-old Gaia jumps in, ready to help, learn, and prepare the sugar cookies for the oven. Soon they'll be brought to life with colorful icing!

Mini proudly displays her handy work, a shooting star cut-out sugar cookie. She enjoys helping in the kitchen any chance she gets.

Luna, Gaia's twin sister, enjoys the camaraderie that baking together creates as she cuts out her gingerbread man-shaped sugar cookie.

And don't limit your baking day to cookies—cakes, pies, candies, bread are all up for experimentation. Aunts, cousins, siblings, neighbors, of course, mom, and if you’re lucky, grandma will be there with the old family recipes. Here we had the kids make a cookie crust from the Snickerdoodle dough for an apple pie.