Having fun baking bread and making toys

The boys love getting their hands dirty and watching plants grow.

Being a full-time working mother, my weekends are used fully for activities with my children. With sons aged three and five, it is important to lay the foundation of making learning a fun and enriching activity rather than a chore. Our weekends are time spent learning through activities of fun with nature, cooking and physical exercise.

Saturday mornings are time for fun with nature. Gardening gives them the chance to dig dirt up, observe insects and, best of all, play with water. Recently we planted seeds from packets we bought at the supermarket and it took a lot of patience to wait till they grew. The boys learn responsibility by taking care of their plants.

It is lots of fun learning the names of plants and waiting for flowers to bloom and trees to fruit. They also learn that worms are friends, and that snails and caterpillars are enemies of plants. The boys also love learning about herbs and spices which, when added to the cooking pot or wok, releases an aromatic fragrance that causes the saliva glands to activate.

Our garden has a curry leaf tree that gives immense joy to the boys as they have fun using the leaves as part of their cooking game fun. They also enjoy plucking the little leaves of thyme to make a lovely wild mushroom soup. They tie up bunches of pandan leaves and hide them behind cupboards and bookshelves to keep cockroaches away. They learn to dry herbs like rosemary to be kept away for future use.

Cooking is always a must-do activity each weekend – we especially make time for baking. As we love bread, Sunday is baking day when we make delicious white breads, healthy wholemeal breads and scrumptious buns filled with delectable savoury fillings or sweet sensations.

The boys will help measure and pour in the ingredients one at a time into the bread pan, and like good chefs they would taste each ingredient as they do it. I cringe at times when they stick their fingers into raw eggs and taste, but I tell myself it is necessary for them to learn tastes and smells.

After pressing a button on the bread maker machine, they wait for magic to happen – for their loaf of bread to bake. The smell that fills the house when the bread is baking gets them excited and eager to taste the fruits of their labour.

Many people feel I have “softened” my boys with such “womanly” activities. But I believe I am equipping them with living skills for life. They like activities all boys love, especially exploring the great outdoors. The neighbourhood we live in has a lovely park with a stream. In the mornings when they wake up early, we fix a quick picnic, grab the beach toys and head to the park for fun at the stream. They dig away at the sand, observe water insects, hunt dragonflies and test the water flow by letting their toys float down the stream.

On rainy days, we do crafts. We usually check online for fun craft activities or pull out our crafts book and see which ones we can do. We make our own toys because it’s more fun that way. We’ve built our own shields and with store-bought foam swords, they learn to be knights defending fair maidens. We make our own play-dough, form them into shapes we like and bake them to harden them. The boys learn to work with their hands, refining their motor skills making the play-dough figurines.

Rain or shine, we always have fun playing and learning as a family.

K. Lim