Monster Smoothies for Kids

Are you a fan of green smoothies?  We have been adding more and more of them to our weekly menu.  To entice my kids, I call them Monster Smoothies.

Appearance is everything to some kids.  This one looks like chocolate!  I have found that as long as the smoothie is icy cold with frozen ingredients, my kids will try it.  My girls will drink any smoothie I make, my boys - not so much.

I don't actually measure my ingredients, so this is an estimate.
To make this one, I used:
2 - 3 cups almond milk
2 frozen bananas (when they start to get too ripe, I put them in the freezer for smoothies)
2 cups of mixed frozen greens, this time it was spinach and kale (again, if I am not going to use greens before the use by date, I put them in the freezer)
1 cup frozen strawberries
1 cup frozen blueberries

I play around with the ingredients and vary the amounts depending on what I have on hand.

I blend the almond milk with the greens first to make sure that the greens are completely blended and there are no clumps!  Then I add the frozen fruit and blend, adding more milk as necessary.  I have found that blueberries are perfect for making the smoothies look more appealing to kids.

Why not read a fun monster book with your monster smoothie?

Everyone is familiar with this book, right?  With each turn of the page, a big green monster comes together, BUT keep reading because you get to make that Big Green Monster go away!  With four kids ranging in age from 15 down to 16 months, I have thoroughly enjoyed reading this book over and over again and look forward to introducing it to my youngest!

Blow Painting Monster Science

The kids and I had a quick science lesson that included an art project and a snack.  We blew air out of our mouths and then blew air through straws comparing the difference in pressure.  We learned that forcing air through a narrow opening makes a high pressure jet that can be directed more easily.

First, I put two blobs of watered down paint on paper and let the kids compare blowing the paint around on the paper with just their mouths and then through a straw.

When the paint dried, they used markers to add monster details.

I love the high heeled lipstick wearing monster!!!!!!!!!

Next, we used two kinds of pudding thinned with milk to do the same experiment.

Candy eyes and m&m candies turned the pudding blobs into monsters.

To go along with our scientific monster art and snack, we read  I Need My Monster by Amanda Noll.

When a young boy looks under his bed to find his monster, he finds a note saying the monster is away for a week.  The boy interviews several substitutes, but his monster is the only one that does the job right.  We all enjoyed this book.  I thought it might be scary, but the friendship between the boy and his monster is perfect to ward off any fears.

Linking to:  Science Sunday at Adventures in Mommydom and Link and Learn at No Time For Flash Cards